Terminal Rework Details

(Vilham) #1

Hey guys

As mentioned in the video there’s currently an imbalance in Terminal’s first objective completion rate. The goal with all Dirty Bomb maps is to have the first objective be completed nearly every time, as we feel what keeps the maps enjoyable to play is the sense of progression rather than being stuck on the first objective all game. We believe this is a large part of what causes it’s low selection rate in community tournaments.

There are three separate issues that contribute to this imbalance: the primary objective which has a few separate issues, the travel time to the objective for attackers which is effected by the secondary gas tunnel, and the layout contributing to defenders having superior positions while leaving attackers without enough options.

Primary Objective

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The location and position of the primary objective on Terminal has several issues:

  • There is no cover protecting attackers attempting to plant, and as the defenders must come from above or behind, it leaves attackers with too many angles to watch and they’re very exposed overall.
  • If the forward spawn has not been captured, it can mean attackers get a rush plant on the second objective as there are no defenders between attackers and objective two. This is a general principle we want to avoid on all maps as attackers should need to contest as a team to complete an objective.
  • If the forward spawn has been captured the only approach defenders have is to drop down from above, this gives you maximum spread on landing and it requires you to do a full 360 degree check. As a general level design principle, it’s good to avoid this.
  • The goal here is to remove that barrier and create a plant site that provides cover and doesn’t require defenders to come over the top to approach.

Travel Time & the Secondary Objective

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The gas tunnel on objective one has long been a complaint of the community. Terminal objective one has the longest travel times from spawn to objective in the game. While in theory the gas tunnel reduces this travel time when open, in practice this often works against attackers as it’s a secondary in favour of the defenders and is therefore rarely open. The capturable spawn acts partially as a band-aid to this issue by moving the spawns forward, but that can quickly be reversed, putting the attackers back to the initial spawn and at a great disadvantage.
This travel time issue will be solved by moving the spawns to the forward spawn location making it a consistent distance from the objective. The gas tunnel is no longer necessary as travel time can’t be reduced further, and equally the capturable spawn is no longer required to bring attackers to the forward spawn.

Layout

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The layout will be effected by any changes to the primary objective and travel times as they require specific well thought out spaces to create fun and replayable encounters. However these layout changes won’t effect the themes and locations in the map. Apartments will still be on the attackers left flank, but the attackers approach will be different due to their new spawn point. The distinct tube station building will also still be there with a modified layout that works for the new C4 plant site. Attackers spawn will remain much the same, although it will have new routes to the objective.

We hope that changes to these elements (the primary objective, the travel times and the layout) will resolve the defender bias on Terminal’s first objective. We look forward to sharing more with you in future!

Vilham

(23OO23) #2

To be honest, gas tunnel was fun, even if only as a side stuff - it was a nice, unique stuff about this map. Forward station was unnecessary though - it both gave advantages and disadvantages, being more situational, instead of being more useful overall for the side that had control over it.

Alas I like changes - so it’s nice to see reworks.

(Mc1412013) #3

Just dont give it the same dome style rework i rather the original dome

(PeterComputer) #4

I think most of us expected Terminal to be reworked but it’s nice to finally see some of the changes being done! The new layout is looking good so far but the C4 zone and the general area around it looks quite close quarters. That’s not inherently a bad thing though.

I do hope that defender routes aren’t limited to that main stairwell though, otherwise attackers will most likely dominate defenders once they take control over the area. Then again I’m sure the testers will do a good job making sure the layout feels balanced.

Anyways, these are nice news. Keep up the good work!

(Melinder) #5

Or you could have just removed Aura from the game.

(Drac0rion) #6

I’d really like to get a top down map layout just like with the Dome before and after pictures.

At the moment I don’t find this post really giving us any “details” other than the map is receiving a rework, which I do appreciate since I’ve been avoiding this map for a while for plenty of reasons.

What will be the new secondary objective?
Will the new attackers spawn for first objective be before or after the forward spawn was captured, compared to the current version?
Will the new defenders spawn for first objective be before or after the forward spawn was captured, compared to the current version?
From the first picture, it looks like post forward spawn where defenders had a left side balcony doesn’t exist anymore. Won’t the stairs instead of the wall become a meatgrinder chokepoint?

I found Dome rework to be a success, even though I didn’t really consider it that bad before the rework.
It became a much more enjoyable map in general, but the rework really just applied to the first objective. While the rework did fix many problems with the map, plenty of them still got overlooked in my opinion.

Overall I’m glad to see SD working on balancing older maps even while Castle is still in the works. Hopefully Underground will receive a rework next, so that older fire supports before Stoker and Javelin have more use of their abilities in that map.

(TheStrangerous) #7

Words cannot express how much I loathe Terminal.

(honeytoken) #8

One of the main things that need to be changed for Terminal is defenders spawn on second objective (since it sounds like you’re already taking care of how easily spawn camped attackers can get on 1st.) Currently, Once the attackers take hold and get their plants down, defenders have two narrow hallways to travel down (one being the balcony) and another choke point with an MG nest facing it. Second obj was more problematic than the first in my opinion. Terminal currently demonstrates the massive skill curve present in the game, and as much as I dislike how easily spawncamped you can be, I’d prefer it to how the designers retouched dome.

(thisisbossi) #9

I’ve always been fond-ish of Terminal, but agree it needs changes; it’s not one I ever find myself voting for. I love the second stage, but while the first stage has great individual parts: they haven’t really seemed to work well as a whole.

  • The forward spawn point is a fun point of contention for both sides; I hope that gets retained in some form, though as noted: it does need some adjustments.

  • The MG-nest overlooking Forward Spawn is rarely useful for either side; I’d love for that to be better situated somehow… either keeping its limited use but improving cover, or improving its use but keeping its very exposed & blind flank.

  • If Defense overwhelms Offense it is exceedingly difficult to push out of Offense Spawn. The MG nest presumably intended to counter such aggressive Defenders is almost never useful; that room is more often a trap than aid, with the flank from the gas tunnel generator making the MG difficult to wield in an already-losing game.

  • The upper balconies above the bomb point offer nearly zero utility, but they’re kind of a neat layout & I’d love if they had more use. As y’all noted: when Defenders lose Forward Spawn these become the only real ingress route… but there’s just no pushing back from them. Could they physically morph into more defensible positions if Fwd Spawn is captured by Offense, perhaps by spawning an MG nest, opening a murder hole down into the yellow-tunnel room, etc.?

  • The gas tunnel is too tough to hold on offense and offers too little benefit to be worth it. A fair amount of the time I see Offense lose is because they focused so much on keeping the gas tunnel open & not on the objective.

  • I delight in Aura’ing in the yellow-tunnel beside the bomb point while on Defense, but not many Offense teams are able to smash that. I have a love/hate relationship with that tunnel-room based entirely on what side I’m on.

  • I’ve wondered if the easiest tweak might be to somehow connect the gas tunnel into the yellow-tunnel. That’d make the gas tunnel far more important, and would open the yellow-tunnel to greater crossfire.

  • Please don’t touch the 2nd Stage: I love that part on both offense as well as defense!

(LIGHT_BAGHEERA) #10

Let’s see how this changes will impact the map, and tbh I never expected you to rework terminal… But will see.

(Press E) #11

Honestly I liked terminal. I didn’t mind if the first objective wasn’t always completed, because in Stopwatch it’s equal for everyone. Sure being stuck at the first obj for 12 minuted is boring, but that’s a problem with Stopwatch itself.
It may not have been the most balanced map, but it was definitely fun, especially the fights that happened around the gas tunnel and forward spawn. Don’t get me wrong, it definitely needed tweaking, but I think this might be a bit extreme. And it seems like all this fix is doing is removing what made the map unique. Of course it’s still in the works, but I’m not super optimistic, especially after SD kicked out a lot of their private testers.

Imo, I think dockyard needed attention more than terminal. It gets picked a lot less than terminal now from what I’ve seen, and there’s a lot of horrifically defender sided areas in it, especially the second corner of the EV escort.

(Demolama) #12

You all put the damn generator on the defense side, where in w:et it was on the attacker side. You all made it harder to use and harder to hold the flag. Map design wasn’t the problem, level designer changes were the problem. Welp I guess this is just one more step this game has taken to show they are moving away from w:et.

(alphabeta) #13

“the travel time to the objective for attackers which is effected”; “layout will be effected by any changes to the primary objective”; Not to be a jerk but you mean “affected”

(azz_abdr) #14

Can you also open the roof above MG on balcony on last objective?

(GatoCommodore) #15

@Drac0rion said:
From the first picture, it looks like post forward spawn where defenders had a left side balcony doesn’t exist anymore. Won’t the stairs instead of the wall become a meatgrinder chokepoint?

this
pls stop creating meatgrinder chokepoints
Nu Dome 1st stage is cancer because of high defender bias and chokepoint

please dont change anymore map with chokepoint kind of map
its stupid, pls dont do this

(Vilham) #16

@PeterComputer said:
I think most of us expected Terminal to be reworked but it’s nice to finally see some of the changes being done! The new layout is looking good so far but the C4 zone and the general area around it looks quite close quarters. That’s not inherently a bad thing though.

I do hope that defender routes aren’t limited to that main stairwell though, otherwise attackers will most likely dominate defenders once they take control over the area. Then again I’m sure the testers will do a good job making sure the layout feels balanced.

Anyways, these are nice news. Keep up the good work!

There are several routes into the main plaza space not just the stairwell visible in the images, the building to the left that used to have a drop down window has a route that comes out to the left, we are performing extensive playtesting to ensure it doesn’t get too attacker sided.

(Vilham) #17

@Drac0rion said:
I’d really like to get a top down map layout just like with the Dome before and after pictures.

At the moment I don’t find this post really giving us any “details” other than the map is receiving a rework, which I do appreciate since I’ve been avoiding this map for a while for plenty of reasons.

What will be the new secondary objective?
Will the new attackers spawn for first objective be before or after the forward spawn was captured, compared to the current version?
Will the new defenders spawn for first objective be before or after the forward spawn was captured, compared to the current version?
From the first picture, it looks like post forward spawn where defenders had a left side balcony doesn’t exist anymore. Won’t the stairs instead of the wall become a meatgrinder chokepoint?

I found Dome rework to be a success, even though I didn’t really consider it that bad before the rework.
It became a much more enjoyable map in general, but the rework really just applied to the first objective. While the rework did fix many problems with the map, plenty of them still got overlooked in my opinion.

Overall I’m glad to see SD working on balancing older maps even while Castle is still in the works. Hopefully Underground will receive a rework next, so that older fire supports before Stoker and Javelin have more use of their abilities in that map.

Hey thanks for the comment and questions, glad you enjoyed the Dome rework. To answer your questions:

I haven’t gone into too much detail because the design isn’t locked and it is possible it will change given more playtesting. But to give you some info on the current version there is a secondary that attackers can repair, this aids attackers by closing a route to defenders, effectively the opposite of what previously happened. This helps balance the first objective towards attackers advantage.

The attackers spawn will be close to where the attackers forward spawn currently is, that entire area is being redesigned to work with the new design.

The defenders spawn will be close to where the current defenders spawn inside the tube station over the wall is.

As mentioned in a comment above, there is still an entry point to the left there, its just not in frame in the images, this provides cover from anyone observing the stairs.

The layout is currently being playtested so any of these things may change based on those tests.

(sgtSZKLARZ) #18

Well… you actually destroyed Dome and now you are going to destroy one of my favourite maps… Gus tunnel is cool and usefull. Forward spawn in unique - there isn’t any map with this. New first objective looks really bad and i guess that Skyhammer or Arty are useless there.

(Teflon Love) #19

Thanks for removing the generator room.

I stopped counting how often I typed in chat on Terminal:

“Pro tip: the team that can hold the generator room the longest wins.”

It was awful how many players spent most of their time their, fiercely defending the generator without ever getting out of the room to take the forward spawn or plant.

(auwi) #20

Very cool work so far! Hopefully you’ll be able to push out further updates to make comp love it.

Here are some of my current issues with the first obj area:

  • Lots of hallways with low ceilings make areas feel cramp and spammy, makes some areas harder to push through (apartment hallways, hallways by the first obj, attacker’s right side route)
  • Sightlines you can’t move around, Especially from attacker’s window and the alleyway
  • Planters are frustrating to move around, having to always jump across each one, makes a huge difference in the heat of combat (jumping reduces accuracy a lot).
  • Feels like there was no good flank to reach the objective, many times i felt stuck in place cause defenders were camping on the apartment balcony, or in various corners.

With that being said, here’s some feedback from the images

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As i’ve said before, the planters are frustrating to move around since they make you jump, causing you to lose accuracy in combat
The wall there seems to solve an issue of a sightline, but causes another one since it gets in the way and creates a corridor, which can be camped and spammed into, I think there should be another route along the side to solve that:

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Finally some attention towards the objective area; the objective area feels cramp as well, as it doesn’t feel like it should be a high focus area. The first objective should really draw the player’s eyes towards it, and funnel players towards the area. To do this, I suggest removing the pillar that is there and raising the doorway and ceiling height. By doing this, you make the area feel much more significant.

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Hopefully these suggestions can help improve it more? I’d like to know what other people also think.