Vanilla maps, mkII

[Proud_God]

Just thinking out loud here, but I think it would be interesting to play on 'tweaked' versions of existing maps. The maps themselves would remain the same, but parameters like spawn zones (location/size), cap zones (location/size/quantity), spawn timers, round timers, etc... would be tuned. Ideally, the layouts would create larger effective battlefields, with more room for tactical maneuvers and less red zones.

Quite the challenge for a mapper to pull this of in a good way IMO But, I would imagine it takes considerable less time compared to creating a new map? Anyone feeling this would be nice to play?
:IS2:

 

[[Mad_Murdock]]

I wholeheartedly support this. In fact, weren't the maps originally supposed to scale with the number of players?

However, I have an addendum to make to this suggestion. They did it with the mounted MGs, so would it be possible to make objectives and spawn zones random?

I think that would make for an extremely unique and dynamic experience, and would reward players for taking the initiative, rather than just sprinting for their favorite camping spot. In fact, if it were possible, this would completely change the flow of most maps.

An example could be, on Pavlov's. You have the standard layout, but then the next time you play, suddenly the Axis start behind the housing block on the left side of the map, and the Soviets start all the way on the right, and now you play crosswise from East to West. Or for example that same housing block on the left is now an objective, and maybe 9th January is not. Etc, etc...

I understand that if you make objectives and spawns random, it would occasionally create an extremely unbalanced scenario, but that is the risk you take with random spawns. (For an easy, though not entirely applicable, reference think of random start locations in RTS)

 

[r5cya]

how about a simple request? i'd really love to play apartments in the dark. dark enough to make it hard to tell friend from foe.
even just switching from attacking to defending, like we do in campaign mode, lends a very interesting feel to the stock maps.
it doesn't take much to bring a bit of life back into them. not sure why TWI doesn't play around with them at all.

 

[Catalavos]

would it be possible to make objectives and spawn zones random

I wondered about this a while back but unfortunately the spawn system can't work the same way. The spawn zones are pretty much set in stone for each individual map. About the best one could do would be to open the existing Pavlov's map, move the spawns around, and re-cook it with a name like "TE-Pavlov's II". It would then be its own, independent map.

 

[Catalavos]

how about a simple request? i'd really love to play apartments in the dark. dark enough to make it hard to tell friend from foe.
even just switching from attacking to defending, like we do in campaign mode, lends a very interesting feel to the stock maps.
it doesn't take much to bring a bit of life back into them. not sure why TWI doesn't play around with them at all.

I'll give this a shot tonight. Not counting the time needed for re-building lighting and cooking this should take about 10 minutes of work to find out if it'll work, then a few hours of playing with all of the other lights to get it to look right.

 

[Chosen_1]

Play countdown?

 

[Cwivey]

In fact, weren't the maps originally supposed to scale with the number of players?

That's set by the MaxPlayers of the server and it does work. 16 Player Apartments has 3 objectives, Commissars starts the Russians off next to C, only focusing the objectives on the line of buildings. etc.

I assume you've only been playing the 64 Version for every single map.

 

[fruitbat]

I'd love to see this - "redux-ing" maps used to happen an awful lot in Vietcong and can completely change the character of a map - dicking about with time, season, weather, direction and caps can completely change things around.

One stage further is to use the terrain, but then use a completely new set of assets.

Only issue is having the permission of the original map author to giving vent to your creative juices with their "baby"!

 

[Fishsticks]

Sounds good to me! I like playing on a map longer that 15-20 minutes

 

[Fishsticks]

Play countdown?

As fun as countdown is the rounds are just way to short. Your loading the next map before you can blink an eye.

 

[AtheistIII]

I wondered about this a while back but unfortunately the spawn system can't work the same way. The spawn zones are pretty much set in stone for each individual map. About the best one could do would be to open the existing Pavlov's map, move the spawns around, and re-cook it with a name like "TE-Pavlov's II". It would then be its own, independent map.

Maybe you could work around this by just making a bunch of maps all called "[map name]-Random Spawns" with different spawn sets and put them all on a server, so you don't know which version is playing, I guess this would give a pretty similar result to actually random spawns.