At first glance, it's simple enough. Two teams, perfectly balanced on the terrain, and a flag with no turrets. Hills facilitate skiing, letting you get up to speed in no time flat, and the absence of much structures make the frame rate just as quick as your armor's feet. (this is indeed nice)
So. You make your way over to the enemy's base, and suddenly realize: open as the flag is, it requires a sideways cap because of a gigantic shield: no skiing in from behind and jetting off into the sunset here. Not to mention the flag-base construction: there is a surprising ammount of spider turrets that can be clamped here.. not to mention landspikes. The Farmer should be pleased with the resources, and the would-be capper unhappily surprised.
With a little skill, you CAN angle yourself to ski from out-of-bounds, down an approaching hill, drop from the sky, grab the flag and just barely miss the flag-structure and the shield, but you pretty much kill your skiing momentum, while being easy prey for the defenders.
Playability is pretty high for this map, as long as you know what you're doing. No vehicles, and not exactly newb-friendly, Solaris 3941 manages to open up a pretty wide playing field to anyone of experience. The bases aren't far apart, so travel is no issue: it's just that with a reduced ammount of targets, you're left to deuling and a hard flag-grab: not exactly something that *everyone* is good at.
Attention to Detail is high for this map: I like the way the pillars are placed into the ground, giving just a bit of ambience to the map. It especially seems that there was one placed JUST so it would interrupt anyone trying to do a back-door flag grab.. pesky little thing. Wonder if that was intentional?
Balance is favored to the offense, just slightly. Defense has an easy enough time with the flag-watching, sure, but only (again) if they know what they are doing. An unwary D could find the flag snatched under their very noses, and the ski-friendly routes make catch-up a chore, especially for Heavy. In addition, the main base, with the inventories for each team, is a deathtrap. Hopefully the teams will come to some sort of "no base attack" rule agreement, because a single heavy could drop a pair of mortar shells in there and render all the equiptment dead, not to mention whoever happened to be trapped rearming.
The Item Placement was hard to judge, considering there are very few game objects on the map: the flag and a quad of inventories, plus that huge force-field shield.. but these few objects, plus the pillars scattered around were quite precisely placed - high marks for this category.
The Mechanics work well for the players who have been "around" a few times, who know the game, and who know how to play. Newbs need to look elsewhere, but for those who know what they're doing, this map quickly turns into a giant chess-board: strategy abounds, and is actually pretty much required for a successful cap.
I'd recommend this map to anyone who wants to use their brains in a match, and to those who like one-on-one or team-on-team clashes near the middle. With close distances, conflicts will be fast and often, with the winner probably being picked up ASAP by another of the enemy. Snipers should have a good time, with just enough vantage points, while the Heavies will find enough skiing to make their treck less lengthy than it could have been otherwise.
~ Editor's Note: One last thing.. where in the heck did "3941" come from? Was that when the mapper logged in and saw "Inventory 3941"? Or what?