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Beta Map RO-Gorlitz Beta 2

I think Kolno was closer to Jucha, this map plays like a different map also from the mod. In fact its layout is almost identical. All I remember is that it was winter and the germans were attacking, it was underplayed due to performance issues. Anyone know what I'm talking about?

Oh, I didnt mean that it WAS jucha, it clearly is not, given that the layout is completely differnt, but the lack of nade spam REALLY makes the gameplay more realistic and much more fun IMO.
 
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If preventing nadespam is the objective it might be worth trying to give only assault class grenades as they are the ones who need to get in close. Get rid of grenades for all other classes that way there is still minimal nade action BUT they are at least in the hands of the class that needs them the most.
SasQuatch said:
if ANY class should have nades historically and tactically* it's the assault class.
 
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Played it a few times but it allready feels balanced right now.
Both times the germans were pushed back to their last caparea and won the map by an inch.

For me the nades are fine just as they are flash: it gives the map more playability for the bolt rifles (nadespam makes bolts useless). I had some very intense fighting around obsticles and rubble. That kind of fights only occur in maps with few nades. So my vote goes for the current "lack of nades" (irrelevant which class has them).

You might want to think about smoke nades but only in certain areas. Maybe make them a pickup item only at certain locations ? For instance when the sovjets have to cross a large open area.
The suppresive effect of the sovjet armour is allready very devastating for the german troops. With smoke added the mapbalance might tip over to the sovjet side.

Just wait another week with new balance-changes until players know the map a bit more and it gets played a bit differently.

Monk.
 
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I've played it for 2.5 hours on TW server and I'm stunned with your map :)

In first rounds Russians had some problems capturing the first bridghead, but it's because many of them didn't know the map well I think. After 1-2 rounds, first bridgehead was just a 5-6min problem. Infantry knew they had to keep advancing to push Germans back. Other than that, it went super smooth.

I don't think you should add a German Pak class. I like the dispersion we have right now. But you should mark the PF supply points on the map.

As for commander smoke, don't add this in for class. Smoke kills the tactical play of the maps, and takes the challange out of it(this is true forsome "official" maps too). But you may consider adding a smoke nade with very long spawn near the bridge for allies.

That's it for now, will report back later :)
 
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played it twice with very good players and here what i think

- People should have grenades, it's often the best way for attackers and defender to get rid of MG. I don't understand why you removed them, it's a part of the game and it would be a different gameplay. The map is big enough to avoid nade spamm.

- Commanders NEED smoke. Definetely, specially for the first 2 flags, It's more than needed.

- Add PAK soldat classes (only if you add smoke first), to balance. Cause with smoke, Allies infantry will move closer to germans and it will become harder to get there. Make 2 PAK soldats with Kar98 and that would be fine.

- Remove 1 kommandir tanka and replace it by 2 ekipah tanka. Simple reason, often forgotten : capping. 2 commanders equal 4 soldiers in capzone. With those changes , a full tank will still worth 4 people capping but will need 3 players.

- Add one more Tank at the first spawn. Not a t34 or IS2, but something like SU. With only HE, it can be helful but will need to be handle toughly.

- Textures near the first russians spawns don't match the floor, it feels like you're hovring when driving over them (dunno if if has been reported yet)

- I found a bug with MG, sometime when you're deployed on a sandbag or a tank obstacle, you're firing blank bullets and have infinite ammo. You cannot hit anybody and never need to reload. Happened to me twice near the first bridgehead.




That's only my thoughts and what I would change if it was my map. Keep up the great work, this is by far the most interresting combined arms map i've ever seen.
 
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Oh, I didnt mean that it WAS jucha, it clearly is not, given that the layout is completely differnt, but the lack of nade spam REALLY makes the gameplay more realistic and much more fun IMO.
Limiting nades is far from realistic, especially removing them from assaulters. The only people who think this is realistic or better are the ones that can't handle realistic assault behavior; "throw nades before you go in". A simple military doctrince on the eastern front.
Especially Monk is very unrealistic in his expectations about war being fair to people who actually wanna be deer hunters instead of soldiers ^^
 
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...
As for commander smoke, don't add this in for class. Smoke kills the tactical play of the maps, and takes the challange out of it(this is true forsome "official" maps too). But you may consider adding a smoke nade with very long spawn near the bridge for allies.

If smoke is one thing, it's a tactical weapon which adds a challange. A challange you personally don't like maybe, but that's different.
 
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This is good feedback, but I'm not quite sure how to act on it. I was thinking it would be good to get a third beta out quickly, but now I'm going to wait on that a couple of days and see if any consensus develops on the different aspects of the map. I need to try and play it more myself too :).

Reviewing some of the spawn areas, I have two questions: How difficult is the central square cap, where the russians have to cross the first bridge and work their way up into the square. Just from the layout and the spawn locations, this looks like it would be very difficult to do. Is this the case? Also, how does the endgame play out? Is it even possible in a balance map for the Russians to capture the trainyards? Is the final fight there at all fun? These two parts, just from looking through the map in the editor, seem like big problem areas. Let me know if this the case.

The new buildings are progressing well, I'm not sure exactly how long they will take, but I'll try to import a few soon and show how they look in game.

Question for sasquatch, when you did the lighting thing did you get this horrible black effect on the north faces of a number of buildings. I tried a lighting rebuild with the parameters that you suggested, and while I agree that it looked much nicer, I got this weird vertex lighting thing that I could not figure out. It seemed like the bottom two vertexs were not getting any light, but from how their properties are set, I didn't understand how that could be the case. I'd like to figure it out, the lighting was quite improved, less bland, and it also seemed to soften the really hard edges, making it look much better without the aa.
 
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I dont think that smoke grenades should be given to commanders in this map. Though realistic I guess, without them it encourages cover and maneuver. Also regular grenades should be limited as the streets are narrow in places and it would just become a nade spam map and the russians would never really advance. When I played the other day once the teamwork started clicking the russians started advancing. Good Map Flash.
 
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I've played the map now for probably 6-8 hours (even lost a little bit of sleep over it). I must say I am really impressed. Its really quite fun when everything works out. Right now it feels a bit like a flawed masterpiece, if you can fix up the issues though it will be a classic. I'll have to wholeheartedly disagree with Hyperion's assertion that smoke grenades aren't needed. He happened to get lucky and the first round he played was one that we won. Anyway, here are my findings:

Balance (Note: this is with a full server) - about 80% of rounds grind to a halt in the first part of the map, usually the first bridgehead. The other 20% of the time the russians were able to get to the final objective (train yard), but this ONLY occured if the tank commander was REALLY aggressive, on the ball, and really knew what he was doing, AND had sappers and infantry that were really on the ball. Basically, to even get this far you had to have a "perfect storm" of just the right players in just the right roles. Out of 10-12 rounds I played with a full server, the Russians were able to win only once. The balance does shift greatly in the Russian's favor when the player counts are low (10-14), but balance should primarily be based on the target player count for the map (presumably 32 for a map this big).

Frame Rate - Frame rate seems pretty decent just running around the map. But once you get 24-32 players in the map the frame rate goes right in the toilet. I'm running a dual 7900GTX SLI rig, and in the central parts of the map I'm pulling high 20's when the map is full. As Ingmar already mentioned, you need to get some BSP in there for network occlusion. I think once you do this and all 32 players and every vehicle on the map aren't network relevant all the time (and rendered all the time), you'll have a good framerate as long as you make a few other optimizations. With proper network occlusion servers might even be able to handle 40+ players on the map when we make the increased player count code public ;) Also, I have noticed that over half of your statics have no collision hulls, and are thus using per-poly collision. This can have a HUGE impact on frame rate. You need to get simple collision hulls on all of your statics, especially the curbs, as this per poly collision is eating up huge amounts of your frame rate.

Suggestions:

Help the assaulting team! - 9/10 rounds are won by the Germans. One of the main reasons for this is that you've taken away most of the tactical tools that the assaulting team should have at thier disposal to break stalemates (namely smoke grenades and regular grenades for assualters). Give the commander smoke grenades, and the assualters hand grenades. If you're going to leave out nades for anyone, leave it out for the riflemen. The areas like the bridges where infantry are assualting accross open ground CRY OUT for smoke grenades. Smoke grenades are a great tactical addition that REALLY helps break up these stalemates. What you want is your map to keep flowing, not bog down with the attackers spending 30+minutes at 1 objective.

Optimize - as mentioned above, add BSP for network occlusion, make simple collision hulls for your statics, and then do other general optimizations.

Add the SU-76 for the russians - One problem that happens is that if you get 1 boneheaded tanker, the whole team is screwed. I would suggest that you keep the two tank commanders like you have now, but add an SU-76. This way, you'll have higher odds that at least ONE of the tanks is being driven by someone that knows what they are doing. Also, the SU won't be as effective in the urban environment as the T-34, so it will help push the balance back some toward the russians, but not a huge amount. Also, this option allows the two tankers to team up, if they want to (which experienced crews/clan members will want to ) to be more effective.

Anyway, like I said, its an AMAZING map, you just need to do some work to polish it up, and make sure the gameplay keeps flowing.
 
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To answer some of your questions:

I was thinking it would be good to get a third beta out quickly, but now I'm going to wait on that a couple of days and see if any consensus develops on the different aspects of the map.

Get a new beta out NOW!!! :) If for any reason to fix the places where you spawn under ground. LOTS of poeple got pissed off and left the server because they were spawning underground. You don't want to have poeple start hating the map now, or they might not give it a second chance. Also, you could add the BSP occlusion, and fix the role loadouts.

How difficult is the central square cap, where the russians have to cross the first bridge and work their way up into the square. Just from the layout and the spawn locations, this looks like it would be very difficult to do. Is this the case?

Its very difficult to cap for a couple of reasons. First is that the Russians have so far to walk from thier spawn to get to it. Usually the UC has run off with 1 or 2 poeple in it, and then all your infantry has to walk the whole way. I would suggest putting the Russian spawn on the other side of the bridge. Also, as previously mentioned, its very hard to assualt these types of positions without grenades, as once MGers and riflemen get entrenched its very difficult to dislodge them without the proper tools. The place I am referring to is between the Trainyard and Trainyard intersection objectives.

Also, how does the endgame play out? Is it even possible in a balance map for the Russians to capture the trainyards? Is the final fight there at all fun? These two parts, just from looking through the map in the editor, seem like big problem areas. Let me know if this the case.

The endgame is very fun (and awesome looking), but you can rarely get that far as russian. I've made many suggestions in my last post on how to address this. The main thing is that you need to break the stalemates somehow, and grenades and smokes are the tools to do that. The very last objectives needs a bit more cover for the Russians as they advance as well. There is about a 50 meter patch where it is almost completely blank, and the entrenched Germans just mow down wave after wave.
 
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Oh, and Hyperion and me agree for once: limiting nades is more fun.
If it's realistic or not: I don't care.
If I want realism I'll go and play armed assault ^^

Monk.

The problem is that it is only more "fun" for a few poeple that like to play a certain way (and even this is questionable). Of course its "fun" to be able to sit back and mow down countless waves of incoming Russians with little chance of being dislodged. Unfortunately, this isn't single player, there are human beings controlling those humans, and those human being have to have fun while playing too :) It is not good to make a level more fun for a select few, at the cost of overall balance and fun for an entire team.

Besides, if you are playing your rifleman role correctly, your not sprinting headlong into the battle, your hanging back taking long range shots. This map is perfect for just that due to its large scale.
 
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Discussing taste is one thing.
Calling the countless topics and players complaining about nade-spam " a select few" is another thing.

And yes I'm a boltplayer who likes to play close-combat.
It's the most difficult playstyle and it will get me killed lots of times.
Hanging back and taking potshots is no fun , almost "too easy" ;)

I do think the games we played last night had a good balance, even with the "lack" of nades. Hence my word of caution to change the current mapbalance.

* sharpens his bajo for another round Gorlitz

Monk.
 
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Map is excellent.I personally thank you for the class equipments:no grenades except rifleman(it migh destroy the whole gameplay of map with a RO classic nadespam fest),no ppsh41 for sappers and best of it is limiting tank class to only 2 persons so that you dont have to have a driver sitting for minutes then driving 50 meters then wait for minutes plus russians have 1 more infantry to fight.

If it is possible it would be awesome to give every german 1 Panzerfaust(except MG guys),without PF spawning boxes without AT class.More realistic and more fun.Or giving a choice between 1 panzerfaust or 2 grenades might be better.

From what i've seen if the allied team is half decent axis doesnt stand a chance in this map,skill or intelligence of german team doesnt change a thing since they'll be blown up repeatedly by HE shells from a good distance except some capture points where Russian tank really has a hard time,even at some point allies have 2 tanks,maybe limiting tank respawns like 4-5 tanks per capture point or delaying the t34 spawn like 30 seconds might be good imho.I hope you never give germans any tank in future versions...

Thx for your hardwork...
 
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Discussing taste is one thing.
Calling the countless topics and players complaining about nade-spam " a select few" is another thing.

And yes I'm a boltplayer who likes to play close-combat.
It's the most difficult playstyle and it will get me killed lots of times.
Hanging back and taking potshots is no fun , almost "too easy" ;)

I do think the games we played last night had a good balance, even with the "lack" of nades. Hence my word of caution to change the current mapbalance.

* sharpens his bajo for another round Gorlitz

Monk.

Only a small percentage of poeple that play the game even post on the forums. And those that do post generally post to complain when they don't like something. You could have 1000 poeple posting saying they hate the standard nade setup, while 100,000 poeple don't post because they DO like the current setup. So yes, its still a "select few" that like to play CQB bolt actions with no grenades :)

And I'm not sure how Russians losing 95% of the time on a full server is good balance. Russians getting halfway through the map occasionally and down to the last objective rarely does not constitute "good balance".
 
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Great map! I've had a lot of fun playing this one. It seems to take a higher degree of teamwork than many other maps in order to take objectives. This makes it awesome when you've got skilled teammates, and oh so frustrating when you don't. Once I made it nearly to the end as a tanker only to sit outside the trainyard for the last 7 or 8 minutes pleading for someone to blow the frickin' barricade. We had THREE Engineers!! We lost. :rolleyes: Tank support seems to be crucial to winning as a Russian, especially without smoke, and infantry support is crucial to surviving as a tanker. Not many maps have that kind of tactical balance.

BTW, there were some real eagle-eyed panzerfausters online yesterday! I was being hit from so far away, I couldn't believe it. I hate those things!

Several times I fell through the ground on respawn repeatedly at the final (?) spawn (Taking the trainyard). It would happen until I changed roles.

Crossing the bridge and the final fight seem similar in that the tank can really reduce the effectiveness of the German's defense. Without a tank the infantry are sitting ducks, but from the Russian side of the bridge a tank can pretty well keep the Germans away from the cap zone. Final fight is tougher due to less visibility, but similar.

Question: May have missed this, but when and where does the 2nd tank spawn? My legs got tired running back to the field to grab the first tank! Sometimes I could find it, but the lack of memorable landmarks makes it hard to navigate the streets sometimes.

As for balance, I'd say give it enough time for people to learn the map before deciding. I've seen the Russians win numerous times, so I wouldn't say it's THAT hard. It just requires better than average teamwork. I like the challenge.

This is going to be a classic! Thanks!
 
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Get a new beta out NOW!!! :) If for any reason to fix the places where you spawn under ground. LOTS of poeple got pissed off and left the server because they were spawning underground. You don't want to have poeple start hating the map now, or they might not give it a second chance. Also, you could add the BSP occlusion, and fix the role loadouts.
YES YES! I'd really appreciate optimization first on the list as it feels like I'm playing chess due to my extremely low fps.
 
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