Note to mappers: Power-ups, Weapons & Spawns

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spineblaZe

VFX Extraordinaire
Apr 8, 2003
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DISCLAIMER: The 4 suggestions below do not apply to all maps. Most of the maps are designed well enough ( :tup: ) that these suggustions become irrelevant. These suggestions are more for future maps like MoonCraters and Castles (two of my favorites :D) Number 4 is my favorite suggestion by far.


First off, I LOVE THIS MOD!! The gameplay is straight up UT2K4 DeathMatch :tup: (which I love), the maps are great, the concept is stellar and the HUD is absolutely orgasmic. :D
hump.gif


Back to my suggestions. Pub play is awesome, I always have fun online, fragging and breaking people out of jail. Part of the reason online play is so fun is because the teamwork isn't that great. Don't get me wrong, the lack of teamwork is a GOOD thing at this point. Everyone runs out, starts fragging and a good time is had by everyone. I love it.

But then I started thinking about competitive play... If two good teams played eachother, neither one would want to leave their base. I guarantee it. There would simply be no reason to. A good team would stay in their base, stick together and wipe out the other team as they entered. This is especially true in maps like MoonCraters and Castles.

Here is where the mappers responsibility comes in. Make damn sure both teams have a good reason to leave their base. This means minimal health and weapons in the base. Here are a couple key points to make sure people leave their base and action stays constant.

1. No Shields. Absolutely no shields in the base. None. 0. Zilch. Neither 100's or 50's should be available in your base. You want shields, you should have to go get some.

2. No Keg O'Health. Health paks and a few vials are ok. However, keep the keg out of the base.

3. No Lightning Gun and Shock Rifle. Do not put either of these weapons in the base. I cannot stress this enough. They are arguably the most powerful and useful weapons in the game. If you want one, you should have to go out and get it.
- IMO, Link, Bio and Flak are good weapons to have in the base. They are good enough and versatile enough to get you going. Use your best judgement. :)

4. Spawn Points. Mix it up. At the start of the map, don't be afraid to spawn people all over the map. Who said all the spawn points have to be in your base? Make sure to keep 3 or 4 spawns in the base, but spread the rest out. Put some in the middle of the map, and even put some red and blue spawns by eachother. This will start the fighting immediately, and give your team more incentive to leave their base and come to the aid or rescue of their teammates.


I talked to a lot of different people in a few different clans about this, and they all agree on these points. I really feel that these suggestions will help encourage aggressive play.

Keep up the awesome work, and good luck with MSU!!!! :rockon:
 

Birelli

meh...
Oct 14, 2001
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Those are interesting suggestions for clan play, but frankly I think actually releasing maps that way would be very detrimental to the mod. Putting player starts across the map means newbs will get pounded on before they have a chance to orient themselves, that's discouraging and drives new players away. Not putting power-ups in base is a good idea, but again sometimes it's hard on newer players who especially on larger maps have a hard time crossing the map. Giving them a fighting chance with power-ups makes the game more entertaining.

Now, it could be said that we should then release "tournament" or "clanplay" maps that are designed in these ways. But, IMHO it's worth noting that none of these potential problems occured when we actually had a clan tournament (the JBIII tournament). Sure that didn't attract big-name clans or anything, but there were solid well-thought-out strategies employed. In many maps the advantage is with the attacker, this may not seem to be true but think of it this way, in a fairly large map the "defense" tends to be pretty spread out, you don't all clump together to defend, because people get in each others way, defense needs space to work correctly. A well-organized squad of attackers, however, can easily work in a "pack", because you're moving constantly, so you don't get in each others' way quite so much, this is especially true of attackers who have frequently worked together before (i.e. clanmates). Attackers then can "sweep" the defense, working through them one-by-one as they overwhelm each defender. Sure, this may not happen every time and certainly not in every map, but by and large I think we (TEZC) found at least that the best strategy was to have a strong offense with a few dedicated base defenders, and we won the tournament, so I think it worked well for us. We did come up against the "turtle" strategy several times and I think by and large one guy "puncturing" through and getting to the switch just once pretty much spelled disaster for the other team as they became quickly outnumbered once that happened.

Now, that having been said putting high-value weapons like the shock rifle and rocket launcher, as well as the high-level power-ups in the middle of the map is still a great idea across-the-board. Mappers should definitely do that, and above all every mapper should at least consider these issues, since in JB they are way more important than in any other gametype.
 
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SON|C

New Member
Jun 1, 2004
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#4 does seem good, but tbh not really that useful. the idea behind it is good, but for people who dont preload skin (i.e. me) when i join a map, it takes around 10 seconds for my movement to be smooth. Within this ten second period i would have been wiped out by the enemy. >:/

this however could be a good idea when a team has just been captured and the map is fully loaded for everyone! :)

BUT, noobs again.... what if just by chance they always get spawned in that area and get caned everytime :( be a real let down for the team tbh... noobs are better next to the switch when they can spam there way through enemies using the flak.

Just my opinion anyway >:/
 

spineblaZe

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Apr 8, 2003
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Roger that Birelli :tup:


There are no flags to steal or power cores to destroy, so you have to make sure there are reasons to leave the base and fight. Better weapons and shields are a good incentive.

Of course, once people start getting captured, you have a very good reason to attack... Jailbreak!!! :D


Keep up the good work guys, cheers.
beer.gif
 

Wiz

The elite cheese master
Mar 22, 2000
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I disagree with mumber 4. I usally have all my spawn points in one place (so that in lan games you can quickly and efficiently get started and stuff).

i think the biggest one though is the weapons. most of my maps hav a redemeer or something in the middle, you camp in your base whil the enemy gets redemeers and your in trouble
 

Half_Lunatic

Other Half Not There
Jun 24, 2002
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I don't like 4 for the reason already stated. A lot of us take time to get oriented when we load a map. A lot of times I spawn dead in my own base cuz of this. The others I agree with and will pay attention to in my own work. Making players leave to base for what they want is nice. I wouldn't mine having a Sniper Rifle in the base. Just don't provide any additional ammo from within it.
 

_Dark_Rusty_

to protect & severe
take this as an unintelligable comment- flak, link, rocket best weapons ev. ev! lightning- easy not best

[edit]- on a slightly more serious not, point 2 I think it was about the big keg o health, good point, but I think thats pretty much commen sense, you'd have to be the maker of ctf-andaction or ctf-stairwaytoheaven to do something like that in a jb map.
 
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Salvatore

TLSC guy - DarkMessenger-TLSC
Aug 25, 2004
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You don't consider the LG the best weapon in the game? Granted, if you can't use it well, like me, it is useless, but some people have the innate ability to score headshots from any range, and with a LG, headshot=instagib.
 

The_Head

JB Mapper
Jul 3, 2004
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Salvatore said:
You don't consider the LG the best weapon in the game? Granted, if you can't use it well, like me, it is useless, but some people have the innate ability to score headshots from any range, and with a LG, headshot=instagib.
I play alot of instagib so I am pretty good with a Lightning gun but IMO it still will never match the versitility of a Flak Cannon.
 

Kantham

Fool.
Sep 17, 2004
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spineblaZe said:
4. Spawn Points. Mix it up. At the start of the map, don't be afraid to spawn people all over the map. Who said all the spawn points have to be in your base? Make sure to keep 3 or 4 spawns in the base, but spread the rest out. Put some in the middle of the map, and even put some red and blue spawns by eachother. This will start the fighting immediately, and give your team more incentive to leave their base and come to the aid or rescue of their teammates.

not bad , but not for JB-Bio Vegetal , this map is 3on3 max (tiny map)
 

tarquin

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Oct 11, 2000
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spineblaZe said:
Make damn sure both teams have a good reason to leave their base.

That's actually a piece of JB mapping advice that dates way back to the days of UT Jailbreak 205 and maybe even earlier... but worth repeating! Nice post, spineblaZe :)
 

Spudsy

Unreal Tournament Junkie
Feb 16, 2005
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I don't totally disagree with number 4, and I do think it is an interesting idea. I could fully agrue agaisnt numbers 1 and 3 however.
 

G.Lecter

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Dec 31, 2004
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From my point of view it all depends of each JB map: :rolleyes:
1. Shields: If the map is easy to attack, having a shield for defenders is not a bad idea, if the map is easy to defend with shilelds in the bases the match probably will finish too early...
2. KegHealth: If the map is small... mmmm... no. If the map is big, no problem.
3. Weapons: Defending the switches must be possible, so having a powerful weapon in the bases might be a good idea. However, it all depends on the difficulty you want to give the map.
4. Spread starts: It's OK for fun, but all the playerstarts should be in a room where you can choose different paths to attack. There is no better room than the base for that...

Could someone write a few ideas about vehicle and jails placement in VJB maps? ;)