84 replies to this topic

[Ralgas]

It's all player midset over design. Defense in the south around the base area is very doable and quite "battle of hoth" esqe if you can get players to engauge in it. The problem is player mindset of "this is the only way that works" which simply isn't true.

[Dauntless Blint]

What would happen if you took one of the biggest maps made it almost completely flat then populated it with trees/patches of forest,that would be awesome sauce stalking the enemy,edging forward gingerly trying to spot them before they spot you,Targets dashing across a patch of ground with no canopy or cover only to be lost in the trees again.

[MauttyKoray]

KraftySOT, on 21 February 2015 - 11:07 AM, said:

I can totally understand that, Alpine is one of the more hated maps. Maybe it and Mordor are the least popular maps.

Though I hope that doesnt prevent other large maps from being made at some point.

Theres literally only two reasons Alpine is bad. One is the same problem thats in Boreal Vaults. The other is frankly, the mountain.

When you give a piece of terrain like that, when theres mechs that cant shoot up or down very well, youre going to have a piece of terrain that YOU HAVE TO BE AT, if you want to do well on the map.

Thats the main issue. That one piece of terrain. The other minor issue is as mentioned the same with Boreal. The lines of sight in many places, are just too damn high. Berms. You need more rolling hills. Berms that you can hide behind that are just as tall as the mech, without some huge piece of terrain that can see over them.

Those two issues, thats all you gotta avoid for large maps. We the player base would still like to see some large maps. Tourmaline is pretty big and you have alot of the fights taking place at different places, scouting actually makes a difference, its a pretty good experience. What makes that map work is that without JJs you cant get up onto the really high spots on the map, and theres deep valleys with berm walls, to allow you to get where you need to go without being shot, however, you can always crest the hills, its not so steep as to FORCE you into the valley.

Id hate to think we'll not see another large map because the head designer is gun shy after one of the first maps that MWO had. Alpine is bad, no one is disputing that, but its clearly because of lack of experience.

Two years later, I have faith that he can make a large map, without the two problems Alpine has.

1. As you said, the big, center hill. Just like Caustic and Terra, large centered terrain is BAD and makes the game revolve around that one part of the map.

2. The other problem being that its basically COMPLETELY open.
-evergreen trees that are solid like the ones in Viridian Bog would create good barriers and flanking cover. A good 1-3 forests around the map and some trees scattered about would make the map SIGNIFICANTLY better. Then the Volcano and Caustic can take their place as the worst 2 maps in the game again.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Ralgas, on 21 February 2015 - 04:00 PM, said:

It's all player midset over design. Defense in the south around the base area is very doable and quite "battle of hoth" esqe if you can get players to engauge in it. The problem is player mindset of "this is the only way that works" which simply isn't true.

Player mindset can be heavily influenced by map design. If that mountain feature or the center of Terra Therma were non-existent and replaced with terrain like the southern side of Alpine or everywhere else on Terra Therma, these maps would be great and the problem would nowhere near as bad.

[C E Dwyer]

12v 12 needs larger maps period

what they don';t need is one obvious feature that everyone will see as the only place to be, or chanels of advance, the maps need to be designed so that the people that are able to think outside the box do better than those that can't

[KraftySOT]

WM Quicksilver, on 21 February 2015 - 04:10 PM, said:

Player mindset can be heavily influenced by map design. If that mountain feature or the center of Terra Therma were non-existent and replaced with terrain like the southern side of Alpine or everywhere else on Terra Therma, these maps would be great and the problem would nowhere near as bad.

Exactly.

Thats a super easy lesson to take away from these maps for the designers. Dont repeat that mistake, and you dont have to be as gun shy about making larger maps. Tourmaline is great. You can take that, make it a little larger, and do what Viridian bog has for cover and concealment, and youve got a winner. Bonus points if it can have all the angles of fire that Hellbore has.

[KuroNyra]

We really should need to talk in live to the guy. And not just by forums. But REALLY talk with him.
A small group of guy explaining the situation to him and explain him what work and doesn't work for us.

Generally, it's the customers who know what can be the best for a map.

[Insects]

Just squash the hill and its like a new map.
People will find a new goto location.

Its nothing to do with map size. Make alpine small to just cover the area of the mountain and it will be exactly the same.

You need to keep maps fresh and respond to feedback by changing problem locations.
Add more maps and there is less frustration about getting the same disliked one over and over again.

[MauttyKoray]

joelmuzz, on 21 February 2015 - 04:54 PM, said:

Just squash the hill and its like a new map.
People will find a new goto location.

Its nothing to do with map size. Make alpine small to just cover the area of the mountain and it will be exactly the same.

You need to keep maps fresh and respond to feedback by changing problem locations.
Add more maps and there is less frustration about getting the same disliked one over and over again.

The hill at 3/4 its current height even would make the map much different (that hill on the east side would become a viable counter-sniper spot and is a pain to get up to anyways with limited viewing angle. I'm actually very in favor of a shorter center hill.

[Astrocanis]

KraftySOT, on 21 February 2015 - 11:07 AM, said:

I can totally understand that, Alpine is one of the more hated maps. Maybe it and Mordor are the least popular maps.

Though I hope that doesnt prevent other large maps from being made at some point.

Theres literally only two reasons Alpine is bad. One is the same problem thats in Boreal Vaults. The other is frankly, the mountain.

When you give a piece of terrain like that, when theres mechs that cant shoot up or down very well, youre going to have a piece of terrain that YOU HAVE TO BE AT, if you want to do well on the map.

Thats the main issue. That one piece of terrain. The other minor issue is as mentioned the same with Boreal. The lines of sight in many places, are just too damn high. Berms. You need more rolling hills. Berms that you can hide behind that are just as tall as the mech, without some huge piece of terrain that can see over them.

Those two issues, thats all you gotta avoid for large maps. We the player base would still like to see some large maps. Tourmaline is pretty big and you have alot of the fights taking place at different places, scouting actually makes a difference, its a pretty good experience. What makes that map work is that without JJs you cant get up onto the really high spots on the map, and theres deep valleys with berm walls, to allow you to get where you need to go without being shot, however, you can always crest the hills, its not so steep as to FORCE you into the valley.

Id hate to think we'll not see another large map because the head designer is gun shy after one of the first maps that MWO had. Alpine is bad, no one is disputing that, but its clearly because of lack of experience.

Two years later, I have faith that he can make a large map, without the two problems Alpine has.

Regarding Alpine I disagree almost completely. The reason the summit and the bowl seem so important is because of habit, not because of any real tactical advantage it endows. Fact is, it's a bad place to make a stand against any team that doesn't do a full on frontal.

There are many good places to either defend or attack from, but the pug obsession with running to the summit usually wins. If the center of ops is the bowl, the summit is important. Tactically it confers very few advantages - but most pugs are habituated to running for it.

My least favorite map is the bog. If I never saw it again, I'd be a happy camper.

[Dirk Le Daring]

Alpine is a great map. The problem is that players consistently do the same thing over and over again.

There is very little variation in player behaviour when it comes to tactical variety.

This is the real problem.

[Fooooo]

Astrocanis, on 21 February 2015 - 07:09 PM, said:

Regarding Alpine I disagree almost completely. The reason the summit and the bowl seem so important is because of habit, not because of any real tactical advantage it endows. Fact is, it's a bad place to make a stand against any team that doesn't do a full on frontal.

There are many good places to either defend or attack from, but the pug obsession with running to the summit usually wins. If the center of ops is the bowl, the summit is important. Tactically it confers very few advantages - but most pugs are habituated to running for it.

My least favorite map is the bog. If I never saw it again, I'd be a happy camper.

Well, it does have access to viewing most of the approaches.

You can see the entire south approach and the only way for them to come up if they go that way is to come all the way around and climb the hill, or goto the hill behind.

You can see the middle of the map and see if anyone is going north approach.

You basically get ample time to counter whatever the other side is doing if you do it right. (conquest not so much)


I guess what I'd like to see on alpine is trees. Cover it with snow covered fir's or whatever they are

Also adjust that hill and most of the map terrain really. ...cut a few valley/canyons through the hills, maybe add a few tunnels that climb up and exit near the top of some of the hills etc etc......


The post about ridges and whatnot I also like, similar to how tourma is in a way.

Lots of bits to cover your movement etc. I don't really think there should be any 1 spot that can see most of the map on any map. (that is easily accessable by all mechs anyway)

Force limited sight lines and people should have to move a lot more.

I guess canyon is sort of like that but its not really the best example of what I mean....

[Kain Demos]

CorditeJunkie, on 21 February 2015 - 03:58 PM, said:

You can negate the mountain on alpine by refusing to fight over it,and instead move to west side of the map,but pugs will never do that because it involves thinking outside the square and proceed with the normal brain dead death march.

Yeah in the group queue we have a tactic we like to use that involves a completely different area of the map and the opposition always ******* and moans that we will not come to the mountain.

[Destructicus]

It's terrible to see whiners hated the concept to death.
Considering large maps would make this feel more like a Mechwarrior game instead of Call of Gundam: Modern Heatscale

The biggest thing is that maps can't be designed for mechs, they need to be made with real world scale in mind.
We need stuff to remind us that we're not in a mech playground, we're just mere men in giant machines.
A couple of destroyed tanks here and there would do wonders.
Viridian Bog just stumps me, there's nothing there that has any kind of significance, just dinosaur bones and mech high grass, which doesn't give us any sense of how big 'x' plant and 'y' dinosaur really is.
I feel like I'm just wading through an episode of Swamp people, not using my giant warmachine to navigate a giant swamp.

I would love maps on par with Mechwarrior 4s maps, huge wide open areas where buildings weren't built with the sole purpose of just being mech cover.

Edited by Destructicus, 21 February 2015 - 08:04 PM.

[Anjian]

The problem of maps in this game, and especially in this game is that the map designer thinks its a good idea to funnel players into chokepoints killing points, like FPS games. For me that is just seriously bad map design philosophy.

It breeds these ills ---

1. Much of the map's resources becomes unused, Combat concentrates only in a few selected areas, creating the impression of a much smaller map. Those sectors becomes overused.

2. There is a lack of strategy in the game. Repeated strategy is not strategy at all. Players will have the same opening move, go to the same places, camp and snipe at these points. It does not promugate mobility, flanking manuevers, and defeats the purpose of scouting and reconnaissance.

A good map should do the following:

1. Force players to maximize all map resources in seach of a working but varied strategy.
2. Encourage players with a variety of opening moves that have equal chances of winning.

The whole intention is to achieve optimum playing repeatability of each map. Think of the map like the chess map grid, a classic game where you only need one map yet execute an immense variety of equal strategies.


I think Alpine is one of the better maps out there, back in the old days when everyone spawns on the same spot. It got worst --- heck all the maps got worst in MWO when lances are made to spawn in different places.

When players spawn in one place, the tendency for the opening game discussion is deciding where do you want to go, left, right, which sector. When you have random lance spawning, the opening game move is always "rejoin". Then teams spend a good amount of time resources trying to rejoin, time spent that could have been saved if everyone just spawned in one spot, which by then would be actually executing a real team strategy other than "group up".

What's make the MWO maps even worst is the constant feet stuck and bad environmental hitboxes that gets in the way of mechs with low slung arms. In other words, these maps punishes those mechs just because of the mech's artwork. And for what? The hllly terrain topography and textures look unrealistic, like paper mache draped over wire frame then someone painted a ground texture on it. Design an environment that best hides your game engine's faults, not emphasize them. A good example of HPG Manifold, it hides those faults, does not have as much failure in environmental hitboxes, and encourages different attack vectors --- exploiting the random location lance spawn without need for a constant opening "regroup".

Edited by Anjian, 21 February 2015 - 08:23 PM.

[Mystere]

Yokaiko, on 21 February 2015 - 11:16 AM, said:

Just make alpine so you can't climb victory hill it gets much more interesting.

That place you call "victory hill" is my "killing field", even without me ever going up there.

I think the people who hate that map the most are the very same ones who exclusively bring big and slow fatties -- the "bigger is always better" group.

Edited by Mystere, 21 February 2015 - 08:31 PM.

[Insects]

Perhaps one solution is to add randomized Hot Zones to maps.

What this means is that a marker is randomly placed in some position on the map, fighting within a certain range (either being within yourself or target within) grants 10% bonus rewards. 200m radius or so, perhaps sized in proportion to the map.
Result is that we get battles happening in uncommon dynamic locations.

Now nobody would be forced to head to the Hot Zone. But there is a reward for doing so, which means PUG matches at least will tend to gravitate to that point, a few players at least will always want to go there.
PUG matches need a rally point that's why each map has its landmark or middle where everyone automatically heads every single game. Try and get PUGs to head to an uncommon location and team fragments to be 0-12 stomped.
Add a random rally point and that will take the place of the landmark. The unspoken group destination.

[LordKnightFandragon]

Mystere, on 21 February 2015 - 08:27 PM, said:

That place you call "victory hill" is my "killing field", even without me ever going up there.

I think the people who hate that map the most are the very same ones who exclusively bring big and slow fatties -- the "bigger is always better" group.

If there is any single thing I dont like about Alpine, its the lack of cover from LRM boats.... Those hills and stuff are just shallow enough that you cant get away from LRMs....

[Zordicron]

Malleus011, on 21 February 2015 - 11:20 AM, said:

I like Alpine a lot, because your 'mechs engine actually matters as much as your weapons, and opportunities for long-range combat exist.

It's the single map we have that feels (in some areas) to be more realistic terrain. Yes, long-range fights are possible, but you can maneuver, reposition, or use superior strategic speed to create a tactical advantage.

In short, it's got deeper gameplay than tiny maps like River City or Forest Colony, which get pretty old after a while.

I think Alpine needs the most help with variety in spawn points - it's a HUGE map, try spawning the teams in a LOT more spots, so more of it gets used.

Yes, the mountain is a dominating terrain feature, but changing up the spawns could reduce it's dominance on the map.

Pity we can't get more maps the size of Alpine, with a variety of spawn points and combat options, instead of being funneled down the same three canyons or jammed onto tiny maps.

Nope. they moved the spawn points, two times now if memory serves.

it is time to just take and make the backside completely unclimbable, and the front needs an avalanche put in so you can't see down the back side to shoot. That makes it only approach from the long slope side, and all it is is a dead end, albeit elevated.

Suddenly, people will have to go some place else, and the map has a lot of some place else.

For the life of me, I can not understand why they dont have one spawn at radio tower, and the other in the deep southern hills. Those hills, if you have never had a bit of a skirmish there, are REALLY fun terrain to fight in. Hills high enough to block LRM, speedy mechs can ditch slower ones going over the top and around, long valley fire lanes, yet easily traversed without putting to much out there to get shot to peices if you use the hills.

Even the original radio tower king of the mountain game had flanking possible and other tactics base on your team make up to keep every match from being the same.


If PGI would simply read some feedback ideas and spend a day or two adjusting things, or hell a week even if need be, the older maps like Alpine and Mordor could come alive.

[Insects]

Mystere, on 21 February 2015 - 08:27 PM, said:

That place you call "victory hill" is my "killing field", even without me ever going up there.

I think the people who hate that map the most are the very same ones who exclusively bring big and slow fatties -- the "bigger is always better" group.

Yeah I agree I do very well there on either attack or defence of Derp Mountain with a fast light.
You have the mobility to circle the hill and flank, run up the steep side and backstot someone and they get angry and chase you back down, where the wolf pack consumes them.

Can understand how frustrating it is for a brawler assault though.