For those who are saying the maps are huge

[Stev0esque]

Re: For those who are saying the maps are huge

Ummmm, they are releasing a BF2 map pack and its free for pre-orders.

They are also releasing map packs throughout the lifespan of BF3.

Crunch

Maybe he be trollin'?

[CptainCrunch]

Re: For those who are saying the maps are huge

The game is shipping with 9 maps right? And then we are getting 4 in the B2K map pack?

Right. Making it 13 by then.

Crunch

[MrChris_CJ]

Re: For those who are saying the maps are huge

it should be 9 maps, although intrigue can be found here

http://www.battlefield3online.com/battlefield-3-alpha-beta-discussion/2259-battlefield-3-retail-maps-other-information-uncovered.html

I am really looking forward to the BF2 maps of course, and the weapons, L85 weeee

but yeh I actually like the structure of Caspian a lot, for some reason it reminded me of BF Vietnam and a map I cannot remember the name of, if all the flags in the middle were on flat ground it wouldn't be as good, but they structured it well with the terrain shape and the river

[stilla-killa]

Re: For those who are saying the maps are huge

I hope they don't radically change the Back to Karkand maps and keep everything like they were. Does anyone know if they will introduce new weapons with the expansion pack?

[CptainCrunch]

Re: For those who are saying the maps are huge

I hope they don't radically change the Back to Karkand maps and keep everything like they were. Does anyone know if they will introduce new weapons with the expansion pack?

New to BF3. They are bringing back the kits of BF2 with Karkand.

Crunch

[*FMJ*Power]

Re: For those who are saying the maps are huge

The back to karkand weapons are listed in the link below from the game files, what i find interesting is aren't some of those the PLA weapons from BF2?


XP1_FAMAS
XP1_HK53
XP1_PP19
XP1_QBZ95B
XP1_L85A2
XP1_QBB95
XP1_MG36
XP1_JACKHAMMER
XP1_TYPE88 (seems to be the sniper variant)
XP1_L96


I'm now more interested to see what this MP_OMAHA is all about.

http://www.battlefield3online.com/battlefield-3-alpha-beta-discussion/2259-battlefield-3-retail-maps-other-information-uncovered.html

perhaps a precursor to a WW2 DLC pack? sure wouldn't surprise me, i mean do you really think they are going to toss out all that work they did on BF1943?

[MrChris_CJ]

Re: For those who are saying the maps are huge

the MP_KHARG level could be kharg island, which would be interesting

[Eagle101]

Re: For those who are saying the maps are huge

would love to see El Alamein, Omaha, and maybe Berlin for some urban action from 1942

[Eagle101]

Re: For those who are saying the maps are huge

Oh oh and tobruk!! that map was good and specially in Forgotten Hope 2!

[Elder]

Re: For those who are saying the maps are huge

would love to see El Alamein, Omaha, and maybe Berlin for some urban action from 1942

I forgot about Omaha, that's one of my all time favs. Pixel aiming the turrets on that map was absolutely hilarious. I remember some matches that lasted maybe 2 minutes max and some other very epic ones. Anyhoo, enough of the nostalgia.

I like the current Caspian set up and here's why. It's a very large map with the flags located in a compact central area. I like this a lot because it takes away the power of vehicles to have a direct impact on the outcome. I don't think anyone can argue that they never quite got the vehicle balance right in BF2. Not only did they screw up the rock-paper-scissors aspect of play that existed in previous battlefield games, but the maps they released made vehicles have that much more of an impact on the outcome.

The longer distance between flags, the more vehicles will determine the outcome. In BF2 it seemed that every 32/64 player map the flags were far too spread out. Think about it, dalian plant, oil fields, zatar wetlands, gulf of oman, songhua stalemate, operation cleansweep, dragon valley, kubra dam. All of these maps had large distances between flags, which made for a several minute walk for infantry. The only way to quickly get to another flag was with a vehicle. This meant that whichever team had better armor and air support had a distinct advantage in capturing and defending flags. It was very easy to contain an enemy team within a certain number of flags by controlling the vehicle traffic coming from those flags. Being an infantry player on these maps was absolutely awful, which is what lead to the cry for Infantry-Only mode as well as the general belief that heli's/choppers were far too powerful.

As a pilot I always felt I had too much outcome on the matches I played in. There were several times where I feel I single handedly determined the outcome of the match by:

1) Contributing to 25-50% of the ticket count with my kills. (Jet's too imba)

2) Suppressing enemy air support, limiting their impact on both kills and flag/map control (Either skill OR jet imbalance depending on which jet you were flying at the time).

3) Map control. This was a big one. By suppressing the enemy air power I gave my chopper and bomber the ability to attack any ground targets at will. What this generally meant was not that they would go on all out killing rampages, but simply suppress enemy attacks by controlling the flow of ground vehicles coming from other flags. This lead to a very boring style a play. There weren't that many great battles over flags that existed in other BF games. Flags were hardly contested AT the flag, it was simply who controlled the traffic of vehicles to and from that flag.

The closer the proximity of flags, the less influence vehicles have on the outcome. For example from 1942, operation battle-axe or tobruk. These types of maps still had lots of vehicle support, but infantry could still play a large role. This made being an infantry player in a vehicle supported map not so miserable. You weren't just canon fodder for the planes or tanks, you actually got to partake in infantry combat regularly and had an outcome on the game. On the other hand though in 1942 there were maps like el al or gazala where you needed a jeep to get form point to point and vehicle control was a much larger factor. In BF2 the vehicle maps had flags too far apart and like I said before made things very very boring for infantry players. You would rarely engage other infantry and most the time you'd be driving in a jeep or hiding from enemy vehicles. You're main role was usually that of an anti-vehicle one. IE take out tanks with the AA kit or choppers/planes with AA/jeeps (didn't help that anti-air was severely gimped). In general larger BF2 vehicle maps had little pockets of action spread out too far from one another, I think having the flags closer together would have united the battle in a great way.

I think for BF3 there needs to be a healthy mix of maps with flags that are spread apart, as well as large vehicle supported maps that have the flags much closer together. I've always thought the perfect BF2 map would have been if they made karkand or mashtuur larger and added planes/choppers. The centralized infantry combat combined with air and vehicle support sounds like the perfect recipe for fun game play to me. So far this looks like the style of play caspian is. You can still support the capture/defense of flags with vehicles and they definitely play a large role, but the infantry still make or break the battle.


Kind of a long rant, but thought I'd pipe in why I like caspian over the "bigger" maps of BF2.

[John Carr]

Re: For those who are saying the maps are huge

I agree that in BF2, getting owned by jets and choppers was annoying. Far to often, you would have to get in a jeep to get to the next flag, only for a kill hungry jet to zip in at 800/hr and bomb you 3 seconds after you got in. This often led you to want to huff it on the ground instead of driving. And yes, walking between some points in BF2 took a long time.

I also didn't like how a lot of BF2 maps were linear. They sort of fixed that with the later packs, but the early maps, traffic was often very predictable. For example, in Dragon Valley, there everything was going South to North, or vice-versa. On Clean Sweep, all the traffic followed the crescent shape of the island, which made it very easy for the F15 bomber to take out jeeps. Kubra Dam was the same way. And Wake Island had very little ground to drive on anyway, so you'd be annihilated by jets and TV missiles if you were driving.

So, I sure hope that BF3's maps address these issues and balance it out.

[Lordsethonan]

Re: For those who are saying the maps are huge

I definitely feel oman is larger than Caspian, just something more open and large feeling about it.........I cant put my finger on it, perhaps the lack of console saturation and bloom but I'm almost positive it's the piss poor flag placement on Caspian having them all thrown in a hodgepodge in the middle of the map. Although oman sure did have a lot of "untraversable" territory but it still just felt so much larger.

I fear that DICE's desire to be the next call of dooty is becoming more and more painfully clear with each minute i play this beta......infantry first......vehicle combat is a afterthought.....would be interesting to see the sizes on some classic 42' maps for comparison as well because i have a feeling they are only a fraction the size of those.

I'm all for progression of the series I certainly will take it all with a grain of salt but shying away from and drawing focus away from the one thing that sets a battlefield game apart from the crowd of cod wannabe's ;massive vehicular combat; just isn't the way to do it.

Map size seems smaller since now we dont have pea soup horizons at 60 meters, we get more potent scopes too, soldiers run faster and dont tire out every 30 meters.

Metro range from the back of the spawn to the entrance of the first tunnel is roughly the same lenght of Artillery Spawn near Hotel to the second flag in Karkand, and you can scope in with an Acog and see to the very edge of the map *shrugs* The whole of Metro is roughly the same lenght of Karkand, I don't get why it's called "small".

It IS narrower, but on par with Karkand 32 players, it could use more space in the last section tough.

On vehicular combat I reserve my opinion at the time, but I don't see it as an afterthought, more like a shift in design. Vehicles more of support for the troops more than overpowering "strenght multipliers". wich is stupid when only 4 people in the whole server get to use them.

[Lordsethonan]

Re: For those who are saying the maps are huge

You dont need to change the actual map for it to be a different experience.

With grenade and claymore spamming gone, Karkand might prove to be a very tacticool map, if the P4F version is any indication.

I hope they bring back Ivan (russian medic) from BC2 tough.

[Eagle101]

Re: For those who are saying the maps are huge

you guys get lag on caspian? i do at some points, is that a system specs issue, beta, or internet?

[CptainCrunch]

Re: For those who are saying the maps are huge

Id say its an instability issue caused by the beta.

Crunch