Mapping Theory

# Advice

Just like every other art, mappers must expect and prepare for their own emotional reactions to their work, especially early work. Many people make the mistake of labelling their first creations as "failures" because they compare them with the finished and released works of accomplished mappers. It is just as unreasonable to expect "instant skill" in mapping as it is to assume this for any art.

All attempts are learning exercises, and all artisans start somewhere. Famous mappers release much less than than make, and resent as many of their decisions as they love. Enjoy your mapping!

### Make life easier for yourself

* Making maps is fun. If you dislike mapping a certain way, stop and think of something else.
* Don't be OCD. Make your **first** maps messily — you will work much faster, getting *much more emotional reward*.
	+ You can get to the clean-up process after, focus on being creative and hitting a 'flow state'. Eventually as you learn to map and improve your skills, a lot of this process will get easier and you will create more 'clean' and better optimized creations.
* Be messy if you want, but practice good brushwork early, good fundamentals from the start means you will have less work in the long run because you know how to properly do things.
	+ This means making sure your brushwork is optimal (less brushes the better) and using mitering techniques.
* Watch other mappers' streams or recordings of them working on a map. This should help to improve your workflow and speed.

### Don't use a linear approach to making your map

   Many people become frustrated when trying to create a map from one end to the other. This puts a focus on small detail (micro) rather than the map itself as a whole (macro).

These two map making approaches are highly recommended:

1. **Planned:** Create the layout of your whole map in rough shapes and test it. Then slowly add more detail all over, layer by layer.
2. **Modular:** Create and detail detached, individual rooms or modules. Choose the best and discard others. Then link and duplicate them all together into a map.

### Map making involves a variety of experiences

* Take different ideas to a variety of lengths. Start with the expectation of playing around: not to complete a whole map.
* Decompile maps to see how they accomplished their design.
* If you have some good ideas working, consider making a full map for release. Sometimes it's good to just 'can' the map and start something else for a while. Let the ideas simmer if you get stuck and come back to it. Touch grass, as they say.[1]

# Frenzy's Design Rules

First before I explain any of my rules for a good map in MBII, let me first steal 5 from John Romero', the (DOOM level designer):

1. Always change floor height when changing floor textures.
2. Use border textures between different wall segments and doorways.
3. Be strict about texture alignment.
4. Use contrast between light and dark areas and cramped and open areas.
5. Create several easily-recognizable landmarks for easier navigation.

25 years later and these rules still apply. Now onto mine, more MBII focused:

Once you have a basic design, let your objective be the 'carrot on the stick' for player flow and build around it. You also need to consider when and where both teams will collide and base your cover for each area on that.

I'm going to try to break down your main consideration points into these aspects and elaborate from there:

### Timing

* **Spawn timing and when and where teams meet is crucial.**
	+ Dotf main is a good example of spawn timing , both teams meet around the same time at either side of the hallway when the round starts.
	+ Make sure you have your map blocked out and the timing of when and where classes meet before you start going into heavy detailing. The block-out-test-shi\* process is super important for making an enjoyable map. At this main junction meeting point, make sure neither team has a severe advantage. Beware sniper holds, especially if there are things you can crouch peak from.

### Geometry

* A big part of flow can also have to do with verticality. Jedi/Sith/Mando are very strong when they have the high ground, so don't give them too much in key areas or else they may easily overcome other enemies. You want to insure areas can be reached by most people to avoid timewasting or snipe meta zones.
	+ If you want to have higher areas, having a mix of low elevation routes and high elevation routes is a good way to balance things.

#### Cover, everywhere, somehow.

* Good cover makes or breaks a map. You want to have it nearly everywhere, but you also don't want it to be too strong. Try making sure there is something to hide behind or use for some kind of cover every 300/400 units or so. Maybe even more if it's a highly populated area. This takes time and careful attention to get a good feel for it.
	1. Avoid boxes you can snipe peak over, especially if the area the sniper is looking into is a large area far away where the enemy has no escape. Disruptors are incredibly powerful guns if given crouch/pop-snipe areas in strong positions.
	2. Avoid cover too large or too short that Jedi/Sith can hop on or over and escape from being shot at by gunners.
	3. You want a decent balance dichotomy between all classes. If one part of the map favors a certain class, make sure the other areas don't also do the same so that those classes can also be enjoyable.

### Objective

* Your OBJ is the key for flow. Generally speaking you can expect your players to go towards the objective. Use this to your advantage.
* Look at secondary objectives as ways to push your players to certain lanes or areas, or to open up chokepoints that occur if the defensive team is huddled up near their final obj.
* Every good map needs good incentives.
	+ If players have no reason to move from their spawn, why should they? Give them reasons to flow to the areas you want them to be at.

#### Lanes

1. Try to always have 3 exits to each room.
	1. Generally speaking, if you have 3 exits per area, you will be on your way to avoiding chokepoints which can occur when players are routed into one entrance/exit.
	2. Avoid routing player flow for important areas into one small door. Matter of fact, avoid small doors in general if you can help it.
	3. Timing is very important to
	4. Make sure you cannot see all 3 exists from one

#### Every good map needs a good gimmick.

* Don't get too serious.
* Always remember to have fun and think of fun ways for those playing to have a good time
* Remember Quake 3 'enjoyerers' enjoy 'movement tech'/movement shortcuts
	1. A lot of the good maps have things you can roll off of, wallrun, hop to. Create your hallways and rooms with this in mind, giving classes like soldiers something to help them traverse the map or escape from an oncoming brigade

## Unit Sizes

As stated before, it is difficult to obtain a sense of scale in NetRadiant. These are the sizes for units used in mapping. (All sizes are in map units)

#### Crouching

* **Normal Player**: 41
* **SBD** (Remember these can't move while crouching): 49.2
* **Wookiee**: 47.15
* **Droideka**: 28.7

#### Standing

* **Normal Player**: 65
* **SBD**: 78
* **Wookiee**: 74.75
* **Droideka**: 45.5