Shell

[Smetzle]

I think spawncamping could be fixed by extending the cliff next to the spawn so it blocks the pathway between the two routes. So, if you were being camped on one side, you could just go out the other door. I'll try and get a picture of what I mean.

Edit: Here's what I mean (with expertly drawn cliff ):

 

[Flying Chicken]

I like everything, but I found spawncamping easier than normal with demoman :l

 

[Ida]

I dunno, Smetzle; I've considered that, but this pretty much splits it into two paths, and if a Demoman is camping one exit, he can close off that entire path, and he's gonna be really hard to kill as you'd have to go all the way around. Thanks for the suggestion though.

 

[entourage]

Missing textures?

Just loaded ver A5 up on our LAN server with 4vs4 and it played great!

I looked through the rest of the posts and didn't see it mentioned, but is the map missing the texture for the rocket and some of the stuff hanging on the walls in the RED spawn?

If this is just placeholder stuff for now, that's cool. Just thought I'd mention it!

Otherwise, looking forward to A6!

 

[Ida]

Thanks for giving it a try.

Those missing textures are because I forgot to pack them.

 

[Ida]

koth_shell_a6 released!
- More detail work.
- Redesigned BLU spawn with Gorge props.
- Added lots of nice grass.
- Removed YELO props, too silly.
- Added a secondary spawn, to improve fighting chance against spawncamping.
- Further attempted to reduce spawncamping by removing the staircase to the basement of the outer buildings.
- Fixed trigger_hurts in the silo, which previously allowed you to stand on the rocket clamps.
- Added the windowed doors from Doublecross because they're cool. Hey, they might help the spawncamping issue!

At the moment I'm having trouble uploading, but hopefully the file will be up very soon.

 

[The Political Gamer]

I love the use of the Gorge props.

 

[Psy]

Looks lovely.

 

[Ida]

Why thank you. ^^

The map is up now.

 

[Ida]

Just so you all know, next version is b1, which feels awesome. I've decided to make a short list of what I plan on having it include.

- Obviously, more details. This includes a gray rocket (anyone wanna make me a skin?) and a skybox.
- Custom soundscape. Borrowing some seagulls from HL2.
- Proper optimization. I think I've figured out how hints work - I won't release before I've been able to do some decent hint optimization.
- Of course, any layout improvements and bugfixes that come up as a result of testing.

If anyone has any comments about my plans and any changes you'd like to see in the beta, I'd greatly appreciate if you told me about it.

EDIT: Sorry if I appear to be treating this thread sort of like a blog, but I do what I can to keep this map interesting.

 

[Westerhound]

Ill do the rocket!

E: Done, sent you a PM

 

[Jindo]

Not a lot of criticism or comments to give on this, the game I played was reasonably balanced and the map itself looks very polished, the only thing I can think of would be to get the capture point to start opening up as the timer ends rather than before.

I should have a demo for this up shortly.

 

[Ida]

Thanks for the feedback, Jindo. I also appreciate your effort to upload a demo, but I don't really need it (I was there), so you can save yourself that trouble.

 

[Jindo]

Darn, well it's up now, if anyone else is at all interested for whatever reason, here it is (for now):

http://labs.topaz-games.com/kj/tf/demos/tf2m/koth_shell_a6_tf2m_301209_4.zip

 

[Ida]

Right, any gameday feedback is welcome. Either way, I'm going to do my regular brainstorming and hope someone catches on and gives me a tip.

Two things I picked up from various people.
- The large neutral observatory building is too overpowered and hard to strike back against.
- The opposing area with the mines is too weak and useless.

So what can I do to make the former easier to attack? I'm thinking about new paths leading from each team's "home" area into the upper floor, where there's currently an elevator shaft...

Regarding the latter, I'm really not sure, but I guess the support walls obstruct the view too much. I might upgrade the supplies there, but other than that I've got nothing.

 

[Tinker]

I thought the mines were a pretty good place for demomen or soldiers to go, especially as you can retreat and grab the medium healthkit, while still have a big height advantage. I would lower the wooden walls a bit or make them see-through fences or something, so you can shoot the point from up there a little better.

I really loved this map, can't wait to see where this is going

 

[lana]

It's a very engineer friendly map, as a single sentry can pin down almost the entire point. Spawn camping is still an issue because teams have a height advantage coming into the enemy spawn.

 

[Ida]

koth_shell_a7 released!
Yeah, I decided to do another alpha, because this time I actually do have a layout change! I know, holy crap right? b1 will 95% certainly be next, and will contain non-halfassed details.

• More details as usual.
• Added some signs for the sake of sticking to conventions.
• Replaced some of the mock lighting with actual lamps and light_spots.
• Made railings in the observatory building solid.
• Added a siren sound that plays when the doors to the silo open.
• Made the silo doors open when the control point unlocks, not 5 seconds before.
• Added additional paths to the observatory to decrease the strenght of this position.
• Lowered the supportwalls by the short cliff with the mine exit.
• Finally fixed the clip on the ladder in the RED spawn.

 

[Ida]

koth_shell_a7a released!

• Packed all missing models and textures.

 

[Hellfire]

i love this map
just let that dead-end thing make sence and thats it