Map Difficulty

[Rush]

I made a comment to another player last night that I think has some interesting implications.

If you look at the most recent official maps (Made by TWI): Hillbilly Horror, Moon Base, Fright Yard, you'll notice they are a lot more difficult than the early maps. What does this mean for Killing Floor 2 maps?

Factor in the change in how difficulty scales (Zed speed and general ferocity vs just damage and health buffs) Killing Floor 2 could be shaping up to be a terrifyingly difficult game. Especially if the sprint inplimentation blocks kiting (as mentioned in the sprint post)

Try to keep the thread on topic.

 

[Chimpster]

Fright Yard actually isn't that bad if people don't wander around on the ground. Haven't played it on Suicidal or HoE though, so can't comment there.

 

[Broski270]

I like the direction Tripwire took with their more recent maps. While all their maps atmospherically sucked (I liked the kfmod2.5 variants more but thats besides the point), the layouts have gotten a lot better since Hillbilly Horror 1. The maps have no good camping spots which is good. Camping really gets boring. For example, Manor's cave, West London's church, Departed's room, BioticsLab spawn area, it all gets boring and its always the same spot for 45-80 minutes. Recent maps have been better in which you move where you gotta move in order to survive. I hope they keep this philosophy with the new KF.

 

[C_Gibby]

The maps have no good camping spots which is good. Camping really gets boring. For example, Manor's cave, West London's church, Departed's room, BioticsLab spawn area, it all gets boring and its always the same spot for 45-80 minutes. Recent maps have been better in which you move where you gotta move in order to survive. I hope they keep this philosophy with the new KF.

To be honest, I'd like a solid, healthy, balanced mix.

The defensive play is legitimately fun when people are experimenting in places like KF-Farm and trying to turn a larger house into a fortress. But not so much when they camp up in one tiny room, you know?

 

[Gabbakeisen]

Nothing wrong with a good campfest as long as there are 2 or more entry points that are actively used. Everyone firing down one corridor (cough, cough, biotics lab) is boring as hell. And to be honest most kiting games are boring as well cause everyone chooses zerker. Thats why i like kiting as support or demo etc. The few times ive played with a team kiting without any meds or zerks has always been great fun!

 

[TheSpringwoodSlasher]

Nothing wrong with a good campfest as long as there are 2 or more entry points that are actively used. Everyone firing down one corridor (cough, cough, biotics lab) is boring as hell. And to be honest most kiting games are boring as well cause everyone chooses zerker. Thats why i like kiting as support or demo etc. The few times ive played with a team kiting without any meds or zerks has always been great fun!

that sums it up pretty good.
firebug kiting is the best kiting <3

 

[YoYoBatty]

I like the direction Tripwire took with their more recent maps. While all their maps atmospherically sucked (I liked the kfmod2.5 variants more but thats besides the point), the layouts have gotten a lot better since Hillbilly Horror 1. The maps have no good camping spots which is good. Camping really gets boring. For example, Manor's cave, West London's church, Departed's room, BioticsLab spawn area, it all gets boring and its always the same spot for 45-80 minutes. Recent maps have been better in which you move where you gotta move in order to survive. I hope they keep this philosophy with the new KF.

Waterworks has a good teir kiting route on HoE man.

 

[Rush]

I don't mind camping, so long as the spot is challenging. Some situations the low level zeds go down easy and there's always a Sharpshooter with a crossbow so the big guys aren't an issue either. These kind of games get old quick.

If you played KF early on, you might remember welding doors was a legitimate tactic, whereas now it seems somewhat useless save for a few specific locations on specific maps., and leveling Support is a pain because of it.

 

[Azukki]

It would be pretty interesting if they made the maps dynamically change slightly between rounds. This would encourage/force various different camping spots throughout the game, and sometimes camping.

So for one example:
--Waves 1&2 could be easy enough that everyone can just kind of do their own thing, and scour the map scavenging.
--Waves 3&4, it gets hard enough that people settle down, probably in the best camping spot. Then, during trading time, the wind spills a barrel of gasoline in the best camping spot. Husks and muzzle flashes make it a very bad idea to return there.
--Waves 5&6, you go to the second best spot for two waves. The last specimen to spawn before trader time is a fleshpound smashing his way through a brick wall as if someone had said "hey kool aid", opening up a new zed spawn, which makes the second best spot much more challenging.
--Waves 7&8, there's no good spots, encouraging kiting. During trader time, the gasoline fire has burnt out, and burnt open access to a previously inaccessible fifth of the map.
--Waves 9&10, you use a good camping spot in the newly accessible area.



Or, if you wanted a really dynamic system to encourage movement around the map throughout the game, the zed corpses could emit gases that are toxic to players in high doses. To clear an area of corpses, just stay away for a while, and the newly spawned zeds will eat them before attacking.
But, you're probably thinking the servers couldn't handle tracking all the corpses, right? There's a workaround. Have the zeds be bio engineered to, after death, dissolve into a sludge that's easy to digest. (because horzine cares about recycling)
Serverside, each dead zed becomes one very simple static puddle object at the point of death, that can't be eaten for a minute.
Clientside, players could see a cool melting animation a while after the gibs and ragdolls settle on the ground. Then the melted sludge freakishly conglomerates into the spot where the serverside static puddle object is, within a minute.

Even aside from encouraging movement with gases, this would be the

As sick as possible

option for dealing with the buildup of corpses, instead of them vanishing before your eyes.

 

[Anemia]

Personally I don't think that kiting should be encouraged any more than it already is. In my experience kiting is done more and more on higher difficulty settings. It seems like the main reason why team-kiting isn't done in most pubs is because it requires a lot of coordination compared to camping or kiting around alone.

I think that the current balance between kiting and camping is pretty good. There are obviously maps where one is better than the other (Biotics for example) but I think that overall it's pretty well balanced.

The only thing that was imbalanced related to kiting/camping was the Zerk. I used to run a Friendly Fire HoE server and there were so many zerks just running solo (essentially trivializing the difficulty) ruining the fun for others. To the point where I added a mod to remove the syringe, forcing people to pick up the small medic gun and only be able to heal friends.

 

[Jack-Carver]

To be honest, I'd like a solid, healthy, balanced mix.

The defensive play is legitimately fun when people are experimenting in places like KF-Farm and trying to turn a larger house into a fortress. But not so much when they camp up in one tiny room, you know?

Exactly! In my opinion it's great fun to change the "camping spot" for wave to wave.

 

[nd2spd]

Haha, that would be funny to try; Zerk is unable to self-heal.

Don't have much to say about the map situation other than: not too easy. Which seems to be the trend, so whatevs.

 

[Nenjin]

I'm torn on camping.

In the beginning, it's fun because it's not easy. It's still tense because you can fail to completely mow down a group of zeds between reloads.

But with a well rounded set of level'd perks, it starts getting boring.

By the time you've leveled all your perks, you start praying someone screws up so something interesting happens.

So I definitely prefer the newer maps to the older ones. Manor in particular, my god. Tunnel vision. Any map that you can reach the same camp spot from most trader locations isn't a map that should support camping designs.

In my mind, camp spots should be an oasis between trader locations. It shouldn't be as simple as an ideal room along the path between traders. It should be off the way a bit, cost you a little extra time to get there.

TWI really learned over the course of the game how to prevent camping just through smarter map design. Anywhere you had a 2-angle approach eventually ended up with a) doorways flush to the walls that allowed zeds like skrakes and FPs to walk out near the players instead of taking fire for 30 seconds to get to them. b) Ceiling, window and vent spawns galore. c) darkness, lots 'o darkness. d) one-way spawns that are difficult to camp (a high window where you can't shoot stuff as it approaches.)

I personally hope to never see the likes of Manor and Westlondon again, because eventually I stopped finding the trance of corridor shooting fun. It'd also be nice if maps could include any sort of dynamic level changes to alter the configuration of rooms and camp spots. (I.e a flesh pounder bursting through a wall, turning a 2-angle approach into a 3-angle approach.) I think KF also needs something akin to Spitter from L4D2. Bloats and sirens address making players move at close range, and Husks make them move at long range. But there's still no enemy that really forces the group to move off the spot they're camping for any real length of time. Something that create a lingering cloud of death (which is easier to notice and avoid than ground-based death) would force players to have to occasionally abandon their camp spot for a while and introduce that lovely moment of panic where KF really shines.

 

[Fooarg]

I like the direction Tripwire took with their more recent maps. While all their maps atmospherically sucked (I liked the kfmod2.5 variants more but thats besides the point), the layouts have gotten a lot better since Hillbilly Horror 1. The maps have no good camping spots which is good. Camping really gets boring. For example, Manor's cave, West London's church, Departed's room, BioticsLab spawn area, it all gets boring and its always the same spot for 45-80 minutes. Recent maps have been better in which you move where you gotta move in order to survive. I hope they keep this philosophy with the new KF.

Sounds like these maps force you to camp and not wander around.

 

[swenor27]

Camping really gets boring. For example, Manor's cave, West London's church, Departed's room, BioticsLab spawn area, it all gets boring and its always the same spot for 45-80 minutes. Recent maps have been better in which you move where you gotta move in order to survive. I hope they keep this philosophy with the new KF.

Then don't camp. Simple. Why do you want me to play your style?
Wanna do area camping instead of funneling? Sure, do it.
Wanna kite as zerks/meds. Sure, do it.
Wanna kite as NON zerks/meds. You can do it as well.
I could say that your style is boring after an hour. If you want to zerk, you still have to run the same way most of time unless you want to be surrounded and eaten.
To each his own.

I like camping. That's how I prefer to play this game. I could camp various spots with different teams on the same map. I don't like running around.
Every map should have at least one spot that is possible to camp. Not necessarily something like Biotics with one just one way for zeds because it's too easy after hundreds of hours, but a spot that experienced HOE team can defend.

 

[karsey22]

Good maps have options of both camping and kiting. The newer maps twi released all have camping spots. Some require you to not have useless teammates which is fine in my opinion, the option is still there. A trend I noticed on the newer maps was the spawns are just freaking EVERYWHERE. So many spots where if you turn your back on them for a milisecond you can be insta-boned.

I don't mind this but in reality all this does for a camping crew is restrict the amount of places for them to hold up safely, and for a (smart) kiting crew or a solo wave clutcher, restricts the safe 'killing' areas to just a few areas which can really draw out a wave timewise. When there's only one or two spots you know you can take a good chunk out of the horde without getting back spawned by a major cluster**** of zeds you spend most of the time running away until you loop around to the 'safe' areas. This makes it 'harder' for people who don't know to do this because they'll feel like they're constantly being spawned around. For a patient player who controls the spawns it just makes it take aaaaages. It's like the opposite problem farm and mountainpass have with the same result. 4hr map sessions.

Of course there's a lot of other mechanics that were part of this, such as maximum # of spwned zeds allowed on the map at once and the options we had to deal with them. KF2 might have a lot of other things going on that will make maps 'good' or 'bad' and we shouldn't use kf1 mechanics as a benchmark for what will make a kf2 map a 'good' map.