One of the most difficult things I find personally about making a TF2 map is boiling down the physical elements a map needs in order to allow each class to function in its niche and be fun to play. We all know that the Engineer needs "good sentry spots" and the Soldier appreciates "height variation", but it's sometimes difficult to translate that into actual structures in a map alongside having to deal with objectives, routes, arena sizes and "making things interesting", especially when you're having to cater for classes you may not have as much of a skill depth in.
I thought it might be helpful if the players who frequented a specific class and knew it inside-out could write down what it is exactly that they love about playing the class and what makes it a fun experience, with specific focus on how this experience centres around aspects of different maps. I figured that if we stepped back from the rather disconnected point of view of a "designer", and focused more on why certain classes draw you to their play style, it might provide more of an insight on why different pieces of a map are important and how you could place and manipulate them to tailor your map's experience.
Classes so far:
Scout
Soldier
Pyro
Demoman
Heavy
Engineer
Medic
Sniper
Spy
To show you what I mean, I'll start by talking about the Pyro who has to date eaten up almost 350 hours of my sorry life.
I enjoy playing Pyro first and foremost because I like feeding people critical Axtinguisgers, and also becase I like chucking extra-damage projectiles back into other people's faces. Once you've been playing Pyro for a good while you begin to become quite durable, even when faced with three or four enemies. On my good days I've been able to sprint out of the enemy intel on 2Fort, reflect kill a Soldier and Demoman, pop a divebombing Heavy back up onto the courtyard platforms, slip out of the door and strike down a pursuing Scout with a critical flare. The fun from playing Pyro comes from catching people unawares; he was designed originally as an ambush class, and for the most part this playstyle has remained, albeit in more of a "quick strike" vein nowadays, but the enjoyment also comes from the fact that people often don't expect you to be able to throw a rocket back in their face or an Axtinguisher in their eye quite as easily as you can do. They think "Oh look, it's a cute little flame-spewer, let's splash his feet", and then they're on fire and within melee range, and then they're dead. Of course, we can't forget than the other half of playing Pyro is tossing people off cliffs and into the path of trains, and the control the airblast gives you over an enemy's movement is particularly valuable in almost all encounters.
So what maps are fun to play on as a Pyro? The first thing I'd note is that narrow corridors, anything between two to four players wide, turn opponents into Axtinguisher food. Provided you can control the distance enemy players can see you from (anything further than a grenade toss becomes difficult to work with), airblasting other players up against a wall stunts their movement and allows you to come in with a critical melee hit. Maps particularly good for this are 2Fort (anywhere between the front door and courtyard), Gravel Pit (corridors between points, specifically B and C), Turbine (vents are pretty good, and intel corridors to some extent) and such, and the back corridors in Duel Pro make Pyros lethal too. Obviously not too much of the map should be enclosed or you end up with Junction; Pyros will choose to hang around the close quarters areas, so making them side routes can allow for Axtinguisher ambushes to help shut down pushes through these flanks. Specific points where you're out of the enemy's line of sight until they're virtually next to you are excellent places for Pyros to be effective.
As for reflecting projectiles, a good size guideline for this is the distance a Demoman can throw a standard grenade: anything further than this and the grenade will have lost most of its momentum, limiting how much you can do with it, and players will have moved further in the time it takes to reflect a rocket back, meaning that it becomes more difficult to predict where to aim the reflect. Small arenas like the 2Fort spawn barn, Gravel Pit B or the rooms either side of Badlands' mid are perfect for reflects; Soldiers and Demomen won't necessarily like having to put themselves in so much close-quarters danger, so forcing transit through one of these arenas using things like control points (Gravel Pit B) will allow Pyros to take advantage of when the enemies are required to get close to them, provided that the gameplay doesn't choke up to an unreasonable extent around these areas.
Finally, throwing people off cliffs is only fun if there are cliffs. Pyros like places where they can lie safely out of sight until enemies appear, before popping out and pushing people to certain death without exposing themselves too much. Wide cliffs with little cover are going to be less effective for Pyros than narrow, winding cliffs where the defending team has a good hold and ammo is abundant. As a map maker you can use this to your advantage: scaling up a cliffside area will make Pyros less powerful there. My personal favourite area to push people off is the rope bridge near the final point of PL Cashworks; hiding just behind the Red doorway means that enemies can easily run past you and onto the bridge without noticing you. The small size of the bridge and the platform area is offset by the fact that the route is provided primarily for use by the attackers, so it's generally only stray defenders who get stung by the ambush spots rather than causing the attackers to become overly vulnerable and limiting the usefulness of the route.
So that's my take on Pyro and map features that make him fun. Anyone else who feels they know their main class in detail enough to provide valuable information, go ahead! I might stick up some screenshots for this post once it's not 1am.
I thought it might be helpful if the players who frequented a specific class and knew it inside-out could write down what it is exactly that they love about playing the class and what makes it a fun experience, with specific focus on how this experience centres around aspects of different maps. I figured that if we stepped back from the rather disconnected point of view of a "designer", and focused more on why certain classes draw you to their play style, it might provide more of an insight on why different pieces of a map are important and how you could place and manipulate them to tailor your map's experience.
Classes so far:
Scout
Soldier
Pyro
Demoman
Heavy
Engineer
Medic
Sniper
Spy
To show you what I mean, I'll start by talking about the Pyro who has to date eaten up almost 350 hours of my sorry life.
I enjoy playing Pyro first and foremost because I like feeding people critical Axtinguisgers, and also becase I like chucking extra-damage projectiles back into other people's faces. Once you've been playing Pyro for a good while you begin to become quite durable, even when faced with three or four enemies. On my good days I've been able to sprint out of the enemy intel on 2Fort, reflect kill a Soldier and Demoman, pop a divebombing Heavy back up onto the courtyard platforms, slip out of the door and strike down a pursuing Scout with a critical flare. The fun from playing Pyro comes from catching people unawares; he was designed originally as an ambush class, and for the most part this playstyle has remained, albeit in more of a "quick strike" vein nowadays, but the enjoyment also comes from the fact that people often don't expect you to be able to throw a rocket back in their face or an Axtinguisher in their eye quite as easily as you can do. They think "Oh look, it's a cute little flame-spewer, let's splash his feet", and then they're on fire and within melee range, and then they're dead. Of course, we can't forget than the other half of playing Pyro is tossing people off cliffs and into the path of trains, and the control the airblast gives you over an enemy's movement is particularly valuable in almost all encounters.
So what maps are fun to play on as a Pyro? The first thing I'd note is that narrow corridors, anything between two to four players wide, turn opponents into Axtinguisher food. Provided you can control the distance enemy players can see you from (anything further than a grenade toss becomes difficult to work with), airblasting other players up against a wall stunts their movement and allows you to come in with a critical melee hit. Maps particularly good for this are 2Fort (anywhere between the front door and courtyard), Gravel Pit (corridors between points, specifically B and C), Turbine (vents are pretty good, and intel corridors to some extent) and such, and the back corridors in Duel Pro make Pyros lethal too. Obviously not too much of the map should be enclosed or you end up with Junction; Pyros will choose to hang around the close quarters areas, so making them side routes can allow for Axtinguisher ambushes to help shut down pushes through these flanks. Specific points where you're out of the enemy's line of sight until they're virtually next to you are excellent places for Pyros to be effective.
As for reflecting projectiles, a good size guideline for this is the distance a Demoman can throw a standard grenade: anything further than this and the grenade will have lost most of its momentum, limiting how much you can do with it, and players will have moved further in the time it takes to reflect a rocket back, meaning that it becomes more difficult to predict where to aim the reflect. Small arenas like the 2Fort spawn barn, Gravel Pit B or the rooms either side of Badlands' mid are perfect for reflects; Soldiers and Demomen won't necessarily like having to put themselves in so much close-quarters danger, so forcing transit through one of these arenas using things like control points (Gravel Pit B) will allow Pyros to take advantage of when the enemies are required to get close to them, provided that the gameplay doesn't choke up to an unreasonable extent around these areas.
Finally, throwing people off cliffs is only fun if there are cliffs. Pyros like places where they can lie safely out of sight until enemies appear, before popping out and pushing people to certain death without exposing themselves too much. Wide cliffs with little cover are going to be less effective for Pyros than narrow, winding cliffs where the defending team has a good hold and ammo is abundant. As a map maker you can use this to your advantage: scaling up a cliffside area will make Pyros less powerful there. My personal favourite area to push people off is the rope bridge near the final point of PL Cashworks; hiding just behind the Red doorway means that enemies can easily run past you and onto the bridge without noticing you. The small size of the bridge and the platform area is offset by the fact that the route is provided primarily for use by the attackers, so it's generally only stray defenders who get stung by the ambush spots rather than causing the attackers to become overly vulnerable and limiting the usefulness of the route.
So that's my take on Pyro and map features that make him fun. Anyone else who feels they know their main class in detail enough to provide valuable information, go ahead! I might stick up some screenshots for this post once it's not 1am.
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