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floofe-trans-doggie · 11 months

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TF2 Summer 2023 Map Tier List*

*Not including the VSH maps because I've only gotten to try a couple of them on community servers, since it still doesn't work in Casual

S Tier-

Phoenix

Taking the top of the list, it should be no surprise to see Phoenix here. The map is GORGEOUS and incredibly unique in its art style while fitting perfectly into TF2, and it plays incredibly smoothly. Every point offers something slightly different, and overall the map always plays incredibly well. This is one of the best maps I've ever had the pleasure of playing.

Sulfur

Do you have any idea how long I've waited for another map that plays like cp_steel? Sulfur was a map I'd been very much hoping to see in this update, and here it is! It's aesthetics are beautiful and expand upon the same visual style we see in Suijin, and though its layout and unique objective takes a minute to figure out, it's incredibly fun and feels overall quite balanced.

A Tier-

Selbyen

LOOK AT THE SEAL GO LOOK AT THE SEAL IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN HIM! Cuteness aside, this is the first Player Destruction map that isn't season-locked that we've gotten since the mode was first added with pd_watergate, which is absurd because there's 7 total maps in the gamemode. It plays well enough, with shorter buildings that you can traverse atop, but the real draw of this map is the seals and how damn cute they are. In terms of gameplay, though, it can be a bit lacking. It feels very cramped at times with how small the map is, and this makes certain classes feel disproportionately powerful, especially Gunslinger Engie. Regardless, though, it's not a bad experience, and it remains at the top of A Tier. Mainly because of the seals.

Cashworks

This one's been around a while. Never heard of it by name, but I had heard of its unique winding second point before, which is interesting, though in my experience the real gameplay comes in the choke immediately afterward. In terms of looks, it's quite nice, though not the most distinctive of this update. In terms of gameplay, it's also quite nice, though it tends to get very chokey as Payload often does. This may just be everyone still needing to learn the map, though. Also there was that day-1 bug where RED could just walk right into BLU spawn, which was interesting.

Rotunda

I mainly like this map because you can ride the train, I'll be real. That's not to say it isn't a great map in other regards as well, I just really like the trains. But regardless, this map has a stunning visual aesthetic, and I'd be shocked if it weren't the map with the most trains in all of TF2, which is certainly a proud accomplishment. The dilapidated train depot turned doomsday device storage facility is visually striking, and hiding around the McGuffin on the center point to capture it is interesting gameplay-wise, though it tends to get very spammy and the walls around the point combined with Engineers being able to set up within them means some very nasty and annoying nests can be made. It's also a very inviting map for projectile spam onto the point, with plenty of space above and an open roof to facilitate this. Gameplay-wise it's a mixed bag, but it's so visually interesting it can't go any lower than this.

B Tier-

Sharkbay

Remember when we all knew this map was being added way beforehand because Valve slipped up? Yeah, good times. This map has some neat, unique stuff going for it. The control point is a fishing boat, it has shark tanks in spawn, there's the sharks, obviously, and there's even a new kill icon for them. Pretty neat. While I love how this map looks, it tends to go very one-sided in terms of how it plays. I have yet to have a solid back-and-forth on this map, and one team usually rolls the other, though admittedly it has just released, and it may get better with time.

Reckoner

It's a solid 5cp map. The aesthetics are fairly unique. Doesn't really have anything too interesting about it, though, at least in terms of gameplay. I don't have much to complain about with Reckoner, but there isn't much that stands out about it to me. Comes with all the rolls and stalemates of any 5cp map.

Hardwood

Rounding out the bottom of B Tier we have Hardwood. It's a pretty good map. It generally plays fine in my experience. Three full points to capture give it a decent bit of length without stretching on like multi-stage Attack/Defend maps do. Visually, it's quite nice, but it doesn't really strike me as anything too special. It's well-done, but it isn't the most unique. Not much to really complain about, of course, but I can't lump all the good maps into S and A Tier, so here it sits, the lowest of the maps that I actually really like.

C Tier-

Pelican Peak

For a Capture the Flag map, Pelican Peak is great. A tad small, but it has a nice visual aesthetic with the fog and the alpine setting and the bridge over the center. Unfortunately, it's Capture the Flag, and it really doesn't do anything to remedy the usual problems the gamemode has, especially with only a couple routes into a frankly rather small intel room with a briefcase you have to climb up a small structure to get to. If Capture the Flag were a good mode, this map would be much higher. Unfortunately, it isn't.

D Tier-

Venice

Aesthetically, this map is fine. It's unique, taking place in, of course, Venice, Italy. However, there's a lot that's just a bit off about this map and makes it easily the weakest of the entire update. For one, the texturing feels a bit weird. Maybe it's just me, but in a lot of spots the textures just look off, particularly on the corners of buildings. I'd love to be more descriptive, but I am running on very little sleep and this is hard to describe. Love to see if anyone else sees it the same way or if I'm just losing my marbles. Also the floating cart on the first point looks really really weird. It doesn't look like it should be buoyant, and it doesn't have a custom model that would suggest it is nor anything guiding it along a track, so it doesn't look like it's floating in the water as much as levitating in it. But visuals aside, this map is hell to play on. It's chokey, has absolutely ridiculous sightlines without much cover, and if BLU doesn't roll, they're probably not making it to the final point. Aside from Pelican Peak which is only not-great because it's Capture the Flag, this is the only map in the entire update that I find frankly disappointing.

#team fortress 2

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