The Ideal BlackMesa (Suggestions here please)

NONONON! It is SEnor Chomp Chomp. We must accept that "Steve" will now be called Senor Chomp Chomp. If you can make it so the fish gets a kill, call it senor chomp chomp :D.

Zaw.... [refering to your signature].... you ever actually going to be back? Or is that Jan 4, 2010?

As far as BM goes... time will tell... I am sure I will like it once I get use to it again... I do wish that the vents were a little more broken up.... but that is my demoman wish... :)
 
Zaw.... [refering to your signature].... you ever actually going to be back? Or is that Jan 4, 2010?

As far as BM goes... time will tell... I am sure I will like it once I get use to it again... I do wish that the vents were a little more broken up.... but that is my demoman wish... :)

I'm just too lazy to click my signature and edit it ;D
 
The Jaws song should fade in when you start getting close to Steve and fade out when you get farther away.
 
One complaint that I heard while playing earlier today was that sometimes you'll be focused on thing and all of a sudden someone will pop up from a different angle and kill you. I kinda agree, but I think we will still have to play it some more to be sure.

My personal complaint is that at A it's difficult to sticky jump across the area. Not because of the structure of the map, because you hit the gryders (that's what they're called right?) that are on the ceiling. I've tried multiple times to sticky jump across, like from 1 platform to the other (horizantly), and hit those dang gryders. It's possible to make the jumps, you would have to make your arc smaller. But most players aren't that skilled at sticky jumping.

And, maybe you should put that map that you had at the old spawn exit back up on the wall. It was very useful for newcomers.
 
The main issue that needs to be fixed is the ridiculous labyrinth of vents. You should keep the vents like you did in v2t3, but keep that new area above the blast doors that leads above B/K and to the portal.
 
One complaint that I heard while playing earlier today was that sometimes you'll be focused on thing and all of a sudden someone will pop up from a different angle and kill you. I kinda agree, but I think we will still have to play it some more to be sure.

My personal complaint is that at A it's difficult to sticky jump across the area. Not because of the structure of the map, because you hit the gryders (that's what they're called right?) that are on the ceiling. I've tried multiple times to sticky jump across, like from 1 platform to the other (horizantly), and hit those dang gryders. It's possible to make the jumps, you would have to make your arc smaller. But most players aren't that skilled at sticky jumping.

And, maybe you should put that map that you had at the old spawn exit back up on the wall. It was very useful for newcomers.
keep forgetting to flag those girders as nocollision...damn me

~D
 
In order to sticky jump from platform to platform, you have to jump further away from the stickies than normal... I use to have problems in A... now I don't... much to snipers' disappointment...
 
The main issue that needs to be fixed is the ridiculous labyrinth of vents. You should keep the vents like you did in v2t3, but keep that new area above the blast doors that leads above B/K and to the portal.

He just added two connection to the main vents, it's really not that hard to understand, but it makes some places to accessible easily, so yeah, old vents is a good idea.

And waiting for steve, i like that idea!
 
I have to say I really loved blackmesa v2t3. It had its problems, but they didn't need too much fixing.
I find the biggest detractors in the new version to be the vents, capture point A, and the spawn.
-The vents have been thoroughly gone over, I won't touch that one.

-I find capture point A to be too claustrophobic now. I've seen a few people mention how much better A is for heavies and pyros now, but that's not who I thought A was meant for. I felt that V2T3 struck a perfect balance for the classes; the spacious areas of A and the closed-in areas of the other points were intertwined so well that every class was always useful, but each had an area in which they could shine.

-It's been mentioned a bit, but the new spawn is definitely too open. Having additional exits is good, but these new exits lead too far afield. There are already excellent routes to each capture area, having additional ones from spawn split up the players too much to be effective.

It's a little messy, but I've thrown together something to illustrate what I would suggest needed help in the V2T3 spawn area.
The main issues with the V2T3 spawn areas were spawn camping and teleporters getting in the way (not major, but annoying and easy to fix).

In order to combat spawn camping an additional exit is needed and the exit hallway needs tweaking. I've utilized the old balcony exit from the pre-V2T3 spawn and moved the V2T3 spawn closer to it so that the route out isn't too long.
In order to leave the already excellent stairwell to A intact (from B/K) a route to the balcony door can be made with through the inaccessible prop area visible through the windows in said stairwell. In order to keep the hallway from spawn to the balcony from getting too steep the entire spawn area would be raised a little.
Raising the spawn room would also help against spawn campers by giving the normal exit hallway a downward slope. This would give people exiting the spawn room the high-ground advantage and would also solve the teleporter issue since players would now be walking down over the teleporters instead of up into their sides.


I hope that illustrates the positioning I had in mind.

I have to be going to bed now. I hope that didn't come across negatively. I'm very appreciative of the work you've done.
 
So iguess what many people are saying is there are TOO many paths people can take?
I agree i thats the case.

For instance, on v3, one could start capping L and have only to watch 2 exits, the vents and the main hallway. Now, they have to watch all sides of the vents, the main hallway, and of course the other hallways because it is so darn easy to get everywhere. I've had ppl capping my C point while i was pyroing around at l, and i just hopped in the vents and got there before the person finished capping.

So, mabye instead of introducing all these map changes, why don't we start small? Fix all the glitches in v3 (buildables in water, the spawn ramp tele block, etc) and then start applying these changes from v7. Who knows, mabye something as simple as insta spawn for the attacking team on b/k and a quick cap (mabye slower than badlands last cap, something more like granaries) and mesa may be the map DH wants.


Oh also, b/k is now harder to attack because of the new opening you created. I think if you closed that gap it would contribute to less stalemates.
 
I don't see why sentries in B/K is such a problem. Alone I sat up above K last night in the room with the drop down holes to K (you reach the room through the vents) and I just picked off sentry after sentry until they ended up just building in the room I was using.
 
My B/K problem is that when you're on the bottom capping, you're pretty much a bug under a microscope (or a magnifying glass... in the sun)... unless it's SUPPOSED to be that hard to capture. Just gets a little stalematey, as everyone's been saying.
 
So iguess what many people are saying is there are TOO many paths people can take?
I agree i thats the case.

For instance, on v3, one could start capping L and have only to watch 2 exits, the vents and the main hallway. Now, they have to watch all sides of the vents, the main hallway, and of course the other hallways because it is so darn easy to get everywhere. I've had ppl capping my C point while i was pyroing around at l, and i just hopped in the vents and got there before the person finished capping.

So, maybe instead of introducing all these map changes, why don't we start small? Fix all the glitches in v3 (buildables in water, the spawn ramp tele block, etc) and then start applying these changes from v7. Who knows, mabye something as simple as insta spawn for the attacking team on b/k and a quick cap (mabye slower than badlands last cap, something more like granaries) and mesa may be the map DH wants.


Oh also, b/k is now harder to attack because of the new opening you created. I think if you closed that gap it would contribute to less stalemates.

I could not agree more with this post.

It is not fun when no matter where you are (except the spawn room) someone can ALWAYS get behind you.

the map should not be this way. It should be kept like v3 where if you sat and camped those vents you had to use your brain and be pretty darn good to manage to get behind the camper and kill them. It's actually an accomplishment in v3 when you do that. The one option to get behind someone camping the vents near b/k was to sticky jump or /spy behind them or go around through A to get them.

Now the map has every possible way for a person to get behind you, you cannot be safe in any area on the map excluding 2 hallways at spawn, and the spawnroom itself. You can die from practically every angle.

I also noticed much less teamwork in this version. 9 times out of ten I find myself trying to clean engineers out from above our last point, only to find myself getting my butt handed to me because its 3,4,or 5 against 1.

I think he next ideal test version of blackmesa would be test version 3. Fix the bugs/glitches that caused frustration, and slowly add these concepts into the new version a little bit at a time instead of throwing a ton a new content into it all at once, and getting mixed reviews about it.
 
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I think if he just took out the connection between the vent system a lot of these complaints would go away.

However, imo I think BM is MUCH better. I had a hard time playing demo on the old BM, probably because I play a more aggressive type of demo play. I don't enjoy hiding in the vents waiting for a poor scout to run by and be blown up by the stickies he can't see. That's not really helping my team. This version of BM really lends itself to a lot more play-styles. No longer will heavy-medic combos dominate the whole enemy team. Which I think is a good thing, because that is just not fair to the other classes.

Oh and A is SO much better. the only complaint I have is that 1 great sniper can pontetially cover the whole area single-handedly. Which might have been intended and I understand that.

I have heard people complain about the new push button blast doors; that it's hard to get it open initially, that it stays open to long, etc. Maybe making the hitscan area bigger would help? And perhaps having it close after a few seconds would help as well. Because, I see snipers sitting there with the door open for virtually forever.
 
Vandal,

ill be switching the steel doors back to the way they were. i "may" place a different version of the switch for the loading platform elevators and have a wheel that spins as the elevator is activated. The wheel could be some thin on the ceiling that you jumped up and bonked your head on to activate.

I'm pretty sure some of the vents are going to be trimmed back too.. i find alot less combat in these areas since point A is more viable for all classes. I know the scouts and snipers luved dominating down there but to restrict 1/3 of the map to 2 classes seams silly.

i may help out the snipers near c/l.. i have an idea for one of the glass window rooms that are not really getting used.

the portal entrance is coming out of spawn and going into b/k... it will be replaced by the health dispenser. That should help players know which way is out as i too some times spin around saying "WTH"?

~D
 

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