91 replies to this topic

[rumblesom]

Hi Guys,

 

recently a number of players have privately complained to me about some of the maps in the RA2 QM. Although there has been absolutely no consensus and rarely are two players' preferences even remotely similar, one idea has been mentioned a few times. Given that when patch hosting was transferred to XWIS a number of new maps were accidentally introduced to the qm, it was difficult to execute any sudden changes. 

 

Now most of the maps have been in the pool for months, and the pool itself is quite large- nearly reaching 100 maps. Additionally this month and in particular December have kindly been sponsored by dsect0r in an effort to restore activity. With old school players potentially returning, I'd like to offer a few options for a qm renovation:

 

Please vote in this simple poll, after a few days the results will dictate the follow-up- thanks

 

 

Original 26 RA2 QM Maps:

 

Alaskan Oil Spill

Artic Circle

City Under Siege

Cold War

Country Swing

DEFCON 6

Depth Charge

Golden State Fwy

Hammer and Sickle

Heartland

Isle of War

Lake Blitzen

Malibu Cliffs

May Day

Montana DMZ

Official Tournament Map A

Official Tournament Map B

Paris Revisited

Pinch Point

Snow Valley

South Pacific

Sovereign Land

Stormy Weather

The Alamo

Urban Rush

 

 

[Seke]

i voted for the first option because, although id love to play every map.... there are several people in the ra2 community that seem to think they shouldnt have to play any of the new ones jus bcuz they have auto ss

 

 

 

edit** please note i think the map pool should be >> 50maps... as in like 1000+

Edited by Seke, 03 November 2013 - 10:58 PM.

[rumblesom]

Let them vote for their opinion- I'm asking for your preference mason

[ZiGZaG]

I believe some the first maps added with auto SS should be standard, i completely disagreed with maps being thrown in and made standard with little to no notification to the community, the more contraversial maps be it original or added should be taken from standard and moved to non standard

[dsector]

I don't like any of the poll options

 

I think several of the original maps should become non standard. Lots of new maps are better than the old and every map is easy to learn so an oldschooler should quickly adapt.

 

Changes I would make to original maps:

 

Alaskan Oil Spill - non standard and mirrored

Artic Circle 

City Under Siege - SW ON A v S or mirrored

Cold War - replaced by fixed version (remove the movement bug on top and the barrels from the br oil derricks)

Country Swing

DEFCON 6 - non standard

Depth Charge

Golden State Fwy

Hammer and Sickle - SW ON A v S or mirrored (also replaced with a fixed version)

Heartland

Isle of War - non standard

Lake Blitzen - non standard or replaced with a balanced version

Malibu Cliffs - non standard or only TL vs BR

May Day - non standard or replaced with a fixed version

Montana DMZ

Official Tournament Map A - non standard or be made mirrored

Official Tournament Map B

Paris Revisited - non standard or only L v R

Pinch Point - non standard

Snow Valley - remove the bugged version

South Pacific

Sovereign Land - non standard

Stormy Weather

The Alamo - non standard

Urban Rush - mirrored

Edited by dsector, 04 November 2013 - 12:02 AM.

[FReQuEnZy]

Alaskan Oil Spill - Non standard and mirrored.
Artic Circle - Standard, SW always on.
City Under Siege - Standard, SW always on. ( I don't see many allied v soviet issues on this map )
Cold War - Replaced by fixed version.
Country Swing - Standard. 
DEFCON 6 - non standard (unfair in A v S, not an interesting map to play on, maybe 1 out of 30 games you will end up in a interesting game.)
Depth Charge - SW always on. 
Golden State Fwy
Hammer and Sickle - SW always on, replace with fixed version.
Heartland - Mirrored due to tl vs bl balance, or replaced by bl vs tr / tl vs br versions.
Isle of War - SW always on, mirrored.
Lake Blitzen - Replaced with a balanced version, though I don't see too many issues on this one.
Malibu Cliffs - Standard, SW always on.
May Day - Replaced by a rebalanced version.
Montana DMZ - SW always on.
Official Tournament Map A - Mirrored.
Official Tournament Map B - SW always on.
Paris Revisited - Replaced by TR vs BL version.
Pinch Point - Non standard.
Snow Valley - Replaced by fixed version.
South Pacific
Sovereign Land
Stormy Weather
The Alamo - non standard
Urban Rush - mirrored

I would prefer having all the new maps turned off by default and letting players enable them, as the new map pack should be an optional bonus and not mandatory. Simply as there are too many conflicting opinions on balance and settings.

The maps will be available for all players to be selected and enabled, this would also remove the need for the previous suggestion I made to make all disabled maps in user's CP to be removed from that player's map pool. An alternative is to let the player remove a maximum of 10 maps from their map pool.

Edited by FReQuEnZy, 04 November 2013 - 01:02 AM.

[Seke]

Let them vote for their opinion- I'm asking for your preference mason

 

well then, obviously my opinion isn't listed.

[SoVsOrDiE]

Nooo!! My vote was supposed to be for option 'setting all new maps' and not 'a vote on 30'

[AMadKirov]

Id rather leave it as is since i dont have my own choose to not play some maps that i dislike but they are in the pool and for some reason they are a "Standard" maps.

[FReQuEnZy]

Id rather leave it as is since i dont have my own choose to not play some maps that i dislike but they are in the pool and for some reason they are a "Standard" maps.

 

Then you should vote for set all to non standard.

[AMadKirov]

Then you should vote for set all to non standard.

I fear that cuz there is less than 100 players and if that happen it wont be easy to find a Qm match, All the Funny maps players will disable all the maps and let only 3 or 4 gay maps.

 

My easy solution is: Super weapon must be always on. and make votes for all the current standard maps to see which can stay as standard map and which not.

[rumblesom]

The 26 maps will remain standard

The number of maps in the pool does not affect the number of opponents you can match

Edited by rumblesom, 04 November 2013 - 04:44 PM.

[dsector]

The 26 maps will remain standard

Why? Some of the original QM maps were made non standard (ex. DC Uprising). Why will these 26 remain standard when some of them are bad or unfair maps?

[rumblesom]

1 map was changed after years and years.

I never mentioned anything refering to changes to those maps and I don't believe anything will change regarding them.

We had votes and debate at times which produced far more conclusive consensus than what the 15 or so votes could achieve today. Don't be unrealistic. You know what I'm saying and there's no need to bother with another revolution/rise of the ppl incident.

The changes to the patch map pool are under review, please offer your suggestions with regard to them.

[SoVsOrDiE]

I think it would be nice to make changes to the maps you can select in the game account. At the moment both players need to have 'Alaskan Oil Spill' deselected for it not to show up in QM. I think it would be fantastic to make it so that both players need it checked, to have it appear in QM..because some of these maps are really depressing, especially when you seem to get them a lot! :[

 

EDIT: You should have to choose a minimum of >75% of the maps, to prevent people choosing their best 5 maps or so maps.

Edited by SoVsOrDiE, 04 November 2013 - 05:37 PM.

[ZiGZaG]

I think it would be nice to make changes to the maps you can select in the game account. At the moment both players need to have 'Alaskan Oil Spill' deselected for it not to show up in QM. I think it would be fantastic to make it so that both players need it checked, to have it appear in QM..because some of these maps are really depressing, especially when you seem to get them a lot! :[

 

EDIT: You should have to choose a minimum of >75% of the maps, to prevent people choosing their best 5 maps or so maps.

 

While i understand your point i dfisagree with this, i think it would be cool however if each player was given a choice of say 5 map's they didnt have to play.

[AlliedPlayer]

I would say - stop moaning about maps, and play them all - if you want to pick maps, make a tournament game. 

[FReQuEnZy]

i think it would be cool however if each player was given a choice of say 5 map's they didnt have to play.

I've been requesting that since the last QM renovation. It won't be done.

Also @ josh, there's no need for debates, when you can use common sense.

Maps that are clearly unbalanced need to go, there should be none of the "but this player can do this to balance it out and make a bit more even" stuff.
As the layout of the maps differs it challenges the player to adapt to it and invent new build orders and explore the best suited style of play for that map, the balance of the map shouldn't be a determining factor.

Now I know that the ra2 maps are far from perfect, but a lot of the ones that display clear imbalances should be made non standard.
There's been a consensus for years on most of the unbalanced maps, yet you never listen and stick to the decision. There's not much of a need to change on any of the maps we decided back then. What's lacking is the settings we requested for those maps.

Also I second super weapons set to always on. They are good tie breakers, camp matches, naval wars, bridge blowers, base traders... etc.

[dsector]

I don't get how the implied changes to the original maps are even debatable (except for maybe two).

[rumblesom]

A consensus has never existed. The previous 'renovation' was a list of your preferences that was loosely debated until it became a flame war (as always).

Don't add bits of rubbish like "I never listen", I go out of my way to gather feedback from the community.

We won't be applying any drastic changes on the sole claim of 'common sense',I can't think of anything less democratic.

And once again this topic was created to debate the patch maps, over which a significant decision is pending- please post comments and suggestions in regard to them.
@ dsector: review topics over the years. For example, Tour a was viciously defended by several allieds.

This is a poll over new maps

[dsector]

Well if this is a democracy, who decided which maps to be standard and which non standard? I never saw a vote for this. Some new maps that I've never played or seen before are set to standard somehow.

[rumblesom]

I don't know how they were selected. But the original maps were successfully in place for years and the game flourished. You might call those maps 'grand fathered' at this point.

As for the appearance of new maps without a vote- as I mentioned at the outset a number of new maps were introduced accidentally and were not intended to be set as standard. Nevertheless after this happened no consensus existed on which were liked/ disliked and the decision was made to allow a trial.

Now the fragment of the community which participates in this poll will effect a decision for everyone- some would say that's undemocratic.

Best that can be done.

[dsector]

The original maps were left unchanged not because the community liked them. Also, the game didn't flourish because those maps were so great.

 

You can read topics from 6-7 years ago about how unbalanced / bad Pinch Point, Urban Rush AvS, Official A AvS, Defcon, Hammer and Sickle AvS, May Day and several others are. Nothing was done about it then and it seems nothing will be done about it now.

 

Adding new and better maps on top of bad maps doesn't get rid of the bad ones.

[rumblesom]

Except I disagree that everyone hated those maps (no consensus)

Also new strategies evolved over time. I already cited an example which contradicts your concept of unanimity.

And 100% the game flourished on the back of its maps.

[dsector]

Players wanted "qm renovations" going back to 2004-2005. Why? Because the 26 original maps were so great?

 

Where did I say that everyone hates those maps? I'm sure the soviet players love some of those maps vs allied players and allied players love Hammer and Sickle vs soviet players. This doesn't mean the maps are fair.

 

Since this is going nowhere, I'm done.

By the way Josh, don't take any of this personally. We all appreciate your work on the QM maps!