- How to build a TF2 map Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wO9lNXcE3Tw&feature=related
- PHA4T3's How to Make Maps for TF2 Tutorials (Playlist): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQeqVSrAsf0&playnext=1&list=PL05E839C5D915EEBD&index=4
Below you can find some hints that Ubercharge.net talks about how to create a good map here (http://www.ubercharged.net/2008/11/14/tf2-design-theory-what-makes-a-good-map/).
TF2 Design Theory: What makes a good map?
Not all maps are created equal. Even among the high-quality Valve maps, there are winners, like Dustbowl, and there are absolute failures, like 2fort.
Something sets the best maps apart from the mundane, and it isn’t the blessing of the Almighty Train God, either.
It’s teamwork. Teamwork is undoubtedly the most important aspect of good maps. Let me repeat: it’s all about encouraging teamwork.
A map that encourages teamwork ensures that all (or most) classes can contribute wholly to the team’s offense or defense. This is the biggest shortcoming of symmetrical CTF and CP maps. If a team has to simultaneously worry about attacking and defending, the team splits: the engineers hole up in their bases building impenetrable sentry nests while the rest of the team blindly rushes the other side. Rather than focusing its entire manpower on pushing forward, the team needs to leave a few people behind to defend against the threat of a single scout or spy far behind their lines. The very idea of the game being called Team Fortress 2 fails.
Let me qualify – there are excellent symmetrical maps out there, and there are terrible attack/defend maps, too. I’m only drawing attention to the fact that symmetrical maps require a team to split offensive and defensive responsibilities – as a result, an entire team cannot be involved in an offensive push, even if the team is winning.
Assault maps, however, avoid that problem entirely by ensuring that all players on a team are focused solely on either offense or defense. The remainder of this post will focus on assault map theory, but most of what I’m writing can be applied to symmetrical maps as well.
Teamwork in assault maps
The best fun maps tend to emphasize teamwork. Generally, this means creating a challenge formidable enough that an entire team must work together to win. This helps discourage deathmatch players – solo players rarely stand a chance against an entire team.
CASE STUDY: Gravelpit B
Let’s admit that Gravelpit doesn’t have the greatest rapport with players, and the statistics show that it isn’t even being played the way it was intended. Most defensive teams abandon point A, focusing on an strong defense at point B. It may just be because of this attitude that Gravelpit has a 55% win rate for BLU. Who knows.
Nevertheless, Gravelpit is one of the most perfectly designed maps I’ve ever played. It’s probably the only fun official map that represents each class perfectly; it’s also very well balanced.
Capture point B can be attacked from between 2 and 3 sides: the attackers can attack from behind using the C route and through the two main routes from the spawn. It’s more or less open – making it good for snipers, soldiers, and scouts; but it has only small healthpacks (pyros and medics thus carry a lot of weight here). There are enough dark and/or out of the way places for spies to (de)cloak and disguise, especially under the ramp at the C connecting tunnel. Heavies are very effective here, because there are enough short-to-medium-range firefights that occur here. Finally, the roof is accessible to only scouts, soldiers and demomen; however, the lack of health packs up there make them rather vulnerable. The windows of the building allow demomen to make a good effort to destroy the inevitable sentries inside.
Thus, every single class is well represented here. Moving on to teamwork – offensive pushes here need support. Standing out in the open areas of this zone is signing a death sentence unless one is well-supported by the rest of the team (snipers will have their dots trained on you, sentries will be targeting you, and let’s not forget the pyros that will inevitably show up to ruin your sentry-clearance operation).
B is protected against solocaps by a very long control point timing. In addition, the long control point timing means that the players inside the building capturing the point need to be able to stage a quick defense (hold the point) against a RED onslaught. When inside the building, attack can come from anywhere – even from above! Capturing Gravelpit B is a difficult ordeal, requiring almost complete control of the entire B zone. Clearly, only a determined team effort (or a terrible defense by a RED team that, admittedly, does not have much teamwork) can allow BLU to win this capture point.
Alternate routes
Of course, encouraging teamwork isn’t everything; in addition, teamwork is also a very intangible quality. As a result, let’s move to a more concrete level. Another common feature between all of the best maps: the presence of alternate routes.This theoretically should decrease frustration for both teams. It also allows scouts and spies to be much more effective, by giving them different routes to sneak behind enemy lines with. Finally, it allows a team the element of surprise: attacking through unexpected and undefended routes can be crippling to a poor defense.
No one is safe
To prevent the defense from entrenching themselves too deeply, it is essential that the defense is vulnerable at all times. This goes without saying, obviously, but unless someone is in the spawn, they should never be safe – if they are at a place inaccessible to the other team / other classes, but where they can still attack the enemy, there should be no cover. Essentially, the layout of a map must keep everyone wary of their surroundings.
CASE STUDY: Goldrush, Final Stage
OK, I admit it. Goldrush has nothing on Gravelpit in terms of game balance and equal class representation – RED wins this map almost 80% of the time, after all. At the same time, it’s one ridiculously fun map. I’ve almost certainly spent more time on Goldrush than any other map.
Goldrush, despite its shortcomings, is great for teamwork, because that’s essentially the only way for BLU to win. Based on my experience, it takes more than a heroic team effort from BLU to win the notoriously lopsided first stage.
RANDOM: Ribozyme – now that’s a nerdy, yet classy name. Bio nerds like me rejoice.
But, anyway, let’s skip over to the final capture point. Firstly, the green circle denotes an alternate route. Sadly, hardly anyone actually ends up using this route offensively, despite the fact that a strong offensive push there can absolutely destroy defense. Nevertheless – it provides a fantastic way for spies to slip past the inevitable rocket/grenade/bullet spam clogging the main cart route. Also, it provides a great place for offensive engineers to build forward bases. Trust me on this one, it’s a killer tactic for the last stage – setting up a strong offensive base in that area and maintaining it will increase the BLU team’s chances of winning tenfold.
Having no direct connection to the ground, BLU would definitely find it hard to get up to the sniper deck, and the narrow path into the last zone gives BLU snipers a very narrow view of the deck. However, snipers are far from invulnerable here. The discrete pile of rubble (circled in red) allows spies to sneak up to the sniper deck and wreak havoc. (I once got accused of hacking because I dominated an engineer who repeatedly tried to build up there).
Aesthetics!
There is a reason why this map…
(I’m very sorry to bash your map here, whoever made this, but it admittedly isn’t too great).
…doesn’t hold a candle to this map (cp_boulder_v3 by mapper MrMof).
Aesthetics are a very important part of TF2. After all, most of the charm of the game comes from the cartoony characters and landscapes. It just happens that maps that don’t look good or fit the style of TF2 just aren’t as fun to play. I’m not too fond of some of the community maps, being a total attack/defend junkie myself. However, all of the popular community maps use the TF2 style and use it well. CP_Boulder uses it very skillfully, which is just one of the reasons I’m so fond of the map. CP_Steel also stays in the TF2 style, despite its very unique gameplay mechanics.
Conclusion
The game isn’t called Solo Fortress, is it? Teamwork is an integral part of TF2, and probably the most important aspect of any map. Alternate routes to an objective help keep a map moving and facilitate teamwork by allowing all classes to participate – as opposed to bottlenecks, where only combat classes can be of use. Finally, aesthetics play a very important role in the fun factor of a map. Generally, maps that look good are far more immersive than badly styled maps.
Of course, these are by no means the only things that give substance to a map. It’s up to you to find out what makes TF2 tick and keep that in mind next time you’re in Hammer.
With that said, I really encourage you to try out cp_boulder when you can. It’s on our rotation at theubercharged.net TF2 server.
