Illumination

Let's light up the Crypt!

This is Illumination

This map has taken a lot of time to perfect, and I'm sure with some suggestions *hint hint* from you guys, I could make a version... uh... five?. I started with a pelican that somebody else made floating halfway up the crypt, built a map with a training center in mind around it, started over and built another map around it with a huge hill as the theme, spent a while with three filters on and a bunch of red and blue lights (that's when the name came into play), added a simple grav lift switch, put in drop pods (more on that later), deleted the pelican :'( because people just camped in it, added bases - with no pelican for the defenders to spawn in, it needed them - added a tunnel system underneath the hill, revamped the power weapon set and layout, and just yesterday spent the rest of the object limit working on pathing and aesthetics.

Red Side

Blue Side

The most interesting thing about this map is the not-flat hill. It's got various levels, each about a wall's width apart, on top of the hill, making for an organic feel that I've never seen in another user-made map. I've put a lot of work into allowing people to walk around without jumping despite elevation changes.

Bumpy Hill

Another thing of note here is the weaponset: only one human weapon and one human vehicle are available on this map, and you have to get those through a simple switch; this means that the fuel rod gun and beam rifle are the power weapons, along with that single human sniper rifle.

Beam Rifle under the blue monument

Fuel Rod Gun under the red light

The tunnels underneath the hill are very important in this map, as they house both the overshields and fuel rod gun, and are the only places with real good cover.

Down the hall from the Fuel Rod Gun

Overshields in the same hallway

To call in the warthog and human sniper rifle on this map, a player must destroy a grav lift by melee or weapon situated on the blue side of the foot of the hill.

Gunning the Switch

Falling 'Hog

Landing 'Hog

And then drive off with it. Notice the sniper rifle.

After the switch is tripped or three minutes have gone by, the warthog will come flying down. It's very possible to kill yourself with it. But the sniper rifle will fall as well, and will, once it respawns, fall again and again, landing in a slightly different place each time.

Found it!

I loved the switch tutorial for the ODST drop pods, and decided to put two of them in my map. They are only usable once at the beginning of each match, and are the only two starting points placed on the map so somebody's gonna get to use them no matter what. They both drop their ODST on red side and both give their user a shotgun and overshields. Every once in a while they will kill the user, and will fairly often damage the user's overshields. I could have taken that out, but it makes sense that drop pods can hurt you.

Other places of interest include a dangerous tunnel underneath the blue monument, a grav lift-equipped sniper tower on blue side and a plasma machinegun nest on red side, two ghosts and a chopper, various tunnels and entrances, a large number of ramps leading onto the hill, and a teleporter system from the foot of the hill to a tunnel near the blue monument.

Vehicle Awesomeness

Other Tunnel Pics

Team Defenses

Back Blue Tunnel (the dangerous one)

Weapon, Vehicle, and Equipment List

1x Beam Rifle
1x Fuel Rod Gun
1x Sniper Rifle
1x Plasma Rifle
1x Plasma Turret
1x Gravity Hammer
1x Mauler
1x Grav Lift
1x Trip Mine
1x Flare
1x Bubble Shield
1x Power Drainer
1x Deployable Cover
1x Firebomb
1x Chopper
1x Warthog
2x Brute Shot
2x Spiker
2x Plasma Pistol
2x Shotgun (in Drop Pods)
2x Ghost
3x Covenant Carbine
3x Needler
3x Overshields (2 in Drop Pods)
4x Spike Grenade
6x Plasma Grenade

And another link to the map: Illumination