new maps...why so many linear corridors?

[Stompa]

I think Tahrongi Canyon is an example of areas designed when SE were on their *A Game*, it has tunnel / mini-canyons but you can scoot through them quickly and up into the big open canyon main, where there are lots of places you can set up your low-level camp. The rising/lowering ground level makes it easy to track where you are from memory of climbing those hills before. It is also very atmospheric and immersive to play there. Flat areas with similar structures everywhere make memory tracking harder.
It is simple logic, when the map has more open space, that means more camps and more potential mobs, as opposed to a map comprised of barriers and solid rock/jungle masses everywhere, this just means the actual number camp spaces are inevitably lower.
I really love the pre-SOA areas, just about all of them, but I don't feel the same fondness for SOA areas at all, partly because of the reasons raised by the OP and other Members in this thread, but also because of the lack of free-roaming / time-pop / lottery-pop NM's, this makes the maps feel dead to me, they have basic mobs only and the camps are inevitably automatically designated, not chosen in the way you could choose a camp in a big open area.

Re; the job points / new areas, I hope it works out as I do greatly commend SE for making a lot of effort to improve the game recently and job-points is another great idea by SE. But I do have some reservations about the system when it leaves the drawing board and enters the real Vanadiel.