Author Topic: Giving Aberdeen some love  (Read 12381 times)

Offline phillip

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Giving Aberdeen some love
« on: 30-01-2011, 17:01:05 »
Between the What 5 maps would you miss the least? thread and a recent crappy COOP round of driving up and shooting all the axis bots in the barrel mainbase, I was thinking this map could use some loving.  It's almost universally hated it seems.  But perhaps with a little help from the community we could give this map a facelift and make it awesome playable.


This is the minimap.  Yellow is the playing area.  There are 10-15+ tanks on each side.  The gameplay tends to just be drive your tank forward and shoot.  Not much for flanking.  Not much for infantry to do other than find a hole and hide in it.  Trucks/APC are death traps because of the amount of armor and lack of cover.  And a pipercub spawns at the bottom city if the brits have the central village flag.  I havn't played it enough in earlier versions to know if the bottom was a flag, but I imagine it was.  


So after getting in that pipercub, I realized this is what we have to play with for the map.  The current playable area is probably only a quarter or less of the space on the map.  Lots of rolling hills and valleys that could make for some fun team tanking warfare.



If you move the current OOB (white) to the blue, look how much more space there is to work with.  The entire mountain comes into play along with the pipercub village.  There is a plateau on the left side of the map and the allies could flank around the riverbed near their mainbase.  


In a 5 minute MSpaint layout that sucks, I put this together. The map wouldn't/couldn't be great for infantry, due to the lack of cover.  But this map could then be great for a pure tanking map. 32v32 tanks+arty.  Tanking flags with 200m flagzones with team spawnpoints that have reserve tanks to get back into battle.   Maybe start all flags as Axis?


The item that takes away from fun of tanking on the large maps is that you spawn, drive for 3 minutes, get one or two shots off, then start driving again.  To do tanks 32v32 I think you need to make tanks spawn forward near the flags so that players can spawn and get into a tank near a flag they control.  Then the team that owns the flag, gets forward tank reenforcments.  Maybe you keep the heavies in the mainbase.  And make each tank objectspawner produce up to 10+ objects.



My machine can't map, otherwise I'd do it.  I am pretty sure if someone puts the effort into updating the map, we could get Sam(F|H) to host it for a "FH Community Loves up Aberdeen" event.  Find a mapper to work on changing the objects, then plan a date to get 64 peeps on it.  I don't know if either of the tournaments have tried to expand the playing area in Aberdeen.  I'm pretty sure F|H hasn't.

I think Lobo was the mapper behind this map, and alot of time has been invested in it.  Instead of relegating maps to "This sucks. Let's never play it again"-status, why don't we as the community get together, brainstorm and give this map some love to make it really fun.


Quote
What 5 maps would you miss the least?
62 (10.8%) - Operation Aberdeen
38 (6.6%) Tunis
34 (5.9%) - Anctoville
34 (5.9%) - Bardia
34 (5.9%) - Mersa Matruh

Why not work on improving what is considered the worst map in the mod?  Can't get worse right  ;D

Offline Archimonday

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Re: Giving Aberdeen some love
« Reply #1 on: 30-01-2011, 17:01:15 »
Amen, Aberdeen has potential, I like your suggestions.

Offline Flippy Warbear

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Re: Giving Aberdeen some love
« Reply #2 on: 30-01-2011, 17:01:59 »
Remember, the battle was a commonwealth slaughter. Germans and italians basically had a screen of 88's and other anti-tank guns which massacred all of those crusaders, stuarts and grants which charged against that barrier... the survivors were finished off by Rommel's panzer division which consisted of both german and italian tanks.

You could even name the flags into locations that were fought over during the battle in real life:
- Like the 88 positions at Bir El Scerab, that basically managed to totally exploit a completely open flank of the british assault. This 88 position could very well be the northernmost flag in current Aberdeen.

- Middle village could be a small dwelling of Dahar El Aslagh. But I wouldnt use any big houses. Those in Mareth Line would look perfect (not the multi leveled ones).

- Western village should be either removed or moved further away to out of bounds. So the battlefield and flag area would be in the huge minefields at the outskirts of settlement of Bir El Harmat.

- Southern strongpoint should become positions of Bir Et Tamar. This was the british artillery position which were also wiped out during the battle.

Battle plan:

1) So I'd flip the mainbases around. Have a mainbase for british at south, call the base as 22nd Armoured Brigade. 21st Panzer Division mainbase at north.

2) All flags neutral at start and both sides start with some tanks and light vehicles.

3) British capture Bir Et Tamar (southernmost flag) and they receive artillery there. If germans do that, they receive couple of more of lighter type tanks to their mainbase (such as Carro Armatos).

4) Western village of Bir El Harmat or more like the outskirts of the village would give both teams couple of more tanks when captured. This flag as said before, would be fought over in a minefield just outskirts of the settlement itself.

5) Middle village of Dahar El Aslagh would only be reinforced for the team who controlled it. Stationary MG's, anti-tank guns both stationary and movable would spawn into the place.

6) Bir El Scerab would give british some extra light tanks into their mainbase but the germans would receive 88's whom would have such a deadly killingzone its not even funny anymore.

-

Of course the whole terrain of the map would have to be altered. Get rid of those fucking ridiculous mountains and deep valleys. In reality the whole place was flat, but ingame it doesnt cut it too well. So better have some dunes to limit vision of AT-guns and kill the silhouettes of tanks. But not to have huge and deep alleys and canyons as the present version does. Smooth terrain with some depressions there and here to make the maneuvering in cover at least somehow possible.
« Last Edit: 30-01-2011, 17:01:26 by Flippy Warbear »

Offline Archimonday

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Re: Giving Aberdeen some love
« Reply #3 on: 30-01-2011, 17:01:40 »
Remember, the battle was a commonwealth slaughter. Germans and italians basically had a screen of 88's and other anti-tank guns which massacred all of those crusaders, stuarts and grants which charged against that barrier... the survivors were finished off by Rommel's panzer division which consisted of both german and italian tanks.

Just because the real battle was a slaughter doesn't mean you have to make a meat grinder. Personally for me opening up the out of bounds and working with the flags is a much better option than continuing to leave Aberdeen as the 1 front, slaughter that it is.

Offline Zoologic

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Re: Giving Aberdeen some love
« Reply #4 on: 30-01-2011, 17:01:19 »
Amongst the top five hated, I think only Aberdeen and Tunis are beyond help.

Aberdeen is at first, not realistic, a very no-no thing in FH, despite Ramelle-Neuville being likewise. But given the release of Russian front, early western, Pacific, and others, I guess by then, Ramelle would top the 5 hated. It is just, many players can't just get enough of lush, green, European-setting battlefields.

An unrealistic setting is beyond any help IMO. The real Aberdeen, as far as I can read in Wikipedia (and its sources), is in quite different setting than the one shown here. This map is intentionally fictional.

Tunis is also beyond help, because it tries to represent the big battle in a CS-manner. When I saw Brest, Anctoville, or the beautiful Port-en-Bessin, my standard has raised a notch on what a city map should look like.

Offline Archimonday

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Re: Giving Aberdeen some love
« Reply #5 on: 30-01-2011, 17:01:14 »
No map is ever beyond help. The simple fact is there are maps like Ramelle and Aberdeen that present themselves in an unrealistic way, that are not photocopies of aerial photography, or satellite imagery. Maps that were born out of the imagination of a mapper who had a vision and sought to make it work. In-fact there are so many examples of these types of maps, in all Battlefield games alike that damning them because they are unrealistic or misrepresent a said battle is unfair to that mappers ultimate dream.

This does not mean that when these maps are created that the original concept may be flawed. I can recall working on the BFP1 Scurvy Dogs Map Pack, a Map Pack where every single map was a fictional imaginary place, thought up in the recesses of our minds and then displayed through the editor as best as we could muscle to make them a reality.

Of the maps made for that map pack not a single one was discarded, every map bad or not was brought back time and time again to the drawing board, and to the cycle of peers working on them, that eventually, even the worst ideas began to take shape into fun maps which the BFP community respected.

Now there is a side of that argument that will tell me BFP is not a game based of a real-life conflict or scenario. While this is true, we should never forget that FH2, as a MOD for Battlefield 2, is in its simplest form a game, and therefore must be treated like one whenever it is necessary. It is one thing to say that you are going to work tirelessly to make a historically accurate, realistic simulation of any armed conflict, but to then ignore the in-balances and flaws in them, or to discard features which have been worked on heavily because of those faults, is then to damn your project to fail.

Instead of treating Aberdeen as a lost cause, the map should be taken up by the community, to better improve it. Aberdeen has arose as one of the maps the community likes least to play, this could be for a number of different reasons, but that is no excuse to discard it or to cast it aside as shit. This man makes a great suggestion about Aberdeen, and it nearly mirrors my thoughts on the map as well.

Aberdeen should be fixed, not forgotten.

Offline Jobabb Jobabbsen

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Re: Giving Aberdeen some love
« Reply #6 on: 30-01-2011, 18:01:34 »
 Usually one side rape the other, and i assume its the brits who usually do that. But ive had alot of fun on this map aswell. The times it works its quite funny. But unortunately thats not often i think.

Offline THeTA0123

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Re: Giving Aberdeen some love
« Reply #7 on: 30-01-2011, 18:01:26 »
Remember, the battle was a commonwealth slaughter. Germans and italians basically had a screen of 88's and other anti-tank guns which massacred all of those crusaders, stuarts and grants which charged against that barrier... the survivors were finished off by Rommel's panzer division which consisted of both german and italian tanks.

Just because the real battle was a slaughter doesn't mean you have to make a meat grinder. Personally for me opening up the out of bounds and working with the flags is a much better option than continuing to leave Aberdeen as the 1 front, slaughter that it is.
agreed, theres plenty of maps already wich end up in a german killwhore festation
-i am fairly sure that if they took porn off the internet, there would only be one website left and it would be called bring back the porn "Perry cox, Scrubs.

Offline Zoologic

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Re: Giving Aberdeen some love
« Reply #8 on: 30-01-2011, 18:01:19 »
If the intention is to deliberately making it historically inaccurate, that is fine. But my opinon, and several other players who voted for Aberdeen, are not all about the accuracy of the map.

Then, my opinion didn't come from me as an map artist. If I were, it would be too damn hard to dump every of my year-long projects and getting disheartened everytime I hear someone else map being turned over. In short, it would be a bias. As a player, I really don't mind playing in Aberdeen, but you can say, of all beautiful FH2 maps available, this one has the least good experience.

My view as a FH2 fan. FH2 as in a whole, should represent historical accuracy to certain degree. PR brings realism in its package, they even tweaked their main menu and uses true-to-the real military map name. But it is up to the dev's choice if they want to do something different. The crown jewel of FH2 would be something like Siege of Giarabub, where the map is stunningly close to the real ones and also quite fun to play.

Basically, I don't want to overemphasize on one aspect. The gameplay is important too. That is why I exclude Bardia and Ramelle on my list. Creativity plays important part here, I love fun & accurate maps. But mirror balanced, CS-like, confining maps which sacrificed too much historical accuracy (in FH2 standards) to be saved from my list, really doesn't do it. Op Aberdeen is 3/10 in accuracy (+2 because of North African dessert setting, +1 because of vehicles), while also 4/10 in gameplay.

If we want to fix Aberdeen, I think we have to pay attention to what Flippy posted. But then, it would totally change the map, there are no cliffs, no lakes, no valleys, and such. It won't be the same Aberdeen.

I recall the worst experience being an infantry trapped in the "strongpoints" or villages. There are AT guns and MG emplacements, meaning we were intended to camp the post and fight the tanks with what we carried and what is there. Since the map is quite huge and has a lot of tanks, well good luck spawning as other than engineer or AT. There are almost no vehicles there. I couldn't just escape, a few tanks drives by and massacred a good portion of soldiers in the village. So they are relatively poor place to spawn from.
« Last Edit: 30-01-2011, 18:01:49 by ZooMotorpool »

Offline phillip

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Re: Giving Aberdeen some love
« Reply #9 on: 30-01-2011, 18:01:11 »
No map is ever beyond help.
...

Instead of treating Aberdeen as a lost cause, the map should be taken up by the community, to better improve it. Aberdeen has arose as one of the maps the community likes least to play, this could be for a number of different reasons, but that is no excuse to discard it or to cast it aside as shit. This man makes a great suggestion about Aberdeen, and it nearly mirrors my thoughts on the map as well.

Aberdeen should be fixed, not forgotten.

exactly.

Sure its not accurate to real life.  But then most battles in real life were slaughterfests, and those don't exactly translate to instant fun in game if you map it the same exact way ( 200 Russian tanks vs 10 German, yay.).  Of course you could alter the terrain, statics, textures and make a fun map.  But that is just making an entire new map.  The current map could work and be more fun, with a different game play concept. 

Perhaps a few mappers could do different concepts, which could be all tested together and then in the next release the best ones could be tweaked and given out as the new Aberdeen.  Give new life to the old dog.  I know removing flags/objectspawners/OOB and laying out a new map is not a difficult or long process for an experienced mapper to do.

Most people didn't flag the map on the least liked list because of historical inadequacies, but because the gameplay is not fun.








Edited in the quotes about it on that thread
Operation Aberdeen - This map has never been balanced or looked good, its been superseded by Gazala

Operation Aberdeen because it is just a bad map which presents the real operation horribly. It *could* be made into resembling at least somehow what it was but that is highly unlikely going to happen.

- Aberdeen, because since 2.2? it is a very one sided map which always ends the same. Also, it feels too generic, too "fake".


Aberdeen because well it's Aberdeen the Ultimate Mirror Balance Fight with an Asymmectrical flag on the west side of the map. Only the scout plane make it sort of funny.

Operation Aberdeen - Need I say more? We have maps like Alam Halfa, Gazala, and Mareth Line for large NA tank battles.

Aberdeen.- too small map to represent a huge operation, short view distance for tank combat, finally, no mobile 88 =[

Aberdeen - because it's aberdeen. Nothing special. Fubar landscape and balance that shifted with every patch till 2.2.



Aberdeen: I still hope for a remake / rebuild / adjust of this map. Why I didnt choose it - its an african map, and I like African maps so much. Just give them some Panzer IV F2.

1. Operation Aberdeen

Definitely not the kind of tank map, it is just a matter of luck that whether your tank shell hit the critical parts of the enemy tank. Map design doesn't feel war-like.

Aberdeen: I actually didn't vote for it because I clicked the submit button too soon!  :P  As for why I dislike it, just look at any of the reasons mentioned previously in this thread.

Aberdeen: because I don't like its game play and think it is ugly and quite sloppy made, both in design and in graphical appearance. One thing you can't blame Aberdeen for though is being boring, but the crazy imbalance and just dull layout makes me alt-tab to desktop or change server whenever it comes up

Arbedeen, feels arcade, works with only a 3rd of its actual size and has no special vehicle or unique aspects.

Operation Aberdeen - Poorly designed map. Feels unfinished for some reason, just look at the minimap and the roads leading to nowhere. One sided battles and boring gameplay also contribute.

Aberdeen, All I remember about that map is somehow boring, but I would like to play it again as I haven't played it for long time.

Most people here hated Mersa Matruh, some hate Op Goodwood, Aberdeen, Cobra and every other maps that tries to represent a city or town with a few blocks of dead buildings. Matruh might be realistic, but the gameplay easily kills it. I get bored waiting in the wrong end with AT guns, only to find out that the Germans flanked from the side. The suckiest thing is moving through the blocks of bland buildings. Now Fall of Tobruk is one brilliant town map, unlike the hated Brest, or Anctoville town maps, we move through a life town.
Goodwood, Aberdeen, Cobra, Luettich have this common thing I called "pointless towns" Instead of getting epic CQB fights there, you are practically trapped in the narrow streets where buildings around you serve as an explosion pad if the tanks can't find you just by randomly shooting the walls with HE shells. And then in Cobra and Goodwood, the most important town, where all the fun should be, is located way off the heat points (realistic, but meh)

Op aberdeen, well this is where the allies constant win

Operation Aberdeen - seriously, what's the purpose of this desert with some house thrown into the middle? Balance is screwed, no cover at all and it looks ugly

Voted for:
...
- Operation Aberdeen
...
Basically all those maps with either lack of cover or horribly long walking distances. Or both. Not to forget: they just play badly.

Aberdeen -

Operation Aberdeen - Just a really lacking map. It doesn't even work well as a tank oriented map when there are much superior ones available such as El Al and Gazala.

I've only voted for one map: Operation Aberdeen

This is the one and only map i truly dislike, every other map is fun to play atleast occasionally or has something good about them. But aberdeen looks, feels and plays like crap. It feels like a map randomly thrown together as a test map in the early stages of FH2 and I could do without it.

Surely there are a few maps i like less than others, for example alam halfa, supecharge and siege of tobruk but like i said these maps Are fun to play from time to time and add variety, whilst aberdeen just dosent cut it.

So open up paint, and draw what you think could make it more fun/better.
« Last Edit: 30-01-2011, 19:01:15 by phillip »

Offline psykfallet

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Re: Giving Aberdeen some love
« Reply #10 on: 30-01-2011, 19:01:14 »
Good job, but as you say, this will have to be done by the community, the devs are not going to touch this map. But if someone were to fix it perhaps they would consider it making the fix official.



Offline Torenico

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Re: Giving Aberdeen some love
« Reply #11 on: 30-01-2011, 19:01:54 »
Actually, Aberdeen is one of my favorites map in FH2. Aberdeen and Bardia: <3

If i could, just do what Flippy said in BF2 Editor, hell yeah i would do it. But, i lost all my experience on mapping D=>

I loved it,  i remember rounds with the Valentine, just showing these silly germans my side armor and laughing at their faces, shooting with my little gun, doing no damage but still having fun.

Or going solo trough the Mountain and sniping British tanks with a PzII or something.


Remake Needed =D


Offline Butcher

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Re: Giving Aberdeen some love
« Reply #12 on: 30-01-2011, 20:01:48 »
Nice suggestions for the map!! I agree with you there, nice thoughts.
The map is to narrow and is just a frontal fight, bashing it out.

But Am I the only one who is seeing the problem with tank balance in North Africa?

I know im getting annoying with this ... but as allies i never had any problem on this map. Problem is that if you are driving a german tank on this map (or most other NA maps for that matter) you are screwed.
The PIV can´t fight over long distances (of course it shouldnt).
And the PIII doesnt do anything. - Hell, i shot a grant over about 100 metres 3 times in the side and it stayed intact. i really think there should be weakspots you can shoot with PIIIs (you know the panther can be 1 shot if you hit the track - why not the other way around).
- Same goes for shermans on other maps (- nice ambush position, pzgr40 hit with PIII into shermans rear, 50 metres, sherman catches fire, stays intact though - it 1 shots your tank. FUuuuuuu)

and infantry is no option in NA. - so what is left?
honestly im just joining NA servers if theres nothing else there - its 2nd choice.
« Last Edit: 30-01-2011, 20:01:45 by Butcher »
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Offline Kelmola

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Re: Giving Aberdeen some love
« Reply #13 on: 30-01-2011, 20:01:06 »
What would be the quickest solution would be to get rid of most of the OOB and add/move flags and what spawns at what flag as suggested. This does not require placing of new statics even.

Also, for a battle famous for 88-whoring, the Germans could benefit from a couple of those (as other maps have shown, they are not invincible!). Even if the flags are reversed, 88's in the place of 2pdrs at the northern strongpoint (or southern, if they're not) would be nice.

Also, the FlaK in the village. What is it good for except for spawnraping the Western Village, besides having suprise buttsecks with the occasional light vehicle that's driven by a n00b who doesn't know its placement?

The layout itself, I have no problem with fictional layouts (Totalize, durr) as long as they are at least named after a real battle (Ramelle, hurr). But in the long term the map really would really need to be flattened out. All elevation differences at 1/4 of the present, it would play nicely. Would have shallow depressions for the tanks to hide in and low mounds for spotters to spot from, instead of the current alpine ravines and vertical cliffs. Is this as simple as changing the heightmap, or is there more arcane lore to be learned?

Offline Cory the Otter

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Re: Giving Aberdeen some love
« Reply #14 on: 30-01-2011, 23:01:50 »
Am I the only one who likes Aberdeen as it is?