Last Flag - Beta Feedback

I've been playing the beta for Last Flag; a PVP, MOBA-esce, third person shooter, with the main gamemode being CTF where players hide the flag at the start of the round. I think the overall concept is interesting, but the gameplay feels bad.

Currently the biggest issue is combat and movement feeling very stiff. This gameplay clip presents a lot of the issues I'm having.

In the clip I'm fighting a player 1v1, the enemy is able to instantly strafe left and right making his movement so unpredictable that tracking him is very difficult. Players having less control while in the air would make it feel way better.

Another issue is shown towards the end of the clip, I try to jump up onto a ramp and end up falling because I hit the corner of the upper platform. I technically completely missed the jump, but I missed it by such a small margin that it feels bad. Theres a disconnect here between player action and expectation. Having players be able to mantle ledges fixes edge cases like this and makes the game feel more fluid.

Deadlock is a pretty good example of really fluid and satisfying movement, and while I think a lot of it is a bit too vertical for something like Last Flag, there are aspects that could be taken that'd make the game feel more fun.

Also, this is super subjective, but I hate Last Flag being set in a wacky violent gameshow. It gives some justification for there being an announcer commentating game actions, but the idea is just so overdone. It feels very 2015 and I really think it's a trend that needs to die off.

Oldwood

 Here's a few screens from a CTF map I did last year for Christmas. The artpass was done super-fast so I didn't really save any in dev screenshots, might come back and polish it up some more later this year.

Workshop Link if you want to check it out.

TF2 2025 Summer Map Predictions

 

These are my predictions for maps to most likely get into the TF2 Summer update.

Here are the links to the individual Workshop pages.

Oilchange

Citadel

Naphtha

Blastforge

Idol

Cargo

Lowtide

 This is a layout and remake of my other map Karnak that I started earlier this year, been spending the past week artpassing it. I've been referencing a lot of older Valve maps for the artpass, mainly Granary and Well, I wanted it to have a classic feel.

As a remake of Karnak it's actually a completely new map, I remade the base layout from scratch and added routes/geo that I wanted to do in the original. 

Here's some screenshots of the current version. Download links will be at the bottom of post.

Thats it, you can download it from the Steam Workshop or TF2Maps.

Ye Olde Conteste

Recently I helped judge some maps in a Team Fortress 2 Medieval Mode mapping contest, a byproduct of this being that I was exposed to hours of TF2 melee only gameplay. As a result of this exposure, it helped me to better identify which type of layout/gamemode combination does and doesn't work for this style of play. This post is mainly going to highlight maps from the contest that I thought did well at accommodating the medieval handicap.

Fopdoodle / Pithaul

I'm pairing these maps together because they both use a game element introduced in Scream Fortress 2024 with the map Freaky Fair, that being a MOBA-esce style shop system allowing players to buy upgrades for their weapons and stats.

The main issue with medieval mode is that strips most of the complexity from the game, melee as a system in TF2 is not a focus and forcing all classes to only melee equalizes them in a way that is very unfun. The shop system that these maps introduce add enough depth that is otherwise absent.

Between the two I enjoy Fopdoodle more, it rebalances the money gain amount in a way which allows becoming OP to happen faster. It also introduces some custom upgrades that enable some classes. Pithaul is fun but it's also arena, doesn't give you as much time to feel strong.

Drunkard

I think asymmetrical modes in general work well with medieval, and A/D CTF is a very interesting mode. It creates VIP-like gameplay that deviates enough from standard A/D to make for pretty interesting gameplay. 

The layout features some pretty tight chokes which I think enables it to play well. Medieval tends to cater to a more mosh pit style of gameplay, so players funneling into these chokes create a natural defense. It feels good as an attacker to manage to push through and cap, and it feels chaotic as a defender trying to push out of the base, it's fun.

The flag also acts a pretty eloquent barrier to how many players can actively capture the objective. Without engineer's area of denial, a normal attack/defense map would get ran through pretty quickly by players just managing to sneak through. 

Joust

Compared to the other maps in the contest Joust is standard, it's simply a medieval arena map. I really enjoyed the pathing through the map, the underground route leading to the other base was fun to contest and felt pretty good when used effectively

I think one of reasons I enjoyed this map more Jarl, another standard arena map, is the lack of height in it's layout. I feel like medieval plays badly with varying height, it's just not fun to be able to see someone standing on a tall ledge and have no way to actually fight them. Also, Medics and Snipers can abuse height and be generally pretty annoying.

Tour

Tour does a lot of heavy lifting with its implementation of CTF. I think CTF works well in a medieval context but there's a lot of minor adjustments it needs to actually have it play well. The main issue is Scouts and Demos can steal and capture the flag reliably due to their movement options. The control points in Tour completely fix this issue, forcing players to capture it first lets nerfs Scouts and allows other classes to defend effectively.

Graveshift

 Introducing Graveshift! A medieval CTF map for TF2!  

Story: Two opposing mausoleums have been set up as listening posts, recording all the comings and goings from the other team's graveyard. Break in, steal the intel, and find out what exactly they've discovered...

I started the layout for this map last year for a Halloween mapping contest. During that contest I got the layout pretty final but didn't have enough time to actually artpass the whole thing in time for the Halloween update deadline. Sat on it for a year and started working on it again earlier this month, got it finished in time this time.

Here's a few screens. 

Still have a little bit of polishing to do for parts of it, but I'm pretty happy with where I have it now. 

Here's a link to the workshop page if you want to check it out.

TF2 100 Player Layout Idea

 

Quick lil sketch idea, layout would have 3 main mid areas leading all leading into a final cap zone. Game mode would be DoD style 5cp, all the points start unlocked and teams have to control them all to win.

Karesansui WiP a6a

- Redesigned spawn area to enable better player flow to other routes.

- Changed routes into mid to hopefully help players rotate

- Changed some height near point so movement onto cap area feels more gradual.

- Managed some sightlines.

- Added a few detail props.

The main issue of the previous version was player routing. Players coming from spawn tended to only use one route to mid, leaving pressure off of half the map and making defending a bit easier than it should be. The was happening due to the old spawn being angled in a way that encouraged players to use the route that was closest to them. The fix was pretty simple, I repositioned spawn so that all routes equally far from it.

The other changes to the map aren't as big, mostly just minor changes around mid to hopefully make it play a little less awkwardly.

View from new spawn

Karesansui WiP a5

 Been working on this Koth map for TF2. Main issue with the layout so far is that mid plays very defensively for the enemy team. I think I might have gotten it into a state where it might not be so hard to attack, waiting to see how it playtests.

If mid plays well I'm going to focus more on some of the routes into it. The spawn area feels super underdeveloped right now, just flat with limited options for defending from forward holds.

I really like the overall layout though; I have a bunch of little hills and caves and I like how they interlock into mid. Kinda want to enable more scout movement too, I had a cool double jump to high ground route but I think I may have unintentionally removed it in this version.

Here are the current screens.

Chaos Canyon Writeup

Chaos Canyon is an asymmetrical control point map for Team Fortress 2 where teams start with a randomly assigned base. To win teams must hold a majority of control points on the map or take control of the enemy team's base.

My idea for this map was to have the points be situated in a circle, with each point having an attacking advantage on the other.  Basically, something like the graph below.

A can attack both the B and C points, but it has an overall advantage while attacking B. My idea being that teams wouldn't have to split themselves between the two fronts, as a few players can defend while the rest focus on attacking.

Rather than sketch out a layout on paper I just went into editor and started blocking out spaces until I felt they were interesting enough to navigate and play on. The first iteration of the map looked like this.

The main issues of this early version had was awkward point design of A and routing between points, the basic layout was there but it needed refinement. The focus of the second update was redesigning A  to make it more defendable as well as make it overall less weird to play on.

I also focused on making some of the routes between points more interesting. Height was added between A and B by having snaking cliffs reaching through the route, and a route that reached into a high ground area for A players to attack B from.

An issue that I was having with the map at this point was long stalemates, most of which stemmed from B point being really easy to hold. To fix this I completely redesigned B and the routes leading into it. Overall it was an improvement, visually it looked better and gameplay was more interesting. 

Between these versions I also did some re-theming of the map from a desert environment to alpine.

Finally having A and B in states where the gameplay felt good, I turned my attention to C point. C point never really played badly, and I thought the valley it was built in was interesting, however it caused a lot of flow issues. Players spawning at C tended to only attack A, as the A route was immediately evident while leaving spawn.

The only solution I could find to this flow issue was completely redesigning the entire point.

After some more playtesting and iteration I finally got the map into a final state where I felt the gameplay worked. Most of the changes between the previous versions and this were related to overall scale of the spaces and streamlining pathing between areas.

Karnak King of the Hill

 This is a simple little map I did for the TF2 Summer Update. The layout of it is simple, maybe actually too simple, but it plays pretty alright. Time spent from start to finish was about a week with most of the time spent gradually updating the art pass. I'm pretty much done with it, but if I were to keep working on it I think I'd focus on getting more custom props done, maybe little breakable pots scattered throughout the map. 

I have it uploaded to the steam workshop, which you can find here.

I also have a vmf posted for it up on the gamebanana page here.