Favorites:
TeaParty: big map with lots of levels and layers, great for several different strategies to be implemented, good balance of resources. Lots of potential for kills and there are lots of flat areas for pvp. OG EggWars map, but recent redesign has made it even better.
Food: Also a big map with lots of flat space for pvp without making it impossible to shoot people off if they just camped all game for diamond armor. Good balance of resources, though I am curious to see what decreasing the gold generator levels at mid would do.
Powerline: Large map, many levels, decent resource balance, and a cool design concept. I like being able to get to mid without having to build but there being a balance that it's treacherous path.
Magical (Teams of 2): Decent flat space and balance of resources. I also really like the design elements and the recent changes to the map height layout.
Mine (Solo): One of the few maps that enables trapping and has a good balance of resources with a tactical twist: stay at mid and get good stuff too long and you're likely to get shot off the map when you try to leave.
Snowy (Solo): Good pvp areas, balance of resources, different levels and a mix of damage-based pvp and knock-back pvp. Only complaint is the snow levels make building annoying.
MLG (Solo): Good early game rush opportunities as well as high risk-reward for going to mid early game. It would be nice to have larger start islands for better pvp but I like the rainbows allow for the combined damage/kb pvp approach.
End (Solo): While the start islands could be a couple blocks larger and the gold generator easier to access, I do appreciate that this discourages camping. Build height should be higher, though. You can't bridge fight properly with the height that low. Still a really excellent rush map that encourages ingenuity and preparedness.
Least Favorites:
Instruments: Islands and mid are too small and everything is waaay too far apart. Also the generators are so low-level that these games rarely see anyone in anything higher than leather armor. Under da Sea has the same problem with islands too far apart, except the generators are high enough at mid to provide a counter to camping that I won't include it in my Least Favorites.
Western: It should not be THAT EASY to spawn-trap an entire team. Absolute failure on the designers' part.
Area 51: Everything is waaaay too far apart, it's too easy to camp the middle or the islands, and the night vision is broken as you lose it the first time you die--this only ends up punishing newer players even more since they are less likely to know about gamma texture packs or editing the .ini file.
Golf (Solo): Infinite. Running. If players have enough food, they can just run indefinitely around the middle ring. So dumb. Otherwise it's fine, but this element is frustrating enough to be included in Least Favorites.
Steampunk (Solo): The fans at the bottom--along with a player's ability to build down there still--encourage camping. If camping players have a bow, it is literally impossible to kill them until they decide to come up and fight.
Stronghold (Solo): Too many islands too far away from mid. Mid needs a cut-through so players don't end up playing "ring around the rosie" for eternity.
Map suggestions/redesign/skins
-Remove the ginger bread man face from the bottom of Teaparty. It's not Christmas.
-Make End, Mine, and MLG start islands just a few blocks wider.
-Make all land sections of Instruments larger and decrease the distance between the islands and mid.
-Decrease the distance between the start islands, jellyfish, and mid on Under da Sea
-Remove non-full snow blocks from all maps. Even though this makes the maps less beautiful, enabling gameplay is more important.
-Remove fans at the bottom of Steampunk, or put signs down there with the message that staying there is bannable. I know this hurts the aesthetic but still--gameplay. I can't tell you how many games have been extended by 20 minutes or more because some nerd clutched and wouldn't come back up.
-Introduce breaks in the Golf mid ring or tnt sand traps. Something to prevent infinite running.
-Move Area 51 islands closer, move the mid up so the generators are only 5 or less blocks below the start islands, and lower the build height so players cannot camp on the rocks or rings or UFO. Also, move the diamond generator down so it is not as easy to camp and defend, and make it daytime or sunset.
-Extend the build protection on Western to the villager. It's absolutely disgusting how easy it is to spawn-trap even full teams of tryhards.
-Introduce some sort of in-between islands or halfway islands between the start and mid islands on Storm and Stronghold to encourage building to mid without decreasing the number of teams on the map.
-Make an access tunnel or hole in the Stronghold middle so it's not just a ring for players to infinitely run around or bowspam.
Maps that need to return:
Honestly, because of Cube's decreasing popularity (with the exception of the COVID-19 situation) there should be less maps available at a time. No more than 16 at most for teams and 8 for solos, but then rotate in all the other various maps on a weekly basis. Admins can use this thread or others to discover which are the best maps to keep and which to rotate and improve. Please listen to your community and not just make an executive decision.
OR = switch each week between these specific maps each week.
My suggestions on Team maps to regularly keep: Rome OR Mansion (10), Orc (9), Teaparty (5), Beach (5), Food (4), Treehouse OR Dwarven (4), Kingdom (4), Powerline (3), Huts (3), Jungle OR Garden (3), Storm (2), Shipwreck (2), Modern (2), Forest (2), Magical (2), City (2).
Solo Maps: Snowy, Safari OR End, Tropical OR Desert, Mine, MLG, Nightmare, Tentacles OR Elven, Farm OR Village
I fell like this specific topic needs it's own thread, though.