Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Aces High General Discussion => Topic started by: Randy1 on January 27, 2017, 12:18:16 PM
-
If you were writing the specification for a new AH3 map, what single characteristic would guide you in the map design.
Mine would be no Starts, HQ or City making downtime's fixed.
-
Bases closer together
No mountains over 5k between front line bases
No fields over 5k
Towns 5 miles or more from bases
No tank town at center of map
Tons of narrow, intersecting canyons
-
Cleavage
-
Cleavage
+1
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
-
Arresting cable on all WW1 fields.
-
Arresting cable on all WW1 fields.
wasn't there a WWI DOS PC game that had those, I do believe....trying to remember, had like 4 different WWI flight games on floppy drives ????
edit: hmm, nope, I was thinking of something that involved crane/hoist that had the ability to lower/pick up float planes as well as catch a very small few WWI type planes had M-2-M playability
TC
-
Bases closer together
No mountains over 5k between front line bases
No fields over 5k
Towns 5 miles or more from bases
No tank town at center of map
Tons of narrow, intersecting canyons
Pretty much hit the nail on the head. 17 mile bases would create much faster and lower fights and be easier to defend against hoards. Lower mountains would not create as many alt monkeys. Canyon fights are cool here and there, but they are crazy to get out of during a furball and are mostly death traps. A few here and there aren't bad. Instead of TT and furball islands, I think there should be a center base in some maps with a 8K alt, and make it a king of the hill type of idea. CVs are really great for action. Would definitely like to see more CV fights. Start from the middle of the map and go out. Symmetry is important on a lot of maps, it also makes it easier to make. I really liked the streams of bases like Festers map had.
The maps work great when all activities of the game can be utilized on each area of the map tank bases inbetween fighter bases do this really well.
-
wasn't there a WWI DOS PC game that had those, I do believe....trying to remember, had like 4 different WWI flight games on floppy drives ????
TC
Oh I dunno, the only other one I've flown is Dawn of Aces.
-
If you want an MA map to be accepted it would have to follow HTC's guidelines and a map with no strats would not be acceptable. Best you could do is move the strats as far from the front lines as possible, cover them with clouds, surround them with flak bases and set the nearby Me 163 base at a high alt. Minimum allowed airfield distance is about 19 miles IIRC. I'd imagine towns would have to be near enough to be obviously associated with a particular field but 5 miles ought to be OK.
I like MA maps to have a limited field choice with no more that 3-4 nearby enemy bases per front line, some choice but not so much that the action gets diluted. Also a few bases that have a strategic advantage that makes them more important than other bases; say lots of spawns from them or they guard a strat or a port or they cover the only pass through a mountain range. If I submitted another map it wouldn't have a tank town or fighter town as they make for one dimensional game play.
-
Place fields and towns well outside the range of fleet puffy ack.
As Caldera suggested, move the town away from the field. Locate spawn points to make it quicker to defend or attack a town with GVs than with aircraft. Let the aircraft fight for air superiority over and around the town.
-
Pretty much hit the nail on the head. 17 mile bases would create much faster and lower fights and be easier to defend against hoards. Lower mountains would not create as many alt monkeys. Canyon fights are cool here and there, but they are crazy to get out of during a furball and are mostly death traps. A few here and there aren't bad. Instead of TT and furball islands, I think there should be a center base in some maps with a 8K alt, and make it a king of the hill type of idea. CVs are really great for action. Would definitely like to see more CV fights. Start from the middle of the map and go out. Symmetry is important on a lot of maps, it also makes it easier to make. I really liked the streams of bases like Festers map had.
The maps work great when all activities of the game can be utilized on each area of the map tank bases inbetween fighter bases do this really well.
I don't know dude, "Cleavage" was a much better answer.
-
I think airfields that are in a string via gv spawns with one of 2 V bases interwebbing them make for good combat for both offense and defense operations. Why I think I liked ozkansas so much and still do because the islands bases were connected well then you needed good missions or a CV to take an initial foot hold onto an island...another base thats out of rotation which had the bases connect in a U shape was fun...think it was mesa?
Also I like maps with a tank/Fighter town(ozkansas and ndisles center areas are awesome....crater used to be but yep those spawns are screwed now)
I dislike...but it's very much a common thing in Aces High these days is using CVs as a mobile flak battery(main reason I don't like Buzzsaw)...Not sure a way a map creator can get the most out of CVs while limiting the ability of a side to do this but thats definately a big hit on my list.
-
closer bases
-
Regarding CV's, imho the funnest use of CV's is in long bodies of water spanning the entire country landmass, but only a sector or two wide. Such as the map that had the 85 spawn (can't remember the name of that map) and Port 86 at the far east side of the map. I would up the port count along those "long lakes" to 2 or 3. And I like the chain-of-base format that narrows the front, so you get a lot of players fighting on a few fronts, instead of 30 bases to go after at once. And I like the gv-gv-air-gv-gv chains. They were fun fights on Fester.
Also regarding terrain features, the 85 spawn area and the 135-136 gv base areas were epic.
-
I really do like it when a CV attacks or parks off a field, that is some of the most fun quick action gameplay that we have in the maps.
Nice low altitude fights. So more of that for Melee.
-
Bases closer together
No mountains over 5k between front line bases
No fields over 5k
Towns 5 miles or more from bases
No tank town at center of map
Tons of narrow, intersecting canyons
That looks like a pretty good list to me.
Wiley.
-
I would actually like the towns closer for gv support and ack support of hording. also like the previous guy said fewer front line bases on a three front base to iniate quick action fighting instead of when one team has real low numbers they get steamed rolled. and free tiger II for low ranking gvers like myself...just saying.
-
If you put the town 5 miles from the field, how far will you place the GV spawn object from the town and from the airfield? Will you place down terrain clutter that blocks GV's to the point of making them useless or, will you run time trials from the GV spawn then GV hanger to the town until your average tank say a panzerH gets to the map room in 5, 7, 10 minutes? After all it is a race from two points to the map room from the spawn and the GV hanger. Then will you stop and consider how much time the average player wants to expend driving doing nothing in this game?
If the path to the town is not obstructed and you place the 1x1 town object down with the default terrain editor error test readout minimum requirement. On average the GV hanger will be 2.5 miles from the town center. And a panzerH will take a little over 5 minutes to get there. So if you make it a fair race between tanks, then the M3 will have troops in town in about 3 minutes. It's not really how close the town is to the base as much as which side of the equation you want to favor in the race. The town defenders or the town attackers. I forgot to time trial the M3 until I had laid down all of my spawns 2.5 from town center. Then I had to revisit almost 200 spawns and push the attacker GV spawns back to 3 miles. But then I am carpeting about 6sq miles around the town with village open farm land clutter tiles. On Buzzsaw some of the spawns are past 3 miles with very little cover for GV, and it still took forever to get to the town in an M3 at 50mph. Think of the tank guys how much longer they had to twiddle their thumbs doing nothing when they are paying $14.95 for something.
And tank towns, tank islands, and tank craters, so what. Just make them equally close enough to airbases to mix things up with jabo, bombers, and the fighters that want to take advantage of them from a field 19 miles away. Even airfields at the minimum of 3\4 sector(19miles) will have a higher probability then with 25mile separation of one side of the furball frequently wiping out the other side and getting over their field just in time for a vulch fest. At 17 miles, you guarantee it in spades and hate fests here in the forums like ENY. It's all about the fuel burn an loiter time.
-
When moving the town further from the field I would add one GV spawn from field to town. It would be on the opposite side to, but equidistant from town, as per all other GV spawns from surrounding fields (none of which would spawn close to the air field).
-
You probably just handed airfields to three guys all night during prime time without even trying.
this list:
Bases closer together
No mountains over 5k between front line bases
No fields over 5k
Towns 5 miles or more from bases
No tank town at center of map
Tons of narrow, intersecting canyons
Guess the next step is to get Hitech as a forum only consensus group speaking for all of the community that never comes in here but pays the bills. To kill the GV game and hope he doesn't loose subscriptions to the other tank game offerings out there. I hate GV's but, I like having a vibrant and diverse community of players with different interests. Terrains are for "everyone" if they get accepted by HTC.
-
When moving the town further from the field I would add one GV spawn from field to town. It would be on the opposite side to, but equidistant from town, as per all other GV spawns from surrounding fields (none of which would spawn close to the air field).
That's the same as I was thinking, except make the incoming spawn a little closer to the town than the defending spawn. They would be on opposite sides of the town, giving a slight advantage in distance to the attackers promotes an attack. As a full-time base defender, I want the attackers to have an advantage, because otherwise they won't attack at all. Putting towns outside of most field gun ack would require defenders to defend. And putting the spawns far from the field discourages field camping somewhat.
(http://i343.photobucket.com/albums/o460/caldera_08/map-2.jpg~original) (http://s343.photobucket.com/user/caldera_08/media/map-2.jpg.html)
One other change that wouldn't deter an attack on the town but would encourage fighters to defend, would be to increase the lethality of base ack (not town ack).
What we have now is cherry pickers massing over the field and ack huggers waiting for the short jump to town to kill the goon. With the town farther away, the fighters would have to leave the ack umbrella to save the town - but the upgraded ack at the field would give them a chance to get airborne.
The end result would be more fights over the town than the base.
-
So far in AH3, my personal favorite map is Montis. It's creates a lot of action on all sides of the map. It's not a "all the action in the middle" type of map. It's condensed. Front bases aren't too far from the enemy side. Streams for CV action. I think when a map can have 2-3 good area battles on the map most of the time, that is when the battles get really exciting
-
...
(http://i343.photobucket.com/albums/o460/caldera_08/map-2.jpg~original) (http://s343.photobucket.com/user/caldera_08/media/map-2.jpg.html)
...
There. There's the cleavage.
-
Less airfields
more VH bases
no "teleporting" to other bases.
I mean really pack the VH bases.
I would add a picture but don't know how.
(http://imgur.com/pmG07Rw)
http://imgur.com/pmG07Rw
-
Large water map. 7 fleets per side (3 BB, 4 CV). Land in 4 corners and sporadic islands (equally distributed). Strats, large air bases to the rear of the corner land masses.
(http://i1197.photobucket.com/albums/aa433/arloguh03/watermap_zps6qb06wvp.png)
-
There. There's the cleavage.
You are correct, sir. The resemblance is uncanny.
(http://i343.photobucket.com/albums/o460/caldera_08/54bbcb73bc033a3416e73f37e4146078.jpg~original) (http://s343.photobucket.com/user/caldera_08/media/54bbcb73bc033a3416e73f37e4146078.jpg.html)
-
that should be your new avatar caldera...I approve!
-
Bases closer together
No mountains over 5k between front line bases
No fields over 5k
Towns 5 miles or more from bases
No tank town at center of map
Tons of narrow, intersecting canyons
Good list ... except I would remove the "tons" of narrow canyons.
Add:
Radar coverage of strats.
Me-163 field(s) near strats.
No strats on top of mountains.
...
To kill the GV game and hope he doesn't loose subscriptions to the other tank game offerings out there.
...
I'm not seeing how moving the town away from the field kills the GV game. It may prevent the base vehicle hangar from being a priority target and actually improve the GV fight.
-
You make it take longer for air response to get out there and wirbels to get setup, M3's to lay out supplys and get dug in waiting for the run troops signal. By the time most players get around to checking out the town, with it that far away even with a spawn, you have already allowed Gvers to get setup. You are handing the spawn camping to the attackers. You have handed base capture over to three guys during prime time under the noses of the average furball.
That list is compiled by guys known to not like GV's in the game including yourself. Moving the town 5 miles away, might as well put the map room back on the airfield and create a separate tank only MA.
-
heres the one I just built, hows this rate? its a 64X64
(http://i706.photobucket.com/albums/ww64/captain1ma/2017-01-28_22h43_50_zpsm1k9fups.jpg) (http://s706.photobucket.com/user/captain1ma/media/2017-01-28_22h43_50_zpsm1k9fups.jpg.html)
-
You make it take longer for air response to get out there and wirbels to get setup, M3's to lay out supplys and get dug in waiting for the run troops signal. By the time most players get around to checking out the town, with it that far away even with a spawn, you have already allowed Gvers to get setup. You are handing the spawn camping to the attackers. You have handed base capture over to three guys during prime time under the noses of the average furball.
That list is compiled by guys known to not like GV's in the game including yourself. Moving the town 5 miles away, might as well put the map room back on the airfield and create a separate tank only MA.
Less airfields
more VH bases
no "teleporting" to other bases. (spawn camping would be a nonissue)
I mean really pack the VH bases.
there are a couple maps like this (the one with lots of canyons)
but in my opinion, the teleport "spawn" system is dumb to me. it takes away the fluidity of the battles, because you can bypass attackers and immediately attack their base, instead of having to push them back to their base. Now you have two battles instead of one large one.
-
You make it take longer for air response to get out there and wirbels to get setup, M3's to lay out supplys and get dug in waiting for the run troops signal. By the time most players get around to checking out the town, with it that far away even with a spawn, you have already allowed Gvers to get setup. You are handing the spawn camping to the attackers. You have handed base capture over to three guys during prime time under the noses of the average furball.
That list is compiled by guys known to not like GV's in the game including yourself. Moving the town 5 miles away, might as well put the map room back on the airfield and create a separate tank only MA.
Spawn camping is going to happen. Which side is the camper makes no difference.
On my preference for play, it's airplanes. Blame the lack of GV skill, really.
My GV whine is with the static turkey shoots (Tank Town, V85/V88 on that one map.) Even when I drive a vehicle, I tend to motor around like a fighter. And, die a lot.
As this is a preference thread, I would prefer to see combined arms actions to take bases rather than the mass GV ranged duels that seem to develop.
-
A natural obstacle, like a major river crossing, to be surmounted, before victory can be achieved, and the map reset. Something like a Remagen set up, or an Oder crossing type scenario.
Maybe building some pontoon bridges under fire. One group to suppress the defenders, interdict reinforcement, while the others construct the bridge(s).
-
Spawn camping is going to happen. Which side is the camper makes no difference.
On my preference for play, it's airplanes. Blame the lack of GV skill, really.
My GV whine is with the static turkey shoots (Tank Town, V85/V88 on that one map.) Even when I drive a vehicle, I tend to motor around like a fighter. And, die a lot.
As this is a preference thread, I would prefer to see combined arms actions to take bases rather than the mass GV ranged duels that seem to develop.
With the new terrains you see a lot less spawn camping these days. Lots of trees to look around now, makes for a lot more hunting and shooting on the run style GV game.
I didn't mind the tank towns, V85/V88 tank battles. It was fun to jump into one for a break after getting HOed and picked for a few hours :neener: or you could practice your dive bombing :devil
A natural obstacle, like a major river crossing, to be surmounted, before victory can be achieved, and the map reset. Something like a Remagen set up, or an Oder crossing type scenario.
Maybe building some pontoon bridges under fire. One group to suppress the defenders, interdict reinforcement, while the others construct the bridge(s).
I'd like to see ANYTHING that promoted fighting, but I don't think you will see that any time soon. If the map was designed to push fighting I think youd see more and more people just log off rather than have to "fight" for it.
-
heres the one I just built, hows this rate? its a 64X64
(http://i706.photobucket.com/albums/ww64/captain1ma/2017-01-28_22h43_50_zpsm1k9fups.jpg) (http://s706.photobucket.com/user/captain1ma/media/2017-01-28_22h43_50_zpsm1k9fups.jpg.html)
I like the light green
-
With the new terrains you see a lot less spawn camping these days. Lots of trees to look around now, makes for a lot more hunting and shooting on the run style GV game.
I didn't mind the tank towns, V85/V88 tank battles. It was fun to jump into one for a break after getting HOed and picked for a few hours :neener: or you could practice your dive bombing :devil
I'd like to see ANYTHING that promoted fighting, but I don't think you will see that any time soon. If the map was designed to push fighting I think youd see more and more people just log off rather than have to "fight" for it.
Getting closer to subitting to HTC. I'm testing the effects of the cloud fronts on FPS. Hitech gave me his requirements, so I'm setting up the fronts. You should like this Fugi. The three closest bases are 19 miles(3\4 sector) away so the fighter and bomber guys will all be playing in that giant pit with the tank guys. All three GV bases are uncapturable so the off prime time griefers can't take away the fun. The gallery around the pit is 500ft above SL, with the pit bottom at 25ft with a tiny tree covered hill in the center at 250ft. The pit is roughly 5000yds across so the long range guys can duel away all night long. The bottom of the cloud layer is 2500yds from the nearest osti if bombers want to take a run griefing the tankers. That is roughly 6sq miles of solid villages with three spawns from each base out into the area. It is not like the tankers won't be inaccessible, just expensive in personal risk to get at.
Did you know a panther can climb a 70 degree slope up forever in our game? That's why the inner wall of the caldera is 1600-2200ft high. Had to raise the wall until the top was steeper than 70 degrees to keep the panthers in the pit.
Now with Hitech's requirements for clouds, I'm using fronts so 80% of the time coverering over strats and other targets at 7-18k is protecting them from bombing above the cloud base. With a 20-30% random factor for bombing success over 24 hours. That means if you loiter around waiting to time the cloud front, you give defenders that much more time to get to your alt. Or you can expose your self by coming in under the cloud base.
The Pit.
(https://s20.postimg.org/rniowkah9/frntTIsl06.jpg)
(https://s20.postimg.org/fugaelonh/frntTIsl03.jpg)
(https://s20.postimg.org/6cgjek2z1/frntTIsl05.jpg)
-
Me262 30k over radar factory. The terrain is a super caldera 18 sectors in diameter with an unbroken crater wall 26,000ft high. AFK for too long won't have you wake up off the map anymore. Note to self: self lighten up that stratus layer above the 262.
(https://s20.postimg.org/npzk1iw3x/1layer02.jpg)
(https://s20.postimg.org/gy94yo74d/1layer01.jpg)
Tu2 26k over radar factory showing the effect of an 18k cloud front protecting the target.
(https://s20.postimg.org/q8pufy77x/1layer03.jpg)
(https://s20.postimg.org/kn3fbw6j1/1layer05.jpg)
-
Pretty.
-
Pretty.
Arlo you say the sweetest things....... :lol
-
Arlo you say the sweetest things....... :lol
Don't make me hurt you. ;)
-
So in the latest change notes for patch18 Hitech talked about a new default water color when you generate a clipboard map. I'm assuming it is to give a better contrast for the new radar rings. Here is the new clipboard map water color. Works with the lighter color of the destroyed radar. It's kind of blinding when you really expand it in the tower.
(https://s20.postimg.org/jcwvoqex9/frnt_TIsl08.jpg)
-
Bustr how close are you to submitting that if you dont mind me asking.
-
I could submit it on Monday if I left out the cloud fronts and it would suck as a terrain. But, with the fronts this is a showcase for what AH3 promised three years ago. I'm really trying to make HTC look good here by pushing the available art work to the max. Hitech recently commented on the clouds in another post of mine which has helped me immensely in building in some of that immersion factor, "fronts" add to the eye candy.
Since I didn't want another round of flak bases for the HQ\city areas which are useless anyway against 25k+ single finger salute platforms. I've been testing cloud fronts and stratus layers to interfere with aiming the bombs. And for eyeballing what is really damaged to make the bombers offer themselves up as targets longer. Unless they want to gut it out under 18k.
I'm putting 18k heavy fronts over every strat on the terrain. That does not mean you cannot bomb the strat from 25-30k. Just means your ability to see the strat in the scope is harder much of the time versus flying in under the 18k front in the open air for pin point accuracy. On the 9 country islands the make up the 3 countries, the highest bases are 2-2.5k at the very upper edge of each island at the ring of water that surrounds the map. There is a single 2.8k base. That ring of land butting up into the 26k mountain ring, the highest bases are about 4-5k. Since this is a bowl, if you look at the clipboard map as descending rings to the center island, most bases are under 1k.
I made land 26k tall then in concentric rings starting at 5k, working into the center at sea level I kept shaving the terrain down like a bowl. Then along those rings I made plate edge blowups where old lava eruptions would have pushed up the plate edges after cracking them. And the final out gassing is the central tank arena crater.
-
Put any BBs on the map? :cheesy:
-
Put any BBs on the map? :cheesy:
You mean the Iowa class ship object sitting in the "all objects" list?
No, it wouldn't be fair to anyone with it's range and destructive ability in those confined water ways. As of yet it has not been setup as a group object the task group function will recognize to give initial way points to. Testing as an add in to the existing task group unit, I found CVs went down from 3 salvos with a 30sec reload time between salvo. Shore batteries went down with 3 and it tore up towns quickly. It's a better game tool in a terrain with large open water areas to slug it out with other BB task groups. And the way I created this terrain, everyone would keep that thing sitting on the bottom 24x7 and I would not blame them no matter how extreme they got about it.
-
I'm letting DX9 run for a few hours with some cloud fronts to see if when I exit, the game throws and error with a DMP file I can give to Hitech.
Here is some fun in the Pit because I'm bored waiting on the clouds to run.
Panther in some trees looking at the enemy GV base 6000yds off. The village just below the GV base is that country's spawn point from the nearest medium airfield. Since that GV base is one of the three uncaptureable bases, capturing the only outside base with a GV spawn to the island will be worth some fun in the Pit. That small GV base has three spawns, one down in the pit in a village center. And one to each side up on the gallery into a village. Just so happens those gallery spawns are one village over from the enemy spawn so you can clobber each other in between the village buildings. Same down in the Pit.
(https://s20.postimg.org/kgh00ozkd/Tcrt01.jpg)
(https://s20.postimg.org/uf1yn68zx/Tcrt02.jpg)
(https://s20.postimg.org/sbrjfi971/Tcrt03.jpg)
Yakking around in the Pit. And this tiny GV base in a cul-de-sac is how the other two tiny GV bases are setup. I placed a landing pad next to the tower where the storch spawns in the center of it. That way the storch will have some place to tower out with a successful landing. And the grass area in front of the tower is 1 mile long. In the first picture just above the gunsight glass is the 250ft small tree covered hill in the center of the Pit. If you can get hidden in those trees, you can surprise some snipers hiding in the 500ft gallery surrounding the Pit.
(https://s20.postimg.org/ts7nbe1hp/Tcrt04.jpg)
(https://s20.postimg.org/pkcv2n025/Tcrt05.jpg)
-
WTG Bustr keep at it! :aok
-
If you were writing the specification for a new AH3 map, what single characteristic would guide you in the map design.
Wanted: Anything that separates the place to fight at and the spawn. Both attacker and defener should have to / have a chance to move some part. Also, some (not complete) separation of air and ground fights. GVs fighting over a town with aircraft needing 2 minutes to up and drop bombs is no fun for the drivers. Aircraft fighting over a town, only to see the capture or resupply happen by a stealty m3 is no fun for the pilots.
Don't care: How it looks. It could be textureless gray terrain without any clouds.
Calderas picture looks like a good start, but this layout only works for 2 fields. Moving the towns perpendicular to the side of a row of fields would at least allow an infite long row (or a loop) of fields. GV spawns for such setup: Zero. Allow for some air-only fights. Defenders might be further away than usual, but in the end the final thing to defend against is goons.
GV-spawns placed where ground fights can happen. But not on opposite sides of a town, where a fight happens after significant damange has been done. Instead, some terrain features is needed: The town being placed in a valley or on a mountain with access from only one side. The spawns are placed on the same side of town, but opposite sides of the area allowing easy access. The side that achieves superiority in that area can move in to capture/hold. Discourage too much air support by vertical and/or horizontal separation from the air field.
Where not enough towns are available (each field can only have one), vbases could work as proxies. Located in the middle of air bases, creating an area to fight over. Now to add some strategic value, a spawn from such vbase right into the center of a town would basically guarantee that the side that maintains control over the vbase also owns the airfield.
Coasts and carriers. Instead of airfields right at the shore allowing to launch close enough to shoot before the gear is up and doors closed, vbases right at the shore. Not too far back, few miles maximum, backed up by an airfield. As a combination of the above, the field offers a place to fight at (without being the spawn), and to avoid that attackers from the sea are drivin back into the ocean, the vbase might come with a spawn right into the airfields town. You manage to get a foothold, you get both fields.
Possibly, a similar feature as for low accessibility towns could be created for carriers to create some ship-ship fights. A fjord with a field of some value placed in the back, would force ships to battle it out at sea. The winner can move in to attack the hard to defend but valuable field.
Strat targets with ground access could use the layout with GV spawns as described above. Resupplying wouldn't be from the opposite side (75mm shells from one side, care packages from the other), but require to fight for access to get supplies through.
-
Why don't you build a terrain? Same question for all of you forum armchair experts on all of this.
It's 200 hours and 100 weather front files to understand clouds in AH3 too late for me to change mine to make you happy ccvi. And all the eye candy is for the 99% not like yourself who will see it for the first time as a 2 week account, or someone's youtube film, or a screen shot. It's nice to hang onto new people. As for spawns and such, build a test terrain and use a stop watch to test trip time from the spawns. It will surprise you how many of your assumption are off just like it did me. If you build a terrain you only have yourself to blame if you don't get your perfect utopia.
Contact Easyscore for expert help on getting started. Also contact the AvA terrain building team. In the end you only have yourself to blame if you don't get a terrain that works your way. All terrains are built by players on their own dime as a labor of love and not a dime from HTC to compensate them.
I don't get half the players in this forum. Complain about everything and everyone else while having the tools at hand and won't show everyone how they say AH terrains should really be done. In 14 years I've played on every MA terrain, and terrains are terrains are terrains. Just a new pile of rocks in an open world sand box somebody went to the time and effort to create for the complainers to tell them it sucks. Maybe this is why HTC never got into pumping out terrains like they produce new rides.
-
By the way, my 5 hour DX9 test of 28 large cloud fronts, changing in game graphics settings, flying in and out of them. And several hours of minimized to the desktop then multiple tabbing out and coming back in every 15 minutes or so for a few hours. DX9 closed clean with no errors. All fronts were set at 70mph.
-
Now with Hitech's requirements for clouds, I'm using fronts so 80% of the time coverering over strats and other targets at 7-18k is protecting them from bombing above the cloud base. With a 20-30% random factor for bombing success over 24 hours. That means if you loiter around waiting to time the cloud front, you give defenders that much more time to get to your alt. Or you can expose your self by coming in under the cloud base.
Then the enemy strats had better be close to friendly airbases if there is going to be only a 20% chance that you'll be able to see the target 1st pass at a survivable alt. No one is going to want to spend a significant %age of their available playing time on a mostly boring strat run without the likelihood of being able to see and hit their target before getting intercepted.
-
Why don't you build a terrain? Same question for all of you forum armchair experts on all of this.
It's 200 hours and 100 weather front files to understand clouds in AH3 too late for me to change mine to make you happy ccvi. And all the eye candy is for the 99% not like yourself who will see it for the first time as a 2 week account, or someone's youtube film, or a screen shot. It's nice to hang onto new people. As for spawns and such, build a test terrain and use a stop watch to test trip time from the spawns. It will surprise you how many of your assumption are off just like it did me. If you build a terrain you only have yourself to blame if you don't get your perfect utopia.
Contact Easyscore for expert help on getting started. Also contact the AvA terrain building team. In the end you only have yourself to blame if you don't get a terrain that works your way. All terrains are built by players on their own dime as a labor of love and not a dime from HTC to compensate them.
I don't get half the players in this forum. Complain about everything and everyone else while having the tools at hand and won't show everyone how they say AH terrains should really be done. In 14 years I've played on every MA terrain, and terrains are terrains are terrains. Just a new pile of rocks in an open world sand box somebody went to the time and effort to create for the complainers to tell them it sucks. Maybe this is why HTC never got into pumping out terrains like they produce new rides.
I dont know about anyone else, but I have downloaded all the tutorials for map making, I have learned a few tricks in Photoshop, I have looked over the program Artiks has made, I have messed with the terrain program a few times, I have read ever post in the "Terrain Editor" threads but I really don't see myself building a terrain anytime in the near future.
Why? Because I work 40-50 hours a week, I sleep 40-50 hours a week, I do 10-20 hours of "chores" around the house (more in the summer, 3 hours a week to just mow the lawn!) to help out my wife who works 50-60 hours a week, the rest of my time is helping with my Dad who has the beginnings of dementia, some cozy time with my wife of 35 years and AH. Not to mention anything my two grown sons may need from me.
I would love to devote the hours upon hours it takes to skin and /or build maps but I just dont have the time. If im lucky in another 5-10 year, IF I can retire, and IF AH is still around I may get my chance.
Don't be so hard on these guys if you don't know there situations. I am very happy that some DO have the time to do these things and I am grateful for their work..... even if I don't like what they have come up with. Don't shout so loudly from that "high and mighty" horse.
-
A natural obstacle, like a major river crossing, to be surmounted, before victory can be achieved, and the map reset. Something like a Remagen set up, or an Oder crossing type scenario.
Maybe building some pontoon bridges under fire. One group to suppress the defenders, interdict reinforcement, while the others construct the bridge(s).
Interesting, maybe make the final map win criteria a taking of the city with a larger number of troops.
-
Why don't you build a terrain? Same question for all of you forum armchair experts on all of this.
It's 200 hours and 100 weather front files to understand clouds in AH3 too late for me to change mine to make you happy ccvi. And all the eye candy is for the 99% not like yourself who will see it for the first time as a 2 week account, or someone's youtube film, or a screen shot. It's nice to hang onto new people. As for spawns and such, build a test terrain and use a stop watch to test trip time from the spawns. It will surprise you how many of your assumption are off just like it did me. If you build a terrain you only have yourself to blame if you don't get your perfect utopia.
Contact Easyscore for expert help on getting started. Also contact the AvA terrain building team. In the end you only have yourself to blame if you don't get a terrain that works your way. All terrains are built by players on their own dime as a labor of love and not a dime from HTC to compensate them.
I don't get half the players in this forum. Complain about everything and everyone else while having the tools at hand and won't show everyone how they say AH terrains should really be done. In 14 years I've played on every MA terrain, and terrains are terrains are terrains. Just a new pile of rocks in an open world sand box somebody went to the time and effort to create for the complainers to tell them it sucks. Maybe this is why HTC never got into pumping out terrains like they produce new rides.
Imo, there really needs to be a map making team. One person making a map takes too long, it's designed for their needs, not everyone has the time, ect ect. If I had nothing to do than I would gladly make maps, but it's not my time. There needs to be a dedicated map making team to construct playable, actionable maps, with fronts that aren't too far apart, and bases that allow for back base defense.
-
Btw bustr, you can also set the first spawn time to a negative value so that when you start the formations will have already been formed.
HiTech
-
Also you need to do some smoothing on those ridges. It would also help if you change terrain types to rock on the steep slopes.
HiTech
-
1.) - Btw bustr, you can also set the first spawn time to a negative value so that when you start the formations will have already been formed.
2.) - Also you need to do some smoothing on those ridges.
3.) - It would also help if you change terrain types to rock on the steep slopes.
HiTech
1. - Got lazy testing and set the first wave at "0" just to get all of the data input into the properties to test the fronts. One more thing for the pre-submission to do list. Like one last time up a plane at every base to check the surrounding clutter and make sure there are no surprises I missed by being brain dead from looking at clutter all of these months.
2. - I thought so too and rounded the tops. Then I discovered on the vertical walls 45 degrees to the cardinal points of the pit a panther tank problem. The jagged zigzag walls at those cardinal points had 70 degree slopes when I rounded the tops and your panther will climb 70 degrees vertically for "thousands" of feet. You can guess what would happen at that point in the pit, everyone would be up on the 2000ft rim tank vulching everyone below.
By drawing the edges up in that jagged manner, I eliminated all of the 70 degree panther climb out spots. I tested every yard of that wall with a panther trying to climb out of the pit from the 500ft gallery. When I pulled those edges up into jagged tops, the wall pulled up into a steeper angle than 70 degrees stopping the panther. I spent hours micro adjusting the intersecting polygons in those jagged faces trying to round the top over and eliminate the 70 degree slope that always appeared in the cliff face below the rounded top. Obviously it's not a problem where the wall runs straight when you use the tool as a 6 mile circle and punch a 500ft deep pit. It's only at the corners describing an arc where the walls are not 90 degrees. And panthers can climb the pit wall at those areas.
3. - I thought in the TE on the bottom clutter row Euro tile set with the sand tiles, the right side end of the row tile, was greenish tan rock with a minimum of trees. I'm using it below 5000ft as exposed rock. At 8000ft-15,000ft there is a white snow streaked textured rock. Above 15k is, I cannot decide if it is a pure granite, or a sparse snow covered limestone face the next level up just before the pure snow tops. The two rock tiles on the top clutter row with the pure snow tile don't blend well with tiles from the lower elevation clutter tiles. And gleaming white granite does not dominate Europe, most of the light colored rock is limestone, while granite is gray to dark brown, even dirty tan.
I probably then don't know which tiles you have designated as "rock" for the Euro tile set. I've tried to use the tiles based on elevation as real world as I could make it look. If you tell me which tiles are "rock", and for steep slopes, did you mean a slope with a base at any elevation 0-26k on the terrain.
I will then re-work the terrain one more time...... :bhead
I wish Waffle had made a generic gray brown exposed "rock" tile for all elevations with no trees or grass on it for just this occasion in the Euro tile set. The town, tank town object, and GV base objects have some excellent exposed rock only textures. Not all exposed rock faces on our planet at steep angles have trees and grass growing out of them. I've done my share of climbing around Lake Taho, other places, and lived near the Hindu Kush. :)
Hitech thank you for your help. :salute
Hindu Kush and on clear days I could see K2 when I lived in Pakistan.
(https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f9/Mountains_of_Afghanistan.jpg)
-
If you were writing the specification for a new AH3 map, what single characteristic would guide you in the map design.
Mine would be no Starts, HQ or City making downtime's fixed.
We already have that map..........it's called the Dueling Arena