It's best to copy across the default weapons layout into your maps, the default weapons arrangement are perfectly spaced from one another and are all easily frobbable for the player and are extremely familiar too. When you start moving and tilting around weapons their highlight boxes can be disturbed which can lead to hard to pick up weapons as the frobbable highlight box can be a tiny target for the player to point at in order to pick up the weapon. Please note however the weapon boards above do not feature every weapon Deus Ex has to offer, it may be a good idea to add other weapons (such as the riot prod) on a nearby table for example.
You can ofcourse make your own weapon boards but make sure you still use the default arrangements, above are examples of custom weapon boards which still use the default weapon arrangement that can be found on any standard Deus Ex multiplayer map. Here you are offering the player a new weapon board design yet a very familiar weapon arrangement so the player can quickly get their weapons and go about their business.
2. Playerstarts
Many maps suffer because of simply not having enough playerstarts, ideally you should aim to have anywhere between 16 - 20 playerstarts on your map. The above picture is taken from the SDK, it shows ideally how playerstarts should be spaced out, also notice that they are quite close to the weapon boards. You'll notice that the playerstarts are all pointed to face the weapon boards, this is done by first clicking on a playerstart and then holding down shift and right click then drag the mouse to rotate the red arrow (which shows the playerstart's orientation) to the desired position. When the player spawns he/she will be close to the weapon boards and oriented to roughly face the centre of them making it nice and easy for the player to then choose the weapons quickly on the familiarly laid out selection of weapons.
3. Spawn locations
Ideally you want to space out your spawns as much as possible, spawns placed around the outer edges of your map work well, leaving the main central fighting area clear. Spaced out spawns will really open up the map and keep your enemy guessing as to where you spawn after dying, you may just catch them by surprise! Above shows good examples of well spaced out spawn points (circled red) that utilise the whole map.
Unless you are going for a standoff style of map you should throw in as many spawn points as you can. You should be aiming for around 4-5 in a medium/large sized map and have no more than 5 playerstarts at each spawn. If you have spawn rooms then it's a good idea to have multiple exits as it is possible for one person to block a spawn exit which means other players cannot pass, another door or a vent would be a good addition in this case.
4. Medbots and Biobots
As you've spent alot of blood, sweat and tears over your map you owe it to yourself to make it compatible for augs as well as 0 augs. This means we need to add bio bots aswell as the regular medbot. Depending on the size of your map you could well have up to six biobots and four medbots, the medbots should ideally not be locked away and should be "free", above is a shot of a medbot from DXMP_Smuggler which is not locked away and therefore is a "free" bot which requires no use of a skilled tool to access. These "free" medbots are a great addition to a map, you'll have people scrambling to the nearest medbot which gives a quick heal for the player and makes for a fast paced map. Just like spawns you'll need to space out your bots and they should cover every corner of your map, this again opens up the whole map and gives every location a point of interest for the player.
It's best to copy and paste med/bio bot housings from default DXMP maps to give the player that familiarity which is crucial to make a fast paced map. Ofcourse you can customise the textures of the housing to suit your map as shown in the picture above. Here the bot housing blends in with the map, so once again you are offering the player something that looks new and fresh but also something very familiar, which is a great balance.
5. Containers
Maps need containers believe it or not, mostly maps have only one type of container - ammocrates. However it is a good idea to put in unbreakable containers too that the player can use to get to higher platforms or to use as blocking devices, it adds another dimension to the map and makes the map more interactive and fun for the player. Not to mention they can be good to add as rudimentary decoration - if one area of your map looks a little bare add a container or two.
Ammocrates should be placed away from weapon boards as there's little point having them so close, and shouldn't be placed in areas where you do not want players to camp - dark roofs for example. Other good containers to have are TNT crates, these will add an additional fun factor to the map and players can get creative with throwing TNT from a height to get a kill for example. But it may not be a good idea to add too many to a map any more then 5 is perhaps too many.
6. Cabinets and Turrets
Cabinets are essential for making Aug-friendly maps, there are two types of combination of hole in the wall (above, left pic) cabinets - LAM, gas grenade and EMP grenade, and HE 20mm and biocell. Depending on the size of your map you can have 1-3 of the LAM, gas grenade and EMP combo, and 1-2 of the HE 20mm and biocell combo. These cabinets ideally shouldn't be placed in (or right next to) spawns as it makes that particular spawn strong for the player thus giving him/her an unfair advantage. As before with bots and spawn locations try to space out the cabinets as best as possible!
Turrets are another good addition to have in your map as it gives the player another objective besides just killing opposition - taking the turret!
Ideally the turret (or turrets if the map is big enough) should be placed so that it doesn't dominate the whole map - there should be a way of avoiding this turret completely should the player choose to. I find it best to place a LAW cabinet near to the turret so that the turret acts as a protector, this law cabinet will again be copied from a default DXMP map and thus have a lock strength of 0.6 which is perfect.
7. Skilled tools/pickups
Your map needs loose (not locked away) skilled tools and pickups such as multitools, lockpicks, bio cells and medkits. Depending on the size of the map these can vary from around 2 of each (small map) to 4-5 (medium/large map). These "free" pickups should be placed with some thought behind them, so free medkits should placed away from medbots, free bio cells away from biobots, free lockpicks and multitools should ideally not be placed right next cabinets/locked biobots. And all of the above should ideally not be placed in spawns or at least in strict moderation as to not make one spawn particularly strong for the player lucky enough to spawn there.
Don't place all these pickups in plain view - hide some away! Reward the player that spends the time searching through your map for some of these pickup goodies. Get creative with placing these more hidden items, but at the same time don't make them almost impossible to see.
8. Vents
Vents are such an integral part of Deus Ex - giving the player an additional route into/out of a building for example. Vents are effective in spawn rooms which give the spawning player an alternate route out of the spawn room - particularly useful if the opposition have closed in on the spawnroom and are waiting for you to exit through the spawnroom door!
Vents are also very useful in providing the player with shortcuts - very useful for quickly exiting a building that might have only one or two exits! Items can also be hidden in a vent and so really they have several uses and are great additions to all medium/large maps. Vent covers that move directly up and down tend to be the best as vents that swing open tend to be buggy in DXMP and should really be avoided. Vents should be 80 x 80 (height and width) unreal units, this will allow two players to pass one another in the same vent which is very useful.
9. Zone Portals
It is a good idea to add several zone portals to your map, a zoned off map will increase performance for the player as only the zones visible to the player will be rendered at any one time rather then the whole map. The gains may only be slight but it's still worth doing particularly for those with poor performance.
It's easiest to add zone portals at choking points such as doorways, a typical Deus Ex door will be 128 units high with a width of 64. So in this case I need to create a sheet brush
that is 128 V, and 64 U and I need to tick the X or Y axis (which will orientate the brush to our needs), now I need to hit the "add special" brush icon 
. Now select from the predefined menu "Zone Portal" then hit add special, line up your brush with the doorway and rebuild your map. In the 3d view window (bottom left) click on mode and select Zone/Portal view, here you will see each zone as a different colour.10. Music and Sounds
Having music and sound effects adds atmosphere and believability to your map. Every DXMP map should have music that suits the style of map, if the map is small and frantic then the music should reflect that, equally if the map is large and action is less frequent the music should be less dramatic. Having ambient sounds will bolster the map's atmosphere and believability, if your map is set in an outdoor environment then you should think about adding ambient sounds that suit that environment. Sounds such as nighttime insects buzzing, wind noise, dogs barking, street noise and trees rustling will add believability to your outdoor environments.
Simple humming noises applied to your lights will add that extra touch of realism, out of bounds noises are also effective - having a closed off gate with sounds behind it will give the player an opportunity to use his/her imagination as to what might be lurking behind. Do you have any underground sections in your map? if so it's worth checking out echo water drips, rumbling and tunnel noises. It's all about reinforcing your visuals with audio that helps hammer home the feeling/atmosphere you are wanting to achieve. All movers should have mover sounds too, make sure the mover material suits the sound - metal doors need metal door sounds, wooden doors need wooden door sounds, elevators and similar movers work well with pneumatic sounds. Most movers should have a closed, opening and moving sound applied (top, middle and bottom in properties > mover sounds).
If you guys make small maps, you can make spawn points as on NYC_Statue or Smuggler (offcourse these spawns points aren't perfect, but are far better than on Iceworld or Pool).
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