It's the Stinky's terrible maps thread.

[Ol' Stinky]

Wow. Lots of maps. Thanks for doing these, it's always good to see the community trying out the editor and posting up their work and it must have taken a while to do them all.

I've not had a chance to look at all of them because you made so many, but here's my general thoughts on what I viewed (about 1/3 of them):

- You need to be more careful lining up the edges of the ground tiles. The 10x10 ones and 5x5 ones are meant to have edges that line up with one another, if you don't do that then it looks weird. It seems you know this is an area to work on already, but having the floor join up in a sensible way (for example on the Farm maps) is half the battle when it comes to creating a realistic-looking map. I find it quite a chore sometimes but it has to be done.

- Your arctic maps are densely packed with props, which doesn't look as bad as I thought it would, but you've gone a bit too far. Having two or three mesas touching one another works fairly well, actually - as does having a lot of rocks in a small area. But having a solid wall of them doesn't quite look right and can be a bit repetitive.

- It seems this goes for all of the tilesets, actually. You've a tendency to re-use the same prop / building a lot in close proximity, which looks a bit unnatural.

Overall I don't think they slot into the Goldhawk style particularly well, but I'm sure the community is happy to have more maps to play though!

Thanks for the kind words! A word of warning, I wouldn't try out the farm maps in map pack 1. They're, uh, not exactly my best work, and that's partly the reason I've chosen to do farm maps again now I have the submap editor. I'm tempted to remove them and probably will once pack 2's farm maps are better; right now they're for people who prefer quantity to quality.

I'll re-visit the farm maps I've made later this week, hopefully I can make the ground look more natural. I'll probably end up taking out the 5x5 grass (if Flash hasn't done so already (; ).

With map pack 1 I really was feeling my way around the editor - also bear in mind that I picked it up at a bad time (18.4, just as you guys started work on the archiving system, meaning I didn't have use of submaps or even really the level viewer). I suspect you're referring to the arctic map where I've tried to create the feeling of the little base/outpost being inbetween a mountain range and a forest. The mesas on their own looked a bit strange so I tried to make the area look more mountainous, but yes, I do tend to overdo it with the props. The submaps help me with my affliction, though - pack 2's farm maps generally have less dotted around the map.

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Those windows look nice, Flash. Maybe I'll even make a log cabin (well, okay, a "plank cabin") for arctic maps with them. As for town, yeah, I'll be going for that after I muck around with arctic for a bit, then revisit my farm maps. I'm kicking around hotel and maybe mall modular submaps around in my head after I see how these arctic outpost modular submaps play out in practice.

[Ol' Stinky]

Okay then. I went through the farm maps and all the 5x5/10x10 grass tiles have been replaced with 20x20s. I also added in more fences to try and make the transition to random fields look a bit better (hopefully), and I also got rid of some fence-end problems. The remaining ones will probably require a custom submap or two.

On FarmStink2 I've tried out mxing stone walls and fences, the idea being that the fences are stand-ins for gates. Let me know if it doesn't really work, I'll take them out if so.

I was converting the farms to soviet wooden tiles when I noticed this:

Sometimes you can hide the tear that happens in the corner, but when you can't, it's gross. I've left soviet farms out of mp2 for the time being.

The modular base thing didn't work out, it was too much hassle for too little gain. I decided to simply make one big submap instead, and it's in the Arctic_ColdStink1_Scout_Corvette_Stinky map in map pack 2. The outpost is a 20x20 building in the middle of the map. I plan on making maps for bigger size UFOs by increasing the size of the outpost.

[flashman]

I will take a look and amend the CMP. The tear can be fixed with a simple spectre edit, you can see it is about 1/2 pivot points in wrong position. Otherwise just take the kink out of your building and leave it with a flat edge.

[Ol' Stinky]

As long as you don't mind spectre edits, I'll do just that. Apart from that graphical issue, sovietwood houses blow the barnwood-houses out of the water, really.

[Ol' Stinky]

Okay then.

Soviet farmhouses are go! I've included the spectre fix in map pack 2. The only other tweaks to the farm maps are minor stuff.

ColdStink 2 and 3, as well as a light scout version of ColdStink 1, are in the pack. These are 60x60 maps, with light scout and scout/corvette versions. ColdStink 2 is not for people who don't like props, as it features random forest submaps. ColdStink 3 has my second outpost as the main feature. This brings the total of maps in pack 2 up to 15. Let me know if there are any problems, I've run quickbattles but they never tell the whole story.

I plan to do a few 70x70 arctics before moving onto a new tileset. I see Flash is heading into Town, so either I'll produce Town maps alongside him, or I'll go Industrial this weekend.

[flashman]

Coolio, I will go through all these later tonight or tomorrow. I am currently fixing up my Soviet Maps to be ready for pack 1, just in time for steam launch. IF only I didnt have kids and a nagging wife

[Ol' Stinky]

I don't have either of those and I still can't keep up with you!

[flashman]

Its called finding time to escape!!!

[Ol' Stinky]

Before you're found and caught: do you want me to do town after arctic (since you're making town maps) or go do some industrial stuff? I could make some construction sites/offices.

[Ol' Stinky]

Added a 70x70 Cruiser/Landingship map for arctic. It uses a modified 30x20 version of D_OutpostA. Quickbattled.

[flashman]

Work on what you can be creative with. I suggest using the town stuff because it is fleshed out and gives you a chance to work on cool ideas.

Industrial could be cool but I am still awaiting inspiration.

[flashman]

Ok Stinky

I have included all your farm maps in the map pack, though I had to fix farmstink4. There was a black line of tiles south-middle, where your field was misaligned slightly.

I have included most of your arctic maps, though I had to drop coldstink2 - both versions. It simply is not possible to navigate vehicles cleanly. They require a 3x3 tile to pass through an area. It is a problem I had early on and I had to rework my maps to fix them.

I had to fix the spawn points on Cold stink 3. The shrike does not have all directions drawn yet, so your shrike was off loading onto the edge of the map.

I also had to move some of the trees on Cold stink 4? because vehicles could not get to the UFO without going around the entire map.

Your ideas are interetsing and I like the idea of cretaing forest submaps.

However, I think you need to rework your large base. It feels a little forced in places. 5 radar is little over kill on the roof and I think you need to decide if you want it to be 1 floor or 2. Perhaps have a raised platform in the middle - 3x3 with a radar in the center?

[Ol' Stinky]

First of all, thanks for checking the maps. I've made the fixes on my end as well.

• FarmStink4 should now be properly aligned.
  
• Shrike stuff should be sorted on the ColdStink map. I've quickbattled the ColdStink maps again, and I think they're okay. Sorry for letting that one slip through.
  
• ColdStink2 should have four hunter paths from left to right now: one along the far north of the map, one north side of the central lake, one south side of the lake, one far south. On the light scout version, it's got two on the eastern side of the lake as well.
  
• I'm not sure how well my random forests really work. I've tried putting in some submaps in Arctic_Thickforest_3x3_Stinky that contain rock covers instead of trees to see if it makes a difference. Previously the submap was pretty much aesthetic, having it potentially provide cover instead of LoS/F blockers might change that. It might not. I need to get some games on solely ColdStink2 to find out, honestly.
  
• Arctic outposts reduced to one radar dish.

I uploaded these changes right before making this post.

As far as design philosophy for the arctic outpost goes: it's meant to be a one-floor battleground, mainly because the AI doesn't seem to value high ground (at time of writing at least) and I have to place spawns at ground level (I hope we can get level control in the map editor, similar to how we can in the submap editor). The only reason roof access is there at all is as an incentive to the player, as it makes for a neat sniper perch when clearing out the remainder of the map. It'll be even better when/if high ground allows you to see over one tile high walls.

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I'll probably have a town map up by mid-day featuring the swimming pool and some new housing I've got going. These will be L and D buildings that take up 10x20 and 20x10, respectively. I don't know whether I should do R and U ones because of the fact we can't rotate the camera, so door-hunting might be annoying, even with rooftops toggled off in-game. Hm.

Edit: oh, and is it possible to edit the loadout of your team in a quickbattle? It'd be nice to have a hunter onboard, as well as lots of explosives. The explosives because I want to test whether an arctic bridge submap would still require land-bridges on the map proper.

Edited June 1, 2013 by Ol' Stinky

[flashman]

When i work out the quick battle changes I will let you know!!, It is a hack to the game but I dont know where it reads the loadout from.

If you have that dropbox account I can give you access so that you can fix the maps yourself.

For a town i recommend 5 buildings for a 60x60 and 5/6 for a 70x70.

[Ol' Stinky]

I'll set up the dropbox thingy tomorrow. I promise.

I've put a new town map in Stinky Maps 2, Town_UrbanStink1_Corvette_Landingship_Stinky. It makes use of my swimming pool and house submaps, as well as random Mazdas as per Gaud's suggestion back in, uh, one of the other threads. Mazdas currently have a 40% chance to appear; let me know if it's too much or too little. I was going to put in vans, but I botched something and they were causing me hard crashes on quickbattles. It probably won't take that long to sort out but I've been hitting various problems on the editing side, and I am in a grumpy mood. I'll fix it when I'm not.

There's only one submap for the down-facing houses right now but I'll cook up some more. I might be able to do one or two more today sometime, then one a day until they're at a reasonable number. Unlike the pool/hotel/shops, they need the submaps more quickly because I plan to use them liberally in my maps.

I've quickbattled it. I don't know why, but it refuses to spawn a shrike, spawning a chinook no matter what. I don't have a terror campaign save due to migrating from Desura to Steam, so I'll either need someone else to verify, or some time to get to that phase of the game.

I'm going to post submap pics in the town thread in a minute, but here's a couple pics of the map. It's the central area north of the swimming pool, featuring a memorial/park.

Edited June 2, 2013 by Ol' Stinky

[flashman]

I like the look but I cant test as you forgot to add the map Only have the props!

[Ol' Stinky]

I, uh, actually forgot to update the /zip. That's actually a bit of a bugger, as it might mean you have the bugged van submaps. Check the town props for Town_RandomVanNE folders and delete 'em if they're there. The mazdas are okay.

Proper version uploaded now.

[flashman]

lol will fix

I also had the vans crash on me aswell when i played with them.. maybe its just fate!

[flashman]

still cant download

[Ol' Stinky]

This time it's Mediafire that's the problem. I'll post when it actually uploads my .zip, and not just says it's uploaded my .zip.

[flashman]

drop box is your friend. just upload latest version and it auto changes for you.

[Ol' Stinky]

This is the first time I've had a problem with it, really, and it seems to be over now. I guess technology as a whole has decided to conspire against me this weekend. I'm still going to sign up for Dropbox tomorrow, which is when I won't be lazy.

Stinky Maps 2's properly uploaded now.

[flashman]

urbanStink1:

I like the shape of the map and building placement, but you have gone a little OTT in places. Instead of making another map, refine this one and it will be a good map.

1) keep the road layout it works well, though the bottom left road, have it be a T junction to avoid the weird tile problem where pavements meet but dont join.

2) Way too repetitive with the cars, worst case scenario the whole road is mazdas. Would be fine if there were 5/6 different vehicle types. use vehicles as strategic cover, to block LOS along roads etc. Be careful with placement.

3) The parked cars at the end of the dead end look a little odd! They dont really fit. I had the same problem and stopped doing it.

4) Reduce the number of houses by half. Keep it residential if thats what you want, but the number and that grey stone making it overwhelming. I have taken advice form Chris for this and i have changed my maps so that 60x60 = 5 buildings 70x70= 5/6 80x80 =6/7

5) Mixbrick type. The estates where I live alternate shades to avoid that Victorian terrace look.

5) Bring in the light. You have room for basketball, town park, give the swimming pool a car park. Put in some front and rear gardens. Make a ground submap that is a driveway and 1 that is a side garden that you can bring in if needed.

Submap editor- paint ground - select town or industrial, both have driveway tiles ready made in different colours. Then put fences around, furniture etc, but leave the rest of the ground empty so that they blend better with the tileset. I have examples in my soviet submaps, in the ground folder.

I would personally ignore gaudlikes feedback atm (no offence G) and focus on making brilliant one off buildings that can be set peiced together for great one off maps. You have great ideas and designs but by creating such different looking submaps, the map as whole only works 50% of the time when the better submaps / or the cohesive submaps spawn.

I would put your different house styles into separate folders and design a layout hat harmonizes. there is plenty of time for adding submap variation once the maps looks bloody brilliant. I have stopped doing multi submaps atm because the 2nd/3rd/4th version always ended up losing my vision or looking crap. This was pointed out to me by Chris, who always liked the original design.

[Gauddlike]

No offence taken, there are plenty of different ways to make submaps and not everybody will use the same one.

I tended to avoid making the sort of striking one off buildings and levels you mentioned because I found once you have seen it a couple of times it became less striking and more predictable.

A striking building is not a bad thing at all, I just prefer to make a couple of versions of it so that as well as being striking it is also more replayable.

Finding the middle ground that suits your own style is the main thing.

[Ol' Stinky]

I don't think it's the idea that's the problem, it's that I simply went overboard with the placement. I've cut their amount down by around half, but they stay in. It's a matter of getting the numbers right.

But long story short, I agree with most of that feedback. I also don't learn my lessons quickly, so I am still mucking around with custom spectres. Me and the computer seem to have come to an understanding; as long as I don't put the spectre files in their own folder, or put "_spectre" at the end of the spectre's filename, they seem to work. But I want to make sure they work for other people.

So I've uploaded a not-yet-final rework of the map with a couple custom spectres/"art". They're flowers. No, really, they are if you squint and turn your head sideways. Anyway, the point is I want to know whether you can see them around the house to the north of the deployment zone. If you only see grass around the house, or if you see the roses in low orbit again, please let me know. Also if you see black squares around the north house, those would be layering problems I failed to squash.

This is what it should look like, although it'll be hard to make out what I'm talking about since I have to shrink the 'shot down.

The green area in the north with the benches, flowers and stands nearby is a temporary deal, I didn't want to put the map up with a huge space there.