Features | Level of the Week | Crude Control

The middle section
The red base's 2 tanks
Rooftops + snipers = fun!
The spawn
Left or right... hmmm

Map Name: Crude Control
Author: [WTF?]Huenberry
Map Type: Capture and hold
Web Site: N/A
Download: crude_control.zip

New Textures
New Skybox
New Models/Sprites
New Sounds

Scoring:

Base crude tanks:
2 points for the team every 20 secs.
If captured by enemy, they get an immediate
25 points for the team, 10 frags to the player
and 4 points for the team every 20 secs.

Center crude tanks
1 point to the team every 10 secs.
2 Frags to the capping player.

Overview:

It's been a while since a new LOTW has been posted here on PlanetFortress. Not only do i blame myself, but i also blame the noticeable slowdown of the TFC community. What with all the hype about the new HL2 and impending TF2, it's understandable, but it's a shame that PF isn't what it used to be. Anyway, the LOTW is back. And surprise, surprise! It's another [WTF?] creation!

Crude Control is a king of the hill variant in which you must capture and hold the different tanks spread around the map to rack up the points. Rockets fly, grenades explode and players run, yet there is no danger of a black tide! Read on!

Description:

For starters, Crude Control was made by [WTF?]Huenberry, a member of the renouned mapping clan [WTF?] which is responsible for pumping out some of the finest TFC maps around. Even though this reviewer (myself!) as played pretty much every map made by them, the quality of this map has not been pre-judged, but i did have high expectations... I was not disappointed.

Crude control, as it's name suggests, is control map in which your team has to capture and hold tanks of crude spread around the 3 main parts of the map: Your base's 2 tanks, the 4 tanks in the middle of the map and the enemy's 2 base tanks as well, all of which cannot be recaptured for 21 seconds.

Think its going to be a walk in the park? Think again!

The map is set at night in some kind of rocky setting filled with lush green grass surrounded by cliffs and a few puddles of water. Arches carved in the cliffs and ledges spread all over th map add even more vertical gameplay which is essential in order to advance on the enemy team and provide a little something this reviewer like to call the "Death from above factor", which basicaly means the ability to rain down grenades and sniper fire to take care of any defense the enemy team might have without exposing yourself to too much danger. Here, Demomans quickly demonstrate their potentials to secure the middle area which has 2 ledges with a layout reminiscent of Warpath, but with less running. This provides a quick way to get from your spawn to the main fighting area and retaliate in force.

Every section of the map is "contained" through the use of buildings at both ends of the middle section which leads to each team's 2 base tanks, reducing visibility and r_speeds. Those buildings also have a sniper window to help the offense "do it's thing". Another good point here. Each base also has sounds of heavy machinery churning and pumping away the crude, but it tends to be annoying due to the high volume. I would of also prefered more different sounds to complete the "industrial" theme and some more environment sounds as well but it's still better then nothing.

Lighting is dark, but not dramatically enough to hinder gameplay. Every important section is lit enough so that players can distinguish friend from foe, yet in some points, still be able to hide in the shadows and snipe some heads off or stab someone in the back. The lighting itselfs mostly comes from spotlights located sparsely around the map, providing adequate lighting but that's it. A few glowing sprites and light cones could of been a nice add-on and enhance the nightime feel.

The map is symetrical, so you don't have to worry about walking around the map aimlessly. After 2 mins of running around, you've got it down. The ledges are accessible either by walking from the base or conc/rocket jumping. Or you can use the many ladders spread around the map, giving you access to them and the many roof tops. For the engineer inside of you, this means some serious sentry gun potential. Maybe not in the middle portion of the map, but for the bases, you'll have a big defense advantage. And since you do NOT respawn after all of the crude tanks are captured (A very good choice by the mapper, since you do NOT want the fast and furious gameplay to stop), keeping the defenses up is important at your base, because your 2 tanks can rack up the enemy team's points alot.

Class usage in Crude Control is perfect. Every class can shine here. From the fast scout which can secure the enemy base tanks easily, to the engineer which locks it down. As stated before, i found the demoman to be a great asset to a team, raining down pipeboms from ledges and/or setting up pipebomb traps on the tanks.

Conclusion:

Furious, relentless destruction awaits you. If you keep the pressure on the enemy team and start capping those tanks, you can rack up the frags and the team points very fast. Great for clan matche too!.

-BlackPanther

BlackPanther's Mapping Guide

Capture and hold (Intermediate tutorial)

King of the hill. A very under played type of scenario due to the level of difficulty the mapper has to contend with in order to get the flow and gameplay right.

The relevance to this map? Well "capture and hold" is the same thing. The difference in Crude Control is that there is more then 1 capture point and it's not territorial control but the principle is the same.

Lets take a look first at the middle capture points of this map. Unlike the base's capture points, they are NOT captured by anyone at the start of the map. Let's see how he did it.

You'll need 2 i_t_g entities at each of your capture points, one for each team, stacked over one another or occupying the same space. Give each one a name  (cp1blue and cp1red) and a goal number(11 and 12). Make each of them ACTIVE and set the right team to use each of them. Set the entity to give the number of frags and team points you want and any other effects you wish.

When each cap-point is activated it puts in your team's flag model and removes the other team's, wether it's there or not. So youll need 2 into_tfgoals right above the cap point, set to show each team's flags. Give them a name like cp1flagblue and cp1flagred, a goal number (111 and 121) and their state to REMOVED.

Now go back to the 2 i_t_g entities and change them so that when the player touches their team's i_t_g, it restores their team's flag and removes the enemy's flag. For example, for the blue team, this can be done by changing the "If goal # removed " to "111", "Remove Goal#" to "121" and "Restore Goal#" to "111". So, now you have a cap point which can be used by both team, score points, and have their flags showing when you run over them.

But how do you set them so they can't be capped by the enemy team right after you? Easy!

Have the i_t_g each target a multi_manager which changes the enemy team's i_t_g's activtion state through the use of 2 trigger_relay entities. The first one makes it INACTIVE and the other, ACTIVE (so the enemy team can cap them again after a while). Set the multi_manager to trigger the first one and then the other after a defined number of seconds.

This is a very quick and simple tutorial so if you need more info, email me or check out this tutorial on Territorial Control over at TF Mapped.



 


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