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Topic Starter Topic: Ironwood by Pat Howard [FINAL]
Pat Howard
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PostPosted: 06-15-2012 01:00 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Ironwood by Pat Howard

DOWNLOAD LATEST VERSION (JULY 14, 2014): FINAL 12.0mb
GAMETYPE: SMALL CTF
BOTS: YES
SEXY VISUALZ: OBVY





Please let me know of any bugs, or whatever you think of the map. I may be able to use your suggestion. If not, your feedback will help me create better maps in the future. Thanks a bunch!

-pat
lvlpathoward[at]gmail[dot]com
http://lvlworld.com/author.php?q=Pat%20Howard




Last edited by Pat Howard on 07-14-2014 07:49 PM, edited 12 times in total.
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Pat Howard
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PostPosted: 06-15-2012 01:03 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


hello everone, first map in quite a while! i'm making a small ctf map for the maverick competition.

looking for feedback...
- item placement
- scale
- paths
- overall balance
- whatever.

thanks very much!
-pat
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Pat Howard
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PostPosted: 06-19-2012 10:32 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


alpha II is up. see first post for link. the update improves on movement and scale of areas. i'm hoping the map will play faster now. feedback much appreciated!

-pat

p.s. does anyone know why the areaportals for my two center room doors on the upper level are not working? do i need to seal off the lower level entrance with a door too?
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obsidian
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PostPosted: 06-20-2012 12:51 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Pat Howard wrote:
Does anyone know why the areaportals for my two center room doors on the upper level are not working? do i need to seal off the lower level entrance with a door too?



Yes, areaportals must be completely sealed off from one another for them to work. So if you have two doorways to the same section of a map, both have to be filled with areaportal.



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Pat Howard
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PostPosted: 06-21-2012 01:21 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


okay, thanks. alpha 3 is up. this will probably be the last alpha. as always, feedback appreciated whether you want to put it here or on the maverick page.

changes...

- added third path inside each base
- re-did item placement.




Last edited by Pat Howard on 06-16-2014 11:56 PM, edited 1 time in total.
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AEon
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PostPosted: 07-12-2012 09:33 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Mind you I am not a CTF player...

Some things I noted:
  • The fog-of-death thing, IMO, should be rethought. In a small map having several folks on your tail, plus no way to avoid them easily (corridors also narrow, per se OK), you really get stressed out when you also have to look out where you step all the time.
  • The overall feel was compact, takes a bit to get used to less than ample corridors. Especially the doorways felt cramped. Note this is just a feeling because most recent maps have much more space to move.
  • Central Arena: The two jumppads' flight path almost clobbers you into the ceiling of the upper level. You might want to carve out some ceiling space for the landing area.
  • Lifting the central arena's ceiling by a factor of two or so with a sky would make the map less claustrophic, IMO.
  • I felt the upper path, though long, was by far the safer and my preferred path. Trying to run the lower path past the JPs felt very vulnerable. The problem I see here is that one sniper should pretty much control the complete central arena. Some glass "fences" might be a good idea to better protect players on the lower level. Plus carve into the walls behind the JPs to make more room to move.
  • Now this is a slightly contradictory point of view. But when on the upper path I was *really* scared to jump down the first time I had the flag. Indenting the lower level, to not be directly under the upper level would help here. Or add some "landing areas" at strategic points on the lower level (over the fog) to let folks change path from upper to lower path without suiciding.
  • I still believe you should carve into the walls more to not have the upper and lower path share the very same tight space central arena.
  • A third path was another thing I was considering.
  • Obviously, you will be adding more direction arrows for dummies like myself to better orientate?
  • I felt the railgun in such a cramped slightly overpowering, especially in the cental area and around the bases.

Just some thoughts... maybe there was something useful in the list.
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Pat Howard
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PostPosted: 09-16-2012 05:04 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Bump. back to work on this. lots of changes so please take a look (first post) and let me know what you think.

- expanded flagrooms
- increased scale
- removed high launch pads in center atrium
- removed death pits in flag rooms
- more play between high and low routes
- removed LG

thanks,
-pat




Last edited by Pat Howard on 06-16-2014 11:56 PM, edited 1 time in total.
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AEon
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PostPosted: 09-17-2012 12:30 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Some thoughts:
  • The overall wider corridor paths help.
  • The shorter path at the upper level statues too... makes them less of a trap.
  • Closing all the pits in the bases helps.

  • JP destination landing areas in the main arena and the bases are strangely lacking in head room, i.e. the ceiling is much too low for no apparent reason, making those areas feel cramped. Depending on how you use the JPs you even can bump your head.
  • I would try and integrate the base JPs near the flags more into the wall geometry, instead of placing it "somewhere" on the floor.
  • Use a cylinder patch for the JP in the main base (near flag), that way the top is perfectly round like the JP textures... the rounded off square patch wastes tris and looks weird IMO.
  • In the main arena you have a "tall step" next to the GL... I felt that was a path "stopper"... and the bots will not be able to take this path either. Just add another step or two there.
  • The RA pad in the middle of the map, represents the direct path with some risk... obviously the bots will be barred using this path as well. You might consider adding some form of narrow bridge to not block this path. A narrow grated bridge would still have a high level of risk, i.e. of getting pushed into the abyss, but the bots would have a chance to actually take that path.
  • About the vertical fighting... standing on the main arena upper ring, you have to "carefully" stand at the edge to shoot down... in a fast game that will probably rarely work, since on the lower level the player will already have run past the zone of danger (in the line of sight from the upper level). You can look into the the other base area, so that may not be all bad... but I don't see defending your own base from the upper level as that valid. Defending the own base upper path, per se, should be OK, but you then need another player to do so on the lower level as well.
  • I still have the feeling that using the lower levels outer wall ring radius, and using that for the upper level's inner ring radius, i.e. upper level ring is concentric to the lower level ring... might be better. I.e. letting you actually jump down from the upper level to the lower one without falling into the pit. Idea behind this would be to integrate the whole lower area into the vertical fighting. Maybe applying my idea for an asymmetric 50% of the arenas upper floor might work well, to keep some cover for the lower level.
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j3st3r
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PostPosted: 09-17-2012 02:26 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Think there needs to be another lower path. Maybe that cuts thru the ra pillar?
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Pat Howard
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PostPosted: 09-25-2012 07:44 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


thanks for the feedback, AEon and j3st3r. i've updated the link with version five. i've decided to just cover the central fog pit with a grate. i feel it was making the top path too imba, because taking the low path meant risking falling in every time.

please let me know if you have any more suggestions. i am pretty much out of ideas for improving this layout and i think i might be ready to move on to the next stage.
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fKd
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PostPosted: 09-26-2012 09:54 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


everything looks in order, the mid jp's feel a bit floaty and i'd raise the ceilings on all the upper levels by about x2. apart from that it looks like its ready to get detailed. also, not sure about having a medkit in the bases.. but thats more something for the gameplay techs to discuss..
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roughrider
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PostPosted: 10-04-2012 05:10 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


SInce I'm a CTF kind of guy, I'll take a looksy and run around in it for a bit. Will come back with thoughts later ;)



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Pat Howard
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PostPosted: 10-05-2012 10:06 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


@pete, thanks :).

@roughrider, looking forward to it. i just put up an updated version which you might be interested in. i am trying to make the low route as fast as possible here and i've also shrunk the center area slightly. it's still alpha five since i can't say i've made any major changes. no worries if you comment on the older version.
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roughrider
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PostPosted: 10-06-2012 02:08 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


I grabbed the newer one and will add fresh thoughts after running around again.



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roughrider
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PostPosted: 10-06-2012 03:02 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


One thing I would strongly suggest doing, which AEon mentioned already, is in the central area where the gl's are located, that needs to have a step added there. Even though the outer edge has a lowered piece to it so the bots can go up, it still tends to be a stopper spot especially if someone is "on guard" in that area and then have to make a quick turn, that makes for a sure annoyance.
Attachment:
shot0068.jpg
shot0068.jpg [ 94.25 KB | Viewed 698 times ]


This next shot, it looks rather awkward to have that "piece" under the health ball. IMO, I think you need to remove all of those that you have under weapons and the various health balls and replace all the weapon location ones with the weapon markers. If you have 3wave maps then while in GTKRadiant, look in texures->ctf-> ctf_unified and you will see the weap_floor decals along with base logo floor and wall decals as well. I strongly suggest not putting anything under the health balls ;)
Attachment:
shot0069.jpg
shot0069.jpg [ 108.35 KB | Viewed 664 times ]


Here in this next shot, I don't know if this was intentional or not but, in the drop down holes you have in each base here, little "ledges" are on back part of that wall in the screeny where someone can hop over the hole and stand on those itty-bitty pieces and camp that.
Attachment:
shot0070.jpg
shot0070.jpg [ 179.43 KB | Viewed 746 times ]



Other notes:
The speed from base to base, regardless of which path you take (upper or lower), is relatively fast. Only hang-ups I noticed were the previously mentioned gl spots. The jp's in the central area seem ok to me but the jp's in the base close to the flag I recommend changing. I would remove those and drop in the jp decals, which you can also find in the ctf_unified textures.
When doing the decals, make them 1 or 2 units tall and put them 1 or 2 units above the floor so they look right. If you set them right on the floor, sometimes it tends to not show at all or you will get z-fighting.
There are a few other locations that could use some changes and I'll touch on them again in my next post, I want to run around a little bit more before I get into that.

Hope this helps ya some.



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Pat Howard
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PostPosted: 01-14-2014 09:30 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


got back to work on this :).



using phant's textures from windsong keep with permission.
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AEon
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PostPosted: 01-15-2014 12:20 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Makes the map look quite medieval... screenshot looks promising.
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Pat Howard
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PostPosted: 06-16-2014 11:52 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


BETA is finally up!

still to do:

-add some sounds
-touch up lighting & texture alignment
-refine performance
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fKd
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PostPosted: 06-18-2014 01:40 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


have you done a clipping pass yet? Also i found an overlapping brush, i'll put up a screenshot when i get home.
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Pat Howard
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PostPosted: 06-18-2014 04:48 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


yep, i have. but i am sure there are some spots i forgot about. thanks for taking a look.
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Pat Howard
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PostPosted: 07-01-2014 02:41 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


anyone know why i am seeing the q3a symbols on my flags on some computers but not others? (compare the flags in this shot to the ones in the very first shot of this thread.)
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PostPosted: 07-01-2014 08:21 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Try on a clean install
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sst13
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PostPosted: 07-02-2014 08:10 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Missing Q3 logo = missing shader



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deqer
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PostPosted: 07-03-2014 04:29 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


From the screenshots, it looks like there's just not enough color for the blue/red sides. The red flags and windows just isn't enough, for some people.

For me, simplicity is key, and I'd rather know what side I'm on or what side to travel to without directly looking for these things, but rather to simply know (by peripheral vision) where I am.

So, I think adding red/blue trim along the whole map would improve this.

Edit:
Thick, bright, lighted trim.

I see that you have some colored flooring, which helps; but those colors are too bland; so, a player might think those colors are just part of the overall castle theme, rather seeing those colors as a clear indication of what side(red/blue) they are on.
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Pat Howard
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PostPosted: 07-03-2014 08:35 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


thanks for feedback, everyone!

@deqer, this was one of my main issues with this map from an artistic standpoint. imo, lights of any kind really don't fit into the theme here. i tried a bunch of times to create red/blue trim textures that "fit in", but they always ended up clashing with the map's subdued colors.

between the torches, flags, stained glass, and fog pits, i think i have just enough color indicators for the average player. i will still look for more ways to work red/blue into the map though.
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Bacon
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PostPosted: 07-03-2014 02:07 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Great map! Fun as hell using CPM physics. You can capture the flag in < 5 seconds using only 2 plasma bolts + 1 rocket, making it easily doable with 100 health in a real game. 3.xxx is probably possible.



The only thing that looks odd to me is the skybox color. More of an orange/red sunset color would seem nice, but that's just personal opinion and nitpicking. Anything else (like map sounds) you already stated you have covered so nothing else I can really add.

Nice job :up:



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KittenIgnition
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PostPosted: 07-03-2014 04:01 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


It may be OK with a few crappy GBs in CPM, but the cpm.1 or vq3.1 gameplay is severely lacking: there are too many obstacles and sharp turns.
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fKd
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PostPosted: 07-03-2014 07:27 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote
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Pat Howard
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PostPosted: 07-04-2014 09:12 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


@fKd: wow, good eyes. thanks.

@KittenIgnition: sorry you didn't enjoy it, but everyone has different tastes in gameplay. better luck next time i guess.

@Bacon: :up: :up: awesome video!! thanks for posting.
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Bacon
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PostPosted: 07-04-2014 12:56 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


KittenIgnition wrote:
there are too many obstacles and sharp turns.


Heres vq3.1, seems fine to me :shrug:



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fKd
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PostPosted: 07-04-2014 01:53 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


id suggest being more aggressive with yourclipping pass, there are a lot of bits where you could smooth it out. apart from that its great map imo. good job man!
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KittenIgnition
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PostPosted: 07-04-2014 05:46 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


I just don't like how not fluid the movement is for such a small map. Personal preference, I'm sure the gameplay is fine for everyone else.
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Pat Howard
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PostPosted: 07-08-2014 08:52 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


@fKd: okay, will try. let me know if you have any specific trouble spots.

@KittenIgnition: thanks for your feedback. i will keep it in mind for future maps.

i have removed the snow pit from the center room and replaced it with a flat floor because i felt it was easier maneuver in the alpha when it was this way. i also tightened up the lower entrances into the center room, as they were in the alpha. finally, i added more red/blue colors and added sounds.

i will send this in to lvlworld for a review soon!
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deqer
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PostPosted: 07-09-2014 12:33 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Pat Howard wrote:
i will still look for more ways to work red/blue into the map though.

Cool. Did you look into maybe just putting in some colored omni lights everywhere on both sides? So that the castle walls have a red tint (faint) to them, or blue if on blue side.

Or does that go against your artistic standpoint.

I think gameplay overrules art, and making players look around for colored parts is not as user-friendly as if the entire area was colored and therefore a player doesn't need to look for colored parts.
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monaster
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PostPosted: 07-10-2014 08:46 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Pat's at it again! Nice. Welcome back, man.



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