Ah Bridge. Probably one of the first, if not the first map I ever saw of this game. I’ve seen this one go several ways, have changed my outlook on the map several times when playing. But now, I feel like I understand how the map works, how teams flow through it; and I have some major concerns. I know the more popular complaint about the map is how in the last phase the attackers can easily capture both objectives back to back. However, I don’t feel like this is an issue worthy of discussion since the whole problem can (in my opinion) easily be resolved with extending the period between the capture of the first canister and the spawn of the second.
No, my real gripe with Bridge is the first phase, mainly for the attackers. Let’s have a quick look at how this map works: We have the 3 streets from which attackers come out of spawn. One leads into an easily camped down, no-cover hallway. The other leads into a long line of sight with minimal cover (Just the garbage cans and car on the left, or ducking back into the alley on the right away from the objective). The final route leads up onto the Bridge. This is probably where the main problems start to arise.
See, moving onto the Bridge often gains you nothing. At best you’ll pick off a sniper or fire support sitting behind the red van, and you’ll have a little poke-war with the defenders dumb enough to show themselves down on the street. The alternative is moving through the office and its accompanying alleyway. The problem with this is that it fuses back with the original middle route, having minimal cover and putting you in several (!) crossfires in the middle of the street. Once again you have the option to poke away at the defenders from the office windows, but it once again gains you nothing. And finally you can take the option to go down the stairs at the very end of the bridge, which just lead you back to the little hallway of death. No cover, no easy retreat, several crossfires should you push out, …
All in all this puts us in a position where ALL attacker traffic has either got to go through the street, or the doorway at the end of the stairs. This is a problem. A problem that is compounded by the fact that unlike Chapel, Bridge’s Defender’s best position is quite literally NEXT to the EV. See on Chapel, the defenders have the high ground, sure, but they’re also quite a bit away from the EV. This realistically means it requires a colossal screw-up from the defending side to get any decent progress (read: 25%) in a single repair session; either through a teamwipe (which with all the crossfire and cover positions shouldn’t be happening) or a lack of attention. Personally, I’ve always been a firm believer of the concept that you cannot design something to be beatable if the other party plays badly.
So what is the solution to this problem? Well, let me preface this by saying I’m in no way a game/level/map designer, so do not take what I say for gospel here. I’m just a player with a love for this game who seems to notice a problematic pattern with this particular map. I am quite confident the folks at Splash Damage are far more competent to think up a proper solution to this issue than I am.
Regardless, I think there can happen either of two things: A new attacker route is added to the EV location so that defenders have to focus on more than 2 points; OR the defenders are somehow incentivized to actually care about who controls the bridge itself.
The new route can be added in various ways. Either the existing routes get altered, for instance the stairs at the end of the bridge do not end up in the same hallway, but in another doorway that is currently a filled up corner. Another way would be to connect the office alley with the second phase alley close to defender spawn to incentivize flanking more. A third way I can think of is a manhole like in Dome, allowing traffic through more than just the street.
As for the incentive for bridge control, we could have another generator up there. Or a destructible train door to drop into the EV area once the attackers have destroyed it. Other options could include a Forward Spawn, better line of sight into the more campy spots, an MG, etc.
If you have gotten this far into the post, thank you for reading. I tried to at least give the whole subject some thought and constructive criticism before making this post. I do sincerely hope this gets taken into consideration, so to alleviate some of the more frustrating experiences in this game. Should you have any feedback towards the suggestions, the post or even something I’m missing about this first phase that would help me; please leave it down below. Thank you for reading, and remember: Play Dirty!