Name: Pavlovsk Bay
Factions: USMC vs. Russia
Size: 4km
Location: Pavlovsk Bay submarine base in Primorye, Russia
We're also happy to share portions of a short interview with the map's creator, [R-DEV]Rudd, by PR's media guy, [R-CON]psychickactivity.
Hello Rudd. "Pavlovsk Bay" is to be a promising map: including amphibious assault and attack/defense in a forest setting. Can you tell us more about this map?
Well, I started this map as a 2km GB vs China scenario, which I mentioned in our earlier interview. I started looking around for ways to put a 4km scenario into play since I was motivated to get a map rolling again. I looked at Vladivostok, but couldn't fit it into a 4km scenario, but Pavlovsk Bay is nearby. In real life it's a decommissioned submarine base where ships go to die, but I didn't see any harm in 'reactivating' it. The topography data (the shape of the terrain) is taken from US Geological Survey (USGS) maps, so the hills themselves are reasonably realistic and I took the position of various objects from the real place, but I had to modify the layout depending on my map size and also the objects available to me. I had a lot of fun making this map, using my own creativity and the real place as a basic guide.
The gameplay I hope to create is to have well-armed, but badly-supplied, Russian forces try and hold against the US Marine Corps, who attack with a stronger force (and have air support in 32+64+128 layers). The Russians have to try and hold the flags in either a west to southeast configuration or a south to northeast configuration. The USMC gain a supply truck and vehicle depot when they cap the first flag, but after only a short time the Russian QRF (quick reaction force) will react with heavier APCs that can take on the AAVP7A1s the USMC brings to bear, as well as the deadly Gopher variant of the MTLB. Currently the Russians also get transport helicopters on the 64 and 128 layers, to ensure they don't get stuck in their main base.
Its also nice to finally have a 4km USMC map (especially since US vs Russia scenarios are currently quite rare in PR).
I'd like to say thank you to the beta testers who had a go with Pavlovsk Bay a few weeks ago. Its debut wasn't as smooth as I would have liked (I find it very hard to find the mistakes in my own maps... haha), but some great bug reports were submitted and I hope Pavlovsk Bay will entertain PR's player base for quite a while.
How long did you take to make it?
The 2km map took around 4 months to make, however it sat lonely and unused for many months. I offered it to other mappers so they could learn to create a map from a reasonable foundation, however no one used it. I eventually got a burst of motivation and put this into a 4km map using Pavlovsk Bay as a source of inspiration. So I'd say another 5 months of development on top of the original (which had the terrible British name of 'Hearts of Oak')
Where did you get the idea?
The original 2km map was inspired by the new Chinese submarine base that was in the news a while back, however I started looking for Russian naval bases to inspire me because of the submarine base level on World in Conflict (R) and the level on CODMW3 (R) where Price fires that nuclear missile... seriously!
What are your preferences when it comes to Project Reality maps?
My favourite maps are probably Dragonfly, Kozelsk and Fools Road; asymmetrical layouts but where both teams have equal chance of winning. Slowly moving with APCs and tanks with decreased power in dense forest vs setting ambushes and manning AT guns... this is something you simply cannot get with any other game or mod. Asset balancing, especially in asymmetrical layouts is very, very hard and requires a lot of player feedback to correct in patches (so we need everyone's constructive feedback, and loads of it!!).
Thanks for your time Rudd. We are all very excited to see this map in action soon!
This highlight is part 4 of 4 for the upcoming 0.973 map pack.
Be sure to check back in a few days for information about the map pack release.
Be sure to check back in a few days for information about the map pack release.
Looking forward to this one.
