Katsu's Article Index

[Katsu! :3]

Hi, I'm Katsu. I like writing articles, but I don't have room for them in my bio! (And the formatting would feel weird) So, I'm just gonna post a list here. There's a treasure trove of knowledge in these threads and while they're not all super sunny and positive, I'll always recommend them to anyone who's willing to take a deeper dive into mapping.

The User Manual
A hybrid of gamemode/level design article that tries to provide some relatively quick tips on what a gamemode consists of, as well as how to make a decent level with it.

• The User Manual: Contamination
• The User Manual: Control the Keep

General Knowledge
These are articles aren't usually specifically about level design; More accurately, they're mostly about the reasoning behind certain mapping decisions.

• "What does _a1 mean?": A Guide to Version Strings
• The 60MB Rule - Why is it good to follow?
• "Don't Make the Flag Bad!" - CTF & Flag Desirability
• The Importance of Universal Terminology

Deeper Dives of Gamemodes
These are a "below-the-surface" level of User Manual articles. In these, I let my mind fly freely and just rant. Not usually the most coherent, but I try to still include as much knowledge as I can inside them.

• Playability vs. Identity - "Why is A/D CTF Controversial?"
• Reverse Invade CTF - A Gameplay Travesty
• 2CP Arena - What's the Point?
• Destruction Modes are Boring, Here's Why

Nav Mesh Collections
I create & edit nav meshes for maps, which I then put into collections divided by gamemode. Das' about it.

• Edited Nav Mesh Collection #3: King of the Hill
• Edited Nav Mesh Collection #4: Payload
• Edited Nav Mesh Collection #5: Symmetrical CP
• Edited Nav Mesh Collection #6: Attack / Defense

Reviews that I care About
This section is dedicated to the reviews I've done that I feel are of high quality, regardless of how I judged a map in the end.

• CTF Hades
• CTF Wildfire

The Rest of It
This one's unorganized!

• The King of the Hellscape Challenge
• Construction Pack Credits
• Gamemode Types on Katsu's Mapping Sheet
• Katsu's Map Collection: 2023 Wrap-Up

 

[Yrr]

I'm sorry you didn't like Hades but did you really have to feature that in your TF2 essays masterpost?

EDIT: Sorry I just realised your flag desirability essay focused on Hades Bad too, did you really have to feature that twice?

 

[Katsu! :3]

I'm sorry you didn't like Hades but did you really have to feature that in your TF2 essays masterpost?

EDIT: Sorry I just realised your flag desirability essay focused on Hades Bad too, did you really have to feature that twice?

Yes. It's the only review I can think of where I took a truly deep dive into the map as a whole, and I am proud of that. And for the Flag Desirability article, reviewing Hades made me realize what it was in the first place, and I knew it was important for people to learn. Your lack of actual criticism towards the posts themselves tells me you feel more personally offended that I have the audacity to dislike a map you worked on, rather than you being able to understand my criticism or why I made it in the first place. I'm sorry I wasn't able to get my points across effectively enough for you.

 

[Yrr]

Your essays ignore the fact Hades' flag has the same "buff self and teammates" aura on it that Toucan does so I feel like your focus on it is out of personal dislike for the gameplay style rather than objective design analysis, and the featuring of it twice here just reinforces my feelings that you just want to dunk on the map in public.

I'll happily accept its just coincidence but at that point you really gotta think about how your stuff comes across.

Like, I wouldn't be so bothered if you weren't presenting this as an objective analysis of the one singular way people to enjoy ctf, but the presentation of "I don't like this specific map so I should dedicate 2 essays to telling new mappers it is objectively terrible" is just frankly rude on top of that.

 

[Katsu! :3]

Your essays ignore the fact Hades' flag has the same "buff self and teammates" aura on it that Toucan does so I feel like your focus on it is out of personal dislike for the gameplay style rather than objective design analysis, and the featuring of it twice here just reinforces my feelings that you just want to dunk on the map in public.

I'll happily accept its just coincidence but at that point you really gotta think about how your stuff comes across.

Like, I wouldn't be so bothered if you weren't presenting this as an objective analysis of the one singular way people to enjoy ctf, but the presentation of "I don't like this specific map so I should dedicate 2 essays to telling new mappers it is objectively terrible" is just frankly rude on top of that.

I did not include the fact that Hades' flag buffs the player and their teammates because Flag Desirability revolves around first impressions for normal players. What I mean is that, the first thing a player sees when they pick up the flag in Hades is that they are completely helpless to enemy fire (because they can't use their guns and they can't move as freely), and this makes the flag really undesirable. The flag being undesirable creates a feedback loop of less people attempting to cap, which in turn the benefit of the flag having a dispenser becomes a moot point because your team lacks the players for it to really do its job. This is counter to the design goal of Hades, which was, from my understanding, to make it so that people play CTF for the objective, not for random DM (similar to some of the more recent CTF maps of our era).

The reason the buff works on Toucan is because there is nothing holding the flag carrier themselves back from effectively playing in combat, and in fact the flag actually assists the player when they are with their teammate. This makes the flag carrier an even more vital target for the defending team, as with the flag being held, they are essentially an AOE medic while also being their normal class. The difference in gamemode also effects this, as retreating (CTF) is generally viewed as less enjoyable than pushing (ICTF) to the average player because it leaves them out of the action. What Hades' flag does is promote retreating via making the flag carrier weaker. This is sound on paper because your design goal is to get players grouping up, however this fails to acknowledge the much more prevalent player who just wants to enjoy capturing the flag, if they want the flag at all.

My representation of Hades having poor quality in two articles is because, to quote my first reply to you, "...reviewing Hades made me realize what it was in the first place, and I knew it was important for people to learn." It was the only reason I wrote that article in the first place, because it inspired me to write about how to incentivize players with your gamemode design. Your map failed at this, and it was in recent memory, so it was very simple for me to use it as an example. The document was not dedicated to just hating on Hades, as over 3/4ths of the article did not talk about the map. My Article Index is also a collection of the work that I've made that I think is actually worth learning from, and Hades being my most recent review that I could remember and knew that it had actual quality writing made it earn its place in my portfolio.

 

[Yrr]

This is counter to the design goal of Hades, which was, from my understanding, to make it so that people play CTF for the objective, not for random DM (similar to some of the more recent CTF maps of our era).

Ahh, nah the goal of Hades was to put the difficulty in the "Escape" part of the CTF loop, rather than on the "Invade" part. I feel like we succeeded at that, but acknowledge that that style of gameplay is not to everyone's taste.

This is where I find the issue with presenting this as objective analysis of the "Right" and "Wrong" ways to do CTF cause there's a lot of different styles of gameplay that appeal to different people, and presenting one singular form as the correct one limits creative potential.

 

[Katsu! :3]

Ahh, nah the goal of Hades was to put the difficulty in the "Escape" part of the CTF loop, rather than on the "Invade" part. I feel like we succeeded at that, but acknowledge that that style of gameplay is not to everyone's taste.

I feel like if this was your design goal then you could've gone with a much less annoying layout decision in using Chin CTF. I personally dislike the layout style, but I find it to be a better solution to the problem you've highlighted as your design goal than making the flag unfun to hold. You've definitely succeeded in your goal, but I feel like there was a lack of foresight in a way with the route you chose to achieve it.

This is where I find the issue with presenting this as objective analysis of the "Right" and "Wrong" ways to do CTF cause there's a lot of different styles of gameplay that appeal to different people, and presenting one singular form as the correct one limits creative potential.

I do not propose Flag Desirability as a right or wrong way to do things, moreso I provide that the statistical likelihood of something being liked is exponentially higher when you don't change the flag or alternatively you buff the flag. My methodology uses the negativity bias, where players feel stronger that a map hindered them for playing the objective (ie on Hades, they are very debuffed when they pick up the flag) than caring for a much more positive interaction with the flag such as on Toucan because most players just want to shoot other gamers in the back of their mind. I may think that the way Hades does things is a very, very dangerous idea towards the health of the popularity of the map, however you may have a different perspective which while I may not agree with, is something that I inevitably cannot change due to our differing mindsets regarding this.

My main goal is to present what I believe has worked, or can work. I don't believe the Hades approach works because its purpose, which you have informed me was to make escaping harder, is immediately outclassed by a layout decision that in the long run would be more healthy for the map. I won't say that the gimmick of the flag in Hades is uninteresting, because I think it's undeniable that the core concept is an interesting IDEA, however I do not think it is a well-informed idea given how it affects how people would play the map. I'd estimate that at least 60% of rounds end up becoming "random DM" on Hades simply because the flag isn't fun to hold and getting it out of the base as you've said was intended to be difficult.

I don't want to limit creative potential, however my job is also to inform mappers on what will help their map in the long run. In order to do this, I have to make more bold points about design choices that maybe not everyone will agree with, but they are always explained when I know how to. I'm trying to get better at explaining the processes in which I think a map will succeed, as my goal is to buff the overall quality of the new maps we get.

 

[Katsu! :3]

Update bump, since this post went live there's been a couple of additions. (A review, the 2023 collection wrap-up, etc.) Check em out if you get the chance.