KotH Geiger

Mar 20, 2012
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An ongoing, corporate conflict is never cheap; whether it's cash, raw manpower or valuable resources, the victor is determined as the company that is the most capable of securing its economic needs. Establishing a temporary base of command on either side of a highly-efficient, coastal, nuclear power plant, the mercenaries of BLU and RED must battle for control of the plant in order to please their employers.
 
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MetalKev

L2: Junior Member
Mar 5, 2012
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Thats funny. Your contest entry is at a nuclear power plant, mine is at a nuclear waste dump.
 
Mar 20, 2012
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Thats funny. Your contest entry is at a nuclear power plant, mine is at a nuclear waste dump.

There's just something about nuclear radioactivity that's astounding. I was watching an hour documentary about a group of scientists that had to physically enter the fourth reactor area of Chernobyl in the late 80s' in order to make sure a second chain reaction wasn't going to occur. They had to run through certain hallways because the roentgens (the former unit of measurement of the kerma of X and Gamma rays) were on a level where radiation begins to harm the human body extensively.

With the more recent Fukushima Daaiichi reactor incident, and the hovering concept that nuclear weapons do exist and can fall into the wrong hands, the very mentioning of nuclear power brings up much controversial discussion.

Plus, it brings up many spytech, TF2-esque concepts. Is the plant truly for nuclear power purposes, or is uranium being enriched for more diabolical purposes?

/hi-5 for exploring a similar topic :thumbup:

(PS I'm hoping some Chemistry/Physics students pop in here to help my re-creation of a reactor sensible. Gameplay is my first and foremost focus, but I want my reactor to make sense!)
 

re1wind

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Aug 12, 2009
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that would be one heck of a stylistic mashup, thats for sure. :p

/me joins the nuclear scenario bandwagon
 

Fruity Snacks

Creator of blackholes & memes. Destroyer of forums
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Sep 5, 2010
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There's just something about nuclear radioactivity that's astounding.

You are a strange person.

(PS I'm hoping some Chemistry/Physics students pop in here to help my re-creation of a reactor sensible. Gameplay is my first and foremost focus, but I want my reactor to make sense!)

Look into how reactors look. You'll find it's just a big pool of hot water with some heavy metal rods stuck into it.
(also, hi. Student of that nature here)
 
Mar 20, 2012
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Godling said:
Read Geiger, brain processed Giger. Am dissapoint.
That would be an interesting mash-up, especially considering that I just saw Prometheus (which was fun, but not as epic as Alien(s)). I don't believe I have the time to model or design a level that would do Giger's organic Sci-Fi work justice. I apologize to disappoint :(

Fr0Z3n said:
You are a strange person.
Considering there's three maps on the subject, potentially four (one person might not do one because of how popular the topic is), I don't think I'm that strange :)

Also, look at all the games that deal with the topic in one way or another (especially post-apocolyptically): STALKER, Fallout, Metro 2033, Half-Life (this one more a stretch than the others), Fallen Earth. The fact that energy itself is capable of being used in such a way that it could physically extinct our species is quite interesting. Scary? Absolutely. Nevertheless, I find it interesting.

Fr0Z3n said:
Look into how reactors look. You'll find it's just a big pool of hot water with some heavy metal rods stuck into it.
(also, hi. Student of that nature here)
This much I know. Correct me if I am wrong, but this is the reason why all nuclear reactors must be built in locations with a constant water supply, such as a lake or (in my case) an ocean?

The major difference that I'm going to have to play with is that normal nuclear power plants generally have around 4 reactors, while mine will only have 1. I don't want the map to be too big. It seems like a small price to pay realistically in order to maintain proper play.
 

re1wind

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Aug 12, 2009
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correction: all water-cooled nuclear reactors. (yes, thats why they're built near coasts - for the cooling)

water-cooled nuclear fission reactors commercially used are inherently unsafe as they require a constant flow of water to cool down the rods in case of disaster.
A molten salt reactor doesn't have these drawbacks as the cooling liquid is molten salt which can quickly be drained from the reactor. there's also little chance of the molten salts leaking into the environment depositing radioactive particles, or causing fallout.

They do, however, have a certain cost-related issue by being prototype designs, no real r&d going into them (relatively) the salts are expensive (to maintain in a liquid form) and the possibility of the salts solidifying within the tubes clogging up the cooling circuit.

@donut: have one captureable reactor with the other 3 being in various stages of construction (construction pack). :)
 

re1wind

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Aug 12, 2009
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I see you're going for a mirrored koth map. how are you going to tackle the inherent balance problems associated with such a design?

i.e.
red's side has a counter-clockwise/left turn/corner which they have better control over while defending.
blu's side has a clockwise/right turn/corn which gives them a strong handicap in that area.

blu will always have a right corner/curve to fight around while red will always have a left corner/curve to fight around, which gives them a strong map-advantage.

this issue is less of an issue in lakeside because it doesn't have many large and important corners or curves.

edit:

koth_viaduct, while being mirrored and suffers from the issue above, has two approaches to the cap point so while one side has the advantage from one side, the other team has an advantage from the other, although the cliff-side is much less advantageous than the bridge-support side.
 
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Mar 20, 2012
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I see you're going for a mirrored koth map. how are you going to tackle the inherent balance problems associated with such a design?

i.e.
red's side has a counter-clockwise/left turn/corner which they have better control over while defending.
blu's side has a clockwise/right turn/corn which gives them a strong handicap in that area.

blu will always have a right corner/curve to fight around while red will always have a left corner/curve to fight around, which gives them a strong map-advantage.

this issue is less of an issue in lakeside because it doesn't have many large and important corners or curves.

edit:

koth_viaduct, while being mirrored and suffers from the issue above, has two approaches to the cap point so while one side has the advantage from one side, the other team has an advantage from the other, although the cliff-side is much less advantageous than the bridge-support side.

Something I've given some thought on. My personal opinion, after playing cp_croissant_rc4 in the current UGC season, is that mirrored really doesn't give that much of an advantage. My team played as BLU both rounds (the server config. got a little screwed) and we won the match. It was a very close game, but I never attributed our win (or potential loss) to map mirroring. Looking at all of the results from other teams, I didn't see "damn, we lost because this map is mirrored" as an excuse. Proper DM, communication and understanding of the game at a competitive level will always triumph whatever tiny imbalances come with the map or engine.

That said, I'm going with my standard 2 + 1/2 (two mains and a flank) route system that I normally incorporate in my mapping. With this design, I'm going to try and make each path a unique and viable option to roll-out on and tackle the mid-fight. It is possible to make a mirrored KOTH map work for competitive: as you noted, Lakeside and Viaduct are the only official maps that are really actually played in competitive play.

If I'm docked for my decision, that's fine. I plan to design this map with competitive highlander in mind, from my own experiences playing the UGC. If the fact the map is mirrored is one of the only problems this map has, then I believe I'm in good standing.
 
Mar 20, 2012
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tyler

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Sep 11, 2013
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Actually, your point reminds me more of the 0000 stage of Tachyon. That's not a bad thing imo, Tachyon has gameplay issues on every stage but it's not doing anything particularly wrong.
 
Mar 20, 2012
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Actually, your point reminds me more of the 0000 stage of Tachyon. That's not a bad thing imo, Tachyon has gameplay issues on every stage but it's not doing anything particularly wrong.

Oh, I see it now. The dinosaur bone point.

Luckily I'm only working on one stage, so I'll be able to iron out the gameplay issues in a more efficient manner than if I was working with the 3-4 that Tachyon comes with.

If anything, I'm really looking at Viaduct as a case study for this map because it's the KotH that I am the most familiar with. There's a good deal more height variation to my actual point than Viaduct, so it will be tricky trying to build around so the fighting occurs on the point rather than around it (like it does in Nucleus).
 
Mar 20, 2012
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I got a little time today to start blocking this out.

A10CDCF87B2EA33F5F57F616067BE8E294F77E3B


(The scale is a little big in some places. I'm going to reduce it. I just wanted to get something into Hammer at this point.)
 
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