PL Boundary rc

[honeymustard]

Game day bump... I know a big problem was leaving the red spawn at the start and turning right, despite the arrows. This has been a problem for a while but I've finally thought of a solution for the next version. Anyway, despite that, any feedback? I guess that people going right at the start had a knock on effect, at least for setting up at the start (not enough time for engineers to build up).

 

[grazr]

Snacks and I stormed this map as heavies. Besides a few select locations around CP1 - CP2 RED have to storm the cart directly and with 3 of us heavies and a couple friendly soldiers/demos shooting cover fire onto us RED never stood a chance at defending the cart.

The map needs more chokepoints... not really sure how to expand on that, but at no point did the cart really stop for more than a few seconds. Perhaps it's the number of flanking routes; because for the most part we had a number of our team (and i participated in this a number of times too) running on ahead and slaughtering an unprepared RED team.

Shrink some of your rooms down and bring flanking route doorways closer to the main path so that it's easier to defend some several points from one location. If you do this in the later portions of the map then it should have a nice difficulty curve.

I also didn't really notice any good defencive spots for RED at the BLU spawn area. I got team switched so i was attacking 3 out of the 4 rounds. But yea... after all the ubers go off it was fairly easy to push RED back.

 

[honeymustard]

15 Nov 2010
- b3 released
- Extended the balcony on cp2 (and added large ammo to it, made large ammo below medium)
- Added a staircase up to the room/balcony at cp3
- Added rails to the sides of the metal balcony
- Added no entry doors to the right of the red spawn (open after cp1 is capped)
- Lots of clipping (rails, doors, roof frames etc.) and a bit of detail here and there

Here are some pics of the changes:

You can see the rails here - they're just on that side and the opposite side.

 

[honeymustard]

I forgot to add some planned changes to b3 (and there was a stupid bug with the triggers), so I figured I may as well put out b4 for the gameday.

18 Nov 2010
- b4 released
- Fixed a bug with the cart triggers not being in the correct place
- Added roll back and forward zones
- New skybox, lighting and fog
- Some more minor clipping and detail

edit: whoops, I broke the menu photos in this version. Will be fixed in b5.

 

[RawrSpoon]

Download link is broken.

Edit: dropbox support says to use dl-web.dropbox instead of dl.dropbox temporarily. So anyone having a download issue just do that for now

 

[honeymustard]

Thanks for the feedback tonight. There were a lot of very helpful comments. I'll incorporate things into a new version over the weekend.

 

[LeSwordfish]

Something i noticed in both tests was that the "ledge" was a far better chokepoint than the last stage of the map.

 

[Buranek]

Map is not cool. But all is on your way.

 

[honeymustard]

That's deep.

edit: made some changes based on gameday's feedback, will put it in for the next one.

20 Nov 2010
- b5 released
- Added a no entry door to the left of red's spawn
- Fixed some clipping and detailing
- Moved some health and ammo around
- Explosion trigger now has range (gibs at close range, kills at longer range)
- Changed some staircases to solid stairs (rather than separated stairs)
- Fixed menu photos

Hopefully this will have solved most major issues and bugs so I won't have to turn around a new version every few days for a while.

 

[grazr]

Same as before. BLU heavies on the cart were OP; after the initial area (which is incredibly easy to cleanup as BLU as there are no choke points for RED to hold besides the actual spawnroom doors) it's just a series of narrow corridors.

Room at CP2 never seems to get used by defenders. Or at least in this test, it did in the last version we tested; but as far as i could tell it was just Snack and I riding the cart from start to CP3 relatively untouched.

There's almost no emphasis on the flanking routes as they provide no real opportunity other than somewhere to retreat too if you survived a sniper shot.

Saying all that though there was almost no medic work during this test.

EDIT: In the room above CP4 put a medium health.

 

[honeymustard]

Yeah I watched the STV and your complaints are valid for these two tests, but red basically played without a medic and engineer for most of both tests. You'll find the exact same thing happens on Badwater and other PL maps if the teams are the same. The test between the two that we had (I don't think you were there), I went engineer and managed to hold each point for a considerable time with a sentry in a good spot. Also I've tested the map a lot on another server where we've always had medics and engineers and red have won holding at each point.

So yeah I really think it's just a case of lack of proper class make up and a few people not knowing the map too well yet.

Also are you talking about the room with the windows (and one of them boarded up)?

edit: A common complaint is the position of the blu forward spawn. Does anyone have any suggestions on where I could reposition it? Also: optimisation. Where are people experiencing fps drops specifically? Or is it just in general over the whole map?

 

[honeymustard]

27 Nov
- b6 released - http://dl.dropbox.com/u/6591985/maps/pl_boundary_b6.bsp.bz2
- Added one-way route between cp3 and cp4
- Lots of optimisation (better vis, occlusion, fade distances etc.)
- Detailing and clipping fixes
- Fixed pit firing out ragdolls

Here's a picture of the one-way route. I was inspired after hopping on a 32 player server that was playing my map last night. The game was extremely fun though the blu team had a bit of trouble in this area, so I feel this route should alleviate some of the problems here. Hopefully this will be the last beta version before the rc stage.

 

[ricardojvc6]

I say... if valve doesn't officialize this map, then, i'll go mad... BTW, its looking really nice but you could fix those rockwalls on the building near to rockwall ledge.. cause its really unrealistic.

 

[honeymustard]

In the screenshot I just posted? I know what you mean. I'll try and rework the whole cliff wall (amongst other details) for rc1.

 

[honeymustard]

Had to release an update due to a couple of little bugs I missed. Still, tested in a 24 player private server and it went very well. Download b6a here: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/6591985/maps/pl_boundary_b6a.bsp.bz2

 

[Jonny]

Your map looks fantastic, i've not played it properly but just had a look at it, and the scenery is great. With how cold it is at the moment the wintery theme feels real .

My only complaint at the moment is I see things fading in as I approach, but great level of detail here.

And yes I see you have a correctly sized woman, but isn't bigger better?

 

[honeymustard]

Thank you. The fade distances are necessary for a good FPS, though I still need to fine tune some of them which might look a bit weird. And I try to keep my woman at 24 units square!

 

[LateLJ]

http://www.aijaa.com/v.php?i=7114301.jpg
Kind of choke there

http://www.aijaa.com/v.php?i=7114302.jpg
Make that window more obvious.

+ I really enjoy airblasting ppl of the edge

 

[Icarus]

I was very impressed with this map. It seems like every few months there is this one great map that comes out, and this could be it.

It had a little bit of everything for every class, something most maps miss.

Most of the issues just stems from the one really nasty choke right behind the second-to-last checkpoint.

 

[grazr]

What Icarus said.

I reckon you need maybe a building behind it or something to prevent or at least reduce how easy it is to knock BLU into the death pit. Right now it's not just pyros that are a threat, explosives knock you off but more importantly sentries are throwing BLU around like ragdolls into the air.

Also, in this image: http://i51.tinypic.com/24zipgh.jpg

just below is a staircase with a rail on it. remove that rail. I can't count the amount of times i got stuck on it.