Leapfrog on LilyPads

Players: 2 or 4 teams, 2 to 4 players per team

Gametype link: Download Leapfrog
Map link: Download LilyPads

Map Haiku: Leaping through the sky / Brave men hold to their platforms / And taste my splazer

Map/Game Overview

Well, I'm finally releasing it. This is Leapfrog... on LilyPads. That name's a bit dumb, but the game is great, and really... what else could I have named it? Basically, Leapfrog is a minigame with a conquest-ish foundation that makes novel use of Halo3's gravity settings. You want to capture as many of the five territories as you can. You have reduced gravity and increased speed so that you can make the jumps necessary to get from platform to platform. HOWEVER: if you are in the process of attacking a territory, you have increased gravity and will fall to an inevitable doom if you attempt to leave your platform... unless you've picked up the custom powerup, that is. Here's a general layout of the map.

Overview Schematic

Gameplay

Spawns
Teams start on elevated spawning platforms. There are four spaced evenly around the map... one for each team. In the spawn area, you can pick up a grav-lift or a trip mine to wreak havoc on the other team(s). Everybody starts with SMG's. This was chosen so that the ARs and BRs are more coveted and to keep the action within the separate platforms. At the spawns, you can pick up a grav-lift (for making landing conditions a bit more difficult for incoming opponents) and a trip mine (for similar, more explosive results). You'll want to either jump to one of the inner platforms (you can reach two of them) or run forward into the downward-facing man-cannon, which will take you to your team's outer platform.

Spawns

The Platforms
Your team's circular outer platform has 3 important things on it: a plasma grenade, a battle rifle, and a custom powerup (CPU). The custom powerup allows you (for 15 seconds) to jump through territories without any of the negative gravity effects. However, it'll also place a beacon above your head, making you an easy target. There are no territories on the outer platforms, so once you've got your gear, you should jump over to one of the inner platforms and start a-capturing.

Each square inner platform has an AR and a spike grenade available for use. Unless you have a CPU activated, you'll want to make sure you're ready to go once you get here, because you can't easily escape until you've waited out the 15-second territory capture time. You do slightly more damage while you're inside the territories (attacking or defending), and everybody has increased damage resistance, so you won't have to worry as much about long range attacks from the outer platforms.

There are also two sniper rifles and two brute shots that can only be reached by jumping from inner platform to inner platform. The sniper is quite useful for clearing the skies of jumping enemies, while the brute shot can occasionally knock an unsuspecting enemy off the platform.

Overview

The Central Tower
Both levels of the central tower can be accessed from any of the inner platforms (you can only jump to the top level if you have reduced gravity). The central territory can be captured from both the top and the bottom level. The bottom level holds a Spartan Laser and a bubble shield, so it might be good to send someone down there early on. Using a grav-lift here will give you a steady shot with the splazer at all the surrounding territories... but you will be a sitting duck. Also, you can't escape the bottom level until your team has captured the central territory. The top level has an active camo for the sneaky types out there and is much easier to escape - just jump down. If you have a grav-lift on you, you can throw it down, float into the structure, and capture the territory in relative safety. There is, however, a nasty drawback of the upper level. If somebody shoots the fusion coils at the top of the central tower, anybody standing in the top level will be quickly vaporized.

Ka-Boom!

The Down Below
This map was built above blackout, since it was the only place big enough to pull this off. As such, if you miss a jump, you'll either fall into the ocean or onto the map itself. There's no way back up to the main area, so your best best is to find a Death-porter (strewn liberally across Blackout) and jump into it for a trip back to the spawners.

Death-Porter Grid

Overtime
If there are contested territories when the time runs out, all uncontested territories will lock, and each team will have to do their best to get to the un-locked ones. The bottom level of the central tower will sprout some bridges to make getting around easier (for those who weren't careful with their closer territories).

Alternate gametypes
I made this map hoping that there would be some flexiblity in the gametypes people could play on it. Two simple modifications are just weapon changes:

1 - "Leaping Lasers" - Give everyone lasers as their starting weapon, unlimited ammo, and change the capture time to 10 seconds.
2 - "Rocking the Pads" - Same as above, but rockets instead of lasers (or go crazy and give the lasers AND rockets)

Additionally, this map should work with other game variants as well. King of the hill can be pretty interesting if you set the people in the hill to 100% speed, 100% gravity while everybody else gets 150% speed, 50% gravity. You can even play some simple slayer games here... just be sure to give the players you want to be able to move around 150% speed, 50% gravity. Maybe the leader could be confined to his platform... Whatever you want! Go crazy! If you create a gemtype you like, tell me about it in the thread and I'll add it to the OP.

Extra Screenshots

Action Shot!

Blue Team Wins!

"Cheating" at the central tower

Gametype link: Download Leapfrog
Map link: Download LilyPads