tl;dr I watched a CS:GO major and liked the defuse gamemode and tried to adapt something similar for TF2 that kept the things we like about 5cp.

I've been trying to make a map around this game mode, but I'm tired now and it's late, and trying to use hammer makes me motion sick and makes me want to kill myself. Maybe I can throw the idea to tf.tv and someone can either inspire me with a good idea, or persuade me that this was never going to work.

How it works:

1. Red team start with all 4 CPs.
   
2. Red and Blue spawn equally far from cp1.
   
3. ALA 5cp, Red and Blue contest CPs linearly, with spawns moving forward and back
   
4. If Blue cap cp4, Blue win.
   
5. If not, and the time runs out, and overtime expires, Red win.
   
6. If Blue won, reset the CPs for the next round, otherwise, Blue keeps their progress.
   
7. After 3? 4? 5? rounds, swap teams, splitting the map into 2 halves.

Goals:
- mid-fights / rollouts and initial clash are still a thing (equal distance from cp1)
- pushing back and forth still a thing (CPs that work like 5cp, 5 mins should be enough time for that to happen)
- "sitting on your ass at 2nd having lost mid, being 1-0 down, trying the safest, boringest strategy for 20 minutes before moving to the riskier stuff that gets the game moving again" no longer a thing (hard limit on round length, no stalemate win conditions)
- many rounds per match, but not so many that rounds are too short to allow for back-and-forth in one round
- doesn't defeat it's own purpose (I had another idea a few weeks ago that didn't manage this)
- minimal dead rounds (like you'd get in
- asymmetric gamemode, so at least one team is forced to do something this round
- round timer that actually forces teams to do something (10 minute before causing stalemate is /not enough/)
- all rounds end in one team winning
- overtime/golden cap can't litterally go on forever
- Red are never encouraged to park the bus and instead defend as one would in 5cp
- some way of taking the pressure off teams that's on them when they're holding last or on an A/D map
- a good chance that neither team will lose 3 rounds in a row (the progress-keeping thing was supposed to solve these 2)
- if the map is not Red-Blue balanced, the 2 halves make the map about doing better on the stronger side

So is that "theoretically, yes for both, but actually, for red, no, a single miss cost too much, and for blue, no, it was too hard to get into any of the entrances"?

As much as it's possible to think about one part of a map in isolation, how much fun was to be had by either team once the first 2 points of cp_gravelpit were captured? How well did the map play out at this point?

Was boring? Stalemate-prone? A mess? Had good flow? Frustrating? Encouraged good plays?

If it's out in plenty of time, will you use reckoner b3?

This map gave me serious nostalgia for mucking about in the THPS3 custom level maker when I was 13. It's just a sequence of variedly filled rectangular rooms with half-thought-out "features" and a collection of props that are spaced evenly so no corner of the room feels too empty or shapeless.

That is a very dark map.

Who's it intended for? Ultiduo? 6s? HL? Pubs?

Blue last and both lobbys are quite dark.

The fence just off second with the barbed wire on top needs a clip because there are 2 supports for the wire poking up that block you from walking along the fence and must be jumped over.

Also is anyone else strongly remind of choji's cp_cargo?

Edit: Oh right and that tank has terrible clipping, especially at the front, but you can also crouch and get stuck under the sides.

Jesus christ, really? I get that TF2 is free, but it's old. I would've thought the TF2 player-base would mostly the same 20-something-year-olds that were playing it 5-10 years ago like CS 1.6/source.

Is there any reason to believe this won't go the way of Warsow and other Quake3 clones?

There are a lot of gaps that eat rockets and pipes, especially all the gaps between the crates in the crate stacks.

Really guys? You wouldn't ask for some of the simpler, more obvious weapon rebalances first? Like "cosy camper now only adds 25 health"?

Lets say a new hire is brought onto the TF team at Valve, and his job is to exclusively to draw up a list of problems with TF2, give them a difficulty rating (e.g. "change the value of a weapon's damage" (simple and small) vs "re-work all hat effects to run better" (large and complex)), then list them by priority.

Is there such a list already floating around the competitive TF2 community to help this hypothetical guy?

So far I can think of: https://wiki.teamfortress.com/wiki/Exploits https://wiki.teamfortress.com/wiki/Glitches and of course the weapon bans, the most liberal (meaning identifies the real trouble-makers) being the ETF2L one, though this doesn't identify what's wrong with the weapon (i.e. several weapons have to do with stopping heavies getting to mid, then the lock'n'load has to do with all the grenades not travelling at the same speed).

If such a ranked list doesn't exist, could we make one, or make it things as easy as possible for the TF team?

One of the annoying things about these sorts of maps is people hide each others tacks when zoomed out, rather than the map consolidating "everyone in city X" or "everyone in small country Y" together until the viewer zooms in.

On that note, hi Funs.

Thesis TL;DR

1. Many players find medic boring (and frustrating) compared to other classes. *
   
2. This creates a dearth of players willing to play medic. **
   
3. Medic is so powerful that it is mandatory for a team to have one.
   
4. In the latest update, valve buffed medic, making it more powerful.

Discussion TL;DR

1. Is medic a less popular class in competitive TF2?
   
2. Are valve attempting to encourage people to play medic by making it more powerful? Is it working?
   
3. Would it not be better to re-work the medic to make the mechanics more fun (such as the crossbow?
   
4. Is there even a problem here, or is this all just my gripes as a medic-main?

* I play medic. I sometimes find medic boring. I've stuck with medic because when I've looked, most teams are looking for an experienced medic, not an inexperienced scout or soldier. I started playing medic because lobbies would always have a medic slot available and rarely for another class, also my first team needed a medic.

** In pugs and lobbies, I notice there will consistently be fewer players signed up for medic than other classes. Inexperienced medics also get flak in lobbies and pugs for hindering the team. I've seen first time comp TF2 players take last player slot as medic and then get yelled at for making the team lose and have irritated scouts telling them to swap places with them.

Pyro needs a real gun. Remove flame-thrower, replace it with incendiary canon. Works just like rocket launcher (rocket jumping and all), does less damage but sets people on fire and no self-damage (or something, basically a weaker, faster soldier but still gotta have something to do with fire I guess).

For heavy, add more chest-high cover to maps like the fence on viaduct middle? Or maybe as that other guy said, heavy is actually basically fine.