Checkpoint

[The Asylum]

*cough*

Well, in lieu of actual feedback in this thread from Gameday, an issue was brought up that I hasn't previously considered- Demomen pipejumping across the map, with the intel. While not much of a problem with, say, 2Fort, with a map as small as Checkpoint, I guess I can see it becoming Easy Street.

The solution, and first pic of B4:

 

[The Asylum]

Holy toledo, it's time for NEW CHECKPOINT!

Featuring major changes to the neutral ground!

Bigass sign to stop Demos from pipejumping across the map holy shit!

No more awkward capture vault goddamn!

CTF CHECKPOINT B4 FUCK YEAH

CHANGELOG from B3

- Shitcanned the capture vault. Goodnight sweet prince.
- Retooled the intel cart platform while I was at it
- Clipped the respawn room doors a little better
- Extended the triggers for all doors
- Some new overlays and decorations
- Middle ground gets a huge facelift. Second set of trains added, and huge sign in the middle so Demos have to, y'know, put some effort into getting from one side to the other.

 

[The Asylum]

GREAT SUCCESS

The gents at freefrag.com have added b4 to their rotation. And I didn't even have to ask them. They've even got it at a 3.52/5 (21) on their mapvote page

I feel so.... validated.

 

[The Asylum]

In lieu of cC with their server crashing at the drop of a hat (figuratively speaking of course), freefrag.com has kept b4 in their rotation, and it's amassed 90 votes thus far.

The verdict: 3.33 (90 ratings)

20 or 30 votes will def. give you a credible rating, 90 is pretty concrete. That all the builds of Checkpoint have consistently hovered around the 3.3 range on cC and freefrag is a sign that I'm doing things right. Of course, I would have liked to have had a higher score, but you can't please everyone (Dustbowl only has a 3.5 on freefrag, so that's comforting )

Honestly? b5 will probably be the last of the beta releases, and then it's on to the final product. I'm thinking of putting up short fences alongside the sides of the decks, giving scouts, pyros, and spies a better covered route to the other base instead of being pretty much locked in between the trains. Other than that and a few cosmetic issues, Checkpoint is pretty much wrapped up.

 

[The Asylum]

Damage control time

- I know the timer was broken, but it was never an issue on the cC servers. I'll have to figure out why
- For all the complaining ppl did about engineers, I got in and out of the bases with the intel easy enough as a spy. That and, well, what else can you expect out of a team with 6 demomen and no medic?

So what am I gonna change?

- Widening the trigger brushes for the big doors, so teammates can hold the doors open for Soldiers/Demos/Snipers/etc to clean house well outside of sentry range. Also negates another Engy camping spot right beside the doors
- Fences along the side of the battlement decks, to give Spies, Scouts, and Pyros a better deal
- And of course I'll fix the timer (first I gotta find out what's wrong with it :/ )
-

 

[Azazoth!]

Had a great time playing today. I thought at first that the sightlines might be a bit too long, but repeated hadokening from unexpected pyros disabused me of the notion. It did seem like the intel rooms were too easy to turtle in, but maybe that was an issue with the teams, more than the map.

(Didn't feel like the intel rooms were very fun to fight in, but I'm not sure that's useful feedback.)

Anyway, interesting map, much improved from earlier versions (now that there's cover and such in the center), excited to see where it goes!

 

[sniprpenguin]

My biggest issue with the map is with the fact that the spawn room can indeed be turtled in. Especially since you have three doors coming in that can be covered easily, all from the same direction, a coordinated defense would be impenetrable. Perhaps adding a side route from one of the far corners leading inside would help.

My only other problem is with the fact that the center area can be watched over very easily with snipers.

 

[The Asylum]

Here's another idea to solve the Engineer problem:

You know how, in Gravel Pit, the BLU respawn room is inacessible to some classes once they drop out of the concrete hallways? And in 2Fort's middle spawn room, the drop-down exit? I was thinking of doing something like that in Checkpoint's respawn rooms, where once you leave, there's no going back. So no running back to the resupply locker to build a sentry quicker

Good idea, is it?

 

[Azazoth!]

Maybe the spawn room would be directly above the point, with a glass floor, but you'd have to go over to about where the spawn-room exits are now to drop down? (That would also solve the issue with the stretched texture currently covering the intel-room's ceiling.)

 

[The Asylum]

Maybe the spawn room would be directly above the point, with a glass floor, but you'd have to go over to about where the spawn-room exits are now to drop down? (That would also solve the issue with the stretched texture currently covering the intel-room's ceiling.)

The idea behind Checkpoint was making it hard to defend, so being able to see what's waiting outside of your spawn isn't an idea I'm too keen on.

But anyway, here's the new spawnroom:

And of course, because I'm cruel:

So close, yet so far.

 

[The Asylum]

CHECKPOINT UPDATE HOLY SHIT

CHANGES from B4

- Fences added to sides of battlement decks, to give Spies, Scouts, and Pyros a better deal
- Prettyfied the bases a bit more
- Extended the trigger brushes for the big doors wider, so teammates can hold them open for maximum sentry disruption. Also to stop Engies from camping sentries around the corner.
- Total rehaul of the spawnroom. Now you can get out, but not back in. Make your run count!
- Never ending rounds of doom also fixed

 

[Geal]

- Make it so you can get back into your spawnroom. If you drop down then need to resupply or change classes/weapons, you're pretty much out of luck. Maybe make it easy to get out of spawn, but a bit more of a walk to get back in? If anything, at least raise the floor so if you jump out of spawn, you don't take falling damage.
- Making spawns inaccessible forces players to rely on engineers for health/ammo (since it seems drops are fairly scarce), which then encourages turtling, which is STUPID easy to do on this map - one sentry can lockdown the entire intel area. Another outside can lockdown all entrances to the intel room.
- Has major line-of-sight issues. Certain sniper positions allow them to target every possible entrance of the enemy team. Good snipers could lock down the map just as bad as a sentry.
- Soldiers and demos had issues with the huge CHECKPOINT sign blocking their rocket/sticky jumps.

Visually, the map looks great. Has a lot of potential, just needs some major layout tweaking so it's not as easily campable by engies and snipers.

 

[The Asylum]

Soldiers and demos had issues with the huge CHECKPOINT sign blocking their rocket/sticky jumps.

That was kind of the point of the sign being there in the first place

As for a single sentry locking down the inside of the base, I don't see how, since sentries built on the walkways outside of the inner walls can't detect players, and the main door triggers are wide so that players can open them from the side, letting Soldiers rain in out of detection range. I haven't seen the demo myself, but a single sentry? No. Two or more, maybe, but two Sentries will lock down pretty much any map

 

[Ida]

But consider that not many Soldiers and Demomen will instinctively know to open the doors from the side and fire at the Sentry.

Anyway, going to the mid was a terrible idea for anyone except snipers (who ruled the middle) and scouts. It needs more cover, but any more props would be very distracting. The best would be to add a building or something to completely break the line of sight between the bases.

 

[The Asylum]

So, here's what B6 is looking like:

- Respawnroom brush is extended to the bottom floor now. There you can change classes/change back to regain health/ammo. Doing so as Engineer of course, will void your buildings. Shitload of full healthkits in said room if you want to try and increase your class kill/time alive/whatever record. Small ammopacks added to side walkways inside the base, to give you a bit of ammo while not giving too much fuel to the continual Engineer problem.

- As for the sniper problem, I tried the train shack idea in the middle for B2 and 3. Shit sucked. Big time. So, here's the solution:

Just enough to cover the entrances of the bases and create blind spots on the sides, without the campground problem the train shack had

 

[Frush]

I havn't really played this map, but seeing these screenshots makes me think the middle is too small and cramped.

 

[(-TN-) Ben2]

it actually looks like it could be a pretty well balanced map, except one thing. your spawn rooms are behind the intel, but on maps like 2fort and turbine players spawn in front of it, i think this is because spawning behind it would make it too ez to defend.

 

[The Asylum]

it actually looks like it could be a pretty well balanced map, except one thing. your spawn rooms are behind the intel, but on maps like 2fort and turbine players spawn in front of it, i think this is because spawning behind it would make it too ez to defend.

If I've learned anything from 2Fort, its where to put your spawnrooms in relation to the flag. Not only do you have to get past the enemy spawn to get to the flag, but the flag is so far back behind the spawnrooms that by the time you're topisde with the flag again everybody is respawned and camping the exits. Sawmill is guilty of this, but to a lesser degree. Doublecross.... don't even get me started on Doublecross.

Turbine has been the closest anybody has gotten so far to TF2 CTF done absolutley right.

 

[The Asylum]

Update time

Middle has been smoothed out and de-sniperfested

And here's the revamped spawnroom. Easy and fast to get out, but you've got to take the scenic route to get to the resupply lockers

CHANGES FROM B5

- Extended the spawnroom brush to cover the bottom floor of the team-specific room behind the intel
- Smoothed out the middle, making running over the flatbed car easier
- Added sign in the middle and additional sniper fences on the battlement decks to break up the sniper wars

 

[The Asylum]

Nice ragequitting guys i rate it 8/10