I'm working on a map concept right now. It's an NS classic map, aboard (suprise) a ship. I don't have much of a backstory yet, but I'll make one (in english class or something ). So far, for an ideas, I've decided to have the "classic" rooms, such as an armory, cargo bay, engineering section and galley, but I'm adding a few that aren't on most NS ship-based maps. I'm including a medical bay, bridge (in an important function, rather than decorative) and hangar (complete with dropships and fighters). The map will only cover a few decks of the ship (no stacked rooms obviously). There'll be a hive in the amory, bridge and engineering. MS will be in the hangar. Yes, the hangar is nice and open, but there can be some strategically crashed fighters or dropships to create a chokepoint or two if necessary. The aliens have taken over the key systems on the ship, including weaponry, so the ship attacked the TSA dropship carring the fronteirsman, which crashed in the hangar, smashing up some other craft into very convenient positions. When I get time (on the weekend), I hope to whip up a little concept diagram.

As for questions... how dark is too dark. Since the power systems of the ship has been infested, I was thinking of having a marine chokepoint in the form of a nearly pitch-black room. Not a big one, and only one. Also, I want the map to be darkish in general, a bit brighter than co_plague tho, because otherwise its unbalanced for marines. As for the dark chokepoint, I'd like to think it adds atmosphere when a squad of marines walks into a pitch black room with their flashlights scanning it.

This is my first NS map, so any criticism is EXTREMELY welcome.

one word.... r_speeds, sounds like a nice idea, but u might be gettin alot of r_speeds in ur ms with that idea, unless u get someone to make models for ur fighters and dropships

umm, sounds like a cool map idea, but there's a few things i'd like to point out...

the first one is about the ms. as people noted, the ms is a place where lots of things happen all the time, and making it huge and high r_speeds and so on can destroy the game for those who don't have those big money computers (including myself). this matter is even more important for the commander than the soldiers.

the other things are mostly just atmospherical questions. i cannot really comment on "how dark is dark". eclipse or veil is propably too bright for you, and i haven't had the chance to play co_plague. but if you make anything too dark, prepare to face some criticism. having an extremely alien-biased chokepoint could very well kill the idea of the map being used in competitive games. but since i haven't seen your layout, i can't really tell.

and lastly, i think that the hives should be somewhere deep down in the maintenance/engine parts of the ship, rather than in the brigde, which i consider "marine side". blame ns_nancy.

Yeah I'm going to make the models for the ships, and make them low-ish poly. Also, co_plague is just REALLY dark... Screenies on this page. I'll have to tweak the idea with the ships to keep the r_speeds low though. Or, conversely, I could swap a hive and MS. Stick MS on the bridge, since there could be an emergency hatch that the frontiersman boarded through, and stick aliens down in the hangar. There generally aren't as many buildings at a hive as there are at MS... ah well I'll have to tweak stuff.

just my 2 cents - i would think about not having hives in the armoury or bridge and go with them in enginneering/ships engine type places, it fits more with the ideas seen in most other maps (and almost every sci-fi film ever ), also as a marine boarding a ship, what would be at the top of your list as the first areas to secure? - the bridge and armoury(), so i would put ms in one of these.

other than that it sounds cool, im not a mapper so i cant give give any usefull comments really, so good luck

I agree with big jim. And not only to copy other maps , but the bacterium always seeks out a warm or damp area to create the hives since the bacterium and jungle like aliens prefer warm and humid environments.

So it has a point to have hives in warm, humid or damp areas

This sounds like it could be a really cool map. If the r_speeds are kept as low as possible.

Lets see a layout plz

Okay, working on a drawing, but have some hive-location changes, as per suggestions. One in engineering, one in the hangar, and one in the torpedo room (dark and dank). The torpedo room will be partially flooded, for atmosphere and the obligatory flooded hive. On the hangar deck, I'm planning for about 5.5 ships. 3 fighters, 1 intact dropship and 1 split in half after a fighter crashed into it (the .5 of a ship). MS will be on the bridge, and since the armory would be a high-value location for both the marines and aliens, it might be a double-node.

Sounds like you have a lot of good ideas there and I wish you the best of luck. My map ns_altair used to be set in a space ship with a similar concept to yours until I decided to plunge my level to the depths of an ocean. I have a rough hanger bay that I made for one of the older versions if you'd like to see it. I even had two small fighters and the entire room was fairly low poly being around 500 if I remember correctly. If you'd like I can send you the source. I was planning on releasing the source to all the older builds of Altair that I scrapped anyways.