Kamakira
Inkster Jr.
as most of us know by now, nintendo has always used turf war matches for the early stages of their official tournaments. yet, to my knowledge, they are the only tournament organizers who regularly feature turf war as a key part of their events. why is that? in this thread i'll take a look at what makes turf war so different from the other game modes, the potential merits to including it in map pools, and how i personally would improve the game mode to make it comparable to the other three (i don't count that one as a real game mode before you ask).
the biggest thing about turf war that separates it is the lack of a physical objective. the ranked game modes all have some sort of map objective that dictates the flow of the game based on who is in control. in turf war there is never a clearly defined "attacker" and "defender". while spawncamping is extremely common in turf war, the team with the advantage is not necessarily attacking- they simply have map control for now, but because every turf war match ends by time rather than having a knockout condition this advantage is far more temporary than threatening an imminent knockout. this is why many people criticize turf war for only mattering in the last 30 seconds, due to how volatile the win condition is.
for example, in a rainmaker game if the attacking team pushes to 5 earlier in the match, they have established a strong lead that was the result of multiple won teamfights and key picks. now with 30 seconds on the clock, they are in an extremely strong position to win the game. the enemy team now has at most 90 seconds to make a deep push across the entire map, and the team with the advantage will have time to set up a defensive position and force the attacking side to go for a risky play with very limited time. in this case, while the last 30 seconds + overtime are still important, unless the attacking team makes a miracle happen they will most likely lose that match due to events that took place earlier in the 5-minute span of a rainmaker game. in turf war, the only goal is to have more paint on the map than your opponents at the moment the clock hits zero. this means that a single wipe in the last moments of a game can be devastating, and locking a team out for 2 minutes brings you no closer to winning unless you can maintain that lockout for the full duration of the match- which quite frankly, is not a fun win condition for either team. this is a completely valid complaint, and one of the key flaws of the game mode.
another important distinction between turf war and the ranked game modes is the list of viable weapons. due to the nature of the mode, turf war tends to favor weapons that can quickly establish paint control. while a charger securing picks on people in turf war still can help to create an advantage, that same charger will struggle to paint the map on its own, outside of being able to quickly paint a long, open sight line. while i do think it's interesting to have a mode that could potentially have its own unique meta, the list of weapons that become less effective in turf war is fairly long, and not every team would want to force their players to all pick up new weapons.
in a similar vein, turf war is the only game mode where every single part of every single map is utilized. look me in the eyes right now and tell me the last time you actually went into the pit next to spawn on umami ruins to do anything besides jump out. in turf war if you can paint it, it matters. we have so many great maps in this game and it's an insult to the hard work that went into crafting them to completely ignore a part of the map that was intentionally designed and included in the final product...
...is what i would say if i was joking. covering every single part of the map is extremely tedious and makes the early parts of a turf war match feel very slow- you might not encounter another player for the first half of the match if you're on spawn painting duty. this is another key flaw that i'll be addressing in my list of ways the mode could be improved.
which brings me to the final point: how could nintendo improve turf war in a future patch to create a more competitive experience?
personally, i think the easiest solution to this would be to include a knockout condition- in this case, whoever has the most paint on the map is "in control", and their points would begin to gradually tick down. this would help to solidify turf war as a lockout-focused gamemode, with a heavy emphasis on strong offense and map control while removing a large chunk of the volatility that comes with the mode in its current state. the team being locked out now has a much shorter time frame to break the lockout, which brings more teamplay into the mix and forces an urgent reaction, rather than letting a single wipeout at the end of the game dictate the outcome of the match.
as for the issues related to map design, there is a very easy fix for this. rather than forcing the players to cover every last corner of a sometimes massive map, only the center of the map counts, which would be a clearly defined zone of the map. this brings players into the action sooner, and creates a static objective to fight for.
overall i think these changes would be extremely healthy for the game and would breathe new life into the scene. as a final note, the mode would likely need a new name that describes the objective itself similar to how tower control and rainmaker are named after the tower control and rainmaker. since we would be focusing on painting just this zone of the map, i personally think a name such as turf zone or splat zone would fit this revision perfectly.
the biggest thing about turf war that separates it is the lack of a physical objective. the ranked game modes all have some sort of map objective that dictates the flow of the game based on who is in control. in turf war there is never a clearly defined "attacker" and "defender". while spawncamping is extremely common in turf war, the team with the advantage is not necessarily attacking- they simply have map control for now, but because every turf war match ends by time rather than having a knockout condition this advantage is far more temporary than threatening an imminent knockout. this is why many people criticize turf war for only mattering in the last 30 seconds, due to how volatile the win condition is.
for example, in a rainmaker game if the attacking team pushes to 5 earlier in the match, they have established a strong lead that was the result of multiple won teamfights and key picks. now with 30 seconds on the clock, they are in an extremely strong position to win the game. the enemy team now has at most 90 seconds to make a deep push across the entire map, and the team with the advantage will have time to set up a defensive position and force the attacking side to go for a risky play with very limited time. in this case, while the last 30 seconds + overtime are still important, unless the attacking team makes a miracle happen they will most likely lose that match due to events that took place earlier in the 5-minute span of a rainmaker game. in turf war, the only goal is to have more paint on the map than your opponents at the moment the clock hits zero. this means that a single wipe in the last moments of a game can be devastating, and locking a team out for 2 minutes brings you no closer to winning unless you can maintain that lockout for the full duration of the match- which quite frankly, is not a fun win condition for either team. this is a completely valid complaint, and one of the key flaws of the game mode.
another important distinction between turf war and the ranked game modes is the list of viable weapons. due to the nature of the mode, turf war tends to favor weapons that can quickly establish paint control. while a charger securing picks on people in turf war still can help to create an advantage, that same charger will struggle to paint the map on its own, outside of being able to quickly paint a long, open sight line. while i do think it's interesting to have a mode that could potentially have its own unique meta, the list of weapons that become less effective in turf war is fairly long, and not every team would want to force their players to all pick up new weapons.
in a similar vein, turf war is the only game mode where every single part of every single map is utilized. look me in the eyes right now and tell me the last time you actually went into the pit next to spawn on umami ruins to do anything besides jump out. in turf war if you can paint it, it matters. we have so many great maps in this game and it's an insult to the hard work that went into crafting them to completely ignore a part of the map that was intentionally designed and included in the final product...
...is what i would say if i was joking. covering every single part of the map is extremely tedious and makes the early parts of a turf war match feel very slow- you might not encounter another player for the first half of the match if you're on spawn painting duty. this is another key flaw that i'll be addressing in my list of ways the mode could be improved.
which brings me to the final point: how could nintendo improve turf war in a future patch to create a more competitive experience?
personally, i think the easiest solution to this would be to include a knockout condition- in this case, whoever has the most paint on the map is "in control", and their points would begin to gradually tick down. this would help to solidify turf war as a lockout-focused gamemode, with a heavy emphasis on strong offense and map control while removing a large chunk of the volatility that comes with the mode in its current state. the team being locked out now has a much shorter time frame to break the lockout, which brings more teamplay into the mix and forces an urgent reaction, rather than letting a single wipeout at the end of the game dictate the outcome of the match.
as for the issues related to map design, there is a very easy fix for this. rather than forcing the players to cover every last corner of a sometimes massive map, only the center of the map counts, which would be a clearly defined zone of the map. this brings players into the action sooner, and creates a static objective to fight for.
overall i think these changes would be extremely healthy for the game and would breathe new life into the scene. as a final note, the mode would likely need a new name that describes the objective itself similar to how tower control and rainmaker are named after the tower control and rainmaker. since we would be focusing on painting just this zone of the map, i personally think a name such as turf zone or splat zone would fit this revision perfectly.
