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Announcements => Developer Blogs => Topic started by: Ts4EVER on 03-12-2016, 14:12:12

Title: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Ts4EVER on 03-12-2016, 14:12:12
Designing FH2 maps

1.Introduction

In this tutorial I will try to explain some guidelines of how to design FH2 maps.
Before we look at some actual details, one thing first: If you want to make a successful map, first you need to get out of the perspective of the player and into the perspective of a designer. A player looks at a map from an “inside” perspective: What can I do here? What do I have to do to have fun / succeed? What are my best tactical options?

The designer needs to look at a map from the outside. What kind of experience do I want to create for the player? What is my map about? The first ideology one needs to shed is that players are in charge of gameplay. That is what you need to make them believe, but it is not actually the case. The mapper is in charge of what happens on a map, players are being manipulated into performing whatever actions are fun to them. A video game provides no real or authentic experience, it is always manufactured.

In this multi part tutorial I will start from a very abstract, high level phase of design, the “overall plan”, and then descent into the nitty gritty details and low level design.

2. High level layout and structure

Usually when multiplayer map design is discussed, one word comes up over and over: flow. So what does it mean? According to the Valve developer wiki:

Flow refers to how players naturally move through the level as their needs change, affected by the navigability of the environment and item placement. Flow is closely related to multiplayer map balance, and is usually discussed in a generalized context in relation to the level layout.

The way I think of it, “flow” means guiding the players through your level from one point of decision to the next. Video games are an interactive medium, so they need to offer meaningful choices to the player. Each round a player plays can be thought of as a series of choices he makes, from big ones (I will take this tank and guard flag X instead of flag Y) to really small, short lived ones (I will run to this piece of cover I see instead of the other one a bit further away). Note that these decisions are not free: They are set up and designed by the mapper, who only provides the illusion of a free choice in order to supply the fantasy most people seek in video games.

So where are the players supposed to flow to? Usually towards some kind of action point, also called action bubble, conflict points etc. In FH2, there are two kinds: Flagzones and chokepoints. “Flow” means guiding players into these objectives so they can enjoy themselves fighting over them. In this first part we will take a high level look at this, before delving deeper into the small scale stuff later.

In order to visualize flow, I usually picture the players as water going through a series of pipes, usually along a path of least resistance. Now obviously this doesn’t mean you should make your map an actual series of pipes, but it helps to visualize it like that to get a good overall structure. Let’s look at an idealized conquest map.

2.1 Conquest maps

The conquest map is the most basic possible battlefield map layout. Its distinguishing feature is that it is open. Every flag can be attacked at any time and no flag is inherently worth more than others, although depending on the layout flags might have different purposes. The basic goal is to hold more flags than the enemy for as long as possible.

(http://i.imgur.com/BnvOz2Z.png)
 
As you can see, you have two main bases here from which the “flow” of players originates, as well as 5 objectives, namely flagzones, that are connected by the main routes.
Main routes can be many things, but they need to be clear. This means a player, even if he never played the map, should be able to say just by looking at it: If I go this way, I will go somewhere useful. In Battlefield maps are usually fairly open, so compared to Counter Strike and similar games you have a lot of freedom to switch between paths, change up your tactics quickly or try something else. The basic design principles are the same though.

Note how it is very easy to visualize player decisions as well. The player spawns into the base and immediately has to make a tactical choice: “Do I go north, south or through the middle?” Each flagzone represents a similar node, it is directly connected to other flags. One way to easily mark main routes is by making them into roads. On many maps the road network is the number 1 guiding tool the mapper uses. This doesn’t mean players will slavishly drive down the roads, but they will know, on some level, that the road on a properly laid out map will lead them somewhere useful. As an example, picture Eppeldorf: the Germans have captured the first farm. Where will a player who spawns there most likely go? In the direction of the town, I would argue. A road leads there and one can clearly see the town as a worthwile objective. Will he go down the road? Maybe if he is in a tank, an experienced infantry player will rather go through the more covered forest, running parallel to the road. This whole area is one main route connecting the farm flagzone with the two town flagzones.

Now you might look at the picture and notice how literally no map looks like it. That is because it is an oversimplification. For one thing, you can change up the gameplay of your within these coordinates quite easily, by manipulating your flag layout. Take as an example the Sinai desert map, released with Battlefield 1.

(http://i.imgur.com/iqMTnDR.png)
 
The basics are the same, but note how the flag layout changes the way the map plays. Four flagzones are clustered in the north, two are close to the mainbases as a kind of springboard and one in the south is surrounded by lots of free space and kind of apart. If you look at the terrain, you see that there is a method here: The north has lots of buildings and close combat areas, so together with the four close flags you will get frantic infantry combat with fast changing frontlines. The south is surrounded by huge open desert expanses, so tanks, planes and cavalry can use their speed and range to duel over this flag. The two others allow players to break stalemates in the town or try and cut of the enemy from their mainbase.
By changing up how the flagzones are arranged and the nature of the terrain around them, they created a fairly unique map within the conquest framework and give the players meaningful tactical choices about how they want to approach the map.

Let’s look at how this idealized concept looks ingame, using Arad as an example.

(http://i.imgur.com/Q5vjInc.png)

In an actual map there are usually few straight lines, but the basic principle is easy to see. Main routes are marked by roads or simply open areas between the forests, effortlessly guiding player to where they need to go. Each flag represents a meaningful choice, there is always somewhere else to go.
This map also shows one of the other principles of map design: the choke point. The choke point is a point between flagzones were conflict is usually inevitable. If a bridge or ford on this map is guarded, there is no way to really avoid conflict and sneak around: You have to push through and take on whatever enemy is opposing you. How that works in detail is not important right now, but one thing should be mentioned. A choke point is not necessarily a point that limits where you can go. A bridge does that, of course, but it doesn’t have to be something like that. An open area without concealment can be a chokepoint just as well, even if it is way wider than any bridge. The beach area on Omaha for example is basically one big choke point, because there is no way to traverse it without somehow interacting with the enemy.

One can make maps completely without chokepoints, but then you run the risk of creating a map where only the flagzones matter, where the terrain around them is only there to be quickly skipped through using the fastest transport available. This can for example happen if the map is filled completely with random concealment, usually overgrowth. What happens then is that all pathing and flow becomes effectively meaningless and the flagzones turn into isolated battles without any relationship with each other.
One of the worst things that can happen in a multiplayer map is back tracking. A dead end in a map represents the end of choice. If you reach a dead end, that is basically the game saying to you: There is nothing of use here, turn around. The only reason there should ever be a dead end in a multiplayer map is because you have completely defeated the enemy and now only camping their main or watching their tickets drain is left to do. In all other cases, it simply is horrible flow.

(http://i.imgur.com/zqkb7Zo.png)
 
This was often done wrong in FH2 maps in the past. Let’s take a look at the original version of Mareth Line, back before a second bridge was added and it was turned into a pushmap.


(http://i.imgur.com/qEdh6JB.png)

Compare this to Arad: Dead ends everywhere. Have you ever noticed how most of the infantry that spawns at Toujane usually automatically runs up an empty hill and then has to jump over a weirdly placed little wall besides that house in order to get to Matmata? This is the effect of bad flow. One of the most trafficked areas in that map has no cover, no indication it is a main route, no gameplay. Meanwhile, many roads actually lead to dead ends or curve around pointlessly.

The worst offender is the big bunker in the center. It is a cool static, but once you attacked it, you are done. You can’t do anything useful from there, so all that is left is turn around and back track. At the same time, it is surrounded by mountains that are a more useful position than the bunker itself.

Part 2: http://fhpubforum.warumdarum.de/index.php?topic=21296.msg350358#msg350358
Part 3: http://fhpubforum.warumdarum.de/index.php?topic=21296.msg350913#msg350913
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Ivancic1941 on 03-12-2016, 15:12:12
Excelent dev blog. I suppose it will continue with explainig push maps too?
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Matthew_Baker on 04-12-2016, 00:12:52
Nice blog. Hopefully people can try to keep these points in mind when making new maps. Good sets of general guidelines to follow
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: elander on 04-12-2016, 19:12:19
Nice devblog!

I would love to start mapping again, and if, more from a designers perspective.
When i did maps in the past I focused on the players perspective - a misstake you talked about in your devblog. Furthermore I pay attention to looks and detiles, so my maps could look good but played so bad.

Sadly there is no time for me at the moment with kids etc ;)

Great blog!
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: hitm4k3r on 06-12-2016, 01:12:30
Very good dev blog with some basic mapping guidelines regarding classic conquest map layouts. Very usefull when you want to create a map as close as possible to their historical backgrounds, for example with real locations based on realistic heightmaps.

Please keep in mind though, that there are different approaches to "the-player-is-in-charge"-theory. There are games like PR, DayZ or even vanilla ArmA that show pretty good that sandbox games can work pretty successful aswell - even for FPS. Or maybe just ask the players of Minecraft or Garry's Mod ... the list of sandbox games is endless. It gets even more interesting when you have movable objectives, as the other players for example, or even with basic gamemodes like capture the flag or deathmatch/team deathmatch where your sole objective as a player is to interact with the other player. For those game modes it doesn't really matter how you plan your routes and your terrain can be generated completely random.

Another good example is a chat that we had about an older FH2 map within the CMP group, named "Supplies for Malta". One team had the objective to bring a certain amount of ships from point A to point B whereas the other team had to stop them. For such a map you could have randomly generated spawnpoints and goal areas, completely relying on player interaction.

About the point of Arad: this map itself shows it even better that there can be different ways to one goal. The original map from Red Orchestra had alot less choke points and was pretty open with forests that you couldn't enter, no roads leading anywhere to the fields and the river could be crossed everywhere with the bridges and the river banks working as cover for infantry or vehicles. Besides the mainbases and the two villages connected by a road and two forests as obstacles, the map was basicly a pretty big sandbox with a minimum of player guidance - the control points being huge areas that you had to clear and capture.

Just some thoughts from another dev  ;)
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Matthew_Baker on 06-12-2016, 02:12:08
Please keep in mind though, that there are different approaches to "the-player-is-in-charge"-theory. There are games like PR, DayZ or even vanilla ArmA that show pretty good that sandbox games can work pretty successful aswell - even for FPS. Or maybe just ask the players of Minecraft or Garry's Mod ... the list of sandbox games is endless. It gets even more interesting when you have movable objectives, as the other players for example, or even with basic gamemodes like capture the flag or deathmatch/team deathmatch where your sole objective as a player is to interact with the other player. For those game modes it doesn't really matter how you plan your routes and your terrain can be generated completely random.

I'd counter that this 'different approach' doesn't apply as much to most FH2 maps. All of the games you mentioned have completely different gameplay that's been structured to suit their open maps and style. FH2 is built more like a 'traditional' (for lack of a better word) fps where infantry and tank gameplay needs some structure in order to play well on a public server.

This alternate theory works fine if you're mapping for these other games tho.

The only real 'player-driven' maps that I can think of that would also work well in FH2 are maps like Battle of Britain and Supplies for Malta (you mentioned). But these maps lack infantry/ tank gameplay and are focused more on air/naval gameplay which inherently requires much less structure.

Air gameplay requires almost no structure (from the mappers perspective) other than making sure spawns can't be raped and where the objectives are located (if there are any).

Naval gameplay also requires less structure. However, we haven't really seen any 'good' or 'unique' attempts at naval gameplay in FH2 or the CMP yet. You can get a little more 'fancy' with naval gameplay and add more interest to a naval map by adding islands and shallow/deep areas that only certain boats can pass through. This would require structuring a map closer to TS's Dev blog and imo could make something very interesting.

As an aside; the FHT19 map Bukit Timah hints toward this type of naval gameplay with its weaving rivers and marshy islands. It's not fleshed out entirely imo, but it shows interesting ways to combine naval/ infantry gameplay. :D
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: MajorMajor on 06-12-2016, 10:12:07
Nice devblog! I had already heard most of the stuff explained in Ts's videos (which have a surprising amount of mapping insight inbetween the gameplay comentary and the occasional ranting  :P), but it is very nice to have it compiled in one single post. The graphics are clarifying as well.

Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Ts4EVER on 06-12-2016, 12:12:29
About the point of Arad: this map itself shows it even better that there can be different ways to one goal. The original map from Red Orchestra had alot less choke points and was pretty open with forests that you couldn't enter, no roads leading anywhere to the fields and the river could be crossed everywhere with the bridges and the river banks working as cover for infantry or vehicles.

Not really, it still had chokepoints. As I wrote above, an open area that can't be crossed while avoiding contact can be a chokepoint as well. These chokepoints are created by the mixture of unenterable forests and open areas with a long sightline.

Regarding convoy maps, these would basically be a variation of capture the flag maps, so the same principles apply. You give the escorting players several paths to choose, with the possibility to switch between them at certain points to outmaneuvre the defending team who will try to stop you at chokepoints. The trick would be to make sure that it is not too easy for the defending team to concentrate on one route once they guessed which one the attackers are taking.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: hitm4k3r on 06-12-2016, 13:12:49

I'd counter that this 'different approach' doesn't apply as much to most FH2 maps. All of the games you mentioned have completely different gameplay that's been structured to suit their open maps and style. FH2 is built more like a 'traditional' (for lack of a better word) fps where infantry and tank gameplay needs some structure in order to play well on a public server.


When you think about the standard FH2 maps with the historical stories and background you have a point. The issue with this argument is, that highly structured classic conquest and pushmaps are just one way of designing gameplay and that other options like convoy focused or dynamic objective gamemodes haven't really been explored for FH2 and that most mappers just stuck to the classic way. We have team death match on Mount Olympus for example. You could have placed that layer allmost anywhere on that map for that matter the sole limit being maybe it's size and the principle of player interaction would still be the same. I could go nuts and place a team death match layer on any of the FH2 maps and it wouldn't change the fact that we are playing a first person shooter settled in WWII. I could randomly generate a terrain in Geocontrol, randomly place some objects on that terrain and you would still be playing FH2 with basicly zero structure in mind. If you want I can do that for you as an experiment while still keeping you immersed. In that regard arena style maps are a prime example and there is no argument that speaks against arena style maps in FH2.

FH2 is built upon BF2 and when you look at the different mods that we've seen for BF2 or other BF titles it gets more obvious that there can be different approaches to fun gameplay even for a single mod. I could make an Interstate mod like map for FH2 with jeeps chasing a truck and people would still be playing the same old game from 2005, besides the fact that players are doing this allready because it is fun for them. It is just that nobody has implemented a chase gamemode yet. There are quite a lot of people in FH2 who have nothing else in mind than chasing the other players actually and who seldom go into a flagzone or follow the flow we provided, instead they play their own little games. Or why do you think that players like to camp on crossed out flags? Alot of this comes also down to engine limitations. If I had the knowledge to create a gamemode similar to RTS games like CoH, with base building, economy and destroyable environment I would do it right away. ArmA has this to some extent with the Warfare mode and it is fun as hell, no matter how big the map is.

It is important to understand that sandbox maps like Kashan Desert and pipemaps like Battle of Brest are just the two opposing ends of a scale that determines how high the degree of structure in your map is. And there is no rule that says that one of the two is right or wrong nor that one can't be applied for FH2. They are still both first person shooter maps with people hitting WASD and using a mouse. When we are talking about game and map design in general we have to step back away from the idea that the world is black and white - this just kills the creativity ;)
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: hitm4k3r on 06-12-2016, 13:12:08
About the point of Arad: this map itself shows it even better that there can be different ways to one goal. The original map from Red Orchestra had alot less choke points and was pretty open with forests that you couldn't enter, no roads leading anywhere to the fields and the river could be crossed everywhere with the bridges and the river banks working as cover for infantry or vehicles.

Not really, it still had chokepoints. As I wrote above, an open area that can't be crossed while avoiding contact can be a chokepoint as well. These chokepoints are created by the mixture of unenterable forests and open areas with a long sightline.

Regarding convoy maps, these would basically be a variation of capture the flag maps, so the same principles apply. You give the escorting players several paths to choose, with the possibility to switch between them at certain points to outmaneuvre the defending team who will try to stop you at chokepoints. The trick would be to make sure that it is not too easy for the defending team to concentrate on one route once they guessed which one the attackers are taking.

Ofcourse it has chokepoints, it's not infinite. The open areas that can't be crossed are not really choke points created by the mapper in the original sense, when player interaction creates them - this speaks against your theory that players are not in charge of gameplay. The map edge itself is a choke point, aswell as the enemy base. It was just an example to illustrate that both approaches can lead to fun results, so more open sandbox gameplay vs. extremely structured pipe gameplay that I implemented on my vision of the map. Regarding the convoy maps: fun fact is that you could generate just a random starting point and an random end point on a water level with the enemy planes spawning mid air randomly. There would be infinite amounts of ways how gameplay plays out.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Ts4EVER on 06-12-2016, 14:12:03
But that is not really variety if it is just an empty ocean with random spawns. Sure you fight in a different square of ocean every time, but what is the point?

And about team deathmatch, these maps are designed using the same principle. Look at COD maps for instance:
(http://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/callofduty/images/7/70/Studio_minimap_BOII.png/revision/latest?cb=20130704095741)

You get two spawn areas and a bunch of paths connecting them. The goal there is to have the fight "rotate" around the map. Now if Mount Olympus is a great team deathmatch map is another question, but TDM maps are not "random". In fact, no good fps map is random.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: hitm4k3r on 06-12-2016, 15:12:26
The interesting thing is, while you mention Call of Duty maps, that they basicly have the most random player created gameplay that you can think of, as the spawns and players are rotating randomly allways searching for each other. Atleast that was my experience until I stopped playing CoD. Sure, those maps are not random, but the gameplay is quite often and it shows perfectly that even AAA games offer variety. I think you are misunderstanding me a bit: I don't say that I want to allways have wide open maps or water levels. I just don't share the sentiment that players can't be in control of gameplay and that everything is controlled by the mapper. These are just too extremes that don't exist. A player player using an asset (driving it, placing or building it etc) is as valid as a level designer creating a chokepoint.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Matthew_Baker on 07-12-2016, 04:12:35
I'm trying to find the thesis of your argument to make sure we're on he same page. It's pointless to argue if we're not talking about the same thing. ;D As best I can tell you're saying that there is a way of designing maps for FH2 where structure (as TS presented it) doesn't have to exist. Or that maps can play randomly to be fun? You've presented a few examples of games (that don't have much relation to FH2 or its core BF2) that show fun gameplay without as much 'structure' to their maps.

My argument would be that this idea of designing gameplay works well for other games, but falls short when applied to FH2.

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The issue with this argument is, that highly structured classic conquest and pushmaps are just one way of designing gameplay and that other options like convoy focused or dynamic objective gamemodes haven't really been explored for FH2 and that most mappers just stuck to the classic way.


Convoy focused or dynamic objective gamemodes need to have the same amount of structure and design behind them as classic conquest and pushmaps in order to play well in FH2. you can not just have an open ocean with random spawn points and expect it to play as fun as a convoy map that has structure and 'choke points.'

TS explained it in this post;

Regarding convoy maps, these would basically be a variation of capture the flag maps, so the same principles apply. You give the escorting players several paths to choose, with the possibility to switch between them at certain points to outmaneuvre the defending team who will try to stop you at chokepoints. The trick would be to make sure that it is not too easy for the defending team to concentrate on one route once they guessed which one the attackers are taking.

In order to have fun gameplay in FH2. It's imperative that you have some structure to the map. A map where the player is 'focused' into combat with the enemy is more fun that a map is that is made with no structure in mind. Without structure you get combat that happens;

a) in places not designed for it. (open forest, open desert)

b) not for long periods of time (capping flags without encountering the enemy, not seeing the enemy for minutes at a time)

These two things are not fun with FH2's gameplay mechanics. (They may be fun with PR's gameplay mechanics, but this is because PR is designed for that. I'll address this later.)

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We have team death match on Mount Olympus for example. You could have placed that layer allmost anywhere on that map for that matter the sole limit being maybe it's size and the principle of player interaction would still be the same.

This isn't true. Player interaction is completely changed based on where you set the boundaries on that map.

Take this example. The screen below is the current TDM area of Mt Olympus.
(http://i.imgur.com/tHtrlXw.jpg)

Player interaction can only occur in certain places between statcis. These interactions occur this way because of how the mapper placed the statics. They also depend largely on the gameplay of FH2.

for example; we don't have jetpacks in FH2. Because of this, player interaction is limited to the ground and around statics that don't have stairs or ladders. If we place this exact same map in Titanfall or the new COD for example, player interaction becomes much different and therefore the map would need to be designed much differently.

If we look at placing the TDM layer in this area of Mt Olympus.
(http://i.imgur.com/bRPCa6Q.jpg)

Player interaction would change drastically as players can now interact in almost any part of this space. This leaves the player with more decisions (in the sense that they aren't restricted by walls etc..) but much less interesting and much less fun gameplay; as each decision yields the same results; moving right puts you in the same relation to the enemy as moving left, forward and backwards. Placing the layer in this area also leads to gameplay that leads to points (a) & (b) that I referenced above.

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I could go nuts and place a team death match layer on any of the FH2 maps and it wouldn't change the fact that we are playing a first person shooter settled in WWII. I could randomly generate a terrain in Geocontrol, randomly place some objects on that terrain and you would still be playing FH2 with basicly zero structure in mind. If you want I can do that for you as an experiment while still keeping you immersed. In that regard arena style maps are a prime example and there is no argument that speaks against arena style maps in FH2.


If by 'arena style' maps, you mean maps that have less structure (similar to my above example) then you can see above for my argument against arena style maps.

I would also argue that it is impossible to keep me immersed in FH2 without adding structure; as towns, cities, landscapes etc... inherently have a structure that needs to be re-created in-game to make them believable.

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FH2 is built upon BF2 and when you look at the different mods that we've seen for BF2 or other BF titles it gets more obvious that there can be different approaches to fun gameplay even for a single mod.

Looking at different mods is not a good example of how different gameplay can be applied to FH2. Different mods have different gameplay mechanics (some to a greater extent than others) and therefore their map designs can not be applied to FH2 and yield fun gameplay.

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I could make an Interstate mod like map for FH2 with jeeps chasing a truck and people would still be playing the same old game from 2005, besides the fact that players are doing this allready because it is fun for them. It is just that nobody has implemented a chase gamemode yet.

Implementing a 'chase' gamemode in FH2 is inherently changing its gameplay. It's no longer FH2 at that point and resembles racing games more than an FPS. Therefore, your maps would need to be designed more like Gran Turismo than BF2.

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There are quite a lot of people in FH2 who have nothing else in mind than chasing the other players actually and who seldom go into a flagzone or follow the flow we provided, instead they play their own little games. Or why do you think that players like to camp on crossed out flags?


The thing is, where these players go is dictated by the mapper. Players who don't want to 'play the objective' has nothing to do with how a map is designed. Players can 'camp' a flag all they want without fighting for the flag in play. however, when a map is designed well, this is harder for a player to do. good map design inherently deters campers and people who don't want to play the game. A well designed map manipulates players into flag zones and incentivizes them to fight for the flag in play.

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Alot of this comes also down to engine limitations. If I had the knowledge to create a gamemode similar to RTS games like CoH, with base building, economy and destroyable environment I would do it right away. ArmA has this to some extent with the Warfare mode and it is fun as hell, no matter how big the map is.

Here's where I would argue that this doesn't hold up. Once you create a "gamemode... with base building... and destroyable environment" you no longer have FH2. These things are gameplay mechanics not dictated by the mapper. FH2 doesn't have 'base building' or 'destroy able environments.' If it did, the core of FH2 would be different than it is now and subsequently, maps would need to be designed differently.

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It is important to understand that sandbox maps like Kashan Desert and pipemaps like Battle of Brest are just the two opposing ends of a scale that determines how high the degree of structure in your map is.

To an extent, yes.

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And there is no rule that says that one of the two is right or wrong
Right

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nor that one can't be applied for FH2.
Wrong.

You are not able to apply Kashan Desert to FH2 and Battle of Brest to PR and yield fun gameplay. FH2 does not have base building, helicopters, or a whole other manner of things that PR has created to make their mod have very different gameplay from BF2. Because of these things, Kashan Desert would play VERY differently in FH2.

The same goes for Battle of Brest in PR. Slower gun-play, higher spawn times etc... would make Battle of Brest play VERY differently if placed in PR.

Here's my main point. Less-structured gameplay (like ArmA) or more-structured gameplay (like CS or BF2) is no more inherently fun than the other. Fun is a pretty abstract concept that is very subjective (it all depends on your taste). My argument is that your maps need to be designed around the gameplay of the game that you're mapping for. If you're making a map for ArmA, you need to make it VERY differently and with different design points in mind than you would if you were making a map for BF1. Because these maps have been designed differently, it is impossible to translate one map into another game and expect gameplay to play the same.

Everything has a design behind it (whether you want it to or not). There is no such thing as 'random' gameplay. All gameplay is designed and effected by the parameters that game makers (modelers, coders, mappers) create. It's the manner of utilizing this design to the advantages of the games mechanics that makes a map 'good' or 'bad.' A map designed with PR mechanics in mind is 'bad' for FH2 and vice versa.

Sorry for the long post, I'm trying to present everything clearly without spouting vitriol and I have a lot of time after work :D
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: hitm4k3r on 07-12-2016, 15:12:33
You pretty much answered your first points in your post, where you didn't agree with me regarding what is fun and what is not, in your last paragraph. It is highly subjective what is fun.

You need to be careful to not make that same argument that one of the former devs made: "Players don't know what they want and they don't know what is fun for them", coming from a person who rarely played FH2. That's the biggest nonesense that you can come up with and it is not even an opinion, it is stating facts. Game developers and publishers are not spending millions of dollars for marketing and market research for no reason. Then suddenly a dude comes up with DayZ, Portal or what ever and they start making shittons of money with FPS games that have completely different approaches and are aimed at completely different tastes and users while still being FPS games, even on maps that those games are not designed for.

Basicly all I am saying is that the "players-are-not-in charge"-theory doesn't really apply for FPS games in general, no matter wich game we are talking about. Without player interaction and the player making decisions there is no game. There can be people who enjoy a completely random forest map with a minimum of structuring and planning only looking for and killing each other - even in FH2. It would be pretentious to claim that I know what people are allowed to enjoy in FH2 and what not. I am pretty sure there are people, who don't enjoy the maps that I worked on for several reasons. Take Ste Mere Eglise - pure freaking chaos, but that's how the landing was. And if you take a look at the map in the editor you will notice that there is much more randomness to it than you think. Another map is Omaha as it was mentioned here: I don't know how often I've heard people saying how senseless and shit this map is, while I personaly enjoy it. The degree of structuring and planning or limiting the power of the player of a map does not equal the fun someone can get out of it.

An open ocean with randomly placed spawnpoints and two control points can be as much fun as a highly scripted game environment with chokepoints. I don't know how you can say this: "you can't expect people to have fun with it". That's all down to the personal taste of the end user and you don't have influence on it, same as you can't force people to enjoy beer - something that is against my imagination. People are playing Silent Hunter wich is basicly nothing else, but on a bigger scale. In that game choke points are mainly created by players and there is no argument in the world that says: this doesn't work on a 4x4 ocean map in FH2 and that it can't be fun. At the end this is just your own POV, wich is as valid as any opinion, but it is not the ultimate truth.

I also think that you are overestimating what FH2 is. It's still BF2 with different models, textures etc. Sure, there are slight adjustements to certain gameplay mechanics, but it is still a FPS-game that people play with mouse, keyboard, joystick or whatever and nothing uber abstract. Players looking for and killing eachother. In that regard you are also completely overstating the fact, that people would not be playing FH2, if they played an arena map (my offer still stands btw) or a chase map etc. People are chasing each other all the time in this game, so are they suddenly not playing FH2? Is there a limit of how much chasing is allowed in FH2? Same goes for your Mount Olympus example: maybe they will play with a different approach. At the end they still start FH2 to play that map and to kill each other with WWII equipment. Also get rid of the idea that we don't have basebuilding: a player placing a mortar, a Flak36 in the tourney or a rally point is nothing else than a player building a bunker or some sandbags and oh wonder - it works in FH2 and can be more fun than a SL hiding in a bush -> just ask Seth Soldier. They are objects for player interaction. Basicly every asset in FH2 is a PCO that can work in different ways according to the creativity of the player. A tank can be as much of a weapon as well as a medium for transport aswell as cover or even a block on a bridge.

And last but not least: there is no map without planning and that's what I allready explained - a map without planning is an Utopia. Me starting the editor, placing some assets, spawnpoints etc. is allready a form of structuring and planning and the mapboarder being a chokepoint itself is allready a limiting factor. The question is, how much I force the player to either have his/her fate in the hands of his/her own or whether I place him/her in a railshooter brainlessly hitting keys to trigger quicktime events. And at the end of the day, no matter how much I try it, I will have no influence how much he or she enjoys it and what he is doing because ... drumrolls ... peoples minds are different. The only thing I could do is to completey take out player interaction wich just ends up as a movie. ;)
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Ts4EVER on 07-12-2016, 17:12:27
It is not "pretentious" to to know what people enjoy in a map, that is literally your job as a mapper. Otherwise you are stuck in the player mindset, as I mentioned in the beginning of my post. Also it shows me that you literally do not understand what I (and Matt Baker) are talking about on an abstract level. Of course players "make decisions", you just have to guide what decisions these are as a mapper. You see design as a limiting factor, when in fact it is the only thing there is to a game.

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The question is, how much I force the player to either have his/her fate in the hands of his/her own or whether I place him/her in a railshooter brainlessly hitting keys to trigger quicktime events.


This is what I mean. You throw out these words like rail shooter like they mean anything. I get the impression you see these schematics I posted and think players are literally supposed to run down the white lines like in a tube. Obviously not, these just guide the players through the map and 90% of the time he can switch between them on a whim, change up his tactics on the fly or even backtrack and retreat to try somewhere else if a chokepoint is to well defended. That is the beauty of a battlefield style game, as opposed to CS, COD etc.
However, this basic structure still needs to be there, as a framework for the player to make decisions in. Otherwise you have no map.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Matthew_Baker on 07-12-2016, 19:12:20
@hitm4k3r I think you're reading through these posts with the wrong idea in mind. We (at least I) am not saying that we know what gamers think is fun. I'm also not saying that we can dictate what is and isn't fun to gamers.

For me, its an argument of design. I said in my last post;
Quote
All gameplay is designed and effected by the parameters that game makers (modelers, coders, mappers) create. It's the manner of utilizing this design to the advantages of the games mechanics that makes a map 'good' or 'bad.'

When you design a map (when you design anything really) you have to take into account the parameters that you are designing for (code, setting, art direction, everything that makes up a video game) and you have to design your product (in this case, a map) around those parameters. When you ignore these parameters and don't design with them in mind, you are designing poorly. (this is objectively true)

Let's say I wanted to make a map for FH2 but I designed that map with PR in mind. I made large open areas with view distances that the statics can't render at. I've included little to no spawn points thinking my players could create FOBs and Rally points. And I've made the size 8km X 8km that will not play well with the texture sheets and models that FH2 has. I've also made all of my vehicle spawn times very large assuming my players will use this vehicle for the whole round.

Now we have this map in FH2 and there are problems, both technical and gameplay related.

This map, objectively, is poorly designed for FH2. This map will play better, and be better designed for PR. I'm not saying that people will not have fun on this map, or that people who like PR style gameplay aren't right. I'm saying that this map is better suited to be played under a different set of parameters.

There are plenty of settings in which, open, player driven environment creates good gameplay. FH2 is not one of those settings, because it wasn't designed that way.

P.S. everyone should check out PRv1.4 8)
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: hitm4k3r on 08-12-2016, 01:12:01
The funny thing is, that FH2 itself doesn't have a predefined general design determining what is right and what is wrong besides a few overall mapping standards that people didn't allways care about - thatswhy it evolved how it did, not only from the official POV. Just check all the maps from all the different people (not only official) and you will notice that we all had different ideas of how our maps should look and feel or how they should play like, with a few overlapping coincidents that are clearly there by design standards (like classic conquest) and some people having different skill levels or opinions on stuff. Thatswhy I said that this tutorial is nice when you want to create a classic conquest map. But that is just one way of doing a FH2 map, and not THE WAY.

One of vFH2 basics standards is from my POV it's immersion by detail and to throw you into WWII, with most of this being down to visual stuff and how we approach the senses. We never had someone saying: this kind of gameplay or that kind of gameplay is not possible. One day someone introduced Koth or Neighbouring Push, someday people tried to establish new standards and it backfired or it worked. People in the tourneys created stuff that is from my perspective far better or in some areas far worse, as the rallye point system for example wich really makes the game more enjoyable. There are even devs who find some of the design decisions in FH2 terrible. Did they take and the hammer and changed it? Nope. Go speak to them all and you will see that we all have very differing opinions of how a game should play like and what is quality, designed gameplay and what not. And FH2 is far away of being a reflection of that. I think the most overlapping fact is, that we are WWII nerds who like Battlefield games ;D

FH2 is using BF2 as a blueprint and in that regard are PR and FH2 more similar than you think. I never said that there is no design idea at all. Far from it and you should know me enough to know, that I design my stuff careful aswell. We all use what DICE shiped in 2005 and what some clever people explored and evolved over the years. I am not talking about people not being able to use their tools. Missing lightmaps or bad textures have nothing to do with design decisions. A 8X8 km map can still offer amazing gameplay, even in FH2. Sadly most of this is down to engine limitations and not a design desicion by the mapper. Sure you could say, that people using their tools according to their limits is a clever desicion aswell. But at the end those people never get a proper chance to establish their ideas because of those limits. Breaching the limits is something, that is actually more interesting, aka 100 player code and stuff like that. Before that 64 players was a standard in FH2 and it changed. If I want to create a chase gamemode in FH2, none of you will stop me from doing that.

If I throw you at an 8x8km map with nice textures, lovely landscape and a few little details that I just place for the sake of being details, with a minimum of predefined strategical planning from my side, I can asure you that you will find people in the FH2 community who are immersed and say: "this is amazing, it feels like something I ever wanted in FH2". Sadly, terrain with that size looks shit in BF2 so I don't even start. Am I clever now? Propably not. Render distance, viewdistances and stuff like that is stuff that I mostly consider as an engine limitation and not a design desicion by myself,  because otherwise I would have set the viewdistance higher on Arad and on that other map even higher, but I just don't want the server to crash so that the map plays smooth. A static popping out and in has nothing to do with planning gameplay, it's just me finding it ugly and avoiding it for aesthetic reasons and has zero impact on whether the player is in charge or not. I could set a much higher culldistance - again engine and hardware limitation and not my personal desicion where I really have that much of a choice.

You saying, that open, player driven environments with good gameplay are not possible in FH2 is just beyond reality and neglecting the fun, that people had on those player driven maps in FH2 over the years. That this is not fun for you is purely subjective and actually the complete opposite of what I experienced. Saying that FH2 was not designed for this, is pure contradiction in that regard aswell, because people have proven that players can enjoy different approaches using FH2. Or why do you think that tournaments had a chance to establish themself in the world of FH2 or why people tried to establish stuff like mumble? There was a demand from people to get exactly that kind of gameplay within the world of FH2 and they succeeded. Maybe you two guys should simply take a look at the TS server of FHT during the campaigns and you will notice that you are not necessarily a representative majoritiy of how people want to play FH2. Maybe I am seeing FH2 not as much as a "product" as you do, but my general impression is that this community produced all kinds of gameplay and not the only single holy grail of FH2-ishness wich is something that I consider as f*cking amazing and not someone breaking the rules ;)

@Ts: Ofcourse it is pretentious to claim to know that people don't know what they enjoy in a game because it is impossible to cater towards every taste of every person who plays FH2. If you think that this is your job, then I can't help myself but to call you megalomaniac. It is also pretentious to claim that I have to get out of the players mindset to do my job. Every marketing guy, who wants to develop a product will tell you the exact opposite thing. You have to get into the players mindset and try to get an image what he will do and what decisions he will make. Arad is what it is because I didn't look through the eyes of a dev but a player.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Matthew_Baker on 08-12-2016, 03:12:35
I just want to address a few of the things that you claim aren't design decisions because they really are. This is a core part of what we are talking about. All of these things (+many more) are design decisions that have an overall effect on gameplay.

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Sadly most of this is down to engine limitations and not a design desicion by the mapper.

Mappers need to take into account engine limitations when designing a map. It may be a subconscious decision, but it's a very basic and important decision.

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Render distance, viewdistances and stuff like that is stuff that I mostly consider as an engine limitation and not a design desicion by myself,  because otherwise I would have set the viewdistance higher on Arad and on that other map even higher, but I just don't want the server to crash so that the map plays smooth.

This is a design decision. It's actually a huge one even tho it's done almost automatically. It's a decision dictated by how the FH2 mod is made. This decision is made differently when designing a PR map, because PR is made differently from FH2.

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A static popping out and in has nothing to do with planning gameplay, it's just me finding it ugly and avoiding it for aesthetic reasons and has zero impact on whether the player is in charge or not.

It really does tho. If you have a static popping in and out and a player can or can't see what's happening behind it, it effects their decision on what to do next.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Now, in every argument I've seen for more "open, player driven gameplay," you give examples of games, mods, or minimods that have different core mechanics (and therefore different design parameters) from FH2.

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People in the tourneys created stuff that is from my perspective far better or in some areas far worse, as the rallye point system for example wich really makes the game more enjoyable.

FH2 public (what TS's dev blog is about) =/= FHT. This mod and its minimod play far differently from each other. Things that work in FHT, don't always work on FH2 public.

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You saying, that open, player driven environments with good gameplay are not possible in FH2 is just beyond reality and neglecting the fun, that people had on those player driven maps in FH2 over the years. That this is not fun for you is purely subjective and actually the complete opposite of what I experienced. Saying that FH2 was not designed for this, is pure contradiction in that regard aswell, because people have proven that players can enjoy different approaches using FH2. Or why do you think that tournaments had a chance to establish themself in the world of FH2 or why people tried to establish stuff like mumble? There was a demand from people to get exactly that kind of gameplay within the world of FH2 and they succeeded. Maybe you two guys should simply take a look at the TS server of FHT during the campaigns and you will notice that you are not necessarily a representative majoritiy of how people want to play FH2.

Here you're talking about the FHT. This is a minimod for FH2 that plays completely different from public play. It has more 'teamwork,' a structure/ chain of command that dictates how the players play the map. This is something NOT present in FH2 public play. The people who wanted this type of gameplay literally got together and changed the game so it could be more fun for them.

And this is what I'm talking about. They re-designed FH2 (albeit to a small extent) because they weren't having the type of fun that they wanted in FH2 public play. And that's great, there is now a minimod where people who want this type of gameplay can go.

However, the design ideas behind these maps, can not be translated into FH2 public play, because the same parameters don't exist. Your arguments for more 'open, player driven gameplay' would work well if you designed a map for this setting. This same type of gameplay falls short when you jump to public play and there is less 'structure/ chain of command/ teamwork/ etc...'

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@Ts: Ofcourse it is pretentious to claim to know that people don't know what they enjoy in a game because it is impossible to cater towards every taste of every person who plays FH2.

This a great quote. "it is impossible to cater towards every taste of every person who plays FH2." :) This is absolutely 100% true. You can't cater towards the taste of every gamer. That's what different games are for and that's why FH2 caters towards the taste of a specific type of gamer by designing their maps (and gameplay) in a certain way. This is what TS presented in his blog.

If you try to cater to the taste of every gamer you get a heterogeneous mix of maps and gameplay styles that have no cohesive design choices because they are contradicting each other. I'm not going to argue against FH2 having a few of these pitfalls itself. that's what happens when a mix of amateurs (and some professionals) create a mod over 10+ years. However, this doesn't mean that it's a good idea to continue this trend and try to cater to both 'typical fps players' AND 'players who want more open, player driven gameplay.'

This devblog is trying to bring some design cohesiveness to the mod by showing the underlying structure of how map should be made (for this mod's current iteration).

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I never said that there is no design idea at all. Far from it and you should know me enough to know, that I design my stuff careful aswell...Arad is what it is because I didn't look through the eyes of a dev but a player

I would actually like to know what your design process is and how it differs from what TS laid out. How would you make a conquest map where the player is more in charge? as far as I see it, the player is no more in charge on Arad then on Dukla Pass.

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If you think that this is your job, then I can't help myself but to call you megalomaniac.

::) let's seriously try to keep this civil. Having these discussions and debates shouldn't be a bad thing for the mod. Lets have it help to advance the mod to a better state.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Ts4EVER on 08-12-2016, 05:12:14
Regarding tournaments and PR: These have design as well, but outside the map. In tournament the design lies in how the teams are organized, how communication is handled and how tactical decisions are made and communicated. In PR it's all those base building and randomization systems, as well as the manual that tells players how to act ingame.
It is similar to those role playing games where people dress up as orks and run around in the woods. You don't need to design the woods for that, but the role playing system, you need to setup the infrastructure for people to live there for a weekend and you need to assemble a bunch of weirdos with the needed imagination.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: GeoPat on 08-12-2016, 06:12:56
Regarding tournaments and PR: These have design as well, but outside the map. In tournament the design lies in how the teams are organized, how communication is handled and how tactical decisions are made and communicated. In PR it's all those base building and randomization systems, as well as the manual that tells players how to act ingame.

Finally getting to the heart of the matter.  The types of maps which Hitmakr talks about and I prefer require more teamwork style gameplay, which I also personally prefer.  But it begs the question, Is FH2 pubby style gameplay really by design or by default?  It seems to use the BF2 tools, squads and VOIP, but in a completely optional way and with no significant changes.  Thus, in my opinion, teamwork in FH2 public is half-assed on a good day.  As many people know, this has led to all kinds of server admin problems over the years, changing rules and their enforcement, stacked teams accusations, etc. etc.  Again, is this really the FH2 way or just a reality that some have tried to address through map design rather than change gameplay?

Anyway, I dont see the point in endless arguments about this.  The diversity of design in the official maps tells me that these points were never really settled.  I think the only answer is to continue with the diversity.  I think the servers running the CMP for example should operate under different rules and do more to enforce teamwork to make their maps play better.  In time they can introduce more features in the minimod to reinforce it, tournament style Rally Points, kick for not joining squads or soldier classes tied to squads like PR, etc.  And of course, revival of FH2 Mumble would be phenomenal.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Ts4EVER on 08-12-2016, 13:12:15
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Anyway, I dont see the point in endless arguments about this.  The diversity of design in the official maps tells me that these points were never really settled.

Most maps that do not follow these guidelines are from the earlier patches. Lessons were learned after that. Not a single map in 2.4 or after does these wrong.

If you manage to implement more teamwork on the public server then more power to you. I know the first thing I always do in a round is jump in a squad. In fact, if FH3 ever happens, I would be for making lone wolfing not even an option.
However, tournament or custom map "design" (wouldn't call it that) has nothing to do with the level of teamwork. These maps work in tournaments despite their layout, not because of it. There is no reason why a properly laid out conquest map with lots of space and flanking routes wouldn't work in a tournament, for instance, unless you think that what I wrote in the OP for some reason leads to less teamplay, which is ludicrous. So even if FH2 officially implemented features to further team play, like, from the top of my head:
- proper ammo sharing system
- proper suppression system
- reworked or replaced sl spawn system
- revive or similar squad cohesion system
this would not change these basic map design principles.
From what I see on the custom maps, this whole "They are made like that for teamplay!" idea is an after the fact rationalization to justify incompetent map design by inexperienced mappers.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: hitm4k3r on 08-12-2016, 14:12:45

This is a design decision. It's actually a huge one even tho it's done almost automatically. It's a decision dictated by how the FH2 mod is made. This decision is made differently when designing a PR map, because PR is made differently from FH2.


I can asure you that the guys from PR face the same engine limitations that we do. And if you played PR, you might have noticed that their performance optimization is total crap for that very reason, leading to unplayable framerates in some sitations and wierd glitches, atleast on my end with hardware that was considered NASA tech when BF2 was released in 2005. That's not a design desicion, that's bending engine limits into wrong directions and overestimating the abilities of your tools, same as we do with some of the CMP maps leading to server crashes because of hardware limits. If my design desicions create server hickups, unplayable framerates, or even glitches and noticable bugs (like the glitching roads on 1x1 or 4x4 maps) then that's not a design desicion within the limits of this engine. It's the same as breaking physical laws with an airplane: sure I can make the desicion to break them, but when my wings are gone they are gone. There is a reason we use 100 players as a benchmark and not 250 or even more. All this is not dictated by how FH2 is made but the BF2 engine and our hardware so please don't mix this up. It's like those funny "elections" in authoritarian states where you can only select one single party or go to jail.

Let me put it like that: if I had the chance to create a 4096x4096 map with the same details as I can make one with 256x256 without all those foreseeable bugs and glitches, I would do it right away. But I can't as there are hardcoded limits. And this is no different for PR than it is for FH2, as much as you make it sound like that I have a choice to crash the server or not. We have those glitches and bugs in FH2 aswell, like terrain LODs or people being visible behind invisble rocks in the distance or UG draw distances as prime example. Stuff like that is not in my range of desicion as it breakes the game in one way or another.

About tournaments and PR: sure you have a point that FHT is a minimod on top of FH2, but the underlying mechanics are still the same for the player, atleast for me with very few differences like the rallye points. As I allready explained, I don't see those huge differences in gameplay that you see and it is still FH2 for me and there is no reason why rallye points should not work in vFH2 - we have those in form of SL hiding in bushes wich is alot more stupid tbh and takes atleast 4 players or more out of the interaction. A person building an 88 works the same as a person placing a mortar via pickupkits. The tournament battles that I played, were pretty much similar to what I do on a public server -> WASD, look for enemies, aim and kill and some communication. Placing mines or smines, using vehicles etc., everything works pretty much the same. As abstract as it sounds, a player building a sandbag wall in games like Squad or PR is nothing different than a player driving a tank in FH2 and giving people behind it cover. We have a kitlimiting system aswell and we use a pickup system too.

Sorry about the "megalomaniac" btw, as it was not my goal to insult anyone. Should have worded it better - like good self-confidence. I think too that this discussion is good to gather some ideas about game design, so lets keep it civil.

Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Matthew_Baker on 08-12-2016, 16:12:36
@hitmaker PR has the same engine limitations. The difference is that they've made sacrifices in some areas of their mod in order to make advances in others. They can have larger maps/ view distances because they've cut down on texture sheet sizes, made their statics render at longer distances etc... These are all design decisions that they made early on while FH2 went in other directions. That's (part of their reason) why they play so differently.

Regardless of whether or not we agree the extent of what a design decision is. I'm looking for some common ground that's at the heart of these mapping decisions; would everyone agree that the main objective of a multiplayer map (in FH2, BF2, whatever) is to provide interaction with other players?
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: hitm4k3r on 08-12-2016, 22:12:27
Not necessarily when we are talking about mapping in general. As I allready explained: just take a look at all the different mods and content for BF2 or any other FPS game for that matter. Sandbox mods, stuff like the Monstertrucks by Rad. What about people who only play against bots? I could just create a map for the sake of creating a map and to fly around or bomb some stuff without any player interaction. Other people are creating dioramas, some people create art with their maps like this guy for example:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCgmX4icpN3HnOOwYtmyYz2w/videos
There were some jump and run maps for CoD UO like Minas Tirith, where you didn't have any player interaction but just tried to master a parcoure. You can do all this stuff in BF2 aswell and the possibilities are allmost endless. When we talk about multyplayer only in the classic sense with PvP, then you are right though ;)
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Matthew_Baker on 09-12-2016, 00:12:10
When we talk about multyplayer only in the classic sense with PvP, then you are right though ;)

I'd agree. That's why I specified.

So if the main objective of a multiplayer map is to provide interaction between players; then it would stand to reason that a map designed to promote and incentivize player interaction, is better designed than a map that deters or ignores it.

You see where I'm going with this.... that's the logic behind the idea. We can say that one map is better designed than another because it better serves the purpose of what a map is; it exists to have players interact.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: hitm4k3r on 09-12-2016, 19:12:31
I would be careful with that logic. In that regard PR maps are better designed because for one fact that mod has more players and is obviously more successful using the same tech as we do. Sure you could bring now again the argument that they make their maps according to their gameplay same as we do, but I could port my maps to PR and the player interaction would be the same - WASD and killing each other, with some voice coms, same as I could port a PR map to FH and the interaction would still be the same in an abstract sense ofcourse. They are still BF2 maps. This stuff is forward and backwards compatible as wierd as it sounds for you. Same as PR has smaller skirmish and push layers and we have maps with huge open spaces that emphasize on teamplay more than others. I know that Ts4ever hates Cobra and thinks that it is just successful because of the many toys we have, but one cool fact about that map is that player interaction works pretty damn well on that map even if it is badly designed. What a contradiction, isn't it?

I got to say, that the PR maps are not better designed, not because they are open sandboxes but some of them have technical problems and glitches that I allready explained, aswell as performance issues where I think that you can avoid this when you know your limits and tools. I know, you still think that this is a design decision but I will let this point rest now. When you dig deep enough into mapping in the BF2 editor, and I got a few hundred hours now and made and still make enough mistakes, you might get another view of what a design desicion is and what not.

I remember that we had a discussion allready long time ago between Natty and some other PR guys about that very topic. Natty told the PR guys that they are too lazy to design proper maps and force it by gameplay and the PR guys told Natty, that it is a cheap way to push players through chokepoints because they have no other choice. My opinion about them: none is right or wrong and both have a right to exist as both force player interaction but just on different levels and ways (still talking about the maps only) - at the end both are equaly good designs. There are maps like that Tudra map (dk the name) that would work pretty awesome in FH2, and this map is huge with very view chokepoints and would rely heavily on player interaction and force it even more, because otherwise you are lost when nobody covers your ass and flanks. In that regard huge open maps are even far superior from a gameplay perspective, because they heavily force player interaction not only with your enemies, but also with your team mates. You need to think about tank formations and stuff like that and that's stuff that works in FH2 aswell but isn't forced that often. In that regard I consider some of our maps pretty poor because we don't force teamwork enough. In our game player interaction is basicly on a minimum and we have a much smaller diversity of player interaction, not because people are not able to build FOBs and other fancy stuff, but because they are not forced to work together by the maps and their design. Players in PR don't join squads and build FOBs because they are forced to do that by their manual like you believe. They are forced to do that by the size of the map and their will to survive. You can still play as lone wolf in PR, but it just gets you killed faster and makes life alot harder in most cases.


A few self critical examples from the top of my head regarding problems in FH2:

1.) Players are not forced enough to fight for a position because possible spawnpoints are too close from where they died. One reason is that our maps are too small and the controllpoints too close together giving not enough incetive to get a flag. If I know that a flag gives me some nice vehicles, a safe spawn position and a superior position against my enemy and maybe some well needed transport, I might also be more forced to actually attack and defend it as it is very valuable -> try to tell that the average FH2 player.

2.) There are not enough surprise moments where you rely on your teammates and it doesn't matter for you to be in a squad or not except for having a mobile spawnpoint as you just rush in one of the waves like a CallOfDuty-zombie.

3.) Not enough desicions for the player of where to go and how to do it and too few options against enemies. Even spotting, retreating and evading an enemy should be an option, but it isn't and looking for different ways is often not possible. At the end the virtual life in FH2 is not valuable enough for the player himself. People in FH2 most of the time don't spot enemies because it makes them survive longer, but because they simply get teamworkpoints for it. If I can't get flanked by a group of tanks that often, there is no incentive to do it and save my butt.

On a final note: don't take this too harsh now. I still love and prefer FH2 for various other reasons. But I played many different games and shooters with different degrees of player driven gameplay and I can tell you, the more diversive games excited me more. Best example: Red Orchestra - Ostfront 41-45. That game had no different mechanics than FH2, even far less tbh (no squads, no SLs), but it offered small pipemaps and huge open PR like maps at the same time and it was awesome in both ways because it demanded different approaches from the players and alot of teamwork. And graphics, effects and ambience were awesome for it's time, both on small and very big maps.  :)
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Matthew_Baker on 09-12-2016, 21:12:18
This is pretty obviously going in circles at this point and it's futile to continue a discussion if the same logic isn't being used. :-\ I'll leave you with a few points.

I would be careful with that logic. In that regard PR maps are better designed because for one fact that mod has more players and is obviously more successful using the same tech as we do.

I don't think you understood my post. Are you saying that PR maps are better designed because they have more players? That has nothing to do with the statement I made about multiplayer maps.

Quote
I know that Ts4ever hates Cobra and thinks that it is just successful because of the many toys we have, but one cool fact about that map is that player interaction works pretty damn well on that map even if it is badly designed. What a contradiction, isn't it?

This isn't a contradiction. Just because a map is designed poorly doesn't mean that player interaction won't occur. I'm saying that a better designed map would encourage player interaction more. TS has a point in saying that the map is poorly designed. There is a lot of room to improve player interaction through a better design.

Quote
I know, you still think that this is a design decision but I will let this point rest now. When you dig deep enough into mapping in the BF2 editor, and I got a few hundred hours now and made and still make enough mistakes, you might get another view of what a design desicion is and what not.

I have a complete understanding of what a design decision is. I trained in it for 5 years at my university. Design is a universal concept. It is essential through all art mediums (painting, sculpting, architecture, video games, movies). The definition of a design decision isn't based on opinion. This point is moot in our discussion tho.

Quote
In that regard huge open maps are even far superior from a gameplay perspective, because they heavily force player interaction not only with your enemies, but also with your team mates. You need to think about tank formations and stuff like that and that's stuff that works in FH2 aswell but isn't forced that often. In that regard I consider some of our maps pretty poor because we don't force teamwork enough. In our game player interaction is basicly on a minimum and we have a much smaller diversity of player interaction, not because people are not able to build FOBs and other fancy stuff, but because they are not forced to work together by the maps and their design.

You're using the wrong logic here. Forcing teamwork and encouraging teamwork isn't the same thing. Just because people are using teamwork in spite of the map, doesn't mean the map is encouraging them to use teamwork.

You wouldn't say that an open ocean is designed to keep you afloat because you'll die otherwise. You would say that a life raft is designed to keep you afloat because that's the purpose it serves.

Quote
Players in PR don't join squads and build FOBs because they are forced to do that by their manual like you believe. They are forced to do that by the size of the map and their will to survive. You can still play as lone wolf in PR, but it just gets you killed faster and makes life alot harder in most cases.

This isn't correct. Players in PR aren't forced to use teamwork because of the maps. They are incentivized to use teamwork because of gameplay mechanics. (longer spawn times, the medic system, integrated mumble, not being able to place rally points without people next to you.) These are all the incentives that PR has created to encourage teamwork. These incentives are not mapping related, they are gameplay mechanics, and hence, irrelevant in our discussion.

I'm a bit done with the long winded posts. I've laid out my arguments clearly. At least this way, people with an open mind can read and interpret them. :)
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: hitm4k3r on 10-12-2016, 00:12:17
Matt, I can try to keep it shorter. But you see, this is no topic that you discuss in five minutes. Thatswhy people are studying this stuff and discussing it aswell. It's science and in science there is no ultimate truth ;)

If you really think that PR don't enforce their teamwork by their mapsize and design then you clearly have to make some research, especialy regarding some basic military principles, principles that apply in FH2 aswell if the map is big enough or allows it. It's a fact, not some imagination or wishful thinking by myself, that you have better chances of surviving when you cooperate in a small group covering 360 degree unless you have a 360 degree vision and the ability to cover that area with fire - wich you don't have alone for different reasons. You don't need ultra marine military knowledge to comprehend this. And the bigger your map gets and the less funneled it is, the more it is important to work together with other squads or that people help you by spotting. This is no different in FH2 than it is in PR. Maybe make some drawings or play some ArmA and you will get the idea. This interaction gets forced by your surroundings - simple game design. If my tank runs out of ammo on a huge map, it's better to drive an ammo truck to that tank instead of driving the tank back to base. Stalingrad just comes into my mind.

There is a reason why there exist different formations for units, may it be on the land, on the water or in the air, even for ship convoys *cough*. If my next objective is 20 seconds footwalk away it doesn't matter for me whether I have mumble or not. If I need it to stay alive (calling a medic, calling for transport etc) or to get to an objective that is a 1km away, it matters much more. It's not like they created all the nice teamwork stuff and thought ... oops, this gets more important on bigger maps - in fact it gets forced by them. The bigger my map is the more important it gets that I stay alive triggering a complete new set of logical strings -> need for proper air support, need for proper tank drivers, need for proper transport, need for a proper medic. Take a look at Squad. You have huge maps there and they enforce teamwork, not the other way around.

All this is simple math. If I play on a map as big as Brest, I don't need transport. If I play on a map like Cobra, transport gets more valuable and if the spawntime of that transport is huge, then even more. Take a stopwatch and do the test. If a map is less funneled the more stuff you have to take into account when engaging the enemy. I am not telling you all this stuff because I made it up somewhere in my brain. It's simple logic and my experience from all the different games I played. You are also completely ignoring what I told you about RO. That game never had an infrastructure like PR, even less than FH2 but it still enforced more player interaction and teamwork without any fancy voice coms besides the Steam VOIP.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Ts4EVER on 10-12-2016, 02:12:53
Seriously, the more I read this, the more I cringe. You simply do not understand what Matt and me are talking about. Now you are suddenly talking about mapsize, whereas this whole thing is about map structure. Doesn't matter if a map is 1x1km, 2x2km or 4x4km, you need to properly structure it. It is mind boggling that you think this is even up for debate.
But as long as you want to talk about map sizes and "basic military principles": The average offensive frontage of an infantry company in WW2 (100 guys) was about 400 metres. Even considering respawns, that means that the kind of player densities you see in PR are highly unrealistic for WW2. A bunch of small squads running around in the bushes are more fitting for modern warfare or anti-partisan stuff.
And there might not be a final truth in science, but that does not mean the opinion of every pathetic creationist or other nutjob is suddenly valuable.  ;)
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Matthew_Baker on 10-12-2016, 02:12:31
Matt, I can try to keep it shorter.

There's really no need. You seem to have gotten so far off topic in the last 2 posts, it's as if you're in a different thread. I've come to the same conclusion as TS. :-\

You simply do not understand what Matt and me are talking about.

(http://s2.quickmeme.com/img/70/70e9dd65072363dc5358a01c5bba3ce0a4148b40c49a093d32779ba41b193ba7.jpg)

Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: hitm4k3r on 11-12-2016, 06:12:00
Simple thought for you both: map size is map structure and vice versa. I don't need more map structure to get player interaction, especialy not better, more and more diversive player interaction and I don't need it to get the opposite result. Get out of your FH2 mindset. Cod, ArmA, BiA, BF, CS, , OpF, RO, PR, FH2 or what ever maps - all are FPS maps and none is right or wrong. Structuring a map by it's size isn't better or worse compared to structing it by it's layout and you will find any appraoch in any game. I would really like to know whom of you both actually played all of these different games intensively?

I think I know enough about mapping myself and actually played games that show any approach, so that you don't have to deal with memes btw. I am not some funky troll you are trying to belittle  ;).

Regarding science: I study Geography so I have my fair share of conflicts with creationists aswell. :P
Our science is only true until they prove us wrong. My first approach to science is to question anything and I would recommend you to do the same: makes life much more interesting and science actually valuable. The trend of giving players much more power in FPS-games is just one way of showing that the leveldesigner-driven way is not the holy one. Need some examples of simple FPS games? Ghost Recon, BF (where the player can be the soldier he wants to be), DayZ, Squad, GTA, Far Cry (extreme example where it got more liberal with every game), ArmA, War Thunder, Heroes & Generals etc. etc. etc. Even racing games went that way (The Crew, Test Drive Unlimited).

All that in genres where we are made to believe that the leveldesigner has everything in his hands. Still you need someone to create a level  :P
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: LuckyOne on 11-12-2016, 12:12:15
If I might throw in my 2 € cents... From my viewpoint (NOTE: I am not a game designer by trade nor education, although I did take a few courses that touched briefly on the importance of the design in general, and in particular in relation to user interaction with interactive media) there are 2 opposite ends of the scale for video games:

Now, FH2 being based on a game from the era when "The Roller Coaster" was the primary design methodology tends to naturally fall more into the latter category. Although a map designer might offer an "illusion of free choice" he still molds and shapes a map to achieve a specific "flavour" of gameplay, within the confines of the engine capabilities, of course.

I believe currently The Sandbox (and sandbox-like) games are the players' preferred choice, because they tend to make gameplay more "personal". It's always satisfying to see how something you "designed" will play out (I guess it is the same drive that makes the game designers happy to see their game played).

The problem is that FH2 has limited mechanisms for going in the direction of a Sandbox (PR tried to achieve more of a Sandbox feel and ended up implementing many arbitrary and "out of band" features to keep the overall gameplay fun).

I do believe it is worth to explore alternative approaches to the map design and general gameplay in FH2. The question is only how to do it without breaking the finely tuned machine that the current incarnation of the mod is... I'm afraid it will take a new engine (and a new team ?) to take the game in a different direction.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Airshark79 on 11-12-2016, 13:12:37
If a map can bring something new to see every time it is played without frusturating the player for his incapabilities then it is a good map. That's one reason to see larger maps being more of a safe bet for a newcomers point of view. There's more to see without getting shot every twenty seconds. Kasserine, Sidi Muftah will always be a better experience than Bardia, PdH or Mareth Line for a newcomer. Since you have more places to go and more things to see and interact with.

You can go way too overboard with the idea of distant flag-outposts with for example Nordwind, or Vosges though. But the great about some of those maps is that you can interact with enemy infantry outside of your range of engagement, that is something the vanilla maps severely lack. There's usually no deal of you're seen- you're dead problem in those, for example across the pond in Wake, or between two mountains in Faid Pass unlike a map like St.Lo Breakthrough, where camping is a real problem to deal with. So a squad or an individual can plan their aproach to a certain place where they don't get shot in the face constantly, like in Omaha beach.

A lot of the vanilla maps don't award communication or teamwork, since there are no support mechanics set in game such as rearming, healing, reviving, you can see that sort of thing is apparent especially in maps like Gold Beach or PHL where one guy with a rifle can disrupt a squad movement in a matter of seconds while a similar mod PR has the revive mechanic to deal with stragglers and retain cohesion more easily.

So one way to bring teamwork is with more options, in a map like Hill 262 a communicating squad has a chance to go for several flags, some of which are defended less or not at all, at one time, and then there is an intellectual involvement in which everyone can participate in defeating the enemy rather than just shooting everyone they see to death.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Ts4EVER on 11-12-2016, 13:12:23
Why do you people keep talking about map size? Did you ever actually read my post? It. Is. Not. About. Mapsize. It is about how to structure conquest maps. It has nothing to do with "freedom" or "tactics" or whatever ideological words all you muppets like to throw around. It is a technical tutorial about how to design a conquest map. Nothing in it is up to debate, it is just basic design principles. And now every wanna be mapper is coming out of the woodworks with his own personal theories about unrelated stuff. I say this in my videos for fun, but is everybody except me really stupid?  ;D

Seriously before you respond, please actually read my initial post.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: FHMax3 on 11-12-2016, 14:12:16
Nope,  ;D ;D ;D, we are not stupid. We are just lazy to structure our words corectly ;).
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Airshark79 on 11-12-2016, 14:12:03
Seriously before you respond, please actually read my initial post.

Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps

I read it, it's the most harmless read I've seen today. All I know is that something must've ticked you off to make this thread. You play this game in a certain way and a lot of people disagree with what you deem to be wrong or unacceptable. Example, never taking a transport and not being involved with squads. So when everyone else is doing what you are doing, like walking to the nearest flag in Seelow Heights or Hurtgen Forest you somehow imagine the team is working towards an objective together when in reality nobody speaks a word and are only looking for people to shoot at.

Doesn't matter though. Now quite a few of the maps are here to stay if the community enjoys them so there's a new and exciting process of natural selection for newer and more interesting concepts.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Matthew_Baker on 11-12-2016, 17:12:45
Get out of your FH2 mindset.

(http://img.picturequotes.com/2/19/18157/-im-sorry-dave-im-afraid-i-cant-do-that-quote-1.jpg)

This is literally a thread about Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps. Also, is it a meme when I'm just quoting a movie in white text?... good to know :D

The problem is that FH2 has limited mechanisms for going in the direction of a Sandbox (PR tried to achieve more of a Sandbox feel and ended up implementing many arbitrary and "out of band" features to keep the overall gameplay fun).

I do believe it is worth to explore alternative approaches to the map design and general gameplay in FH2. The question is only how to do it without breaking the finely tuned machine that the current incarnation of the mod is... I'm afraid it will take a new engine (and a new team ?) to take the game in a different direction.

I would agree. :) FH2's mechanisms aren't designed for Sandbox gameplay. That's my argument against putting a sandbox style map in FH2. You need the Sandbox style gameplay mechanics to go with it. And I think that changing FH2's gameplay mechanics at this point in its life, would be a total overhaul that would take it in a different direction.

All I know is that something must've ticked you off to make this thread.

Good to know you've come into the discussion with an unbiased opinion. ;)
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: GeoPat on 11-12-2016, 19:12:58

I would agree. :) FH2's mechanisms aren't designed for Sandbox gameplay. That's my argument against putting a sandbox style map in FH2. You need the Sandbox style gameplay mechanics to go with it. And I think that changing FH2's gameplay mechanics at this point in its life, would be a total overhaul that would take it in a different direction.
It's almost like it was developed despite the engine instead of with it.  IMO official FH2 gameplay style and maps operates constantly at the weak point of the BF2 engine, which is intense player interaction.  It's basically frag and lag most of the time.  Some of the maps are considered unplayable by those of us who prefer a little more strategy.  Though I would like to see servers enforce teamwork more, the mechanisms don't need to be changed to play more sandbox style maps.  The CMP has proven that players will adapt and appreciate the variety.  As I write this Midway has 90 players and it defies all FH2 conventions.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: MajorMajor on 11-12-2016, 19:12:10
It sure does defie them; there is no stock FH2 map so poorly optimized. The island area, besides being completely unremarkable, is almost unplayable due to FPS drop. If you aren't into air/naval combat, that map is dull as hell.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Ts4EVER on 11-12-2016, 20:12:35
From now on I will delete all comments that do not directly address the content of the dev blog or subsequent installments. I don't want this thread to become some kind of battleground (or even more than it already is now).
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Alubat on 12-12-2016, 00:12:55
Nice thread & dev blog
Dunno why, but Arad is the only new map that dosent do it for me while I find pegasus as one of the best maps in the whole game

Its not allways I like to game as intense as beeing in a squad.
Playing as lonesome wolf can be just as fun and is more relaxing and less stressed
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: MajorMajor on 12-12-2016, 08:12:05
Looking at the layout diagrams for Arad and Sinai made me wonder... could a FH2 conquest map with 6, even 7 flags, work if some of them were clustered enough? Stock maps (64p layers at least) always have 4-5 flags, but BF1 succeeds with 6. And in the other end of the spectrum, some Bf1942 maps had as few as 3.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Ts4EVER on 12-12-2016, 13:12:30
That is entirely possible. Some of the custom maps do that, as well as Sfakia. You just need to be aware of what effects it will have. If you cluster together lots of flag, you will get a very high octane area, very chaotic, like Sfakia. If you make a huge, open map with lots of flags on it, it is important to not clutter it up to much with overgrowth etc, otherwise you will have the problem of the areas between the flags basically counting for nothing, with every flag being a self contained "island". In a case like that I would go with a very long view distance and relatively open terrain, so that the flags are in direct "contact" with each other, over long range of course.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: hitm4k3r on 13-12-2016, 00:12:28
Nice thread & dev blog
Dunno why, but Arad is the only new map that dosent do it for me while I find pegasus as one of the best maps in the whole game

Its not allways I like to game as intense as beeing in a squad.
Playing as lonesome wolf can be just as fun and is more relaxing and less stressed

That's a pretty interesting POV and pretty much sums up what I've been talking about. Arad is a classic conquest map and I spend quite some time thinking about how to "guide" players with different meassurements, yet there are people who don't like it as much as other maps, gamemodes or whatever. Pegasus on the other hand introduced something new while still keeping the classic FH2 gameplay. With the introcuded gamemode a team has actually a choice of where to attack while still maintaining some limits. It's a nice and smooth way in the middle between two extremes and actually shows a tendency towards player driven gameplay without introducing base building or anything.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Alubat on 13-12-2016, 01:12:47
Nice thread & dev blog
Dunno why, but Arad is the only new map that dosent do it for me while I find pegasus as one of the best maps in the whole game

Its not allways I like to game as intense as beeing in a squad.
Playing as lonesome wolf can be just as fun and is more relaxing and less stressed

That's a pretty interesting POV and pretty much sums up what I've been talking about. Arad is a classic conquest map and I spend quite some time thinking about how to "guide" players with different meassurements, yet there are people who don't like it as much as other maps, gamemodes or whatever. Pegasus on the other hand introduced something new while still keeping the classic FH2 gameplay. With the introcuded gamemode a team has actually a choice of where to attack while still maintaining some limits. It's a nice and smooth way in the middle between two extremes and actually shows a tendency towards player driven gameplay without introducing base building or anything.

Maybe I just havent played Arad enough yet. I think its a map that appeals more the high experienced players, than new comers.
Maps should favor both experienced players and noobs at the same time :-)

I mostly like playing as lone some wolf in the working days. After 8-10 hours of hard mans work in noisy conditions. I dont allways feel for the squad rush kind of gaming. if I do I can still just follow others without beeing in the squad.

Saving the energy for playing FHT in a squad Thursday and Friday

I like gaming FH2 as it is. Some people play it like CS others like GTA. Making it a squad only based game would kill a lot of fun for me and probaly only appeal military geeks and students :-)

The best maps in this game are maps like a good song that just gets better every time its played, but shouldnt be in rotation too often
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Pr0z4c on 14-12-2016, 11:12:45
Nice thread and good explanation on map flow Ts4ever. very usefull

Now im not going to spend a whole lot of time typing a reply. But im giving my 2cents on the discussion of a mapsize.

I like both. i like the more smaller maps based on infantry altough it is a grind sometimes. Overall they perform good. On the other hand i would love to see some larger (fh2) (stock) maps make it into the game.

formost reason for me is the feeling that you are on a battlefield and that you as a player have a choice in what you want to do in that map. playing infantry, driving tanks or flying aircraft ect.

this does not mean that the ''flow'' of a map will be compromised.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Ts4EVER on 01-01-2017, 12:01:59
2.2 Sector-Push Maps

The main goal of a push map is to create a sense of progression in a player. Conquest maps are not static, but the player is fighting for the same pieces of terrain over and over until one side runs out of tickets. Push allows you to create maps with a “narrative” to them. As an example, the narrative on Omaha Beach after an allied win is something like this:

“First we landed on the beach and got all mowed down, but some clever squad leaders and experienced players managed to get a foothold on the bluffs. From there we managed to drive the Germans from the trenches and advanced inland. Now we were in the advantage: Supported by our tanks we captured a village and then overcame the German last stand at a church.”

It is your job to create such a story when you make a push map. It is not your job to put push on maps in order to keep people from back capping or because you feel the player density is not high enough on your map. There are better, more elegant ways to fix those problems.

Sector Push is the simplest way to achieve this goal, but it is also a limited one: The defending team is forced to defend, the attacking team is forced to attack. Beyond recapping single flags, there is usually no option for the defenders to drive back the attacker. This simplicity is a strength when used right, but can get really frustrating if done wrong or if one team is noticeably superior to the other. The biggest danger is a crushing victory by the defending team: This is the least fun outcome for either side, since the “narrative” simply stops at some point and turns into a meatgrinder over the same area. Because of this it is advisable to give the attackers a slight advantage. If in doubt, buff the attackers.
When it comes to flow, the same basic principles apply as for conquest maps.
 
(http://i.imgur.com/ujPXnFm.png)

How many flags there are in each sector and how many sectors there are in total is up to the mapper, although more than three flags in each sector are very hard on the attackers. The most important thing is: The sectors need to be distinct. This means they need to be easily distinguishable, both because they are removed from each other geographically and because they each have a unique theme. Take Seelow Heights as an example:

(http://i.imgur.com/86q6ZzG.png)
 
Again reality is more complicated than the generic layout, but the basic principles are visible: The sectors are well defined and distinct: You start in the open terrain of the Oder river valley, fight up into the hills of the Seelow heights and end in the bombed out town of Seelow. The narrative is clear. Note also the use of bottlenecks, especially between the first and second sector. There are four ways up the hills: Across the bridge in the center, the open flanks in the north and south and the more hard to use, sneaky path between the two flags.

The use of team spawn points is essential to the success of a sector push design. Defenders should  always spawn behind their flags and never between the flag and the attacker. The fewer flags a sector has, the more important this becomes, because taking a single flag with all defenders spawning all over it is almost impossible. It is best to designate dedicated spawning areas when designing a sector, providing cover and quick paths into the flagzone.

When it comes to ticket setup, usually both teams should have the same amount of tickets. This is to prevent the attackers from winning by simply outkilling the defenders, which happened on earlier push maps quite a bit. Once the final flag is taken, a very quick bleed drains the defending team’s tickets. It is up to the mapper if the last flags are recapturable or not. If the bleed for the defenders starts earlier, they can’t effectively recap their flags due to the Sector Push layout, leading to a very annoying end to the round. If you want a push map where not all flags have to be captured for bleed or a more complex, dynamic layout, use the new adaptive push code.

2.3 Adaptive Push-Maps (Or Standard Push)

Forgotten Hope 1 was one of the first BF1942 mods to incorporate push mode. Due to coding limitations, these maps tended to be simple: You simply captured the flags in a certain order, one at a time. When Forgotten Hope 2 came out, it had become possible to create all kinds of different push layouts and in the first versions of that mod (2.0 – 2.3) people often went with very complex push layouts. This changed after 2.4 and the release of Hurtgen Forest. It had become apparent that these overly complicated push layouts were not really working as intended. At best they were slightly awkward conquest maps, at worst a confused, unfocused mess. This led to the development of Sector Push mode, which was retrofitted on many earlier maps (on some more successfully than on others).

In 2.5 a new type of push was released: Adaptive push, with Pegasus being the flagship map for it. At this point I would consider only 2 types of push in the mod, namely Sector Push and Adaptive Push. Sector Push was already described. Adaptive Push can be used to create more complex scenarios that allow the defenders to gain back flags and more varied bleed conditions. To avoid the pitfalls from earlier push maps, here are some helpful guidelines.

Make sure the amount of flags open is limited. This seems obvious, but look at examples like Saint Lo Breakthrough. There are stages in this map that feature 6 capturable flags at the same time, more than most standard conquest maps. At this point you have to ask yourself: Maybe a conquest map would be the better solution?

There needs to be an obvious progression similar to a Sector Push map, it just has to go into two directions. Ideally the counter-attack should represent its own narrative. At the same time, the defenders getting back a flag can be extremely frustrating to an attacking team, who is now forced to turn around and backtrack, often while being on a very fun attack that is now cut short. To circumvent this, an Adaptive Push map needs to be designed differently from a Sector Push one. Instead of having clearly defined sectors, the flags unlocking each other need to be close to each other, to create a flow “flag to flag”, not “sector to next sector”.

Lastly, whenever the bleed goes over to the defending team, this should also represent a shift in initiative, meaning the attackers should get a sense of “We came this far, but now we have to hold out to defend.” The easiest way to achieve this is by giving the defenders reinforcements or taking away attacking team assets, but it can also be built into the push layout. Ideally the point where the bleed stops should also be the point where the attackers have more flags to defend than to attack. This represents a scenario of overextension, where an attacking team has to divert resources from the attack or suffer the consequences of lost flags.

Adaptive push mode has an additional feature that I will mention here but cannot comment on much, because there is no map except Brest that really takes advantage of it in its design and it is presently bugged in the public version. It is possible to have flags “cut off”. You may have noticed this on Brest. Basically, if a flag gets “isolated” from all nearby friendly flags due to these being capped, it becomes cut off, meaning the spawn points connected to it are disabled. I could picture a big map with lots of flags taking advantage of this by making encircling enemy flags a major component in gameplay.
Lastly I want to show you another simple push layout that is fairly old but can be easily created with Adaptive Push:

(http://i.imgur.com/Yxbz9aT.jpg)
 
This kind of layout can be found on Lebisey and Sammatus, as well as on Siege of Tobruk in slightly changed form. The bleed on this kind of map should be set up like on a conquest map, meaning the team holding three flags inflicts bleed.

Due to this, the attacking team has two overall strategic options:
They can attack on a broad front, trying to get the three frontline flags at once. This can be easier, since they are closer to the own mainbase and tank reinforcements. However, you have to defend three flags now, meaning you are now effectively in the position of the defender. This is the kind of initiative shift I mentioned earlier.

If attacking on a narrow front they will try to capture a second line flag, thus going closer to the enemy main and risking being cut off if a flag behind them is recaptured. However, if this is achieved, the attackers have a very good position, because they have only one flag to defend and are forcing the defending team’s hand. Lebisey works perfectly like this. A possible next step for this layout could be to use Adaptive Push to mirror it, meaning three flags in the center and two for each side. This could create a map where the front is pushed back and forth, with the side having fewer flags getting more tanks.

Finally I would advise an inexperienced mapper who wants to create push map to go for Sector Push first: It is the simpler and more elegant solution, with fewer variables to think about.
Title: Re: Designing Forgotten Hope 2 Maps
Post by: Ts4EVER on 21-01-2017, 15:01:46
3.   Player density

One of the things people like to get worked up about is map size, even though it is of ultimately minor importance. What they are usually talking about is player density. I would define player density relatively loosely:

“Player density determines how often you interact with players of the opposite team.”

The higher the density, the more players you will interact with. There is no exact formula for this, it can’t be expressed in numbers, like “This map has a player density of 3.5”, but it is something to keep in mind. There is also no rule about how high or low player density needs to be on an FH2 map and in fact it varies a lot. Before I explain all the elements that affect player density, I will talk about what will happen if the density is too high or low.

Too high density will lead to one of two scenarios. If the map is characterized by bottlenecks and progression, it will result in stalemates and terrible meat grinding. Especially if the map is close combat oriented, you will see player stacking up and spamming nades at certain chokepoints, leading to extremely static, frustrating and ultimately boring gameplay. Tunis is an example of this, which is why grenades have been heavily limited on that map. Note that if your map requires you to limit a basic item such as grenades (and it is not some kind of weird or special scenario) you probably have a problem on it.

If the map is more open or just unstructured, but player density is still too high, you will get spammy “Call of Duty” type gameplay, where you cannot predict where the enemy will come from next or where a firefight will occur. There will be short lives and quick battles. This can be fun to an extent, but due to the extremely high weapon damage in FH2 it gets old really fast. Each engagement turns into a meaningless frag without context.

Too low player density will lead to a map where it is too easy to avoid combat. This can have several effects. In some maps it leads to “flag carousel”, meaning flags change hands with little or no player interaction, leading to the feeling that one is chasing the enemy from flag to flag without actually fighting all that much. It can also lead to a situation where the terrain outside of the flagzones is, for all intents and purposes, “skipped”, meaning gameplay and combat only occurs in flagzones. In this case the area between flags is basically indefensible, so hunkering down in the flagzone and watching as many different angles as possible is the only sensible tactic. Here too the combat feels meaningless and random. If an enemy is met, there is no way to anticipate it.

3.1 What affects player density?

The most obvious variably of player density is map size. The bigger a map, the lower the player density, as basic math would suggest. This is, however only a minor element. To illustrate this, imagine the following scenario:

A square area of 500 x 500 m, completely flat and empty, has two players with rifles in it. Obviously they would see each other within seconds and engage, meaning player density is extremely high. Now imagine the same area, but filled with random overgrowth: trees with low hanging branches, bushes etc. Suddenly player density is extremely low, even though the map size has not changed. The two players could search for each other in that forest for minutes without result.

So let us list the most important variables to keep in mind:

Map size: Bigger playable area – lower player density

Concealment:
More concealment – lower player density

Note that random, meaning unpredictable placement of concealment causes this even more. There is a difference between having a hand placed line of hedgerows and 10 random bushes, each of which could house a player. The earliest versions of Purple Heart Lane had way more concealment than the final version, but it was found in testing that gameplay was too random. This is a sign of too low player density. The same is true for open buildings or very complex heightmaps. Imagine Point du Hoc without any craters if you have doubts about this.

View distance: Higher view distance – higher player density

Spawn point placement: Spawn points further apart – lower player density

This is especially important to keep Sector Push Maps playable. Imagine the last sector on Omaha Beach, except the Germans can spawn in the church. It would probably be harder than the beach section, and less fun for both sides.

Transport:
More fast or armored transport – lower player density

Objectives: Fewer flagzones – higher player density

Numbers: Fewer players – lower player density

3.2   Varying density and lessons learned

As if this wasn’t complicated enough, no map has the same player density in every area. Players cluster around flags, villages have different densities from the surrounding terrain and to make matters worse, servers play maps with different player counts. Of course this does not mean that a mapper has no control here, just that it is an extremely complex issue. Generally speaking, using the list above, make sure not to go into one of the two extremes.

Do you have a huge map with lots of flags? Then don’t also fill it with forests everywhere and make every house open. Do you have a smallish sector push map? Make sure the spawn points are placed far away from each other (look at Hurtgen for an example) and provide enough concealment for sneaky maneuvers.