mge_castaway development

[Kvasorob]

Making this a new separate thread to have less clogging and finally have a proper throughout discussion rather than this be "what-if"

the work on castaway's own mge map has been started, and despite some said that this "should be community project where everyone participates" - it is obvious to me that noone is willing to do anything about this except for few, few even participate in discussing this and even less know how to use hammer or dedicate effort into making these arenas (which does take effort despite being cutouts of already ready maps), so I took it upon myself to create castaway's very own mge with arenas picked specifically for our realities and playerbase, as previous discussion was very vague and had no plan whatsoever as to what it even should be. Therefore I believe that community's contribution to creation of this map could be providing me with feedback and thoughtout discussion. If anyone wants to make an arena out of existing map to be added here themselves, feel free to do so, but for now I assume only I and 1 another person are willing to actually do that.

I at first tried to include new arenas into default mge_training_v8_beta, but I quickly ran into brushside limit, after adding 5gorge. As such, only 1 additional map could be added to that map file, so I decided to make entirely separate map from scratch, without any of stock mge_training's maps, so intention now is a completely separate map, which may or may not run on server parallel to original mge_training, but as such it will not include badlands or badlands spire and so on.
I've currently added 6 arenas: hydro power station, 5gorge middle, asteroid middle, fastlane second, yukon second and doomsday's rocket area.
Original mge map only allows up to 11-12 actual maps (not counting simple custom arenas like ammomod and so on), but if we go off only brush side limitation, considering that each of 6 maps I've added so far has on average 2500 brush faces, and current roster takes up 37% of brush side total limit, own map can fit in from 15 (considering 5 maps I've added=33%, 5x3=15=100%) to 24 (2500x24=65000, the limit is 65536) arenas that utilize stock map's area, I know this is a rather broad number and I am not a mathematician at all, so perhaps a better calculation can be performed, but I choose to orient at number of 12-15 arenas from maps we have that can be added to such a map. Perhaps additional maps can be fit in with some optimizations, but I am uncertain on what exact number of brushsides that would free, and this amount can be rather miniscule and insignificant, as such I am not willing to put effort in that, if anyone wants to try their hand at that and can do so, your effort will be appreciated.

This being said, amount of possible arenas included in a single map file proves to be very limited. As such we can't fit every map from our rotation into it, so we need to select only a few areas of few maps to be included as arenas to be played in castaway's mge.
I've already came up with some maps that are highly requested already to be included and also ones that would constitute good MGE gameplay, but I choose to thread carefully and wish to have a discussion on what other maps should be added, the list goes as follows:

1. Hydro's power
2. 5Gorge's middle
3. Asteroid's middle
4. Fastlane's second
5. Yukon's second
6. Doomsday's rocket
7. Foundry's middle (In-progress)
8. Hydro's dish (In-progress)
9. Lumberyard's log (In-progress)
10. TBD
11. TBD
12. TBD
13. TBD
14. TBD
15. TBD

I've also came up with some guidelines or basic rules for what an mge arena should include, they are not that strict but those are trends I see in original mge_training:

1. Round layout (multiple choices on how to approach the enemy, you can go around the map and not be stuck in a deadend, for the most part);
2. Unique layout compared to rest of arenas (example of similar layout would be foundry's middle, fastlane's middle and koth_king's middle, being largely a twist on similar idea of a roofed middle with relatively open surroundings);
3. Rather compact area but big enough for scout or soldier's maneuvers;
4. Plenty of verticality and height difference.
5. Actually being frequently played and liked by many (obscure is rather unpopular map with stale, oversized and rather flat layout)
6. Situated for 1v1 duels (mojave's 1st is too big for 2 players, and if you remove cliff and blu spawn area, then it's essentially a flat ground with a bunch of deadend rooms.

As such, I personally don't see most koth or arena maps fit for mge, as most of them are already intended for some kind of team deathmatch and often have plenty of mostly dead space where you can duel in actual games, which is not the case with meat grinder team-oriented 5cp for example, and most koth maps can be difficult to properly cut off, without making them too small, but leaving them in their entire or majority size breaks the point and seems too big for 1v1 duels, again in this case you can just boot up the map on server already. Viaduct works in the original mge_training because it's originally a compie map it's middle area is pretty round and whole map is structured sort of like letter "Ж", everything gravitates to the middle, whereas in a lot of koth maps they are three laned "I I I", meaning you can just skip and avoid seeing point entirely and go to enemy's spawn.
This being said, I theorize garbage day can be a 50/50 for MGE, it's round and fits most of criteria above, but, even cutting off spawn areas, I fear it might be too big for just 2 people, but if there will be popular support for it I don't mind adding it, perhaps elevator and basement area under the point will need to be removed as well.

And there is also a number of issues I'd like to hear feedback on and addressed:

1. Should doomsday rocket area have an elevator that you can activate and be lifted on, or should the arena be static?
2. Should original mge_training's simple custom arenas be ported over to mge_castaway as well? (ammomod, endif, BBall etc)

below you can see all the progress so far:
YUKON SECOND

DOOMSDAY ROCKET

ASTEROID MIDDLE

5GORGE MIDDLE

FASTLANE SECOND

HYDRO POWERSTATION

Decided to go with asteroid's skybox to make the map unique and set it apart from any other mge map out there, also because asteroid without it's skybox feels really off whereas other maps look much cooler with it, and it's an obvious marker of this being an edited version of the map's area rather than original, in screenshots for example. In future I'll also likely add castaway.tf banners around the areas as a way of preserving identity and heritage of castaway, and also as potential reminder that this server runs reverts and you can mge with reverts, or as a subtle subconscious instruction to visit castaway.tf, perhaps learning more of it's community and so on.
Any bugs (such a z-fighting, lightning bugs, etc) from screenshots will be addressed in future.

Thanks for attention and hopefully I'll get thoughtout prolonged responses and instigate actual conversation about this.

[Scout]

Here are some arenas that I think would be cool to have:

• Turbine mid
• Something on Nightfall (either stage 1 courtyard (the area outside spawn) or stage 2 mid)
• CP Well mid
• Coldfront last

I theorize garbage day can be a 50/50 for MGE, it's round and fits most of criteria above, but, even cutting off spawn areas, I fear it might be too big for just 2 people, but if there will be popular support for it I don't mind adding it, perhaps elevator and basement area under the point will need to be removed as well.

Add it for some custom map representation. The underground area isn't strictly necessary IMO.

Should doomsday rocket area have an elevator that you can activate and be lifted on, or should the arena be static?

Keep it static

Should original mge_training's simple custom arenas be ported over to mge_castaway as well? (ammomod, endif, BBall etc)

I don't see anything wrong with doing so

In future I'll also likely add castaway.tf banners around the areas as a way of preserving identity and heritage of castaway, and also as potential reminder that this server runs reverts and you can mge with reverts, or as a subtle subconscious instruction to visit castaway.tf, perhaps learning more of it's community and so on.

I really don't think they would be as beneficial as you think they would be. If you really want to add banners, put them on stuff like ammomod and endif so they're visually distinct from their mge_training versions -- the other arenas being from Castaway maps (and the map being called mge_castaway) already serves that purpose of preserving server identity.

[Kvasorob]

Alright, so the current roster is looking the following way:

1. Hydro's power
2. 5Gorge's middle
3. Asteroid's middle
4. Fastlane's second
5. Yukon's second
6. Doomsday's rocket
7. Foundry's middle (In-progress)
8. Hydro's dish (In-progress)
9. Lumberyard's log (In-progress)
10. Garbage Day middle
11. Turbine middle
12. Foundry last

I am already running into map limits after adding Foundry's last (6000 brush sides, almost triple the average of 2500), and I feel like lumberyard already might not be feasible because it's also stacked on brush sides, namely because of the bridge in the cliff area.
Though I feel like it is possible to just convert a lot of decorative brushes (which is what eats most of brush side limits, I imagine) into props, thus allowing to cram more stuff into the map, since brush sides right now are the only limitation. I am not sure though if this will be consequenceless gameplay wise (for example, theoretically some props may eat pomson shots they otherwise wouldn't, like on watchtower), though I'll try to make that in a way that minimizes any gameplay differences.
Then I am considering to also add Hydro's Dam and bridge areas into the selection, if limits will allow, and then done with adding maps.

[Kvasorob]

Additionally, should lumberyard's log's cutoff be

Here

Or

Here?

In other words, should the building by the point be accessible, or not?

With it the map might be too big and split in 2 separate halves for 2 players, but I feel like without them arena is bland and plain otherwise, and it doesn't feel like there's any real space to respawn in relative safety (part of why I want maps to be round is you can never guess where your enemy will spawn, perhaps only approximate or expect, so you can't spawncamp or something), In other words, without that building's interior it feels like just ammomod with extra bits of decoration, cover and death pit. Though opening the building could bring in some assymetry, though I feel that's sort-of fine since there's already assymetrical fastlane 2nd and, on original map, badlands spire.

So should it be 1 or 2?

[Kvasorob]

If anyone cares, new arenas:

FOUNDRY'S LAST

TURBINE'S MIDDLE

GARBAGE DAY'S MIDDLE

[Kvasorob]

Additionally, should lumberyard's log's cutoff be

Here

Or

Here?

In other words, should the building by the point be accessible, or not?

With it the map might be too big and split in 2 separate halves for 2 players, but I feel like without them arena is bland and plain otherwise, and it doesn't feel like there's any real space to respawn in relative safety (part of why I want maps to be round is you can never guess where your enemy will spawn, perhaps only approximate or expect, so you can't spawncamp or something), In other words, without that building's interior it feels like just ammomod with extra bits of decoration, cover and death pit. Though opening the building could bring in some assymetry, though I feel that's sort-of fine since there's already assymetrical fastlane 2nd and, on original map, badlands spire.

So should it be 1 or 2?

Now that I think about it, with addition of the house most fights will probably be there rather than the log, destroying entire point, so I'll go by route 1.

[Kvasorob]

Alright, so the current roster is looking the following way:

1. Hydro's power
2. 5Gorge's middle
3. Asteroid's middle
4. Fastlane's second
5. Yukon's second
6. Doomsday's rocket
7. Foundry's middle (In-progress)
8. Hydro's dish (In-progress)
9. Lumberyard's log (In-progress)
10. Garbage Day middle
11. Turbine middle
12. Foundry last

I am already running into map limits after adding Foundry's last (6000 brush sides, almost triple the average of 2500), and I feel like lumberyard already might not be feasible because it's also stacked on brush sides, namely because of the bridge in the cliff area.
Though I feel like it is possible to just convert a lot of decorative brushes (which is what eats most of brush side limits, I imagine) into props, thus allowing to cram more stuff into the map, since brush sides right now are the only limitation. I am not sure though if this will be consequenceless gameplay wise (for example, theoretically some props may eat pomson shots they otherwise wouldn't, like on watchtower), though I'll try to make that in a way that minimizes any gameplay differences.
Then I am considering to also add Hydro's Dam and bridge areas into the selection, if limits will allow, and then done with adding maps.

Though there's no real point of going beyond 12 as maximum number of players is 24, and it is now approved that if that goes above 10 an rtv vote will be summoned, i'd still like to include all hydro's 4 middle areas just as an option for people that'd like to mge on them, and I feel like hydro's bridge is better iteration of 5gorge's 2nd.

[Kvasorob]

Here are some arenas that I think would be cool to have:

• Turbine mid
• Something on Nightfall (either stage 1 courtyard (the area outside spawn) or stage 2 mid)
• CP Well mid
• Coldfront last

I theorize garbage day can be a 50/50 for MGE, it's round and fits most of criteria above, but, even cutting off spawn areas, I fear it might be too big for just 2 people, but if there will be popular support for it I don't mind adding it, perhaps elevator and basement area under the point will need to be removed as well.

Add it for some custom map representation. The underground area isn't strictly necessary IMO.

Should doomsday rocket area have an elevator that you can activate and be lifted on, or should the arena be static?

Keep it static

Should original mge_training's simple custom arenas be ported over to mge_castaway as well? (ammomod, endif, BBall etc)

I don't see anything wrong with doing so

In future I'll also likely add castaway.tf banners around the areas as a way of preserving identity and heritage of castaway, and also as potential reminder that this server runs reverts and you can mge with reverts, or as a subtle subconscious instruction to visit castaway.tf, perhaps learning more of it's community and so on.

I really don't think they would be as beneficial as you think they would be. If you really want to add banners, put them on stuff like ammomod and endif so they're visually distinct from their mge_training versions -- the other arenas being from Castaway maps (and the map being called mge_castaway) already serves that purpose of preserving server identity.

Thanks for your input, added turbine and garbage day.
I may add nightfall's 2nd's middle if limits approve, that seems to be a nice idea, coldfront's last though I feel is not really fit, it has some interesting design choices, but I feel like it's too similar to fastlane's 2nd and it's mostly flat circle with middle area with the point below it. Also, not really a factor but a fun fact, we play every other map currently in selection more than coldfront, except for lumberyard, that's for VA1. and on EU even lumberyard is played twice more than coldfront.

well's middle also kind of suffers from not being interesting or unique enough, and we also don't play well maps that often, though it's quite compact and otherwise, maybe I'll also include it if we have space left.

[Kvasorob]

Alright, so the current roster is looking the following way:

1. Hydro's power
2. 5Gorge's middle
3. Asteroid's middle
4. Fastlane's second
5. Yukon's second
6. Doomsday's rocket
7. Foundry's middle (In-progress)
8. Hydro's dish (In-progress)
9. Lumberyard's log (In-progress)
10. Garbage Day middle
11. Turbine middle
12. Foundry last

I am already running into map limits after adding Foundry's last (6000 brush sides, almost triple the average of 2500), and I feel like lumberyard already might not be feasible because it's also stacked on brush sides, namely because of the bridge in the cliff area.
Though I feel like it is possible to just convert a lot of decorative brushes (which is what eats most of brush side limits, I imagine) into props, thus allowing to cram more stuff into the map, since brush sides right now are the only limitation. I am not sure though if this will be consequenceless gameplay wise (for example, theoretically some props may eat pomson shots they otherwise wouldn't, like on watchtower), though I'll try to make that in a way that minimizes any gameplay differences.
Then I am considering to also add Hydro's Dam and bridge areas into the selection, if limits will allow, and then done with adding maps.

Though there's no real point of going beyond 12 as maximum number of players is 24, and it is now approved that if that goes above 10 an rtv vote will be summoned, i'd still like to include all hydro's 4 middle areas just as an option for people that'd like to mge on them, and I feel like hydro's bridge is better iteration of 5gorge's 2nd.

Though adding basically entire hydro isn't really good, and on a second thought maybe adding the two areas is not that great, dam feels too big for 2 players and bridge also, it's hard to say. Though dam could be interesting because it's basically only area in the game to feature vast amount of puddle water, which allows soldiers to rocket jump higher than average, which could be interesting to see playing out.

[Kvasorob]

Final map roster is:

1. Hydro's power
2. Hydro's bridge
3. Hydro's dam
4. Hydro's dish
5. Doomsday's rocket
6. Lumberyard's log
7. Garbage day's middle
8. Turbine's middle
9. Asteroid's middle
10. 5Gorge's middle
11. Well's middle (CP/Arena)
12. Foundry's middle
13. Foundry's last
14. Yukon's 2nd
15. Fastlane's 2nd
16. Nightfall's 2nd's middle (In-progress)
17. Nightfall's 1st's courtyard (In-progress)
    plus Simple arenas from mge_training (ammomod, endif and so on)

Decided to include basically whole hydro so as not to be slandered later as in why that area was added and not that one, and it also simply felt improper picking 2 areas (originally planned to be just power and dish) and leaving out the 2 other, as all of them are equally good and have interesting geometry or features not seen in any other maps, such as dam's puddles of water letting soldier to rocketjump way higher to dish having a dish with a narrow cover in the middle and so on.

Only nightfall arenas are left to be added, after that is done I will polish out all the arenas visually (eliminating visual or gameplay bugs etc) and then it will be ready for sail. Hopefully will be done earlier but I am confident in saying will be done before next monday. Despite my pessimism regarding map roster, thankfully it indeed proves to be possible to at least fit in all of these into the map with a lot of optimization. server can hold in a maximum of 24 players (assuming all of them play 1v1, 12 arenas can be populated simultaneously), and since it is expected to be made that rtv will be automatically called after 10/12 players join - there will definitely be more than enough variety and options to choose from.

[Kvasorob]

Final map roster is:

1. Hydro's power
2. Hydro's bridge
3. Hydro's dam
4. Hydro's dish
5. Doomsday's rocket
6. Lumberyard's log
7. Garbage day's middle
8. Turbine's middle
9. Asteroid's middle
10. 5Gorge's middle
11. Well's middle (CP/Arena)
12. Foundry's middle
13. Foundry's last
14. Yukon's 2nd
15. Fastlane's 2nd
16. Nightfall's 2nd's middle (In-progress)
17. Nightfall's 1st's courtyard (In-progress)
    plus Simple arenas from mge_training (ammomod, endif and so on)

Decided to include basically whole hydro so as not to be slandered later as in why that area was added and not that one, and it also simply felt improper picking 2 areas (originally planned to be just power and dish) and leaving out the 2 other, as all of them are equally good and have interesting geometry or features not seen in any other maps, such as dam's puddles of water letting soldier to rocketjump way higher to dish having a dish with a narrow cover in the middle and so on.

Only nightfall arenas are left to be added, after that is done I will polish out all the arenas visually (eliminating visual or gameplay bugs etc) and then it will be ready for sail. Hopefully will be done earlier but I am confident in saying will be done before next monday. Despite my pessimism regarding map roster, thankfully it indeed proves to be possible to at least fit in all of these into the map with a lot of optimization. server can hold in a maximum of 24 players (assuming all of them play 1v1, 12 arenas can be populated simultaneously), and since it is expected to be made that rtv will be automatically called after 10/12 players join - there will definitely be more than enough variety and options to choose from.

I'm proud to announce that all these maps are now added to the map, so the hardest part is out of the way. Now I will focus on refining smaller things, shouldnt take too long