Personally, I find it immensely disappointing. 343/Certain Affinity need to learn that 1) they shouldn’t be telling us where to drive and 2) vehicles don’t need further handicaps.
Look at the Wraith? Why is it even there? The low ceilings make it impossible to use long range, and if you move anywhere outside of its spawn, you’re literally asking to be boarded. I just don’t understand the creative process. How did we go from wide open maps like Avalanche and Sandtrap to these scripted things? That’s what they are–they’re scripted. Every single game plays out one of two possible ways.
That’s not fun. The game has potential! Stop limiting it!
The Mantis is a terrible thing to place on rigidly symmetrical maps like Ragnarok and Meltdown. They almost never leave their side on Ragnarok, and it barely goes 10ft from the spawn on Meltdown.
More Asymmetrical or dense maps like Vortex or Outcast maps are much better suited to the Mantis and other heavy vehicles. It seems pretty solid and show you can have solid BTB maps without ridiculous sightlines.
I can already tell that this map will have screen lag on the scale of Shatter. Green lights everywhere, complex background scenarios (did that ship just fly through the dock?), and blue flames will lead to tons of lag.
I like Dominion, so I’m hoping this map adds to that experience, but I doubt I’ll enjoy it from a Slayer standpoint. Too up-close-and-personal for a BTB map, and the numerous columns will make it really confusing to navigate. I still haven’t figured out Abandon’s forest parts yet…
> I personally can’t stand wide open maps. The long sight lines are what make the DMR overpowered.
That’s true, but a problem with the DMR and not the map. I think a slayer BR BTB variant would be very revealing just how game-changing the DMR is for those wide open maps, which I think are far superior to the cluttered stuff we have now. Reach started it, the only non-cluttered map was Hemorrhage, and that was still hard to drive on because the Warthogs flipped so easily.
My viewpoint is that vehicles and infantry should have seperate areas to go. Think Avalanche, for example. The vehicles have the wide open outer areas to manuever as much as they like. Infantry can run around out there if they like, but it’s typically more advantageous to stick to the inner areas.
Now, the design philosophy seems to be infantry can go anywhere they want, which isn’t realistic, isn’t strategic, and makes vehicles useless.
From the video walkthrough that was released recently, it’s obvious 343 wants to make vehicles no fun, and useless. There is NO open areas on the map so vehicles are forced into tight ravines and there is no way their survival rate can be high against infantry even without infinity setting. The wraith will be useless as it will be easily boarded. A mostly stationary and well defended mantis might be somewhat useful in more open areas, and warthogs will serve no purpose but to blow up.
> I personally can’t stand wide open maps. The long sight lines are what make the DMR overpowered.
The DMR is what makes the DMR overpowered. Map design is an essential part of the online experience that can’t be edited post launch. Then DMR and it’s range aren’t essential and shouldn’t be a roadblock for map design.
All I could think was this map looks huge! I don’t know much about the other maps, but I wouldn’t be surprised if this becomes one of the maps nobody votes for. It just doesn’t look like it’s much fun.
I will reserve my judgement until I play it. However, to me it looks like vehicles are going to useless with all the tight corners and nooks infantry can get into. It wouldn’t be so bad if people don’t have the option of custom load outs to ruin it.
I really appreciate 343i giving us a new campaign. At least, that’s what it felt like when they were walking from one end of the map to the other. The map is humongous, and I dislike that.
From what I’ve seen so far, it looks like vehicles are going to get completely raped, all the time. Plenty of corners to hide behind with your plasma pistol and plasma grenades. sigh