43 replies to this topic

[Boggratt]

CG Oglethorpe Kerensky, on 23 March 2013 - 08:21 AM, said:

I like the map

But please put in a night version of it where it is cold and dark.

I agree on both counts.

Deserts can be very cold at night the temperature variation between day and night would make an interesting contrast.

[Wintersdark]

*********, on 23 March 2013 - 09:00 AM, said:

Im pretty sure they said it is in a two star solar system so its unlikely that it will even have a night time on this planet.

In a binary star system, the two stars orbit each other, and the planets orbit the two stars. This can result in a longer day time (and of course it's possible that a given area of the planet may be in perpetual daylight due to a bizarre rotation) but you're not going to have the planet moving between the two stars (sun on both sides simultaneously) like I believe you're expecting.

[slash b slash]

With Tourmaline Desert they outdid themselves. Sadly it's so good all the other maps pale in comparison.

[jper4]

Smeghead87, on 23 March 2013 - 02:12 AM, said:

I liked it at first but I get it almost every time I drop, and when I don't I get alpine. I've forgotten what river city looks like, did they take it out of the rotation?

i believe i saw something on one of the sticky threads somewhere(the desert feedback one maybe? i hop around a lot on the forums...) that they tweaked the numbers slightly to have the newest maps pop up a bit more than they did pre-patch. i do know i have 27 drops in the desert now (most of any map) and i still haven;t broken 20 on alpine yet.

as for tourmaline itself- it's becoming my favorite, lots of paths to take, new twist on cover (mechs on one side of the slope can slimb to the top and fire down, but do to the angle the ones under the overhang can;t so no charging up the hill from both directions). yeah the main brawl tends to be around the theta cap point (if on conquest) but flanking is much more a factor in the matches i've been in. stymied by the snipers of doom set up along one ridgeline? then backtrack and flank around behind them under cover. plus all those one mech wide paths between the crystal ridges that aren't marked on the map as paths that you can sneak through to surprise the other side.

just finished one match where the enemy snipers were all set up along one line near theta and we were down 0-2 pretty quick, we managed to sprint (well "sprint" seeing how we were jagers and caraphrats) behind a ridgeline, went around it and started back and forth firing from closer range forcing them to leave their sniper' nests and come down after us. in the brawl our light snuck past it all and we ended up scraping out a cap win just as the other side got into firing range (our base was under 20% too) of our light in a 4-7 match that went a decent amount of time (8-9 minutes or so?). but the fight had pretty much three separate brawl areas (ok 2 brawls and 1 snipe) by the time it ended.

[Khanublikhan]

It really is an excellent map. Well done to all involved in making it, testing it and releasing it.

*Oliver voice* Please sir... can I have some more...?

[Der BruzZzler von Wiesndoof]

I love this Map. A 150 kp/h SDR with nine or more JJ's is pure fun on Tourmaline Desert! *wheeeee*

[Helsbane]

Smeghead87, on 23 March 2013 - 02:12 AM, said:

I liked it at first but I get it almost every time I drop, and when I don't I get alpine. I've forgotten what river city looks like, did they take it out of the rotation?

I would pay good money to forget what River City looks like....

[CarnifexMaximus]

I'm inclined to say yes. I need to play it more. It totally brings back the mw2:mercs crystal desert contract vibe. Gameplay is solid. Nothing quite beats climbing one of those tourmaline spires and dumping a ton of UAC/5 ammo into some unsuspecting bystander.

I will always like forest colony. The gameplay is lots of fun, it's rather well designed. It's terrible with the whole immersion factor though. I might as well go camping in the Sierra Nevadas.

Edited by CarnifexMaximus, 23 March 2013 - 10:12 AM.

[Shiro Matsumoto]

/agree, its Great!

Edith Says: Its on an asteroid.. can we get a steller night version too, when the Asteroid rotates?

Edited by John McFianna, 23 March 2013 - 10:52 AM.

[Wintersdark]

Gotta say, I've never wanted a Spider before, but since playing this map... Yeah. I think I need to buy me a Spider.

[engl]

Looks like iam the only one who doesnt like it. Not because the map is horrible or badly designed, but because it seems to be made for 40 players instead of 16.
The first 3 minutes of the map are wasted with walking to your opponent, wich (in my opinion) cant be great gameplay in any sense or scale. But i had the same issues with alpine, so maybe im the instand action kid, who simply doesnt like that waity gameplay.

[Khanublikhan]

Winterdark, you will like playing a Spider mech on Tourmaline. It is an ideal map for a scout to learn his role. It is big, so a Spider mech's speed is a plus. A Spider mech has good jump jets, so you can take advantage of the nicely done elevation changes incorporated into the map.

This is part of what makes the map so good. It allows a scout / light mechs to shine as a spotter (in a non-combative role).

I have played this map numerous times piloting a Spider mech. I may have lost the match and not gained any kills, but I gained lots of spotting XP and was the last to die on several occasions.

engl, on 23 March 2013 - 11:19 AM, said:

Looks like iam the only one who doesnt like it. Not because the map is horrible or badly designed, but because it seems to be made for 40 players instead of 16.
The first 3 minutes of the map are wasted with walking to your opponent, wich (in my opinion) cant be great gameplay in any sense or scale. But i had the same issues with alpine, so maybe im the instand action kid, who simply doesnt like that waity gameplay.

engl, I sympathise with what you are saying. For heavy and assault mechs with a slower top speed it can take a long time to traverse the map. Hopefully MASC will be implimented into the game sooner rather than later which will give a short boost to speeds.

[xxx WreckinBallRaj xxx]

I agree it is the best, with Alpine being second best. Maps are suppose to be large and feel like an actual environment. They are not suppose to be tiny boxing arenas, especially if we aren't even getting TDM. These other maps need to be restricted to Assault/TDM while Conquest goes to these bigger ones.

I especially hate Frozen City and River City since buildings aren't destructible like they should be. Forest Colony I hate due to its design, although not as much as Frozen City. The only original map I liked was Caustic, although it too is too small. It's basically just a pile up at the creator until one side loses. But I wish ALL the original maps would get enlarged, at least for Conquest.

[engl]

Khanublikhan, on 23 March 2013 - 11:25 AM, said:

engl, I sympathise with what you are saying. For heavy and assault mechs with a slower top speed it can take a long time to traverse the map. Hopefully MASC will be implimented into the game sooner rather than later which will give a short boost to speeds.

I play only medium mechs. But there is no sense in leaving the heavys and assaults behind to scout, if the heavys and assaults cant shoot those scouted anyway. So i stay with the group and wait.

Edited by engl, 23 March 2013 - 11:38 AM.

[Swiftstrike]

Props to the team who designed this map! I love that the battlefield is litered with mechs who have been blasted asunder and that the rolling terrain leads to a variety of interesting engagements.

[ShadowDarter]

Boggratt, on 23 March 2013 - 09:22 AM, said:

I agree on both counts.

Deserts can be very cold at night the temperature variation between day and night would make an interesting contrast.

This map is on a planet in a binary star system, the sun never sets on this map supposedly, or if it dose its more like a brief sunset/sunrise and then full on sunshine again.

[Blue Frog]

I like the map. Perhaps if they added sandstorms, kind of like the snowstorms on Frozen City. Not sure if it was mentioned earlier...

[Teralitha]

Victor Morson, on 23 March 2013 - 01:40 AM, said:

The only downside I've found with this map is that, well, it makes the other maps feel dated by comparison. Recently PGI has really stepped up giving us the kind of terrain that we've wanted - bigger, open environments with rolling cover and all kinds of hillsides with Alpine. Then, they went and bumped it up another notch with Tourmaline Desert. It hits my check box of everything that makes a great MechWarrior map:

[x] Lots of rolling hills and cover
[x] A unique aspect to make it memorable, but not so unique it doesn't represent multiple worlds
[x] A large size to allow team maneuvering and hide & seek/hit & run
[x] Largely unrestricted or "path" movement: You can easily maneuver up the hills
[x] An alien twist on a typical Earth environment

When I first saw screenshots of the map I had assumed huge parts would be impassable to force 'pathways.' Being able to run up those jagged spires and jump jet off of them at will has resulted in some of the most epic escapes this game has seen so far (and even midair fire exchanges). It's really exceeded my expectations.

Getting the earlier maps with their smaller, more "pathway" feel, feels like a sharp contrast by comparison.

Anyway, keep it up! These are the kinds of maps I and I think many others have wanted since day 1.

OMG I agree with Victor Morson yet again.... Is the world coming to an end? (commits seppuko)

Edited by Teralitha, 25 March 2013 - 08:16 AM.

[Dennis de Koning]

Glad (most of) you all like this map.
We all busted a nut over this one and appreciate the positive feedback.

DdK

[EvilCow]

Best map so far, it allows for a variety of tactics and there is not a "preferred place" for fights. Very beautiful visuals too. The risk of being capped usually makes teams not very aggressive however.