Downturn

evicted

L1: Registered
Jan 12, 2010
40
9
This is a CTF map set to an alpine theme. It is intended to be a fast paced map that is almost impossible to lock down with engineers. I laid the map out so that sentries should be very easy to destroy, as long as one side has halfway decent teamwork. My main objective is to simply design a balanced CTF map that almost never stalemates.

The screenshots are not the best quality, I apologize for that.
 
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Terwonick

L6: Sharp Member
Aug 25, 2010
278
190
WRONG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

UTILIZE alternate routes. Let's look at 2fort, for EVERY courtyard, there are at least 3 entrances/exits. In the basement, you can cover one entrance, or the other. The point is that don't put in "win-all" sentry spots, and you'll do fine, but put in sentry spots that will let people be taken by surprise and killed, until they learn that you can "take it out."

EDIT: sorry about the ranting, just took a closer look at the screenies and saw all of the alternate routes you put in, but don't make "very easy" sentry spots. AND you need way more cover (in the main yard), my main suggestion would be crates in-front of doors, that or the handy-dandy sniper fences that come with the SDK :)
 
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Beetle

L9: Fashionable Member
Aug 17, 2008
627
178
And no, it will not be this dark in the final version. I only added the bare minimum lighting to avoid fullbright screenshots.

All people mean by this is when people, for w/e reason, be it a leak, laziness or ignorance, don't have lights in their map at all making it literally equally bright in every corner of the map. Even if you made your lights bright it would still look 100x better than actual "fullbright". Just sayin' :)
 

red_flame586

L420: High Member
Apr 19, 2009
437
122
As above, all full bright means is there is no light being emmited from light entities in the map, so the map is rendered for light in every place, you should put in a lot more lights, even for those screenshots it looks to dark

Also, you probably should put a bit more cover in those, courtyards. It probably isn't a good idea to make your map completely sentry-proof otherwise it will discourage engies and you want to make your map suitible for every class.
 

evicted

L1: Registered
Jan 12, 2010
40
9
Yeah, I wasn't really sure what to do with the couryards just yet, but I think I will use the crates and sniper fences in front of doors to make it more difficult for people to fire into the building. Also, by sentry-proof, I just meant that there are plenty of ways to counter each spot. I'm trying to avoid the trap that many CTF maps fall into of having a single spot that dominates throughout the round. I will take a closer look and make sure that I didn't make it too easy, though.
 
Aug 10, 2009
1,240
399
The difficult thing I find with CTF is that in order to balance sentries, there need to be a lot of routes in and out of the cap, but in order to make it so that the flag carrier can be stopped, there needs to be a converging of these points within the map, that still doesn't allow for sentries.
 

evicted

L1: Registered
Jan 12, 2010
40
9
The difficult thing I find with CTF is that in order to balance sentries, there need to be a lot of routes in and out of the cap, but in order to make it so that the flag carrier can be stopped, there needs to be a converging of these points within the map, that still doesn't allow for sentries.

I believe this map should work fairly well by that logic. All the paths converge in the intel room, and again in both courtyards, which should make it very easy to see where the flag carrier will be by looking at the HUD indicator. Meanwhile, the sentries may get people the first time they're set up, but it requires just a couple people working together to take them down.
 

evicted

L1: Registered
Jan 12, 2010
40
9
I appear to be stuck at the lighting stage, basically the place that holds me the longest on every map I've ever made. For whatever reason, my lights will not give off light. The only entity that actually works as it should is the "light" entity, and point_spotlight, env_spotlight, light_dynamic ect. just do not function properly. Here's and example: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3625704/ctf_downturn_a2.jpg

I have 2 env_lighglows as well as 2 light_spots. After looking at dustbowl's lighting and following the example, they still do not work, even though their values are almost exactly identical to those found in dustbowl. Here are some of the values:

brightness: 255 255 255 1200
inner angle: 30
outer angle: 75
focus: 1
pitch: -90

Everything else is default. I have no clue why my lights wouldn't work when I set them up like dustbowl's, so if anyone could help me out it would be greatly appreciated.
 
Nov 14, 2009
1,257
378
Rav made a lighting library a long time ago. I cant seem to find it right now, but im sure if you search in the right sections you will. Copy and paste a light from there, and if it still doesnt work, check for a pointfile!
 

evicted

L1: Registered
Jan 12, 2010
40
9
No pointfile or leaks. I've got no clue what's going on, but lights just refuse to hit non-prop surfaces. I've only found one other person with this problem on google, and no one answered his question on it. Is this some rare glitch with hammer then, because it happens in both TF2 and CS:S?
 

evicted

L1: Registered
Jan 12, 2010
40
9
After many unsuccessful attempts, I finally just tried copying a light_spot directly from dustbowl to my map. The props still light correctly, but none of my brushes will light up at all. Apparently, the only way to get light onto brushes is by using a "light" entity, which looks awful. My light_spots are not grouped, unnamed, and are not tied to anything else whatsoever. There are no leaks in my map, as it doesn't have a pointfile and the env_light works correctly. Does anyone have any idea what could be causing my lights (that aren't just "light") to not light any brushes?

EDIT: I found the issue. Apparently I neglected to disable shadows for my static prop lights, which basically explains every error I've ever had. I would like to formally apologize to everyone on the planet for this incredible but unacceptable display of mind-numbing stupidity. I sincerely hope you can forgive me.
 
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