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General Forums => Aces High General Discussion => Topic started by: bustr on October 02, 2016, 03:04:44 AM

Title: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: bustr on October 02, 2016, 03:04:44 AM
I liked how the AH2 CraterMA tank town worked so I brought it forward onto my new terrain.

This is the 20 mile diameter center island of my super caldera at sea level. The tallest remnants of the long dead tiny volcano are 3500ft tall. Everything slopes down to the central area which is 100ft above SL. A 4 mile diameter ring of 600ft cliffs surrounds that. Just back of that is a 900ft tall ring of rock. I opened up the vista with villages and farmland inside of the center around the tank town object. So all of you guys who loved to long range snipe each other back in AH2 can once again do it from the 500ft cliff edges. It will be awhile before I work out spawns, but I'm thinking 3 GV bases per country.

I still have to build a 17,000ft wall for the super caldera 9 sector radii. Otherwise the terrain land mass is built, unpainted, and is a gigantic bowl sloping from 12,000ft into the center pond at sea level. I love that bi-liniar leveling tool, all 6 miles diameter of it.

Some shots of Tank Town island.


(https://s20.postimg.org/whda6argt/caldera02.jpg) 

(https://s20.postimg.org/6zuvmp9ql/caldera03.jpg)

(https://s20.postimg.org/qvqv28qrx/caldera04.jpg)
Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: 8thJinx on October 02, 2016, 01:34:23 PM
This is GV porn.
Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: redcatcherb412 on October 02, 2016, 01:40:03 PM
This is GV porn.
Is that a bish t34 in the third notch Jinx ??   :x
If I know you, you already have your spot marked out.   :grin: :salute
Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: BigPun on October 03, 2016, 10:41:31 AM
I am sorry so much work has gone into unintentionally ruining what was a fun & popular area on this map.
The CraterMA TT is rarely used and is waste of space in it's current form.



Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: caldera on October 03, 2016, 11:12:46 AM
I liked how the AH2 CraterMA tank town worked so I brought it forward onto my new terrain.

This is the 20 mile diameter center island of my super caldera at sea level.

<Boon voice> "Is he bigger than me?"
Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: bustr on October 03, 2016, 11:59:39 AM
I am sorry so much work has gone into unintentionally ruining what was a fun & popular area on this map.
The CraterMA TT is rarely used and is waste of space in it's current form.

The original was a bowl with spawns to the edges of escarpments between three large mountains. Sniping range across was about 7000yds(4miles). Most tank guns can lob that if the player has some shooting skill. It's easy to pass judgment from your keyboard, can you do better? I liked the venue and I've adapted the physics of the original. A 500ft cliff ring with a clear line of fire across and down into the bottom of the crater. Lots of trees to hide behind.

Why don't you fire up the terrain editor and show me yours? It's easy to be cheezy..... :O
Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: JunkyII on October 03, 2016, 12:10:54 PM
The original was a bowl with spawns to the edges of escarpments between three large mountains. Sniping range across was about 7000yds(4miles). Most tank guns can lob that if the player has some shooting skill. It's easy to pass judgment from your keyboard, can you do better? I liked the venue and I've adapted the physics of the original. A 500ft cliff ring with a clear line of fire across and down into the bottom of the crater. Lots of trees to hide behind.

Why don't you fire up the terrain editor and show me yours? It's easy to be cheezy..... :O
You can absolutely pass judgement....

FIX CRATERMAs CENTER SPAWNS HTC!!! they are placed poorly...the center ones should spawn near the center Army encampment and the outsides need to be pressed in more toward the enemy bases but still on the friendly side of the spawns coming from the enemy base....Crater fixed. The spawns are the only problem, trees take some time for tankers to adapt to but the spawns are fixable.
Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: bustr on October 03, 2016, 12:54:00 PM
And the same to you Junky, you are free to open the terrain editor and do something besides twiddle your fingers in displeasure at me. It's a tedious process sculpting 400sq miles of land after you lay down the topo blocks. And that trade off between what people will see up close most of the time versus what you can pass over quickly because no one will ever get closer than 10,000ft. I'm almost done, and then the clutter tile painting followed with setting up fields, strats and the resupply road and train system.

The physics of the location is no different from the AH2 one so everyone can hide and snipe each other at long range. I may have to make parts of the open area 3 miles across since that is the max detail range. It's a trade off on play ability versus great vistas. That was the attraction to the original CraterMA tank town crater. Waffle created the tank town object to be used as a focal point for setting up tank fighting areas.  Did you know there is a telecom communications company store in the tank town object named "Roy's"? Because it stands out alone at it's location on a road with a big sign out front, makes a very good key indicator for a map of that object since the object can be oriented in 4 different directions.

I reiterate, it's easy to be cheezy before you open the terrain editor yourself. Easyscore taught me that on..... :O
Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: BigPun on October 03, 2016, 02:54:48 PM
The original was a bowl with spawns to the edges of escarpments between three large mountains. Sniping range across was about 7000yds(4miles). Most tank guns can lob that if the player has some shooting skill. It's easy to pass judgment from your keyboard, can you do better? I liked the venue and I've adapted the physics of the original. A 500ft cliff ring with a clear line of fire across and down into the bottom of the crater. Lots of trees to hide behind.

Why don't you fire up the terrain editor and show me yours? It's easy to be cheezy..... :O

Can I do better? No of course not, but that's not really the point.
CraterMA tank town is NOT being used. Try being objective and less defensive.




Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: JunkyII on October 03, 2016, 03:05:57 PM
And the same to you Junky, you are free to open the terrain editor and do something besides twiddle your fingers in displeasure at me. It's a tedious process sculpting 400sq miles of land after you lay down the topo blocks. And that trade off between what people will see up close most of the time versus what you can pass over quickly because no one will ever get closer than 10,000ft. I'm almost done, and then the clutter tile painting followed with setting up fields, strats and the resupply road and train system.

The physics of the location is no different from the AH2 one so everyone can hide and snipe each other at long range. I may have to make parts of the open area 3 miles across since that is the max detail range. It's a trade off on play ability versus great vistas. That was the attraction to the original CraterMA tank town crater. Waffle created the tank town object to be used as a focal point for setting up tank fighting areas.  Did you know there is a telecom communications company store in the tank town object named "Roy's"? Because it stands out alone at it's location on a road with a big sign out front, makes a very good key indicator for a map of that object since the object can be oriented in 4 different directions.

I reiterate, it's easy to be cheezy before you open the terrain editor yourself. Easyscore taught me that on..... :O
What are you blappering on about??? AH2 constant tank fights in center of crater....AH3 no tanks fights....what changed the trees....how do you fix? Spawns make them closer so action is immediate...as of now you have to search through a jungle to get to the center then you got to search for enemy tanks....tankers want to fight, they want to up and be in the mix, not have to go looking for it.

It's not your map, it's one HTC has already blessed off on....and it's broke so anyone can come here and comment that it is broke. Stop thinking because someone makes a suggestion to HTC about a fix that will help the game is a bad thing....Hitech aint always right...nobody is....the center tank area is awesome when you get tanks in there...but right now nobody wants to drive 10 minutes to fight there so why even have it????
Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: Lusche on October 03, 2016, 03:55:53 PM
...but right now nobody wants to drive 10 minutes to fight there so why even have it????

I think if they knew there would be a place the fight is actually at, quite a lot tankers would drive some time for it (after all, pilots do the same).
Unfortunately, with the trees and the spawns Crater is just a giant maze where you never know if and where something's to shoot at. The few players I saw there where often just sitting somewhere, hoping someone else would drive by.
Which is about that I predicted during Beta, based on what had happened in 2007 when the big terrain update brought us a similar maze of hedges and pulled back spawns on Ndisles.
Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: CAV on October 03, 2016, 08:47:40 PM

Quote
CraterMA tank town is NOT being used. Try being objective and less defensive.

I have been playing AH from just about day one.... and this terrain is the best thing that has happen to the GV side of the game in many years. Look at the maps Tanks are back in the "Fight" all over map. Not just setting in some BS TT running up their kill count not doing anything useful.  Tank Towns are dead... let them stay dead.

Cav
Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: Oldman731 on October 03, 2016, 09:32:38 PM
The few players I saw there where often just sitting somewhere, hoping someone else would drive by.


Doesn't say much for tanker ambition, does it?

- oldman
Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: JunkyII on October 03, 2016, 09:33:06 PM
I have been playing AH from just about day one.... and this terrain is the best thing that has happen to the GV side of the game in many years. Look at the maps Tanks are back in the "Fight" all over map. Not just setting in some BS TT running up their kill count not doing anything useful.  Tank Towns are dead... let them stay dead.

Cav
:rolleyes: this guy was probably one of the guys who would bomb fighter hangars at furballs just to get the furballers to play the way they wanted....you friends with Dogfite?
Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: JunkyII on October 03, 2016, 09:35:52 PM
I think if they knew there would be a place the fight is actually at, quite a lot tankers would drive some time for it (after all, pilots do the same).
Unfortunately, with the trees and the spawns Crater is just a giant maze where you never know if and where something's to shoot at. The few players I saw there where often just sitting somewhere, hoping someone else would drive by.
Which is about that I predicted during Beta, based on what had happened in 2007 when the big terrain update brought us a similar maze of hedges and pulled back spawns on Ndisles.
I agree, we got about 10 of us in there going at it because we started annoucing it on 200...so people were willing to make the drive. With closer spawns the guys who would be going around looking for the campers would be more willing to fight that type of fight because they wouldnt have as far to drive back to them.

In the end it's the guys who can shoot and manuever who would score big numbers in that area.
Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: BigPun on October 04, 2016, 09:57:47 AM
I have been playing AH from just about day one.... and this terrain is the best thing that has happen to the GV side of the game in many years. Look at the maps Tanks are back in the "Fight" all over map. Not just setting in some BS TT running up their kill count not doing anything useful.  Tank Towns are dead... let them stay dead.

Cav

"not doing anything useful" So YOU decide what other players should and should not do?
Let me check my credit card statement and see if I am still being charged for my AH subscription, just a sec............
Yep still being charged.




Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: bustr on October 04, 2016, 11:57:33 AM
I forgot a basic rule of terrain building, square objects like Tank Town cannot be set down on top of grind lines. The object will favor one side or the other of the line. I couldn't make the 4 one square mile squares that are the tank town object the physical center of the the terrain. So I had to rebuild the center of that island's center caldera depression. I'm not going to quibble about the obvious 2-3 miles off center from the clip board map below on 100 miles of pond. Now it's a ring of 500ft cliffs and slopes into a 2mile diameter bowl. I bumped the flat bottom of the caldera with 50ft hills and laid down several villages with open farmland and trees. Many places to sneak around and shoot back at the higher elevation snipers or, sneak across the bowl and up the other side to sweep snipers off the rim. Or sneak around the behind them.

The primary caldera rimmed by 3500ft eroded crater remnants will hold two GV bases per country close enough to allow for the same kinds of GV combat as those lines of close GV bases on FesterMA. I just noticed in the last picture I spaced the distance from the base of the inner crater remnants two miles out from the edge of the center depression. I should cut some radial seams from the base of those walls to the center depression. There won't be any airfields on the island because the 4 sectors of pond to the mainland will have a friendly CV while I'm thinking of using a 7,000ft cloud ceiling to mess with bombers. Those ack bases on CraterMA are overkill while bombers trying to level bomb under a 7,000ft ceiling will make 37mm and 88gunners happy. And fighters, wirbels can take care of them. There won't be any GV bases out side of the crater near the shore, so LVT capturing a base is unlikely. You will have to do it GV base to GV base or fly in troops. And I used a sparse tree tile as you notice in the close up.

And that big ring 18 sectors across, this is a super volcano with a 17,000-23,000ft rim. I still have to cut the erosion channels on the backside, all 2000 miles of it. Looks like I still have some cutting I need to do to the north to make that part of the pond 4 sectors. As a joke I'm thinking about placing piles of 1000ft tall Back Beer bottles in the four corners. They are available objects in the Terrain Editor for placing on terrains. Still having those on the terrain might hit some PC's for FPS by them being there. Now I know why really serious terrain builders get a copy of L3Dt, hand building 2000 miles of 20k mountains..... :eek:

So if you gents have some vision of utopia for our game, feel free to fire up the terrain editor and make us all proud. 


(https://s20.postimg.org/c93opswb1/caldera05.jpg)

(https://s20.postimg.org/hlsj3xk7h/caldera07.jpg)

(https://s20.postimg.org/4voaquc99/caldera06.jpg)

(https://s20.postimg.org/wx2c4jhjh/Adj10bowlma.jpg)
 
Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: DmonSlyr on October 04, 2016, 12:29:25 PM
Make the bases 18 miles apart instead of 25.

Make the entire map smaller to about 12x12 or 10x10

Don't include furball island or a TT because it defeats the purpose of "winning the map" type of game play.


Create paths of bases that sort of direct action from base to base

Don't create mountains that are too high. Mountains that block short distance fights only create alt monkies and 24K 190s and P51s.

Add big rivers for CV units to flow through.



These are "suggestions" to make the game play actionable and entertaining. 

When I am retired in 40 years, I'll have time to make a map. I can only be suggestive. But the main issues with maps today is they don't funnel action, and back bases are too far away to defend against the hoard.
Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: Mano on October 04, 2016, 12:31:11 PM
I am sorry so much work has gone into unintentionally ruining what was a fun & popular area on this map.
The CraterMA TT is rarely used and is waste of space in it's current form.

Quote
Can I do better? No of course not, but that's not really the point.
CraterMA tank town is NOT being used. Try being objective and less defensive.

My sentiments exactly. CraterMA was very popular. Now the center of the map is completely empty of GV'ers.
CraterMA was the best thing in AH2 that ever happened for GV's. Every GV'er could not wait until Crater was up again.
Now when Crater is up, GV'ers log off. I do.

 :salute
Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: bustr on October 04, 2016, 02:12:36 PM
Make the bases 18 miles apart instead of 25.

Make the entire map smaller to about 12x12 or 10x10

Don't include furball island or a TT because it defeats the purpose of "winning the map" type of game play.


Create paths of bases that sort of direct action from base to base

Don't create mountains that are too high. Mountains that block short distance fights only create alt monkies and 24K 190s and P51s.

Add big rivers for CV units to flow through.



These are "suggestions" to make the game play actionable and entertaining. 

When I am retired in 40 years, I'll have time to make a map. I can only be suggestive. But the main issues with maps today is they don't funnel action, and back bases are too far away to defend against the hoard.

1. - After building 2000miles of mountain range, no I'm not starting a second smaller map. I will control the numbers of bases instead.
2. - I can control how many bases and follow the HTC placement rule for airfields of .75-1.0 sector distance between fields.
3. - I can control GV spawns and bases to where GVs can go. A rough idea is the prototype reference picture below. I can place GV bases and ports much closer to other bases. And it's not a very good idea to tell someone "Not" to create something that takes 3-6 hours to build. Unless you want to cut me a paycheck.
4. - I will use the existence of CV's as air bases for furballs over the tank town island which won't have air fields. I may give each country 2 CV's but, no AAA bases with 63 88mm. Placing those near the HQ and city will be enough pain for bombers.
5. - This is a super volcano, the tallest mountains are the rim, all 2000 miles of 17,000-23,000ft. Everything else is water cut or remnant walls from later mini eruptions. Note to self, map the water cuts to ports. What is the Serengeti plain and the escarpment surrounding it??
6. - The land at the base of the mountain range is 6,000ft, all 2000miles of it, and it all slopes to the center pond at SL. I cannot see making any remanent secondary and tertiary minor eruption rim features higher then 3500-5000 feet weathered down. Much like the primary ring of the center crater in the screen shot posted above.
7. - Note to self, hmmm, Serengeti, giant herds of sheep in place of Wildebeest?? No this is the Euro tileset so sheep are good.......... :O
8. - Honestly I will loose my freekin mind populating bases into anymore area than defined by the two red rings in the clip board map below. Kinda looks like a 10x10 map filled with bases at that point......  :cheers: The outer area below the mountain range will hold strats, three un-capturable bases (1 Me163 base), and AAA bases. There are some nice 30,000ft bomber sneeking areas at each map corner. Or NOE runs. But, I can spread out two of the un-capturable bases to use as early warning radar stations.
9. - Note to self, push the north shore 12 miles north to even the pond.......




(https://s20.postimg.org/w2anabedp/proto.jpg)


(https://s20.postimg.org/wlkvrs13h/Adj11bowlma.jpg)
Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: DmonSlyr on October 04, 2016, 05:15:27 PM
Hitech should allow the bases to be .60 to 1.0 for the base distance. Or make all the bases .75 away. I feel a slight change in base distance would make a huge difference in creating action in the map. It would also be a hell of a lot better for the off hours.
Title: Re: I really Liked the AH2 CraterMA Tank Town.
Post by: bustr on October 04, 2016, 07:17:40 PM
I feel you are free to use the Wish List to make your feelings known to Hitech.