Lionhardt's WIP Mapping Thread

[Lionhardt]

Yea, I played with that idea too after seeing Gorton write about that kind of spawn setup in aeolus today.

[Lionhardt]

This is the first pass on the spawn layout.

Suggestions to maybe arrange it more intelligently?

Edit 1:... Hm, to facilitate inner vs outer it would be better to half all odd slots inside and all even slots outside. But... that's ugly.

Also, inner vs outer would be crazy hard to balance... I am not even convinced yet if I really want to do that.

Edit 2: Closeup of the center area mex layout with ACU range rings for sense of scale

Edit 3: Ress Layout whole map. I felt like experimenting (hydros)...


The map kind of demands a new name too. I thought of Vale of Shards.

[Aurion]

This is the first pass on the spawn layout.

Suggestions to maybe arrange it more intelligently?

Edit 1:... Hm, to facilitate inner vs outer it would be better to half all odd slots inside and all even slots outside. But... that's ugly.

Also, inner vs outer would be crazy hard to balance... I am not even convinced yet if I really want to do that.

Edit 2: Closeup of the center area mex layout with ACU range rings for sense of scale

Edit 3: Ress Layout whole map. I felt like experimenting (hydros)...


The map kind of demands a new name too. I thought of Vale of Shards.

The things that you can do with the map editor are amazing

[Vee]

Both maps look excellent. May I suggest making it 20x20? As much as I love 40x40, the game is bugged and units lose orders on 40x40. It would be a pity if such a beautiful map is unplayable due to bugs :'(

[Lionhardt]

Hm, scaling it down would not go very smoothly, I'm afraid. Also I think the center island would be too small if it was a quarter the size :/


But before I sink one hundred ours into placing decals and props I will release an alpha version to see how it plays out. Just needs a little reclaim before it can be alphatested.


Anyway, here is the first pass on the AI markers:

Spoiler: show

oc_n_ai_1.jpg (555.06 KiB) Viewed 2329 times

Edit: Argh, markers once again broke the thing... What was causing this again? Something about naval markers, right?

Edit 2: nvm, fixed it. And yes it was the naval marker bug.

Edit 3: New issue. The AI doesn't do anything upon spawning...


This is the save.lua: http://pastebin.com/XsUz4WYc

[IceDreamer]

While I realise you want your maps to be as complete as possible, might I suggest leaving AI markers until the very very end, after playtesting and decals and everything. The vast majority of people using this map are not going to be doing so against the AI.

Regarding spawns, that sized centre looks utterly perfect for a 2v2v2v2 with each pair having one inside and one outside, but I must say the size means that an inner VS outer setup could become very, very interesting, especially if you gave each middle player two extra Mex to offset their disadvantage of getting to and maintaining a presence on the other islands.

[Vee]

With inner vs outer, the inner already has the natural advantage of having their bases together, so they can more easily combine their forces against one outer player, and they can more easily help each other to defend.

[Lionhardt]

Alpha version live for playtesting. Please provide feedback.

Also refined the center area:

Spoiler: show

vos_centang_1.jpg (786.19 KiB) Viewed 2280 times

[Omnipotent]

Ok mate, some feedback to rack your brain again...

Heightmap is nice. Lot's of elevation, however, when it comes to the lake, it's simply too shallow. The "Tempest" and "Atlantis" bug through the floor in places. When they dive, they tip deep in to the soil.
That being said, the water looks absolutely amazing, the texturing underneath gives it like an oil slick looking effect. I'm really impressed with the water!

Remove some of the heightmap rocks, and make the remaining ones bigger. I can just see naval clutter everywhere as they have the worst pathing possible. Are the rocks really necessary? One must ask themselves. I would shorten the spawn rock and add another but on the main land mass. So you have 1 rock protecting the sea from left flank and rock protecting ground attack from right flank.

Can't figure out why AI is dumb on this map. Won't even build. Had more coming from a "Nomads" Commander that managed to build at least 2 land factories and 1 air fac before stalling and sending engie transports everywhere, and still doing nothing about it. (Top left spawn, central island)

Criticisms about the mex spots. It is an alpha so not much can be said but 5 Hydro's on 4 islands? You must've been very happy placing all that down haha. Not sure that's gonna go down well... I have a feeling that the centre island is just going to be a bloodbath where the winner will literally claim everything. Thus leading to an inner vs outer. Not an outer vs outer. If you were to place spawn points on the islands you could get an outer vs outer as well. Rushing to centre would be a priority and satellite bases could be built rather than a main base which would inevitably get KO'd.

You could even release an EP version of this map with 10 or 12 players. That is what I'm doing on a revamp version of my River of Martyrdom (ROM) map.

The centre itself should be it's own 5x5km map lol.

Dark patch in the mountains (bottom right) between both peaks allows you to build 1 or 2 facs. Not sure if that was by design or not. Expanding on that could lead to very nice stealth field bases. Just an idea. Don't make it obvious but just lay down some reclaim and the keen sighted players will figure it out.

Good luck texturing this map, if the small 10x10 map nearly drove you insane, imagine what this ambitious project is going to do.

Heightmap: (Moutains: 3/5) (Water Elevation and rocks: 2/5)
Water texture: (4/5)
Texturing and strata (4/5)
AI: (1/5)
Spawn and Mass points: (2/5)

Alpha score: 0.64, Possible Potential Beta score: 0.84.

[Lionhardt]

Thanks for the suggestions.


Quite a few people didn't want to play the map because the felt like it was too large. I created a heightmap for a possible shrunk down version.

The proportions of the different land masses had to be altered as to not make the center island to small. This would be 20k:

Spoiler: show

sov2_HM_1.jpg (96.33 KiB) Viewed 2272 times

The white square is the exact size of a 5v5 map:

Spoiler: show

sov2_HM_5k.jpg (95.91 KiB) Viewed 2271 times

As I said, the concept does not work on a 20k map. It no longer looks interesting. It looks pretty dull and generic.