This map is unfortunately very unbalanced and favors destruction extremely over building.
This leads to long-winding games where nothing happens except players getting frustrated. Every time I’ve played this map, at least a few players have complained about it so I thought I’d make a forum post.
The reason for this imbalance is that opposing players can get behind the block-shooting line without any effort or risk of being shot. This means, no matter how good the other team is playing, you can just go underground, punch a tiny hole into the wall and instantly shoot the enemy bridge. This usually would not be an issue, as you can just shoot away their cover. However, since babel prevents this, there is nothing you can really do about them. And even if you do hit them, they can just come back and dig a new hole.
I have to disagree with you about removing trade-off from rotation. It’s a good map but imo dramatically different from typical Babel maps. The map is only long if a team doesn’t have a good balance in building and active defsense (imo).
As a builder I have to join others in saying that Tradeoff is a very interesting map.
However, the team that wins will be the team that manages to change its gameplay to suit the map, since it must be played very differently from other maps:
-A bridge to the other island must be built as quickly as possible (since this is outside of the protected zone, griefers often do much damage here).
-Players must actively seek out oposition players that attack the bridge.
-Attacking players often try to sink the intel, so this too must be protected.
-Even if your team has managed to complete a bridge, crossfire over the top of the platform makes intel collection difficult. Flanking attacks may help.
-Alternatively, a bridge directly underneath the platform all the way to the intel can be used for intel capture
In conclusion: The map is good, but it requires a good team.
When I playing the map I managed to see that the dynamics is different which makes it an interesting and fun map compared to the common maps of babel, I don’t see any reason for it to be removed from the rotation given that it’s a good map.
