Helltower

Helltower
Basic Information
Variants:	Hightower and Snowtower
Developer(s):	Unknown
Map Info
Environment:	Desert
Setting:	Nighttime, cloudy
Hazards:	Pitfall, Pumpkin bombs, Skeletons, Lava
Map Photos
Map Overview

“

Push a corpse-filled cart through a magic-blasted, skeleton-infested terrorscape to reach the infernal maw of a gaping Hellmouth in this Halloween-themed Payload Race of utter pants-filling terror! Just to be clear: You will poop your pants. — Helltower publicity blurb

”

Helltower is a Payload Race map added in the Scream Fortress 2013 Update. It is the Halloween-themed version of Hightower.

The objective is to push a cart of gravel containing the corpse of the opposing team's employer (Blutarch for RED, Redmond for BLU) to the lift at the high towers before the other team. Once either brother is pushed to the checkpoint, all players will be sent to a demonic cave only known as Hell.

In Hell, the teams are pitted against each other, and all players must attempt to enter the Skull Island. Any player killed in Hell will become a Ghost and can pursue the living players, however ghosts have no way to deal any damage. Pressing primary-fire as a ghost will cause the player to yell "BOO", which can be used to annoy living players but serves little other purpose. Players that survive and reach the book receive an unfilled fancy spellbook, if they do not already possess one in their backpack, which can be filled with pages found from the Haunted Halloween Gift. Only those that are alive and have reached Skull Island can receive the unfilled fancy spellbook.

Occasionally, Green Skeletons will spawn as well as Halloween gifts for random players on the server.

Mann Brothers

The Mann Brothers, Redmond and Blutarch, are the Halloween-themed Payload carts unique to Helltower. After being slain by their long-lost brother Gray Mann, the ghosts of the Mann Brothers endeavor to have their respective mercenaries send the other brother to Hell so that one may claim their father's inheritance as described in Grave Matters. Thus each team must push the corpse of the other team's boss to Hell while the ghosts of their respective employers bicker, report progress, and give instruction in place of the Administrator.

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  RED team's cart, with Blutarch Mann inside

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  Close up of Blutarch Mann

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  BLU team's cart, with Redmond Mann inside

Hell

While the initial push to the end works like a regular Payload race on Hightower, once a team has pushed their corpse to the end, the screen will flash white as all players are transported to what is believed to be Hell.

On first arrival, all players will arrive on separate sides of a small area surrounded by lava (along with a short dance-off.) The team that has successfully pushed their cart to the end will gain a noticeable health buff as both teams are to fight over winning a prize upon Skull Island; an Unfilled Fancy Spellbook.

At this point, the game turns into a short Arena match, with no respawns. Instead, killed players will turn into ghosts. Whichever team manages to make it to the end and lower the gate around the book wins the match, even if they lost the Payload race.

Strategy

See Community Helltower strategy

Gallery

Map locations

File:Plr hightower event overhead.png

Overview of the map.(Large file)

The Hightowers

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Central Tower: Includes a long pit/shaft, similar to Ghost Fort.

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The Ramp: Unlike Hightower, the carts do not fall back down these ramps by gravity.

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Cliff-House: Its back wall is now opened up and can be fallen off of.

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Balconies

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Tower Corridors: Some changes have been made here, including small puddle rooms on each side that players can drop down into, and small inaccessible tunnels, which can be used to teleport to the opposite tunnel when you are affected by the shrinking spell.

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The Bridge: Appears and disappears.

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Hell: When one of the caskets reaches its goal, both teams are sent to Hell.

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  BLU's side

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  From this point of view, BLU enters on the left, and RED enters on the right.

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  RED's side

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  The Bombinomicon in Hell.

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Halloween Spell effects

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  Super spellbook on the Clocktower

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  Regular spellbook

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  A group of skeletons

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  Close up of the Skeleton King

Bugs

• The carts will not destroy any buildings when passing over them.
• In Hell, if player died and became a ghost, changing teams will respawn player at point where player's ghost stands with 1 health point.

Trivia

• Both the Mann brothers have a knife sticking out of their back, a reference to when Gray Mann stabbed them at the end of the Blood Brothers comic.
• The Ghost of Zepheniah Mann can be spotted on the Clocktower's walkway when the bridge is not active, presumably watching the fighting.

Update history

October 29, 2013 Patch (Scream Fortress 2013)

• Added New Halloween Map Helltower

October 30, 2013 Patch

• Fixed neutral pumpkin bombs exploding with blue particles
• Updated the round restart event to remove spells after playing in hell
• Updated plr_hightower_event to improve server stability

October 31, 2013 Patch

• Fixed a client crash caused by low detail skeletons
• Fixed green zombies not spawning on Linux dedicated servers
• Fixed players being able to issue the "boo" command when they are not ghosts
• Fixed cloaked Spies losing their spells if they attempted to cast them while cloaked
• Fixed the stealth spell only lasting for 2 seconds instead of 8 seconds
• Fixed players keeping their spells if they were rolling for them while leaving hell
• Fixed not switching back to the normal weapon if a spell was cast while standing on another spell
• Updated spells so they cannot be deflected

See also

• Hightower
• Magic spells