The Battle of Blood Gulch.

The UNSC Sparta Orbital Defense Platform was called into action above the Blood Gulch mining facility in 2547 in response to a full-scale Covenant invasion force that swept in from the sea intending to harvest the rich spoils paid for with the blood, sweat and tears of the civilian miners stationed there. Her deck was fully loaded with a fleet of Scorpions, enough raw firepower to level a city ...but the enemy knew no fear. Even with the Sparta and her troops stacked against them they still had us outgunned, outnumbered and outclassed, all that remained was for them to reap their harvest and obliterate their enemy ...or so they believed.
But the heavy ordinance carried upon the Sparta's decks was a shield, not a sword, and it was the sword they should have feared. The blade sheathed within the Sparta's hold upon it's descent from high orbit was drawn the very moment that massive vessel once again settled into a stationary orbit, now resting directly overhead of the massed Covenant forces still engaged in the slaughter of the civilians below, and this was when the enemy finally learned fear. A five man team of armored warriors was blasted into the horde from the Sparta like an artillery strike, and then the slaughter began in earnest. These armor clad killing machines fought with a righteous fury that not even the Sangheili could stand against, they knew no fear and they knew no weakness, for these living breathing weapons of war there was only one reason for being, the motto they lived and died by;

Victory or Death.

The only Covenant to survive The Battle of Blood Gulch were those that ran from the armor clad "Demons" sent against them, and this decisive battle in a gulch that had truly lived up to its name was where the legend of the Spartans was born.

(sorry, I got bored so decided to give my map a story ;)

This is my first attempt at mapmaking in halo and I've attempted to create a large scale slayer based map which allows players to choose whatever style of combat they're most comfortable with, be that vehicular, snipers or close quarters, plus gives players willing to find them access to tricks that can prove quite advantageous in combat such as a teleporter jump in the center of the map and multiple routes into the flying fortress that is intended to be the focus of the action. This map is primarily designed to be played as a red vs blue big team slayer map, although it is equally suited to solo slayer so long as you have enough players to fill it. Jet-packs do provide players with an obvious advantage on this level (particularly when used in conjunction with the launch pads, try it from the red or blue airbase launcher's for another exceptionally quick route to the top btw ;), but it has been specifically designed so as jet-packs are simply a benefit rather than a necessity, thus allowing the benefits of the other armor abilities to shine through in other ways should you choose to use them. The teleporters are all two way and all color coded with the sections they lead to in an attempt to guide new players around as much as was possible. So far I've only played this map split-screen with 3 friends so it's not really been playtested as such since a total of 4 players is nowhere near enough to really test out a map of this size to it's full potential. There are some seriously LONG lines of sight on this map, but I've yet to notice any major lag problems in splitscreen so hopefully the design has overcome the system limitations, although if it has it was pure luck since I knew nothing of the line of sight issue when creating it ;)

p.s. storming the enemy base has never been as much fun as it is on this map, try it and see what I'm talking about (although lets just put it this way, at the speed you'll be moving when you hit their base it's gonna be a real test of shooting skill to hit anyone on the way in, in which case you may end up doing it on the way out, presuming you live that long in a prime enemy spawn point ;)

p.p.s. be sure to read the actual map description for info on the teleporter jump should you wish to try it out, although I'll give you one more hint: "the plank" is blatantly obvious if you actually look for it ;)

Oh, and one last thing, the two way teleporter on the field near the hill, the one without a frame used for the teleporter jump, will teleport whatever goes through it, be it player, scorpion, warthog, ghost, or even falcons and banshees, providing vehicular access to the flying fortress.

OK, in response to the unanimous criticism of my grid by absolutely everyone who saw it I decided to attempt a refit in the hopes it would at least end the grid complaints, hope this is more to everyone's tastes ...and yep, now it's done I have to admit that I agree with the criticisms, the whole thing does look more solid, sturdy and aesthetically pleasing now that the grid is gone. I've also attempted to address the line of sight issue on the grid area that seemed to be drawing complaints from the majority of people who saw it. Please let me know if you consider the refit a success ...or not, as the case may well be ;)