Clefairy

+1 That map is a mistake of nature. There's nothing even remotely cyberpunk about it. I generally just turn the contrast way down on my monitor when it comes up, and maybe unplug my speakers. The trick is to turtle on the middle point for 20 minutes, preferably with a sentry or three, then switch to scout and blitz the other team hard. It's not pretty, but it gets the job done. Of course, so would just sitting out for half an hour, or taking it off the server.

@Sensai: Yeah, but it was also a big timesink. If one guy doesn't take the teleporter, and you bump into him, there goes your entire plan, plus 20 seconds. That's not say it doesn't still have its uses. From what I've seen, players in general haven't caught on to spies being able to use the teleporter. Having that glow around your feet makes people trust you at least three-quarters of the time. And if the engineer is dumb enough to have all his stuff clustered together, hey, score one for you. Also, critboost = Kritz/First Blood.

+1 for balloon race. It's not mapcycle material, to be sure, but it's at least on par with pacman for an occasional novelty.

Frustrated scout makes me laugh. And oh god I want a viking hat. The win in that picture alone is incalculable. I would think it likely that, with the tripling of the hat pool, they're probably going to up the droprate. The current system rewards newbies but offers jack to everyone else, especially now that weapon drops don't have variable levels. lol at Valve still pushing arena. Not that I mind, I quite like the change of pace, and this looks like a good one; it just seems like dead-horse-beating at this point, given the majority stance. EDIT: http://www.teamfortress.com/classless/hidden/barbary/ o.O Hat-betting...?

This man has the right of it. It's all well and good to say that class spam on one side can make for a poor experience (for an example not related to sentries, youtube "soldier defense"), but restricting players' options is not the answer. There are just so many ways for the game to break down. Class spam, pubstars, entire rounds where no one talks, pissing and moaning about ultimately trivial things like stock maps vs. customs... If you think about it, it seems sort of miraculous that we have as much fun as we do. Anyway. I won't pretend to know the answer, because I don't. The community's out-of-hand rejection of the mapcycle I designed is proof of that. Nevertheless I stand by my opinions; updates/customs will keep the game alive, and server events will strengthen the community.

Fun and balance aren't mutually inclusive. I almost typed "It's Valve" out of reflex, but that argument doesn't hold a lot of weight these days. Anyway. We'll see how game-breaking or not it is when the patch hits; all I can say for now is that is about to get a lot more awesome.

Offensive engineering. Level one sentry plus shotgun brings the pain. -- From a gameplay perspective, this is completely unviable. And yet I'm drawn to it... Gets me thinking. What would a map designed to be played upside down be like? Hm. I just might explore that...

Yes, well. As the saying goes, that was then. To me, it's in the little details. If the stickies are right up against the door, yeah, that reflects poorly on you. If it's a nice, even carpet on the dirt just past the cement of the room, that's fine. Same with intent; covering your tracks is one thing, keeping people trapped inside a room is entirely another.

I'm opposed to the demoman as a class; I think he brings too much to the table in comparison to the others, though it becomes really obvious when comparing him to soldier. Suffice to say, not very good. And I really think you're underestimating the value of psychology. For example, is it camping if you lay stickies on the ground outside the aforementioned resupply, then run off to the middle point with no intention of detonating? He wastes precious seconds destroying them, you get off Scot free and can carry on with your business. -- In other news: http://communityfortress.com/tf2/news/exclusive-interview-with-valves-robin-walker.php

They don't get a free pass, unless you give them one. I was hoping you'd bring up this example, because it's what I had in mind for my counter-argument. Upon chasing the scout inside, you can do the in-and-out dance, or you can backpedal a bit and fall behind the rock immediately beside the dirt ramp leading up to the resupply. Unless the scout sees you doing this, he'll assume you've either gone on toward the spire, or gone through the main door on the stone bridge for health. Either way, he runs off, advantage you.

There are two typical characteristics of areas designated "spawns". One, they have resupply cabinets, two, people spawn in them. The room in question has the cabinet, but no one spawns there. It's like an inverted forward spawn in a push map, like Badlands when your team has 4/5. Semantics, really. Regarding people who hide, there's a significant difference between being flanked and being flanked when you know it's coming. Unless your hider is particularly quick on the draw, you could even move out of sight until they pop out again and ambush them.

I've seen you roll pyro occasionally. It's.... unsettling.

Spy sappin' mah weekend! -- Looks like you've all been busy. And a suggestion I made was implemented!? This shatters my entire worldview. Eh... I don't have a lot to say on BB vs. AB. It is the fault of the victim for not checking their back; there are fully three classes (Scout, Spy, Pyro) that use flanking as a primary tactic, and every other class is capable of using it to enormous effect. But TF2 is a bright and colorful game, I think keeping people focused on the objective to leave them exposed to that was a significant design choice on Valve's part. As to the weapons themselves, it comes down to what you want. Relatively boring utility or the chance to go on ridiculous killing sprees. I'm a whore for utility, myself; ergo I use the flamethrower. EDIT: Oh yeah, I meant to talk about this. So, here's what I'm thinking about scrims. Every Wednesday and Saturday night I can be online, I'll check in with people around 7 or 8 EST to gauge interest. If there's enough, we'll pop on over to the ZUZ server and get started between 8 and 9. I see FireSlash has re-installed TF2 on his server, so I'm thinking we can use that as a backup. I haven't talked to him about that yet, so nothing's set in stone; I'll come back and update when I have more info.

I heard Aeronaut talk tonight. That never happens. So let's see... Hish, Joseki, Aeronaut... Unless I'm missing someone else who never talks, it's just Ele now. Also there was some stuff about human towers and general mayhem on Orange X. Kamikaze has an embarassment of screenshots (184 was the number I believe), so we should be seeing a few of those soon.

Hm... Point. The weekend scrim is supposed to accomodate people with that type of problem, which it doesn't do when held on a Sunday. New proposal: Wednesdays and Saturdays. Opinions?

Jeez, the things I miss in a day. I'm pleased to see people enjoyed the scrim; thanks to Vahn for putting up those demos. Since there's interest in doing it again, how does Thursday/Sunday every week sit with y'all?

Due to prior commitments I had completely forgotten about, I will be unable to make the scrim tomorrow. I've put Sensai in charge of getting everyone together for game time. Have fun out there. If someone could record a demo while they're at it, that'd be gravy.

Pretty much every attack/defend map suffers from this problem to some degree. Dustbowl is just the worst example; I like to think it's the ridiculous number of bottlenecks. Every single entrance into Red's territory on the map is either a tightly enclosed space, or a massively exploitable choke point. The area around Dustbowl 3-1 is the worst thing Valve has ever designed, in my opinion; there are good spots for at least 3 sentries, which already poses a significant challenge to an unco-ordinated team. Once 4 or more go up, unless blu is smart enough to get two ubered demos going, with escorts to negate red pyros' airblast, it's game fucking over. It genuinely boggles my mind as to how someone who has played TF2 for any significant length of time can find Dustbowl fun. And of course it follows that they can't explain it, since about 85% of the internet utterly fails at critical thinking.

To anyone else that might be burned out on the popular maps we play so much of (I'm looking at you, Dustbowl), allow me to direct you here. Research and Development in particular gets my recommendation, with MINERVA, Powerstation 17 and Joutomaa following closely behind. -- So, we've been running through the same mapcycle for a good while now, and if the above doesn't make my position clear, I'm pretty tired of it. I love this game, I really do; probably too much, by some standards. But I'm also prepared to let it grow and change into something different, because you know what happens to things that don't? They get old and die. Look at all the games on your shelf you never play anymore if you want proof. The updates do a lot to that end, but we're approaching the end of that cycle. And it seems rather unlikely to me that we'll see the same level of support and content from Valve once every class has an unlock set. It's possible, just unlikely. I seem to have lost my train of thought, so I'll just open the floor to discussion. I've posted my ideas for a new mapcycle, what are yours.

I'm reasonably sure you would need to remove the demoman and the sniper (or at least headshots)entirely to make that work. Nades have no falloff at all, and stickies are only subject to it for 5 seconds. The other thing that jumps out at me as being a problem is that all weapons do 100% damage to buildings, regardless of distance. Spread is the only thing that cripples non-explosive classes' ability to deal with them at long range. Damage percentiles are a huge part of the game's mechanics, though, so it's safe to assume they're not hard-coded. Totally viable. Hm... Not sure how you'd map for it. The only two designs that come to mind are King of the Hill and Red Rover.

Sunday. Don't tell me you've contracted my inability to count.

Alas, poor Garbage Day... I knew him well... *sob* Incidentally, nice sig. -- Thursday Hemophiliac !! S.A.M. Either Sensai Abyss meatball Joseki garian Clefairy Bleck Prophet Orwell Donut CaptainYahoooooooooooooooooo Lumpy EdgeCrusher duckyboy I have 9 slots to fill! Get 'em while they're hot! Steam is preferable to here, because I'm not subscribed to the thread. Also, my pre-game ritual involves The Legendary Team on repeat. EDIT: Scrim is probably cancelled for tonight due to lack of interest. Not enough people showed up, and the server I'd chosen flooded with pubs once 5 or 6 of us got in. If Sunday expresses similar problems, there's a decent chance I'll let the idea die. Suffice to say, if you want this to happen, make yourself available.

4 of 12. It was 7 of 13 the first time around, there was a big stink over it several pages back. Also, welcome back, baha.

:/ My current hosts have bailed out, it seems. I found a server that would suit our purposes in the master list, but I haven't had any luck in getting a hold of the admin, and it feels like squatting to come in and just have the match there without warning. I guess we'll see how it shakes down. -- Clefairy's Suggested New Mapcycle 2.0! Now with 80% more consideration! (read: 50% less customs. I am nothing if not conciliatory. ) ctf_hallofdeath pl_frontier cp_gravelpit arena_storm_b1c cp_fastlane plr_pipeline cp_steel ctf_turbine pl_hoodoo cp_granary pl_waste arena_well cp_egypt

I didn't particularly care for that one, but to each his own. Hope to see you then. --