de_Kendo

[VariousBreads]

Hey all, starting this a little later than I would have liked, but I'm working on de_Kendo, I've tried a few different layouts so far and haven't been too happy with them. I'm wanting to build a Japanese estate of some kind. Hopefully building in interesting movement options later on, but will have to see honestly! Very blank canvas at the moment.

No workshop page just yet, but I'm building up one of my bombsites at the moment getting a feel for the scale and angles I want to play around with.

Posting at the top of this page,
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3243015889
Still super early on, but on the workshop now for my own testing.

Edited May 9 by VariousBreads

[VariousBreads]

Building on the vertical elements, squashing, stretching and adding extra smaller details to help build up the feeling of the central area. Still not sure if this'll be my middle or a bombsite, but I'm using it as a bombsite right now to help test timings and angles.

[VariousBreads]

Altering CT and alternate door positions to allow CTs onto the site faster, without adjusting T timings to main. Adding extra cubby spot spammable from T alternate. Swapping CT door has moved statue to the side into what now feels like dead space, but can be used to spam the planter if smoked off.

made the room longer to stop Ts reaching the plant spot as quickly


Adjusted CT spawn door to be closer allowing them access to the site faster without changing T timings, hopefully smooths out the approach to allow them to smoke main easier also.

Cubby on the left allows CTs smoked off from site to spam through the paper walls. A wall further back, later maybe an alternative route, but right now a nicer left > right angle to should peak from.


CT cover on the right side of site, allows them position to hold on the site itself not exposed to T alternative entrance, but can be spammed. Grenades can be exchanged through the window gaps.

Adjusted T alternative cover behind squeaky to allow CTs to hold deeper and to cut down harsh angles to site

[MrTrane18]

Love it!

+REP for the presentation of the submission! 

[url=https://www.mapcore.org/topic/29696-de_kendo/] [img]https://i.imgur.com/60HRCdw.png[/img]

Funny thing, I've made a map am_MetroTrane back in the day for CS:GO, though, I imported the map for CS2 , and currently, does not work. Anyways, I took inspiration from Matrix movie as well. The scene from the metro. Where Neo wakes up in between the worlds. Remember it?
 

Edited May 10 by MrTrane18

[VariousBreads]

For this version, I've moved where my T spawn comes from. V1 looked like this, Ts would approach from my thumbnail angle, and would need to cross over or smoke the gap themselves to make it to the squeaky side route. It wasn't very good for T side, and if they did cross the side route was really tricky and crampt to push.


In this new version, I've made the alternate route my new main, and have Ts push squeaky similar to nuke A site door. Where opening it plays a sound cue for players on site, but aren't immediately in danger. There is now also an outside route where CTs can hold wider awp lanes, they are also able to support the site from an alternative angle. Building up areas to pull CTs and Ts away from the site getting ready to figure out where my next site will be placed.



Looks similar, but now T side entrance on the left side has the same width as the CT side to make smoking it easier.


CT spawn is no longer angled to help with level flow, was easy to miss the corner to the main bombsite on CT side when the door pointed you more towards the heaven route previously


CT box added for cheeky further back angle into main

Heaven route added to CT connecting to outside

CT Heaven + wrap doorway. Heaven can be self boosted into if outside is taken

Squeaky route pushed out with wider doorframe to reduce tight angles from the previous thinner doorway

Added sliding doorway to outside connector, building up visual language to the player than any section with this instance attached can be spammed, barring exceptions like the main doorways with a clear central divide between pieces

I think its important that if a surface can be spammed, the map tells you it can be.

Example being on this wall, the one section where the spam wouldn't work has a prop of a different type placed in front of it.

Shrunk plant zone and pushed it closer to top site to try and build better plant positions. I need to add markup to make the plant zone clearer than it was before.

Edited May 11 by VariousBreads

[RazzleDazzle1]

Lovely detail!

[VariousBreads]

 

Had a fun 2v2 on what's currently there. Was nice playing the angles against real players. Got some valuable feedback from this.
Just some clips from our game, helped me remember I need to add markings to the bombsite and should really setup a radar asap really.

Edited May 11 by VariousBreads

[VariousBreads]

Spent some time today making changes, and learning / setting up my radar.

Biggest change I made to the level, is I flipped the entire thing. one of the points of feedback I got was that I had too many left to right peeks where your characters arm is visible before you can see who your fighting, in the above video theres a section where my teammate attempts a flank, and gets double headshot before they can see the enemy on their screen.

By flipping the level and having most engagements lean into the players viewmodel, it should really improve the feeling of taking these fights.

I widened the site by 64 units, the hall was feeling a little tight to move around in before.

I moved the middle site cover, but this now meant you couldn't self boost onto a box at the back. I liked that spot, so re-added it in with a different climb.

I clipped some of my instance to stop you getting snagged if you walked too close. Really quick change but makes it feel much better to move around the map.

Edited June 7 by VariousBreads

[VariousBreads]

Nothing huge to update, lots of very small height tweaks to allow angles to work better. Sorting out some crouch height boxes, improving lighting around the map to remove some of the worst cases. I found that stretching the room wider lost a little of the vertical feeling I liked from my main room. So pinched it back at the top again.



Honestly putting off figuring out my B site haha, but I'll make some more real progress soon hopefully

[csWaldo]

Areas look fun
Are you planning to keep the spawns like this? Currently it creates a weird tension where the outside path takes you way past and around the bombsite rather than attacking it. A path that leads you so far away from your actual goal will likely feel less useful / desirable to players and it might even feel like a chore going there. This could become even more awkward depending on where the second bombsite would be.

Simply moving the spawns to the left and right side of the map rather than the bottom could relieve this stress and make all paths feel more equal.
 

[VariousBreads]

2 hours ago, csWaldo said:

Areas look fun
Are you planning to keep the spawns like this? Currently it creates a weird tension where the outside path takes you way past and around the bombsite rather than attacking it. A path that leads you so far away from your actual goal will likely feel less useful / desirable to players and it might even feel like a chore going there. This could become even more awkward depending on where the second bombsite would be.

Simply moving the spawns to the left and right side of the map rather than the bottom could relieve this stress and make all paths feel more equal.
 

Right now I'm pretty sure you can also throw grenades into the other teams spawn if you wanted! No they'll change  I've got them this close just so theres not as much of a run to the site as it is and I can get to the core of what I want to test as quickly as possible.
I still need to add the other bombsite, and both my T and CT spawns and the routes around them are really bare bones at the moment. So it'll definitely change. 

[MrTrane18]

I've made a little showcase video of the map! 
But there is more, another guy made a showcase video of the map as well!

Stay safe and stay mapping!

[VariousBreads]

Hey! Been working hard on my CT and T sides. Reverted my placeholder middle and removed the side route to outside from T spawn. I'll add it back in later, but for right now it felt like a good stage to post another update. Changelist for this update would be:

• Reworked CT spawn. Adding an interior room for CTs to move through buffering time between CT rotates.
• Moved site box boost to alternate side to have it be better for post plants. Adding extra site box at back of the bombsite to block the previous boost corner.
• Made CT connector wider to stop player blocking and giving more room to breath.
• A main room is now connected to T short, rather than T main. The squeaky door gave too much power to CT side to play aggressively and backstab the T push into A.
• Large changes to T side overall.
• Ts now have a neutral space to control, playing off a "Kenny" angle, giving an option for a fast awp fight on both sides.
• Ts can avoid this duel by taking a slightly longer route around the screens, or can move through squeaky into A main.
• Underpass route connecting T neutral into middle. Hopefully allowing lurk plays where Ts can show presence on A and then slow rotate out.
• Tried a few versions of T neutral, and am continuing to simplify the space, boiling it down to the core components to make it easier to understand angles.
• Stretched A main to make grenades less oppressive.
• Also increased T side timings. Now taking around 10 seconds to meet, allowing more time for discussion pre-contact. (6 if you decide to take the awp duel)

CT Spawn


Site box boost


A main changes


T Neutral space


"Kenny" angle

T Neutral options


Underpass route


(Spamable floor panel)

[VariousBreads]

Reworking A site
CT spawn
T spawn
T con
T main
Moving A cubby to opposite side
Steamlining T site movement
Adjusting kenny angle
Building multiple viable plant positions on A to clarify default, CT and main plants

[VariousBreads]

Looking for inspiration for my outside area, found a nice piece of concept art that had lots of elements I thought worked well! Referencing it as a base then tweaking from there.

Other reference gathered below that I want to also lean into so its not 1to1 plagiarism of their concept art.


I'm not spending the time making a minimap image just yet until I'm happier with the angles, timings and whatever else.



Right now its split into multiple lanes. T's can wide swing coming from the river and challenge the CT awp position.
They can hug close to the wall and rush under the bridge, but risk a disadvantageous fight against CTs swinging wider outside
Or they can crouch through underpass, and come close to the front of the building. Where they are exposed but covered from the CT awper

I'm also experimenting with moving the connection to A from outside to a front facing wider doorway. 

This makes it easier for Ts outside to move into, and harder for CTs to guarantee support to A site from this passage.

Previously, if contact was made from A site, the outside awper could drop down and peek site within seconds. I wanted to add some more friction to that angle or force them to make the choice to try and support from CT instead.