Audley's Workshop: Rat's Nest Reforged

I'm going to be ramping up the production of Audley's Workshop pieces for a bit, with three different categories for subjects. I'll still cover reworking or speaking about weapon/vehicle sandboxes from games (mostly Halo, with some inclusion of Perfect Dark, PlanetSide, and the Unreal Tournament series)...but I'm adding two other subjects: Halo map design and some diving into League of Legends design.

Today will mark the launch of the Halo Map design Audley's Workshop series: Reforged. There are tons of maps in the Halo series people remember fondly. Some, they think are great maps. Some, they enjoyed playing and tilted their head when Forgers or other players called shit design. Others were just god-awful maps.

For the Reforged series, I'll stick mostly to the ones people enjoyed but became confused when the design of the map was attacked by the more analytical or cynical crowds.

Coming from primarily a BTB background, the first map I'm going to talk about is quite possibly the best Neutral Assault map I ever played, but a map that I felt played every other gametype subpar or poorly.

Rat's Nest

Before we get into talking about how to make things better, we have to talk about what they did well and what they did poorly.

As I said above, Rat's Nest was a fantastic Neutral Assault map. No Halo 3 map felt more balanced for Bomb than Rat's Nest.

A large part of this is the focus on the inner areas of gameplay for moving the bomb – map control is obtained by controlling the respective Kitchens (labeled “red base” and “blue base” on the overhead picture above...they got the name Kitchens from me in H3 BTB customs, which was a leftover callout from PlanetSide for “the room behind the spawn room – where players are cooked”).

However, if a team took control of your kitchen but lost bomb control, you could simply take the bomb out the back of your base, hop into a vehicle, and speed run it along the outside of the base, offsetting map control entirely and resetting the map.

If a team scored, the bomb respawned at Rockets – an area with zero high ground, limited cover, and only three routes out – toward windows (Plat in picture) or toward the middle of the map. Often, teams who had just been scored against would either spawn at their Windows (Plat) or near the entrance to Mauler / at Sniper spawn. Either way, they were spawning in position to contest the reset bomb, meaning a team that had just scored needed to fight to retake map control, rather than easily snowballing into multiple scores in a row (unless the matches were extremely one-sided.)

Although vehicles were fairly dominant in many of the Halo 3 BTB options, Rat's Nest kept them under control. A large portion of this was the geometry separating the streets from the kitchens and bases, leaving vehicles with very poor options for sightlines or extremely risky routes if they wanted to be aggressive for kills. Any player with a Plasma Grenade or good timing on a highjack could end a vehicle run on their own.

In short,

• Map control could be reset any time the aggressor lost control of the bomb, whether arm attempt was successful or failed.
• A “back” route to the bomb plant which was actually faster than the inner route, but sacrificed map control.
• Bomb reset point is in the weakest point of the map, far away from any power positions and with very limited route options to move the bomb out.
• Strong central arena portion of the map dominated by infantry battles.
• Vehicles were fairly limited in power by map geometry separating outer ring from inner arena.

So what were the map's problems that arose on other gametypes?

An overabundance of 90 degree angles and CQB weapon choices (shotguns, Gravity Hammer, Bubble Shields, automatics, Dual Maulers) meant that attempting to push through a corner was a truly dangerous task. Additionally, the doors protruded a bit meaning players could camp above the doors and surprise pushers with SURPRISE DEATH FROM ABOVE as they ventured into a new room. The only true counter to door campers was to use the Brute Shot to fire barely around the corner, killing them or weakening them with splash damage.

The aforementioned separation of the streets and inner sanctum meant attempting to run vehicles to look for kills in Slayer was useless unless the enemy Kitchen and base were under your control, in which case players would spawn by Sniper, at the elbow, and at windows, ripe for picking off by a Warthog or Ghost patrolling the streets.

Unlike Assault, Capture the Flag tended to be extremely snowbally at the top level, where once one team managed to get control long enough to pull the flag past middle, that control stuck long enough for back to back caps. Since map control wasn't forcibly reset by the movement of the objective to a neutral location, and spawning Windows would mean getting slain from players on your balcony (seen as “Garage” on the picture), it was hard to get back into a position to retake map control.

The exception to this rule was when your team managed to spawn near Sniper, but even then you were left with only a handful of options: 1) Push over Sniper area into the main central area (where you have to overextend to get back into the kitchens) 2) Push into the massive choke point known as the Mauler to retake your kitchen. Or 3) Push over Sniper area into the enemy Mauler, and either attempt to solo retake control of the enemy Kitchen or push behind their base to their Balcony/vehicle spawn area to attempt a sneak cap as they move back toward the center of the map.

Laundry list:

• Everything is a 90 degree angle, which increases the potency of camping. (Reduced movement incentive.)
• Door geometry allowing players to hide on top of doors increases potency of camping. (Reduced movement incentive.)
• Combined with above two, a heavy focus on CQB weaponry leads to almost mandatory camping / lack of reasons to move in a stalemate unless Rockets are going to spawn soon.
• Vehicles have few options on how to break a stalemate, due to massive segmentation of the map.
• CTF is snowbally, due to never losing map control upon scoring and ease of spawn killing from major spawn areas during a scoring run.
• Retaking central control after losing is is extremely difficult due to required passing through choke points in order to do so.

So how do we fix it?

In Rat's Nest case, a majority of the problems (90 degree angles, too many choke points, too many CQB weapons, door camping) have really obvious solutions.

Open up the angles. Remove some CQB weapons. Widen some choke points. Flatten the doors.

Fixing the potency of vehicles and reducing the occurrence of multicapping in Flag will require a more deliberate approach.

But before we get into fixing the two major issues, let's do a little more focused discussion on where to open angles, and which CQB weapons need to stay.

The biggest offender is the entrance/exit to the Turret area of the map from the Kitchen. Turret is the primary flanking area into the opposing Kitchen, and thus the most important place to push (pushing across bridge is a death trap due to being open to crossfire sightlines from turret + Sniper with limited options to break both sightlines simultaneously.)

In order to improve the incentive to actually push from turret, rather than stalemate camp the area, We can bust open that door and stretch the entrance further toward the Brute Shot spawn, which will give the pushing player more vision toward the back side of the kitchen as they push. This encourages a team with confidence by giving them more information as they push (more field of vision) and reducing the amount of space a CQB wielder has to hide and use for an ambush.

The second offender is also the primary choke point of the map, the Mauler->Kitchen door, directly across from the aforementioned turret door. This is an area I feel should be greatly widened for a couple of reasons.

With one of the “safety spawn” areas occurring just behind the pictured player, outside in the streets, this route is one of the primary routes in order to attempt to retake your Kitchen, or reenter the fray after being slain. Widening this area reduces the chances you'll be cut off by grenades and further increases your ability to see the CQB wielders who have taken refuge in your Kitchen.

Finally, the entrances to the Kitchen from your own base are also choke point doors with areas to hide around the corner. Sure, you can bank a grenade off the door frame to peg a player around the corner, but he still has plenty of room to dodge and be prepared to take you down with whatever weapon he and his teammates have primed.

In order to fix this particular area, you could widen the bottom doorway in order to increase the sightlines for players looking to push out or peek into the Kitchen, or trim the frame and round off the square edges, giving a bit more visibility around the corners as you prepare to push, increasing the potential reaction time and increasing counterplay for a camping Shotgun or Hammer played just inside the door.

So now let's talk CQB weaponry.

Per side, Rat's Nest has 2 SMGs, 2 Spikers, a Brute Shot, a Shotgun, and 2 Maulers (both right next to each other). Each team also has access to a Bubble Shield and a Regenerator in their Kitchen. On top of that, the map features a neutral Hammer.

In total, the map has 6 Shotgun-type weapons, 4 high RoF automatics, and 2 splash damage explosives (not counting the power weapon of Rockets).

Personally, I would remove all 4 Maulers and move the Shotgun from its place near the center of the map into the Maulers' home. This would better equip players coming off Snipe Street spawn into the Kitchen to fight off players inside their kitchen, assuming the Shotgun was available.

The Hammer needs to stay, as it serves a unique purpose of being an anti-vehicle weapon inside Rocket street with its high physics impact carrying the potential to launch vehicles off the cliff – countering bomb runs or flag runs that took the risky road. It's also a viscerally powerful weapon in general with a ton of satisfaction when used.

The SMGs and Spikers on the map are somewhat superfluous with every player spawning with ARs as their secondary weapon. SMGs' primary role in the case of BTB use cases were as a counter to Banshees, while Spikers saw almost no use for any reason. Either or both of these could be cut without having any significant effect on the gameplay of the map.

With a Bubble Shield and a Regenerator both spawning in the Kitchen on short timers, players carrying CQB weaponry were empowered further, as their fast kill times could slay players within the field created by the equipment. The Bubble Shield is good for defensive purposes in Bomb, but in terms of pushing potential doesn't really enable anything, especially in the case that you're pushing against other CQB weaponry, as you're just giving them opportunity to get into range by throwing down the shield on yourself. The Regenerator, however, is much better for pushing, as it allows you to survive BR fire as you move into position.

Pulling the Bubble Shield back from the Kitchen can reduce some of the power teams taking over Kitchens carry, whether they have CQB weaponry or not. The Bubble Shield could be moved into the bases, at the old SMG spawn location (upstairs along the wall), further encouraging its use as a defensive tool for Bomb disarming or as a tool to protect from choke point grenades as you push into your Kitchen.

Or, the Bubbles could be placed in a location that helps alleviate one of the problems I mentioned with CTF, where post-capture spawning typically left players spawning at the Windows were susceptible to fire from their balcony as they attempted to push back toward their base. Place the Bubble Shield near the Windows (opposite from the Plasma Grenades) to improve the chances for players to get back to their base with a bit more safety.

And that segues us into talking about how to improve the map's snowball situation for CTF.

One major issue of the Window spawn is that players only have two options upon spawning there: Move toward your base (where enemy players are killing you) or Move toward Rocket spawn (the weakest position on the map).

The ramps leading down to rockets are a complete dead zone. You can only move forward or backward when passing through. Adding an additional route from here into either the Kitchen or the Base would drastically improve map flow in this area, in addition to enabling players an option to avoid the Balcony spawn campers.

Between the two options, giving the route into the Base is probably the wiser option – it avoids creating too much funneling into the Kitchen, and also creates a new flag route option for a trailing team. While a leading team will almost always want to run the flag through the Kitchens due to the speed / safety of the route, a trailing team usually wants to run the flag a back way, typically into a vehicle behind the base. In this case, if a player is managing the sneak grab alone, he may elect to take this path and look for reinforcements at Rockets, an area of the map few are likely to venture to when the weapon is not due to be up. If an enemy team groups to stop the capture from this route, they are left out of position for map control and the trailing team may set up to stop the bleeding.

With the Mauler entrance to Kitchen also opened up, the snowballing in Flag matches is alleviated as players have better options to retake their side of the map, as the team with control of the interior is more exposed in general.

But they're still safe from the final problem I highlighted, which is the low amount of options for vehicles on the map.

I don't necessarily think this is a major issue existing on Rat's Nest, and more a bit that gives the map a unique flavor. After all, once a spawn trap is set up, the Warthog can dominate. And when a spawn trap isn't set up, a lone wolf Ghost can score kill after kill patrolling the outer ring for players picked off in the center of the map.

However, for players who find their BTB fun primarily when utilizing the motorized portion of the Halo sandbox, Rat's Nest can be a frustrating experience.

Minor improvements could be made in order to help out a driver's life. For instance, the “cliff” below Ghost spawn could be moderately reworked into a ramp, improving vehicle flow through the center of the map and giving players driving past rockets an opportunity to drive by or do gun runs past the Kitchens, without the enormous risk of being forced to stop, turn around, and reverse back to Rockets with ample time to end up stuck by plasma grenades, flipped by other explosives, or highjacked.

Although the doors of the map are big enough for a Warthog to fit through, they could be made just a bit bigger to encourage the true offroad terror driving surprise of WHY THE FUCK IS THERE A WARTHOG RIGHT HERE?

Although not NECESSARY, introducing a low route or open window into the Kitchen or Base from Snipe street to give a Warthog gunner sightlines into the area could improve harassment or route options for the wandering tusked beast.

Regardless of the flaws discussed here, Rat's Nest was a map that played quite well in the context of Halo 3 at a competitive level. Despite accusations of passive play, it was a Slayer map that rarely failed to reach the 100 kill marker, and CTF matches were always fast paced and exciting. The map was just far superior for Bomb and failed to reach its potential for other gametypes. The changes detailed herein could've made the map a Classic, rather than just a “Oh I remember that one.”

This concludes the inaugural Audley's Workshop: Reforged.  Hope you enjoyed!  Next visit to the Forge Workshop, we'll be talking about Lockout.  (But I'll probably revisit the Armory next and talk about Armor Abilities.)

Audley's Workshop: Balancing an FPS Vehicle Sandbox

I'm bored and feeling creative, so it's time for another visit to Audley's Workshop.

This time, instead of talking about a variety of guns from the Halo series, I'm going to focus on the vehicles we've encountered in the past. Just in case my previous rants about Halo vehicles weren't enough (Part 1, Part 2). And unlike the situation with guns, where I was mostly speaking of how to buff underpowered weapons into being used competitively...this time I'll be talking about how to make certain vehicles more fair to play against.

I'm gonna cover a few Halo vehicles as well as a few vehicles from other shooters that we've seen. Vehicular sandboxes are one of my favorite parts of most FPS games. Fuck running around on foot, there's driving to be done!

To start, let's talk about Halo 3's most overpowered vehicle (that was witnessed in matchmaking, I'm not counting the default Hornet).

No, it's not a tank.

It was this motherfucker right here. The Brute Chopper.

I referred to it once as “If Firefly Reapers got a hold of a Covenant Ghost” and I don't think that's far off. On enormous open maps like Sandtrap, the Chopper actually had meaningful trade-offs. The Chopper was forced to move, exposing its weakness of having three sides completely open to small arms fire.

Unfortunately, because the Halo 3 BR was not really a long ranged weapon (unlike the CE pistol, H2 BR, Reach DMR, etc.)...most of the maps in Halo 3 ended up not being very large. And as a result, we ended up with this map called Sandbox.

On Sandbox, the Chopper became a monster. The best Chopper pilots simply moved out to the dunes and fired from afar, feathering their trigger to rapidfire long range, high damage shots at anyone found out of cover. Only the Missile Pod or Rocket Launchers could threaten to dislodge a Chopper from its post on the edge of the map, as well. With those threats heavily telegraphed, it was rather easy to keep the Chopper in its oppressive suppressive mode.

Granted, there is one easy solution to balancing the vehicle in TODAY'S context...Reach introduced Vehicle Health, which means any vehicle can simply die from small arms fire. Just BR the bastard til it blows up... But how do you balance the emergent gameplay of the Chopper within the context of Halo 3?

There are two “easy routes” to take in regards to the vehicle.

The first is to simply reduce its standard fire range, missile speed, or gun damage in order to further encourage the use of the grinding front tires to splatter Spartans across whatever improvised road you choose. The issue with this easy route is that the Chopper had notoriously bad handling when making any sort of sharp turn (which would be necessary whenever playing on Sandbox map variants, as the maps featured some tight corridors).

The second easy route would be to gut the Chopper's impenetrable front armor identity and separate the wheels ever-so-slightly in order to expose the driver's head. This route leads to a “feels bad man” situation for drivers where there is no correct decision to make in terms of positioning, as you have no safety.

If the latter option WERE explored, increased side or rear armor would also be necessary to compensate for the new heavy exposure to danger from the front. Requiring more precision to take down a pilot from the sides or rear also somewhat encourages more aggressive plays from the Chopper as a missed Splatter does not necessarily equate to death.

An alternate method is one that would fit the animation of the Chopper much better, improving its visceral feel and the level of mastery necessary to operate the Chopper on smaller maps, while also ensuring the “park and be a mortar cannon” style of play was no longer possible, without actually nerfing the Chopper's viability in other roles – Because the wheels are constantly grinding/rolling, even while the Chopper is stalled, the Chopper could have a consistent forward momentum – guaranteeing the vehicle moves forward, even if very slightly. This means parking on the dunes has a limited timer, or a sort of cooldown for how long you are able to maintain the position. While on larger maps, where the Chopper must be constantly on the hunt for new vehicles as its pilot hums the theme from Jaws, this forward momentum would not greatly impact its playstyle or use cases.

Next on the Chopping block (Ha, Chopper, Chopping block... Great Segue m8)...is hands down the most overpowered vehicle in Halo history when used optimally... a level of play less than a dozen players can honestly say they Reached during the vehicle's game's lifespan. (Ha, you'll see what I did there in a second.)

The Halo Reach Banshee.

This fucker right here. THIS fucker.

Okay, if you ever faced Gamesager in the Banshee (or a handful of ace pilots that existed in the game), you know how fucking absurdly broken this vehicle was. Outside of the hands of ace pilots, the Banshee could be taken down by a coordinated assault of DMRs or a lucky Laser.

The only thing an Ace Banshee pilot feared? No, not a tank. Not a Spartan Laser. Not Rockets (ha, flips break lock-ons, good luck hitting me sucka). They feared Sniper Rifles.

But the Banshee in the hands of an ace pilot was truly a weapon to be feared – the type of fear that could also be mistaken for respect. I've said in my most recent blog that MOBILITY IS SURVIVABILITY. Well, when you have the fastest vehicle in the game able to dodge and roll (which breaks any sort of lock on), you've multiplied that survivability to crazy levels. Coupled with properly timed boosts, the Banshee's flip animation could be faster and cover more ground. If you thought Neo was crazy for dodging bullets in The Matrix, then seeing an ace Banshee pilot zip across the sky might leave you with dampened pants.

But that wasn't all that made the Banshee strong. Like its Halo 3 counterpart, the Reach Banshee had the ability to fire fuel rods at its opponents. Giant green Banshee Bombs that could kill in a single hit. Normally, these were easy to dodge. But the most mobile vehicle in the game and greatest of aerial vehicles in Halo history came with a trick up its wing.

Those flips I mentioned? Yeah, if you had a target in your sights as you did one, and launched a banshee bomb at the same time... that target was 100% dead. Because a flip accelerated the Banshee Bomb and magnified the aim assist.

While this was probably a bug, it was an enormous part of Ace pilots ability to find an isolated target, flip toward them, bombflipdestroy them, and literally flip the fuck out. No one was safe from your reign of terror.

So, balance issues:

• wtf sniper damage destroys me
• OMG WTF LOCK ON BANSHEE BOMBS AND INFINITE FLIPPING FOREVER

How do you solve?

This is one where the obvious answer is probably the right choice – fix the interaction where flipping makes the Banshee bomb a guaranteed kill. Yes, you'll make many a Banshee pilot angry by nerfing their guaranteed damage and greatly exposing them to increased risk for much more difficult to acquire reward.

This is an instance where compensatory buffs are necessary. Because when the Banshee wasn't flipgodding their way to instakills and flipgodding back out... it really wasn't an effective combat vehicle.

The Banshee definitely needed improved front armor, to better encourage the use of its nose cannons (which were a death trap to actually use – using them instead of the Banshee Bomb meant you weren't flipping. Which meant you were dying to DMR fire from every angle on the map. And if the enemy had a Sniper Rifle, you were dead (5 shots from the Sniper meant a dead Banshee. Period.)

I would also personally increase the damage from the nose cannons as well as their targeting reliability – leave the Banshee bombs for cleaning up targets in cover. Tighten up the ability to utilize the nose cannons when entering or exiting a flip so target acquisition can come sooner as you roleplay AcroBatman across the sky over Gotham. Any tweak that can encourage the Banshee user to use the actual guns of the Banshee over the Banshee Bombs is a step closer to a balanced flipgod machine.

Now, you've finally nerfed Gamesager. Sort of. The survivability is still there (flipgod for days) but the damage is not. You've now made the hardest vehicle to master in Halo even harder to master...

OH WELL, on to the next subject!

The Gauss Warthog.

This one, I'm going to keep short and sweet. In fact, we'll balance it without actually touching the vehicle.

Halo 2 is the strongest incarnation of the Gauss Warthog we ever saw. It was an instant kill, somewhat rapid fire vehicle turret that ensured the demise of anyone on a level playing field with it. Halo 3 nerfed the rate of fire, but the vehicle dominated even harder than the previous iteration. Halo Reach...well, we never saw it because it was bugged and literally fired through Forge objects. In Halo 4, we saw the Gauss on Exile completely dominate games even when players could spawn with Plasma pistols and Plasma grenades to take it down. It saw longer sprees than the Mantis could ever dream of. Its rate of fire and aim assist were nerfed, but it continued to dominate.

In Halo 2 Anniversary, 343 took a heavy hand to the Gauss and turned its firing mechanism from an instant kill upon trigger pull into a charged up shot much like the Halo 4 Railgun, which made it a bit unwieldy for the user.

Ironically, the strongest iteration of the Gauss Warthog (Halo 2's) was the least dominant. (Unless you directly compare H2A Stonetown versus H2 Zanzibar, in which case Stonetown Gauss is weaker. Over the whole of H2, however, the Gauss was less dominant than a Gauss on Stonetown in H2A can be.)

With the new incarnations of Halo, the developers failed to properly assess what made the Gauss acceptable in Halo 2.

The vehicle existed on maps such as Zanzibar, Headlong, and Terminal in Halo 2. Each of these maps featured either extreme verticality, heavily segmented map design, or both in conjunction with one another. There were plenty of paths along the map that were free from the gun's reign of terror. Its turret's range of motion wasn't steep enough to pick off targets overhead.

The Gauss Warthog saw repeated nerfs in subsequent games because it wasn't viewed contextually, nor was it allowed to be placed on maps that let it take control of low impact areas of the map (low field on Headlong, the fields on Terminal) – it could easily control those areas, but could not reach the portions of the map which were necessary for scoring an objective. (I mean, the Gauss COULD drive there if you were determined, but... not really the best place to be.)

tldr: HEY BIG TEAM BATTLE MAPS WITH VERTICALITY AND SEGMENTATION RATHER THAN LARGE FLAT OPEN FIELDS ARE COOL AND IF YOU UTILIZE THEM THEN THE GAUSS BECOMES OKAY TO BE OVERPOWERED BECAUSE IT CAN DOMINATE UNIMPORTANT SECTIONS OF THE MAP RATHER THAN THE ENTIRE MAP ALL AT ONCE.

Okay, enough about Halo vehicles... lets talk about something from another game...

This is the Flail, from PlanetSide. If you've driven the Wraith in Halo, you have a mild idea of what the Flail is like. But now take that Wraith range (base to base on Blood Gulch maps)...and multiply it by about ten. The Flail could fire from base to base on the expansive PlanetSide continents.

But there's a problem... the Flail pilot can't see anything he's doing. In order to utilize the Flail, you need a second person in your Squad with a weapon called a Laze Pointer. The Flail was never self-sufficient. It wasn't uncommon to see a column of Flails all in the same squad with a single person painting targets to unleash a cataclysm of plasma mortars raining from the sky.

Unfortunately, this is at odds with the PlanetSide 2 design goals which insisted every non-transport vehicle was given some degree of self-sufficiency (all tanks gave control of the main cannon to the pilot, rather than locking the guns away to additional passengers.)

So my favorite PlanetSide vehicle was not allowed to play in the sandbox with its other friends when they made the switch to the new playground.

How can we fix it?

The first option is to include a camera in the shots – each time you fire you're given a fly-by-wire camera to spot where your shots are actually going. (This functionality definitely exists in the game, as it is the NC's Empire Specific Rocket Launcher, the Phoenix's method of operation.) The issue for this idea, of course, is that the travel time of the shot is often longer than the time it takes to recharge shots, so you'd be forcing a player to sacrifice potential damage output / suppression time in order to line up their shot. A second issue is that this doesn't help prevent the trial-and-error shots from ending up landing among your own army and betraying everyone.

An alternate route is to have the vehicle automatically place a personal waypoint where its shots will land – this helps you better understand what you're going to hit and where to aim to get your desired result. While this one doesn't carry the drawbacks of the previous option, it's perhaps a bit TOO user friendly and may make the vehicle too easy to use.

The third route combines the first two: have the vehicle include a deploy option before it may begin firing (which I'm fairly sure the original already had) – once deployed, the vehicle first releases a drone, piloted by the player. This drone may be flown wherever, and then the drone must also be deployed. Once the drone is deployed, a waypoint is placed in order to target the drone (which is immune to Flail fire, but susceptible to being killed by other weaponry.) If killed by other weaponry, the Flail must release another drone in order to continue firing. This keeps the vehicle user-friendly and capable as a fantastic mortar vehicle, but also grants counterplay to those who are under siege from the mortar (an option not present in the original PlanetSide, where all it took was a stealthed player with a laser pointer to declare your base Plasma Crater Number 722A.

And now the Flail is free to exist in the context of PlanetSide 2.

I wanted to cover a vehicle from Unreal Tournament as well, but I couldn't honestly think of one other than the Leviathan that felt like it wasn't well-balanced in the context of the game. And the Leviathan was meant to feel the way it did. (5 player vehicle, of COURSE it's going to be OP).

So instead I'm just going to say: Unreal Tournament's Manta and Scorpion are fucking fantastic examples of how to handle self-sufficient vehicles with trade-offs and noticeable weaknesses.

And with that, I'm wrapping up this trip to Audley's Workshop. Hope you enjoyed!