Hi, I'm Matt - new Level Designer on Tribes. AMA

My thoughts:

Make maps that are fun to cluster on while being still able to create strong caps from different locations. I'd personally like to see some bounce orientated maps where the entry point for a capper is any point but still spotable 5 seconds out(A mix between kata and DX for this). But the return routes require bounces which slow a backcap so it is possible for offence to crash(no sub 10 second return routes). I think blueshift had the right idea with the boosters but still had some shitty hills and a large distance to travel to get to the other stand. If you are going to add those putting them within walking distance of the spawn and making them actually faster than just skiing would be a good implementation. An issue with that could be that the sniper could use it to instantly get away from offence and get an easy kill on a returning capper as they respawn, limiting this at least a little would be nice.

Hoping in the community mumbles from time to time is a strong way to get suggestions and criticisms for maps you are working on/improvements to current maps.

A large portion of us want large maps but in reality tribes is quite boring half the time with them. Maps with large amounts of flag play (arx and dx) are quite enjoyable where teams with stronger cluster play co-ordination and fragging power excel where as maps like katabatic is more based on sniper/capper skill. The good thing about arx in my opinion is how easy it is to crash/meet and how easy it is to shutdown a backcap as sniper.

When it comes to routes the main issue I see is how the fog is implemented. Balancing the fog with capping is quite tricky and I'd say a map that does it the best is katabatic. DX's main issue was the fact that your team could spam the spot key from anywhere on the map and spot the capper spawning.

Here is some advice: Don't take all of our bitching about your maps to heart. We are a cruel bunch and will criticize anything we can find about them. I fkn love arx but the maps has some serious issues like how strong sniping is, how limited the routes are and how strong a backcap or just a punt can be.

/r/Tribes Thread