So what the heck IS comp CTF?

[shdw.puppet]

ubers are used in a variety of situations. On attack, they are used as soon as you can, to make sure the other team doesnt get uber. Medics will push as far in as they can, then uber through a chokepoint to avoid getting raped by stickies.

Defensively, medics wait until it becomes dangerous, then pop on whoever needs it, switching back and forth trying to keep the other uber from doing anything.

If the battle for middle is long enough, uber or kritz can be used. If your mid takes as long as an uber build to take over too often, your middle may not be streamlined enough.

I play comp. medic actually (that is probly what I will do on test days) and have for almost a year, but the topic of ubers is the most controversial and most difficult concept in comp TF2.

I hope I answered your question...

 

[VelvetFistIronGlove]

My aim with ctf_desind is to fix two specific problems that all the traditional CTF maps seem to suffer:

Defenders camping the flag to prevent it being picked up.
I don't just mean engies building sentry farms in the 2fort basement, but also demos sticky-camping the flag when it's dropped, to defend it until it times out. Both these forms of defence are static, not dynamic: they prevent the enemies from gaining a point, but also do nothing to help your own team gain points, so they don't move the game forward.

Two different goals, in unrelated areas of the map.
With traditional CTF, your team's focus is split: you have to capture the enemy's flag, but you must also defend your own flag. With only 6 people on a team, this has got to be a serious cost. With a 5cp map, the cost is far less, since your team's goal and the enemy's goal are related and closely connected, so team members can more fluidly shift roles; but in a traditional CTF map the two goals are at opposite ends of the map.

Both these goals hinder a ctf match from being fast-paced, and give your team divided goals, one of which is purely reactionary.

Not being aware of the "Invade" mode CTF, I took rugby as inspiration for how I thought CTF would work better, and came up with pretty much the same rules. Both teams have the same goal: to pick up a single, neutral flag, and deliver it to a capture zone in the enemy's side of the map.

A single neutral flag solves both these problems elegantly. There is no point to camping the flag, since your team wants to pick it up and capture it for themselves. And both team's focus is the same place: where the flag is. Since the map will have a few (but not many) routes between the flag spawn and the capture zone, there will be variety in where battles take place, and tactical decisions to be made concerning which approach is best.

So far I'm very pleased with how this has played out with a couple of pub tests, and feel confident that the approach is sound for competitive play as well; though if any comp players here have a different opinion, let me know!

 

[lana]

While neutral flag gamemodes place the objective in one location, it can have dangers. Firstly, it must be taken to the enemy base, otherwise players are only utilizing half the map. Secondly, the flag can be camped. The first problem can't be fixed with neutral flag type gamemodes, but the second can be solved by pulling a Backpier and putting the intel on a cart.

 

[shdw.puppet]

I am not sure how invade ctf_ will play out competitively. 6s teams have no problem doing both tasks in CTF (controlling middle almost always controls the field) and im not sure how an invade ctf_ will fare in terms of a 6v6 strategy because it will encourage the camping of the flag area by the very, very competent scouts (scouts at this level can beat any class hands down) while the combo (medic+soldier) and another soldier or the demoman accompany to deliver the flag. The other team will never get an opportunity to capture anything because on the small map size of a ctf_ map, there is no room for two teams to coincide at any time, conflict is perpetual.

 

[absurdistof]

ubers are used in a variety of situations. On attack, they are used as soon as you can, to make sure the other team doesnt get uber. Medics will push as far in as they can, then uber through a chokepoint to avoid getting raped by stickies.

Defensively, medics wait until it becomes dangerous, then pop on whoever needs it, switching back and forth trying to keep the other uber from doing anything.

If the battle for middle is long enough, uber or kritz can be used. If your mid takes as long as an uber build to take over too often, your middle may not be streamlined enough.

I play comp. medic actually (that is probly what I will do on test days) and have for almost a year, but the topic of ubers is the most controversial and most difficult concept in comp TF2.

I hope I answered your question...

Yes, you did

Many thanks

 

[lana]

Also, I want to clear something up with water. Mangy was talking about this a while ago and after a lot of thought I agree with him. Water should be shallow and sparse. Because there are no pyros, competitive players have no need to immerse themselves in water. Instead, it slows them down and prevents them from rocket, sticky, or double jumping. Shallow water will prevent cratering (death by fall damage) but otherwise becomes an obstacle.

 

[VelvetFistIronGlove]

Firstly, it must be taken to the enemy base, otherwise players are only utilizing half the map.

Yes, of course. Going to the middle and taking the flag back to your own base would be a bit uninteresting.

I am not sure how invade ctf_ will play out competitively. 6s teams have no problem doing both tasks in CTF (controlling middle almost always controls the field) and im not sure how an invade ctf_ will fare in terms of a 6v6 strategy because it will encourage the camping of the flag area by the very, very competent scouts (scouts at this level can beat any class hands down) while the combo (medic+soldier) and another soldier or the demoman accompany to deliver the flag. The other team will never get an opportunity to capture anything because on the small map size of a ctf_ map, there is no room for two teams to coincide at any time, conflict is perpetual.

Presumably both teams will have players of similar competence? I don't see how one team's scouts can lock down the centre any better than the other team's scouts could attack and kill them. But playtesting is of course the key to seeing how it works in practice.

 

[lana]

The other team will never get an opportunity to capture anything because on the small map size of a ctf_ map, there is no room for two teams to coincide at any time, conflict is perpetual.

If the conflict in a map ever stops, it is not a good map.

 

[shdw.puppet]

there needs to be breaks in conflict or a team will never be able to build an uber or hold a location. of course there will be constant shooting and stuff, but conflict I am talking about is ongoing 6v6 fighting. Those turn stalemate in a fight scenario and are boring. Think a 30 minute long middle fight and you will have constant conflict.


@velvet, I was talking about how a team will inevitably win the middle fight (9 times out of 10) and then take control of the chokes. then the scouts will watch the intel spawn in the center and the team will dominate. Remember, comp players arent playing for fun, they are playing to win and will do so with any cheap ass tactic they have.

 

[lana]

Conflict good, breaks bad.

 

[shdw.puppet]

ok NerdBoy, this may be true in pubbing, but take a look at a demo of the top teams (complexity, EG, Loaded! etc) and watch what their combo (medic+solly) does... for the most part, nothing. There is brief violence at mid, one team wins it, the other backs out and waits for a push or an opportunity to push themselves.

 

[absurdistof]

I have to say, I think shdw could have a point here, I mean if two wicked good scouts took mid at supersandvich long enough for the rest of the team to go there, they could hold it for a good long while. That said, supersandvich is a bad example because holding the middle on that map wouldn't be perpetual, due to the lack of chokepoints.

Also:

oh, I almost forgot, dont forget replayability. Comp players will play these maps 20-30 times, learn them backwards and forwards and spend the greater part of a week on them. Then they will match. If you want a map to be successful competitively, you must make sure players will want to play them over and over. It may seem like the best maps are simple ones, but really, the best maps are ones that look simple, play easy and yet always have something new to find about them. Just this season (we are on season 5) I saw strats I have never seen before on badlands. Badlands has been played 1000's of times, and we are still finding fun in it.

if you want that, keep it interesting kk?

So, basically to keep the jumps and new routes going I was thinking of adding unclipped ledges to run/jump along, and possibly some unclipped models along the walls allowing for more advanced jumps, is this a good idea or no?

 

[shdw.puppet]

you can leave some things unclipped, but dont rely on that. What I mostly meant was dont make it so there is only one way to do things, make there be variety, though some nice hidden jumps isnt a bad idea either (there are some pretty awesome unintended jumps from bad clipping on blands that the scout can do)

 

[General_Norris]

My thoughts as a comp player, albeit a somewhat newbie one.

The most important thing about comp CTF is being able to protect the intel while attacking. Team Size is limited and it's not fun if every time you get out of base someone sneaks in via another route and escapes before you can do anything about it.

Turbine is a good map because if you are attacking then you hold the middle, and thus, the other team can't ninja you.

Basically if it's possible for a Spy to go to the intel without crossing the other players the map has too many routes. An example is Double Cross. You can go using your cloack and then run for your life. Not fun.

However the problem with Turbine, IMHO, is that whoever controls the middle is able to win without much effort. Since there's only one "control zone" in the middle you can camp the doors with a Demoman and leech points until you are bored. This happens ins Pubs too, once an Engineer puts a teleport and a sentry facing the door the other team is trapped.



Now, this is your choice but consider that Highlander (9v9, one of each class) and 8v8 are competitive formats too. So don't focus just on Scouts, Demo and Soldiers because that's not the end of the world. In fact, I play Heavy competitively and man, he rocks Turbine hard in 6v6.

Consider that CTF is not CP, playing Heavy and Engineer is not as weird as in CP.

Hiding spots and corners work wonders for Medics and makes Engineers and Spies not filler material in Highlander.

If you want to I can try to tell me clan about helping tf2maps in testing but we are not going very smootly lately.

 

[shdw.puppet]

I agree with the general, there is a fine line map makers must tread, too many paths and there is no skill involved, only luck. Too few and there is no way to make a comeback and players get bored. The key is in balance, test it out, you will be able to tell instantly whether or not your map is any good when 6v6 comp play is going on.

 

[absurdistof]

you can leave some things unclipped, but dont rely on that. What I mostly meant was dont make it so there is only one way to do things, make there be variety, though some nice hidden jumps isnt a bad idea either (there are some pretty awesome unintended jumps from bad clipping on blands that the scout can do)

I wont rely on it, but I got the idea from Pipeline (I'm an addict), and how the clipping on parts of that map allows for certain jumps, as well as from mid to 2/4 in Blands as well. Not HUGE stuff, nothing game-breaking, just some less obvious intended unclipped places that can act as a B for the scout trying to get to C, if you get the metaphor .

EDIT: That's an interesting point about turbine, thanks to both of you for that! I like the idea of the spy run, general, it would make a good test to do while a map is in session.

 

[Tinker]

A trend in the maps and mapper's attitudes that's starting to annoy me;

"Don't expect this to play well in a pub, it's geared towards competitive play".

That's bullshit. If a map works well in competitive play, it will work in a pub. Vice versa cannot always be said, but making your map insanely small (less playing room) or with fewer chokepoints is not the same as making it appeal to generally smaller groups of people playing. Arguably the best competitive map is Badlands, and look at the space! Look at how much people could fit in there! Please stop making your maps tiny and convoluted just because "it's only 12 people". It won't work and will just make it have less variations, less way to approach it.

 

[shdw.puppet]

The people who argue that BLands is the best map are the same people not allowed in tf2 irc channels... Blands is an ok map with some serious flaws, like the space makes scout OP. There are much better community maps out there.

But I do kind of agree with Tinker, a lot of maps that are good comp style are also good regular, but that isnt always so. If your goal is to make a comp map, dont focus on pub play, make a solid, balanced map and maybe pub play will follow.

 

[grazr]

Making a balanced map for an unbalanced team is, in principle, making an unbalanced map. We're practically asked to ignore the engineer altogether, and disregarding the heavy is.. well we all know about the heavies problem, it's actually the same in pub as it is comp.

I don't believe it's a matter of designing for comp and then the pubs will follow. But that's not to say it's design for pub and comp will follow either.

You simply have different design approaches, which if thought about properly, and with the proper inspiration, will hopefully accomodate both as a result.

 

[Tinker]

Engineers are used in competitive CTF. Heavies are used in competitive CTF.

I also cannot think of a single finished map that works well in competitive but doesn't work at all in pubs.