What Makes a Good Infantry Map?

[azreal]

Tell me, I'm curious. In your mind, what makes a good meat-grinder map? No vehicles, no large artillery guns, just 64 players slugging it out over a single town or village. Similiar to Ramelle, Brest, Anctoville, PeB, and/or Tunis.

Please keep it civilized. Thank you.

[Battlefieldfan45 (CroPanzer)]

Urban, street to street combat, with no or limited granades. Chokepoints before flags to make it spicy
Tunis always offeres a good inf vs inf combat!

[Josh094]

Nothing to allow huge amounts of fragging like Rifle Grenades.

Good atmospherics in the map itself. Mixture of Chokepoints and open expanses with plenty of cover. Multiple alternative routes. Good sniping spots, good MG spots. etc etc.

[Kelmola]

PHL is IMHO still the best infantry map, but Brest and PeB come close.

What I value:

• ability to choose your attack route freely instead of rushing mapper-placed choke points
• more "organic" terrain (be that vegetation or ruins) instead of running around in clean 90 degree corridors from the 90's (hello Tunis & Giarabub)
• emphasis on infantry: Anctoville, FoT and Ramelle are borderline cases whether they have too much tankage to be "pure" infantry maps anymore, but still are not full-on combined arms maps
• good firelanes: too many maps block the killzone as viewed from static MG nests; I prefer clear killzones instead but ways around them
• constant bleed on one side to keep the battle from degenerating into trench warfare (ref. Nations Cup '09, Finland vs. Poland 2, El Alamein 16)
• defensive spawnpoints close to the flagzone to keep the firefights more intense (unlike in Brest and Ramelle)

[Thorondor123]

No grenades.

[Ts4EVER]

No Grenades? Don't you know major chukows order in the battle of Stalingrad?

"No soviet soldier is to advance further than he can throw a hand grenade"
And no I ma not making that up.
The hand grenade is the number 1 close combat weapon of the infantry.

[Thorondor123]

It's the number 1 killer of any fun on close quarter infantry maps. In real life you would have few nades and that's it, but in FH2 you throw the nades, die and spawn back again to spam more nades.

[:| Hi]

Corridors, CQC, open houses. Ambush points.
Sniper towers.
No Grenades. Atmospheric. But some areas where your squad is completely alone (Read Ancto 64, wandering to cap zones)

[Sotka]

Pickup kits to give variety... (mortar,flamethrower,shotgun,drilling,sniper, for example). Not just 1-2 but
about 6-8 in somewhat accessable places.

Also trenches.

[Alakazou]

Limited grenade, no grenade will be a mistake, but you have to limite it.

[[130.Pz]S.Lainer]

Oddly enough I would have to say tanks.     I would love an infantry map with two tanks thrown in scary environments that tanks hate.  Thick woods or closed in towns.  A smart tanker will make sure he has lil'blue arrows all around him.  One of my favorite maps that come to mind is Fall of Tobruk which has this setup.

[Kelmola]

Now that we're talking, I would say that grenades, especially hand grenades, are an essential part of an infantry map.

And there's never enough flamethrowers

[Alakazou]

Too much grenade suck. I think the assault kit (with submahcinegun) should have more than just one grenade in that kind of map, and  the map should have a rifleman kit (limited) with grenade. In short, like we have know is that kind of map.

[Natty]

- Max two kits with hand grenades (both limited)
- No rifle nades!!
- Clear objectives (flagzones with unique layout, landmark, that stands out from the rest of the map
- different routes, so it matters what I choose. Do I run the closest most intense in-your-face action route, or do I take the longer, more quiet, protective route.
- MG nests that works
- Flanking ability - that forces defenders to spread out
- Lines of sight that are blocked for the defenders, so they also must choose which flank they protect. (Trees are great for blocking sights from 2nd floor windows for example. While Rocks and terrain is better for frog-eye-view
- The Terrain in Battlefield is the #1 important object on a map. No statics can ever replace the pure function that this gigantic 500,000 poly blanket creates - use it wisely!

- Last but not least: Infantry experiences are not created in the Editor. You can very easily see maps that havent been played InGame by the creator. Infantry maps are made from the 1P perspective, not the top-down omnipresent Editor view (OK: Editor has a SoldierCamera which also works OK, but Editor has another FoV than the game.)
- Ingame Ingame Ingame. Launch a windowed mode game in the background, walk around, when you reach an area you dont like - swap to Editor and fix it, then back to the game.

- When you have the path staked out from spawnpoint to flag, and have run it 10 times as an Infantry, shooting pretend defenders, you are on the right track.

The infantry cover-to-cover experience from spawn to flagzone is the most vital part of the game, each cover, each line of sight, each visual landmark is important. Remember the "tunnel-view" that players get when playing, only what they see in the crosshair matters, and it is the path you build that they must see, and it must be intuitive, natural. I dont mean to build wolfenstein corridors, it can be a huge open field, but the covers and terrainshape should still create a "path" that the player instinctively takes.
If the player moves in this path without realizing he is doing it, you have designed a good map. The player believes he made the path up by his tactic cunning sneakyness 

[Capten_C]

Craters, broken walls, foxholes, trenches, destroyed buildings (with second floor access) places to fire from and take cover as you try to defend/advance.
Best skirmishes I can remember seem to be around the streets of Falaise Pocket and the new Hill 108 on St Lo.