PL snowycoast B6

[GroundCode_]

So I thought someone else would notice it by now, or maybe you've already fixed it but;

At the sentry balcony, there is a bit of a bug.

If you come over here and look up you'll see this:

There is a hole. It's also one of those holes that breaks and is very weird to look at. (You know, that bug/thing where the sky box starts copying over things from the map and starts to light up to white)

^ Bad Pic ^

Also cool, first thing on 8th page!

 

[EArkham]

Long unobstructed view into RED spawn.

I don't think that sightline is too big of a deal considering there are two routes that, if used, will put RED players in a perfect spot to mince any snipers standing there.

That said, C becomes impossible to push into once RED has more than 2 or 3 Engineers set up here, which will happen like 90% of the time in a Valve pub. A particular spot is on the red barrels in the top-right where it completely covers the right cave entrance into this area.

I actualy am not surprised about it though, the same happens in other maps aswel. Once the red team manages to get a large sentry nest at such bottleneck it can often lock down the map. dustbowl, goldrush, upward, badwater all have similar issues. I think its just the case of 'the red team is better than blue' which is normal to happen.

What he said. Typically BLU rushes down that side flank (the one closest to last, the opposite one Alias mentions) and just attacks RED from the other side. I still think C needs a little shoring up to be "just right." Once C is balanced, I'll add another flank to 1st/2nd and flow should be pretty decent overall.

 

[Vel0city]

Well, whatever you change to 1st/2nd, DON'T change the little underground way that opens after 1st is capped.

That route (going in via the balcony overlooking 2nd)+Backburner+Detonator-jumping=best flanking route of any map, and I mean that. You Deto-jump in, go down the stairs where a medium healthpack awaits, and then you pop your head out of the entrance on BLU's side where you're still fully covered by a see-trough fence on your right and a hallway with a medium health kit on your left so you're safe to hang around for a while to wait for the perfect moment to strike. Case and point: the same match as in my last screenshot (of that massive Engineer nest) started as some sort of a steamroll trough first for BLU. Well, until I got 6 people (including a fully charged Medic) just past that point with my good ol' Backburner. They struggled to get trough B which gave our 5 Engineers (cuz Valve pubs) more than enough time to completely lock down C.

 

[Vel0city]

Got some more stuff:

This door is slightly recessed into the wall but isn't clipped, making people get stuck there.

This door here is Z-fighting with the frame it goes in.

 

[GroundCode_]

So one thing that is really annoying is trying to set up as an Engineer on last, behind the warehouse at the excavation site, even before they open the door. When you know the attackers will open the door before you have time to set up in the warehouse, you go and start to set up outside the doors. However, if the attacking team is really strong they already have players behind the warehouse stopping Engineers from setting up. They use this route to get behind the defenders and it's very overpowered:

Taking this flank before the warehouse door opens gives players the ability to easily kill Engineer's who are trying to set up here...

and trying to defend the door from here.

It's really effective because all the defenders, except the Engineers, are up front attacking while the Engineers are at the back setting up and very vulnerable. I also like using the spot above because it's good for defending before and after the door opens, but they're are some really weird angles where attackers can shoot at the sentry and the sentry can't target them. (also Demomen like to shoot stickies over the wall and just destroy any nest that's been set up here, but you decide if you'd like having these things in place or not)
My recommendation for making behind the doors easier to set up at would be to:
Step 1: Close either this door...

or the one on the other side, and open it when the warehouse door opens. This would prevent the attackers from accessing behind the warehouse before it's opened and depending on what side you put the door on would make a really nice sentry nest spot for either team. (Or alternatively you could create a door on this side that will only open for RED players and a door on the other side that only opens for BLU players and have a pretty fun, cool, and neat part of the map. Also this way both teams have access to the health pack and ammo in that room. Both doors open, allowing both teams to pass through, when warehouse door opens)
Step 2: Add a new flank route into the warehouse that doesn't let attackers get behind the warehouse until the door opens, maybe one that utilizes the rooms under RED's final spawn(?).
Also at C there s no sentry spot that really compliments sentries that are up here:

I thought I saw something in a post about an alcove being added to the wall behind me, maybe an elevated platform as well, to compliment this spot. Is that being added?
(And one other thing if you do end up doing that two door thing to that one flank, maybe make it so a disguised spy could go through the other team's door as way to counter the Engineers and make them not so overpowered?)

 

[GroundCode_]

Actually wait, I had a better idea! (Ignore the idea in my other post, this incorporates it better) In this spot:

You should have a RED-only door here that disguised Spy's can pass through to counter Engineers that are defending in this spot: (or maybe not idk)

And maybe add a new flank route into the warehouse if you think it's necessary.

 

[Dadema]

Wow. This map looks good

 

[Skittelz]

Also cool, first thing on 8th page!

Not for me. My resolution shows yours the first on the 12th page. Just something to know.

 

[Moonrat]

Not for me. My resolution shows yours the first on the 12th page. Just something to know.

A two month bump for that?

 

[Skittelz]

A two month bump for that?

My mistake. I could've made a post about the screen resolution and chat thing.

 

[Crosshair]

Very thin line above C point which allows anyone to sticky/rocket jump up and get an unfair advantage. It's a bit above the cliff. I believe it's where the top of the cliff boundary and the regular skybox boundary meet, but don't align,

 

[LizardOfOz]

There's one change on Summercoast I'd like to see ported to Snowycoast: a one-way flank from BLU starting area to B that gets open when A gets captured. B is known to be a hold of Dustbowl's difficulty.

https://imgur.com/6zJqcs8

 

[EArkham]

Very thin line above C point which allows anyone to sticky/rocket jump up and get an unfair advantage. It's a bit above the cliff. I believe it's where the top of the cliff boundary and the regular skybox boundary meet, but don't align,

Hm, where does summercoast move the large health kit that sits at the defending side of the shutter?

I thought this change was going to be more complicated, since I figured it'd conflict with the wrap-around staircase in that area, but it actually would just kill a small (and not particularly noticeable) out of bounds detail area.

 

[LizardOfOz]

While summercoast actually changes up the staircase area a bit (by moving the exit to above the engie nest) it's not necessary to introduce the new route.
Summercoast changes up most of the pickups in the area, swapping around the large and the small health packs (and the large and medium ammo packs)

The map is available at https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1761528829

 

[Tiftid]

I would completely hate defending B if that change was introduced. That area already has a nasty case of "oh, they have this dropdown that gets behind us", and with this change you wouldn't even be able to stop them from doing it by pushing forward and assuming a forward hold position.
In fact, the presence of that one-way would preclude a B forward hold happening in the first place, because you'd try to push forward to hold the entrance to the old bullshit "they're behind us" route but now you can't even stop them from using the new one, so what's the point?

It would make B harder to defend - but not in a fun way.

The changes to the health packs I think are more appreciable, since RED not only has to backtrack longer for health, but they have to cross the arena which is very difficult to do while half-dead.
However, to me it feels like 1 full health and 1 full ammo are the right amount for the safe side of the arena - enough to keep a defense standing, but only barely.

 

[LizardOfOz]

I see the point about defending B being harder, but attacking B is miserable right now because you just have to spam through chokes until enough of RED happened to be dead at once.

With the new flank (let's ignore other changes summercoast makes to B) RED's underbalcony hold will not last nearly as long, allowing blu to push past the chokes they're currently stuck to, getting rid of the death zone.

The current balcony alone isn't a good hold breaker because that position is too vulnerable for attacks from the area around the point itself, not allowing the attackers to overextend to attack the underbalcony hold. The value of the new flank is specifically to pressure the underbalcony hold without exposing yourself to the hold around the point itself.

(UPD: Hold names were edited because a later comment disagrees with the naming)

 

[LizardOfOz]

To simplify, BLU are stuck behind the chokes because RED own the area under the balcony, which shuts down 2 out of 3 exits with the help from the point hold.

And the third exit (the balcony) is shut down by the point hold, its general remoteness, and inability to rotate to another route (maybe it would benefit from a one-way drop down to the new flank)

The balcony and the new flank would be considered "behind us" only if RED are still trying to hold onto the underbalcony area.
If RED would instead be expected to pull back, then there would be 2 general BLU attack vectors in front of RED.

 

[Tiftid]

You seem to have not understood what the forward and backward hold actually are.
For starters, they need to be more than 256 units apart.
The actual definition is based on routing - each hold has a number of routes that enter into it.
The point at where you can push forward, and successfully watch all the routes that go into the backward hold with minimal rotate time is called the "forward hold".
This is true of Snowycoast B as well. The balcony route is real trouble for the backward hold - so, the forward hold is the point where you can watch the entrance to that route and prevent BLU from ever getting there.
Here's a diagram:

It is, of course, a distinctly tough backward hold. All the BLU routes converge into a very small area, so RED has very small rotate time to watch each one. But you may notice that the newly proposed area doesn't actually change that at all, dumping BLU into the exact same 512-unit strip RED is holding.

Saying that the "value of the new flank is to pressure the forward hold without exposing yourself to the backline holds" is mystifying to me, since even as you've drawn it, the backline holds both have direct sight of the new entrance.
And, of course, as I've drawn it, the new route totally skips the forward hold. The entire purpose of the forward hold is essentially to prevent BLU from magically appearing at the backward hold with an uber and taking the point without anything RED could have really done about it, so letting BLU skip the forward hold would be a big "oopsie".

I don't like to describe basic TF gameplay when I've done it so many times already, but here's how Valve words it:

[Jakob Jungels] Invulnerability also sharpens pacing by helping a team push through a defensive stalemate, when the enemy team turtles up and refuses to come out of their base. With a lack of defensive skirmishers, it's easier for the offense to build up the invulnerability charge without interruption.

Essentially, the purpose of the Ubercharge is to prevent singularly strong backward holds from making a map impossible to capture.
But, if every hold could be broken by a single Ubercharge, the gameplay wouldn't be very engaging. Defenders would feel cheated, because no matter how skillful they were, they wouldn't be able to defend the point for long.
That's why we have the forward hold - defenders have this constant time-pressure of needing to push forward so they have the forward hold, so they won't just lose the point because the attacker medic right-clicked once. If they fail, and the medic uses an Ubercharge on the backward hold, they almost certainly lose the point. So, if RED loses the point to an Ubercharge, it's their point for being too passive, and if BLU doesn't ever capture the point, it's their fault for letting RED retake the forward hold too many times.

 

[LizardOfOz]

I haven't found the correct callout for that area, I just called it a forward hold for the sake of giving it a name.
My point wouldn't change if I'd call it that area "that one place you almost always see a sentry and a dispenser on pubs" every time.

 

[Tiftid]

The forward and backward hold have much grander design purposes than being callouts. My previous post goes into more depth about that.