Ok for the sake of the poll I'll summarise the argument and split it off from what I originally posted:
The argument is that:
1. More flat (only slight hills) maps that allow you to see the enemy directly would promote more teamwork i.e. cavalry and infantry formations. Resulting in big epic battles. This is achievable simply by a couple of guys taking charge in each team.
2. It provides more variation. Currently we have village camp maps, hill camp maps, town maps and the very occasional open map. Adding a few more open plains would simply increase the variation and there would be something for everyone. You'd have your street brawls as well as your mass tactic battles.
3. It would help promote cRPG for pubbies to be able to see that it isn't just a nub server hacking and slashing at each other 1vs1 all the time. You can go to native for that. Teamwork is a big part of cRPG (else there wouldn't be so many clans) and it should be shown off even in pubby.
4. By voting no, it can be considered that you are voting against such variation for whatever reason. I am not arguing that all maps should be like this, merely that there should be a few more in there. As it is currently sorely lacking. For those fearing a cav rampage, if you end up in one of those maps, take charge of the infantry and organise them, that way you have nothing to fear.
If you want, read the rest but that is the basic summary of what I propose.
Vote away!
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Ok before a lot of you come in here and shout this down, listen to the argument.
I would like to propose that the servers have a lot more open plains, flatter maps. Here are the reasonings:
1. It promotes teamwork. This morning on eu 1 we had an open plains map, completely flat, possibly the first I've ever seen in rotation. It also happens to be the first time in CRPG pubby that I've ever seen teamwork with 100 people. On both teams the infantry banded together, formed shield walls and slowly approached each other. The cavalry took up positions on the flanks and covered the infantry in the advance before finally charging eachother. It was well organised and what a real battle should feel like. Honestly the only thing that threw this off was the appearence of flags one round, so both teams had to charge the flags down.
I feel that the amount of town maps and village maps simply don't promote teamwork. They are hack and slash maps designed for individual fighting. I have never ever seen team work done on any scale on those maps. An open plains map, with no spots to camp, requires that a team works together or else die.
2. I feel that open organised battles should be what M&B is about. We have enough members of various groups in order to form some sort of organisational team work, even with pubbys. On open plains maps people listen because they know they have to. The result is truly epic large scale battles rather than crappy street brawls and everyone who played in the one this morning said they wished their were more, flat open plains maps. Both infantry and cavalry said this. So no it wasn't just cav rampaging.
I understand the possibilties of this being difficult when there are a smaller number of people on. But in a battle server that regularly tops 100 people, I feel that the village maps ect are simply too small and cramped. They don't promote team work, simply camping and individualality.
3. It would attract more people to CRPG if they could see that battles are regularly organised and not just individual hacking and slashing. Making this mod more popular can only be a good thing and will prolong the life span of it. Not everyone will want to play strategus (if it eventually appears) in order to feel some sort of teamwork.
I know there will be some players who come in here and immediately shoot this down because I'm GK and they think I'm just a cav player trying to get maps for cav to own. Well I'm not. The infantry actually did incredibly well against the cav today, and there were some very good, regular cav players on the sever. Each team had around 20 cav and 30 infantry. So it was relatively balanced. Consider this as a proper possibility. I'm growing tired of endless street brawls and bad village maps. I'm not saying get rid of them entirely, there should be town maps. But there should be more open, flat plains maps (not the ones with giant hills for people to sit on and camp). CRPG should be about teamwork and epic battles.
EDIT:
Not the only situation as well. Last night a similar situation occurred...you guessed it, on an open plains map (albeit with a big hill). But because we had lots of GK on, the cav banded together. The infantry then realised what we were doing and it resulted in both teams switching to teamwork. In almost every battle there's a good number of one group. Whether it's GK, Guards, Risen, Shogunate ect ect. If some just step up and take a little responsibility, then great battles can occur on these open maps.
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