» Tue May 24, 2016 6:39 pm TL:DR - Spent a heap of time making a big and involved map for 8v8 gameplay before learning about the 4 player max for SnapMaps! What the hell Bethesda?? See below for more detail...
So I can't post new topics in the actual Doom forum, hopefully this thread gets moved there by a mod as it's where such feedback and discussion on this topic should be (or a dedicated SnapMap forum).
Anyway, I've just finished putting 10 hours or so over a few nights into making my first map for the new Doom using SnapMap. I'm really happy with how it turned out, at least that was until I learned about the 4 player limitation for maps created under SnapMap!
My gameplay design was based on classic TDM sniper maps and after designing and making the actual map, figured 8v8 would be the optimal max amount of players to duke it out to a winning score of 50 kills or maybe 100 dependant on seeing how fast the round would be finished on reaching 50. So the map is a huge room with teams spawning on either side with the centre of the room blocking players from crossing over, leading to the ranged sniper gameplay. I also added an additional alternative gameplay element to the map where you could perform a one off (per map round) 2 player infiltration to the enemy team's side.
I put a lot of thought and effort into making this additional gameplay something pretty interesting from a team score bonus perspective to mix the gameplay up a bit more from the basic sniper gameplay. Basically if you managed to survive the process in reaching the infiltration teleporter then a max 2 players would be allowed through, picking up a megahealth each and one getting quad damage to wreak havok on the enemy who are still being sniped at from the rest of your team on the other side.
Upon looking into publishing my map I noticed the team settings screen only showed 4 player options. I initially just put this down to being able to set the number of teams and minimum number of players and thought no more on it except that maybe I also needed to set the amount of allowed players for the map somewhere in the map itself by a placed module. After looking further into the matter via internet searches on how to set your amount of players I finally came across the information that 4 players is the limit. Seriously, what the hell!!?
With the player limitation on my map, this means your WHOLE team of 2 can teleport into the enemies side, making it a standard 2v2 TDM until they get killed and respawn on their respective side OR if they can't be killed then it remains a normal TDM until the round ends as the original scenario was meant to be 8 enemy players vs the 2 infiltrators so that it was only a limited opportunity to get some extra easy kills to boost your team's score before you were overwhelmed and spawned back on your side to play out the remainder of the round (as only 1 infiltration is allowed per team, per round). This limitation simply cripples the deeper gameplay I've already made into my map, let alone the 2v2 sniper gameplay is going to be pretty darn dull!
I really wonder why this limitation is in place and why it isn't made clear to you the second you go to make a new map for the first time. I've essentially at this point wasted a whole heap of time I could have spent elsewhere as currently the map is pretty much useless. Even if it was 4v4 it would be better but still pretty dull for a competitive TDM map!
Bethesda / id, do you have an answer? Essentially SnapMap is only useful for creating co-op missions as 4 players is not nearly enough even for even a standard competitive FFA / death match map that is larger that one big room...it doesn't even make sense in that you can configure the map for 4 teams when publishing it which would result in 4 one player teams and therefore are not actually teams?
You've made this great tool for easily making maps for all gamemodes yet it is only really useful for one of them (co-op missions) when you get down to it, I really hope this 4 player limitation will not stay in place for long...otherwise SnapMap is pretty much pointless for my means and the potential multiplayer future of the game.
- Hyp3rion
