Help:Style guide/Maps

This Map Style guide will hopefully help people adhere to a consistent standard of style and formatting throughout the Team Fortress Wiki map articles. Covering all situations would take a long time, and the following is only meant to be a reference for the Team Fortress Wiki's specific guidelines.

Article titles

Article titles should be the map's name, without the prefix that appears on the filename. For maps with conflict between the filename and the displayed name, the name displayed in the game on the loading screen should be used.

• Example: Double Cross, not Doublecross, is used despite appearing in both forms, because Double Cross is what appears in-game.

For maps with multiple versions added to the game over time, the original version – the first version officially patched to the game – takes the normal article title as described above, while Custom version or additional Patched versions have their full game mode appended in parentheses. The intention is to avoid changing the names of existing map articles as newer map versions are added to the game.

• Example: arena_nucleus uses the title Nucleus, while koth_nucleus uses the title Nucleus (King of the Hill).
• Example: koth_harvest uses the title Harvest, despite arena_harvest being the first developed, because koth_harvest is the first version officially Patched into the game.

Hatnotes

Those hatnotes and tags that are intended to appear at the top of the page, e.g., custom map or stub are generally to be the first lines in the markup source. Others generally are placed as needed at the starts of sections, e.g., Community strategy stub link or main, or as makes best use.

Maps with multiple variations should list the other variations via the {{Map Variant}} template.

Introduction

All map articles must contain an introduction. This introduction should include basic information about the map, such as the game mode, style of play, and goal, as well as any immediately pertinent information for a reader.

All map articles must use Template:Map infobox to include an infobox with the basic map details and a screenshot. For custom maps, an author, version, and download link must be provided.

A quotation from an update or promotional page may be added at the top of the page, but below any hatnotes related to variations.

Introduction videos should be the first body section immediately following the introduction section.

Content

These are body sections strongly recommended to be used. If content for the article fits one of the following sections, that section should be created and content should be placed there. Sections should be ordered as they appear here. Sections not mentioned should appear after the introduction video and before screenshots, but not be placed in between the Locations and Strategy sections.

Developer credits

This is a list of all developers and contributors listed by Valve on the map's start screen credits.

• For each Valve map, only Valve may appear here in this entry (do not list individual Valve employees).
  • For maps with both Valve and community developers, the Community map policy should be used.
• For each added Community map, Community credits are listed on the map's start screen. Developer credits must appear here in the same order as on the start screen.

The order of Community credits is provided by the developers to Valve. Most commonly, those who worked directly on the map (layout, artpass, etc.) are listed first, then those who contributed any content created specifically for the map (props, textures, etc.) are listed, and finally any contributor of previously created content (props, textures, etc.) may be listed. In this manner, those who worked most on the map are at the top of the list.

• Usually, this order of listing is found in some form on the map's Workshop page, if not, look up the order in Team Fortress 2/tf/resource/tf_english.txt or create a server by typing map <map name> in the console and following the list displayed there.

Introduction video

If an introduction video exists for the map, it should be embedded in this section. This section should immediately follow the article introduction and be the first titled section.

To embed a video, use Template:Youtube.

Locations

The main purpose of locations is to provide points of reference on the map to help players navigate the levels and share strategies; in that sense, Locations takes the role of Callouts on Competitive maps.

This section should be more than a simple description or promotion of features of the map. This section should identify and name notable tactical locations and navigation features of the map as well as functional information about those locations, including related gameplay aspects. Particularly, the Locations section supports writing map-specific Community map strategies; as map-strategies are usually specific to particular places on the map. In this sense, Locations should also be the basis for describing unique mechanics of the map (commonly, gate openings on Payload and Attack/Defend maps or event triggers in Halloween maps).

• At a minimum Control Point maps and Payload should be divided by control points and capture points, respectively. Often, further map sections can be identified, since, especially on Payloads and Attack/Defend, major tactical combat areas, flanks, and chokes appear separate from the points (an example being Mossrock).
• Locations for multi-stage maps should overall be divided by the stages.
• For Arena, King of the Hill, and Capture the Flag maps, locations should be divided as appropriate.

Locations should be properly titled, as by their Callout name (typically Bolded). Control points are named in maps, and the names as they appear as the points are captured in-game should be used in Locations. Location names used by developers can sometimes be found in change logs and Community maps developer workshop pages. Each Location subsection optimally would contain some screenshots of the locations being discussed.

Example (from Coldfront):

== Locations ==
=== Control point 3 (Decrepit Cabin) ===
* Control Point: The central control point rests comfortably within the wreckage of the cabin.
* Entrances: Each team has three paths to the House area. Two paths enter from the ground, going uphill as you get closer to the house, and an upper path among the one of the high cliffs.
* High Cliff: One of the passageways into the area from yard. Normally a one-way drop-down, but Scouts and Soldiers can climb up, too. It is a common Sniper perch.
* House: The worn down cabin which holds the control point. Soldiers and Demomen can rocket jump on top for a better view of the area.
* Behind the Rocks: A small safe haven for Medics and Engineers, especially due to the close proximity to medium Health and Ammo packs.
* Yard: Each side has a large, open intermediate area in between CP2 and the CP3 cabin. Separated into two halves by a Pipe-Bridge.

Strategy

See also Community Strategy Style Guide and Community Strategy Project.

To keep the map pages clean, strategies for playing on various maps should be placed on separate Community strategy pages, such as the Community 2Fort strategy page for 2Fort. In most cases, this section contains only a link to the Main article template linking to the map's Community strategy page. This section may also contain a Community strategy stub tag when the map's Community strategy page has too little content.

A start map strategy substitution template is provided for creating Community strategy stubs. Users are encouraged to contribute relevant strategies as they are able, while remembering to follow the general style guidelines as well. Be sure to place class-specific strategies under their respective sections, and cooperative or counter-class strategies where appropriate.

Control Point Timing

For maps with a control point or capture point, use of Template:Control Point Timing is encouraged and should be placed in this section.

Update history

For official maps, patch logs relevant to the map must be placed in this section using the Patch name and Update history templates.

Changelog

For custom Community maps, a changelog is usually included with the map. This changelog can be added to the article using Template:Changelog within this section.

Bugs

A bulleted list of the map's observed Bugs, if any, is included here.

Trivia

This section should contain any small facts about the map that may be interesting to a reader that are not covered by other sections. As with other Trivia sections, please be sure to follow the Trivia guidelines.

Gallery

Screenshots and other images related to the map are usually placed in this section in a gallery, using the <gallery> tags. Screenshots galleries are also commonly used in Locations sections.

Example (from Coldfront):

<gallery perrow="5">
File:Cp coldfront0007.jpg
File:Cp coldfront rc20001.jpg
File:Cp coldfront0010.jpg
</gallery>

Screenshots should be captioned if possible.

References

Include this section with the <references/> tag if <ref></ref> tags are used.

External links

Links to external information should be contained within this section in a bulleted list. Any screenshots should be uploaded to the Team Fortress Wiki and included in the Gallery section, so do not link to external image galleries.

See also

A bulleted See also section may be added to link to other notably relevant Team Fortress Wiki pages.

Categorization

Through use of Template:Map infobox, map articles are automatically included in Category:Maps. Custom maps must be manually included in Category:Custom maps using Template:Custom map.

Maps are automatically subcategorized by game mode when using the infobox.

Spelling & Phrasing

Spelling and phrasing should be consistent across articles. The following applies only to map articles unless contained in the Style guide for the entire wiki.

• Control point is not capitalized. Control Point, the game mode, is.
• The payload is to be referred to as the cart. The bomb and the payload are not acceptable.
• Capture point can be used in place of control point in Attack/Defend maps. Capture point cannot be used if both teams can control them.
  • Exception: in Arena, it is a capture point, as only one team can capture the point in each round.

When referring to a specific variation of a map, use the map's name appended with the game mode in parentheses. This holds true even if the variation in question is the original, and the article is not appended.

• Example: Sawmill (King of the Hill) not KOTH Sawmill or koth_sawmill
• Example: Nucleus (Arena) not Nucleus

See also

Team Fortress Wiki style guide A-Z - The TF Wiki A-Z of style guidelines