Crazy stupid game type idea

PenPen

L5: Dapper Member
Apr 24, 2008
207
136
I'm back from the dead now, at least partially. Anyway!

I was thinking about a map/game type called survival. I'm thinking that it's probably done before. But anyway, here it is.

Red controls a single CP and is given some time to setup (eg. 1 minute) but after the setup phase ends, they are unable to respawn (and the respawn room is closed), or they are forced to respawn in some far away spot on the map as a spectator (they can't affect the battle after they die, except for engies since their structures are still intact).

So, Blu's task is simple, capture that CP within a time limit. If they kill everyone, the CP is supposedly totally open for capture and Blu can take it and win. Unlike Red, Blu doesn't have the respawn point drawback.

The map should work like L4D's survival mode where Red has some space to operate but is still working in a confined space. It's not really making a totally new game mode, it's just a slight mod to the normal attack-defend CP. And rounds will end quickly. People with short attention spans like me would love to play it out. The maps are supposedly of a medium to small size.

Drawbacks:
- Red can be almost a full team of engineers and just camp out the CP. So it's important to the mapmaker to limit on the number of ammos out there, limit the setup time, and make it so that when the round starts, Blu won't be facing 12 level 3 sentries by the CP.
- After a number of runs, the map will get much easier to figure out because nothing's changed and spots are easy to remember.
- Autobalancing from Blu->Red = Ragequit?

Let me know about your thoughts. I *think* it's technically viable but I haven't ran Hammer in a while unfortunately.
 

J4CK8

L11: Posh Member
Mar 4, 2009
820
243
Would be interesting but I doubt many people would find it fun to die on red and have to sit out. I know it would be easy to make a map for this type and I might just try it and see if it works out :p
 

uma plata

L6: Sharp Member
Jan 20, 2009
294
93
Yea, having to spec was the death-knell for Arena (even though a few of us still enjoy it)

But ideas for new modes are always a good thing. Keep at it, you might be on to something with a few tweaks
 

Fenderic

L1: Registered
Dec 9, 2009
13
3
have you ever played any zombie fortress maps (zf_)
your idea isn't the same, but it sounds somewhat similar to me,

red are survivors and don't respawn
blue and zombies but can only melee
sentries cant go past level 1 (to avoid being overpowered)
blue wins by either killing all red or by capping the point (not all maps have cap points)
red wins by staying alive for x amount of minutes.
 
Feb 17, 2009
1,165
376
Like Fenderic said, this is a bit similar to zombie fortress. Maybe this would turn out pretty good. I think we need an in-game preview of this.

EDIT: 500th post :thumbup:
 

J4CK8

L11: Posh Member
Mar 4, 2009
820
243
Like Fenderic said, this is a bit similar to zombie fortress. Maybe this would turn out pretty good. I think we need an in-game preview of this.

EDIT: 500th post :thumbup:

I'm working on a small test map for this, but just struggling to actualy do much right now. I always get bored of it being the same as every other map out there :p

And congrats on the 500 :)
 

PenPen

L5: Dapper Member
Apr 24, 2008
207
136
I'm at work now but once I get home I'll work on a prelim version or a template-ish version and see how it'd work too (gonna try with bots first). Should be interesting (and relatively simple to make).
 
Last edited:

UKCS-Alias

Mann vs Machine... or... Mapper vs Meta?
aa
Sep 8, 2008
1,264
816
I like the idea of having some survival mode but i dont like the part of being completely unable to respawn. It should simply be a distant respawn place (TPs should be allowed to shorten it).

The way to make the defending more difficult in time can be done by:
- Having red take a longer walk route (TPs make that quite useless but a TP wont last forever if the map is made well).
- Blue gets more spawn exits or spawns closer
- Shorter cap time*
- Smaller/Larger cap area*
- Respawn times (even though IR servers wont notice that)
- You can even make it so blue can use a route that leads to the red spawn being able to disrupt them there already.

* this can be changed with a workarround! Dont think its impossible

The map shouldnt be simply win or lose. As that would end up like many maps, 1 team wins 90% of the time or loses 90% of the time. It would be better if red allmost allways loses but get their score decided on how long they managed to hold it.

I would say a score system of 10 'waves' would be good. Each wave is a specific ammount of time. During the wave nothing will change and the time counts down for that. After its over you get overtime allowing blue to finish their capture. If the overtime is over (blue didnt cap) the next wave starts and a few things change making it easier for blue. Each wave red did defend they get a point.

I did make a start of such system before but as i was already working on ramparts i quickly stopped with it as ramparts is already getting too many delays.
 

grazr

Old Man Mutant Ninja Turtle
aa
Mar 4, 2008
5,441
3,814
Limiting Red's access to the map beyond the cp or even not doing that, Blu can win easily by charging up an uber before going in, unhindered, and ubering a demo over and over, widling down the defences, safe in the knowledge they will inevitably take that CP. A single demo who knows what he's doing can clear 3 local sentries easily. So unless there are so many sentries that Blu can't even get close because of knockback (a game breaking imbalance in itself). Red are going to have to deal with the fact that they will inevitably lose, so why play?

CP A/D is balanced as is, with the fact Red usually have longer respawn times. Not allowing them to respawn will tip that balance, ontop of the fact that the defences will only ever get weaker per assault. Decreasing the time limit to cap wouldn't work because the initial stages are the most difficult for Blu, irrespective of uber's, due to counter ubers and knockback. The balance lies in the ability for Red to maintain their bulwark through resupply and reinforcements. Having a time limit too short will not allow Blu to create secondary ubers and attempt another assault, and too long will mean Red will suffer too much from casualties.

I can see this game mode also being a grief fest, and spy's to be quite OP. This is just my opinion though.
 

Caliostro

L6: Sharp Member
Jul 6, 2009
261
110
Limiting Red's access to the map beyond the cp or even not doing that, Blu can win easily by charging up an uber before going in, unhindered, and ubering a demo over and over, widling down the defences, safe in the knowledge they will inevitably take that CP. A single demo who knows what he's doing can clear 3 local sentries easily. So unless there are so many sentries that Blu can't even get close because of knockback (a game breaking imbalance in itself). Red are going to have to deal with the fact that they will inevitably lose, so why play?

CP A/D is balanced as is, with the fact Red usually have longer respawn times. Not allowing them to respawn will tip that balance, ontop of the fact that the defences will only ever get weaker per assault. Decreasing the time limit to cap wouldn't work because the initial stages are the most difficult for Blu, irrespective of uber's, due to counter ubers and knockback. The balance lies in the ability for Red to maintain their bulwark through resupply and reinforcements. Having a time limit too short will not allow Blu to create secondary ubers and attempt another assault, and too long will mean Red will suffer too much from casualties.

I can see this game mode also being a grief fest, and spy's to be quite OP. This is just my opinion though.

This.

+ Suicide mode.

Kritzkrieg a soldier with RL or a demo... Spam into the room... Suddenly half the team is gone, and with no prospects of coming back. An uber could also quickly terminate an entire team. Pyro +Uber = Someone is going to die.

Spies could also easily thin down the enemy numbers.

See, in this game, eliminating a single person is very easy. Living to tell the tale, on the other hand, isn't. In "emergencies" I often suicide rush the enemy lines in order to take down a specific target (usually a medic)... And 99% of the times they die... around 99% of the times I die as well, but that's the point of a suicide rush.

Starting to see the issue? In this game mode BLU could suicide rush all they wanted, even with a huge and boring 30 seconds or 1 minute respawn. RED can't respawn. So it's a matter of wearing them down.

Not a matter of "if", just a matter of "when".
 

Trotim

aa
Jul 14, 2009
1,195
1,045
I love Arena and know way enough people who also do. The thrill lies in not being able to respawn and the fast, frequent skirmishes. The focus lies only on you as player so actually killing 4 enemies in one round and winning as last man standing is a lot of fun for you. It does kind of go against the premise of TEAM Fortress, yes, but most of the time the teams I have to play with in pubs might as well just not be there. :facepalm:
It's not about capping the point or the intel or anything silly, it's just distilled Team Deathmatch. Usually players who do well in Arena are also way more of a credit to team than others who are only used to the "normal" game modes; they learn to value their lives and every single point of damage whereas you usually only worry about killed and alive enemies. It teaches the idea of lit enemies, basically.

That's why I can actually see this gamemode working. RED has a setup of 30s, then has to defend for 2 minutes without dying while BLU tries to cap the single point. It's kind of like the last few minutes of normal A/D CP when everyone desperately tries to just kamikaze to the point.

I do agree you'd need a good prototype to test it out though. How are you going to stop RED from respawning?
 
Last edited:

PenPen

L5: Dapper Member
Apr 24, 2008
207
136
Wow, thanks for all the feedback after my post from work (posting from work - it's super effective!). Looking at the later posts I definitely see where people are coming from and what can be expected if this is made. Thanks for taking me out of my tunnel vision.

It'll definitely need some sort of revision (a major one perhaps) on this idea. But if I'm making the red team respawnable, that wouldn't make a big difference from regular a/d CP. I'd still want the some of the survival element to be around.

It's a delicate balance as grazr and Caliostro said. Blu can do suicide runs like crazy and still have the advantage over the long run (or let's say they just have the advantage right off the bat, it just becomes more obvious over time), which means that it's not a matter on if blu is winning, it's a matter of when. Unless the server or the map has a huge class limit on only allowing 1 medic, spy etc for blu, it'd be crappy since it means the map may already be unbalanced and a hard cap is used to make it feel balanced.

The only way that can keep my original idea working without further imbalancing is to make the timer super-short, like make it only 2 minute per round or even less. That would make red's disadvantage not as painfully obvious as it'd be. And red has a chance of winning, but it's very slim.

Aside from this above "workaround" I think I'll do some more thinking about how to make this a more well-rounded idea. But regardless, thanks for all the feedback so far and keep them coming!
 

Caliostro

L6: Sharp Member
Jul 6, 2009
261
110
Well, a possible work around would be to take a page of the zombie fortress book and make it so BLU can only use melee.

On the other hand, Melee = camping weapons would be insanely broken (for RED) since red shouldn't even take a hit. So to compensate you could probably either severally limit RED's ammo supply (only 1 or 2 small ammo packs) or none at all, force people to rely on engineers for ammo and health.

Speaking of Engineers, they can easily offset this balance since once a dispenser is up = infinite ammo and health... This would turn the matches into a matter of "can you destroy the one dispenser the engies can build right off the bat before they get enough metal for a sentry?". Once a sentry is up melee is downright doomed.

A possible workaround for that would be to limit the places engineers can build, maybe to some far, offhand place. Forcing RED to not only rely on engineers, but also forcing them to retreat and leave the point unprotected, or the team members alone to recover ammo and health slowly.

In sum, here's my idea:
- BLU instant-respawns, maybe starts overhealed by default, but only has melee weapons. Any class allowed.
- RED never respawns, is limited to the point the area they have to defend, has no resupply lockers, and only 1 or 2 small ammo kits, no health kits. Engineers can only build at the starting point off, far off the defending area. No weapon or class limits.


But that's just theorycrafting. Needs testing and such.
 

grazr

Old Man Mutant Ninja Turtle
aa
Mar 4, 2008
5,441
3,814
Still, presuming the engineers have any sense, all the engi's will upgrade the first dispenser with the 200 metal they spawned with. They could easily get 2 lvl 3 dispensers up in ~30 seconds.

Each alternative i think of that makes it work more/better only makes it more like basic CP A/D.

No setup time = scout rush
only able to build in setup time = same problem of no Red respawn. Ubers would just flaw the defences with no hope of recovering. It's the ability for Red to fight back that balances A/D.
No respawn for either team = bascially Sudden Death A/D.

Having a map where the defending team is only engi and there are no ammo drops would be interesting. But they'd simply get out classed.
 

Caliostro

L6: Sharp Member
Jul 6, 2009
261
110
Still, presuming the engineers have any sense, all the engi's will upgrade the first dispenser with the 200 metal they spawned with. They could easily get 2 lvl 3 dispensers up in ~30 seconds.

That's why I mentioned making building impossible anywhere near the fighting area.

Melee only = Blu's at a great disadvantage. Can't Uber, can't snipe, can't spam rockets and grenades... etc.

As a compensation RED would have no way to resupply at the defense zone, would have to rely on engineers to resupply (which themselves aren't particularly strong without their sentries) and would be unable to build near the defense zone.

Thus, BLU would instant respawn, allowing them to keep constant pressure on, but would need to attack in group to overwhelmed the guns (and slowly wear down defense) or be slaughtered one by one. As a compensation, RED had no way to heal, no respawn, and very little ammo around (1 or 2 small ammo packs)... Since BLU will keep coming back for more, RED would have to rely on an engineer building dispensers to heal themselves... However, they'd need to take a long walk for it, leaving the point undefended. Can't build sentries anywhere near the point after all.

This seems to balance things as the more engineers you have, the less fire power you have to defend yourself from the constant onslaught, the less you have, the longer it takes to resupply, the more exposed the point is.

Since you can't build anything outside that starting room you also couldn't build a teleporter to make things faster.
 

Zee

L1: Registered
Dec 30, 2009
34
16
I had this same idea actually. This is what I had planed out:

Red is on a hill, overlooking everything, defending the cap point. They have a resupply on the hill, but only goes off every minute or so. Thus red has a great advantage because they can see what blue is doing, and can be healed. Once they die, red goes into a cage over the cap point, where they can shoot, but can't actually shoot at anyone at the cap point. Thus they are greatly limited and can be shot at.

Blue has to cap the point, but spawns around in a circle. Thus they have to meet up. They have no way of getting healed besides a medic, but it will be hard because they have no central spawn to fall back too.

After red goes, blue switches places. The team who survived the longest wins. Because of this, it's all on how long red survives, not on if they do. Making it a balanced game type.

If you already made a map, I can help you out if you like. If you didn't start, I would start on mine once I finish my other map. :)
 
Last edited: