Tactically interesting maps?

[Europa]

Quick question: What makes a map tactically interesting?

[Vixen]

Subtle elevations, realistic looking terrains. Personaly I love fights centered around small villages.

[mrpwase]

I like rolling, bestepped (is that a word?) hills with woods scattered around and a few towns. Good for armour battles and big mechanised attacks.

[Europa]

What about terrain mix? I tend to fill every part of my map with something, like filds or such, no open terrain at all. Is that bad? It gives the infantry lots of cover almost everywhere on the map.

[Vixen]

Some open terrain is good or the map seems too cluttered. You have to use different tactics for overcoming open spots as well so it adds more dimensions to it.

[Kingfish]

Mile after mile of the dead impaled on 20 foot spikes.

[Pud]

Im always after good , well done interesting maps. Perhaps people could post links to their all time favourite map?

[yacinator]

I like maps that force players to get creative with their tactics.

[dalem]

I like to make realistic maps. Folks rarely like to fight on those though, I've found.

-dale

[Tarkus]

I like maps where you get many tactical options in QBs, but I generally prefer realistic maps for historical scenarios. Sounds obvious but still...

Back then I was quite impressed by Manstein maps for CMBB he made for QBs. Dunno if he did some for CMAK ? Look for his packs at cmmods.com.

Best

[Richie]

Originally posted by Europa:

Quick question: What makes a map tactically interesting?

The troops you put with it...

[Pzman]

Originally posted by Europa:

Quick question: What makes a map tactically interesting?

Anything that gives the AI a chance to stop me.

[Blah Blah Blah]

I like maps that don't look as if they have had certain terrain put there specifically. I don't want to think that piece of terrain was done for a reason.

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by dalem:

I like to make realistic maps. Folks rarely like to fight on those though, I've found.

Trouble is, you make ralistic maps of places like Disney World and downtown Minneapolis.

Michael

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by Blah Blah Blah:

I like maps that don't look as if they have had certain terrain put there specifically. I don't want to think that piece of terrain was done for a reason.

That was always my gripe with the old Squad Leader game. The map boards all looked like miniature golf courses, not like real world terrain.

Michael

[Macphail]

as long as we are in this thread, why doesnt someone recommend some good maps? the generated ones are good, but i would like see some other peoples work. i have not really liked the few maps i downloaded, with the exception of a river crossing type one.

[securityguard]

The best maps are the ones with subtle choke points, varying elevation and most importantly organized terrain. A bad map is one where the terrain is skewed all over the place randomly. Real terrain almost never looks like that, it usually has some sort of pattern to it.

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by securityguard:

The best maps are the ones with subtle choke points, varying elevation and most importantly organized terrain. A bad map is one where the terrain is skewed all over the place randomly. Real terrain almost never looks like that, it usually has some sort of pattern to it.

Very true. I hope the map generator for QBs in CMx2 is a bit better in that regard, but I'm not sure how you'd write that into a program. It's not bad most of the time even now, but it does do some distinctly odd things now and again that you wouldn't see in real life, like roads going straight up the sides of cliffs, for instance.

Michael

[sand digger]

Yeh the road to nowhere thing as done by the map generator is a bit offputting. But other than that its quite good, damm good at times.

Other than fixing the wonky roads, it would be good to have the generator do abrupt changes in height, like banks and cliffs. All curves and no straight lines.........

[Michael Emrys]

One other thing in regard to roads and grades, where a road is proceeding across the face of an incline, in the game, it has the same slope as the surface it's on, whereas in real life there would be a cut in the hillside so that the road surface is level from one side to the other. I hope that is clear; I know it's a little hard to visualize from a verbal description.

Michael

[Kilroy Lurking]

Hi ME!

" ...so that the road surface is level from one side to the other...."

It has always niggled me that the 'roads' are painted on the terrain and follow its contours rather than being 'level'. Apart from the small amount of extra work in map making in these games, in real life roads cut into and built up on the terrain provide really useful cover (sometimes the only cover available).

On a similar theme, Pill Boxes (Bunkers)! In game on hilly terrain these give a whole new aspect to the term 'Jerry Built'. I remember in the original 'Valley of trouble" Demo being amazed at being able to place one of these on the junction of two sloping tiles so the the PB was at an angle of 45 degrees and hanging over the edge - just like that old Charlie Chaplin film!

Something to fix in CM the new?

Seasons greetings to one and all - David