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24 Dec 11, 06:31PM
(This post was last modified: 24 Dec 11, 11:31PM by MasterKaen.)
I'm about to beat a dead horse, please brace yourself. I don't make a habit of bludgeoning deceased ungulates, but this one could do with a few more whacks.
I'll start by saying that I hate @camper style map (or any gimmicky maps of that style); I don't play them, and I don't allow them on my servers. I would continue by saying I think that these map restrictions are a bad idea.
The goal of the map restrictions (as far as I can fathom) is to improve the quality of the pubbing experience by disallowing this style of map via some (IMO arbitrary) mathematical restrictions on the construction of the maps. I consider this unnecessary, and actually potentially damaging to the AC community.
First, why it's unnecessary:
Ultimately the pubbing AC biosphere consists of two fundamental parts: players and server owners/admins. These two groups work/compete to determine the set of maps and modes which are publicly played by the AC community at large. The server owners control the maprot and command line switches which determine the maps and modes which the server will play by its own volition or allow through voting and possibly player uploads. Players then determine which of the maps within this set to play through voting, or through joining servers playing maps/modes they find interesting.
My point in this is to demonstrate that there already exist two mechanisms for culling bad maps from public play. By simply leveraging these two mechanisms, we (as the AC community at large) can indirectly influence the maps that get played, and do so in a very natural way.
All we'd have to do is work on cultivating a specific culture of admins and players. Server admins who have respect for AC mechanics and gameplay, and players who are critical consumers of AC maps, and who judge them based on a set of informed criteria which are in line with the developers' goal/vision for the gameplay. How this is to be done deserves another thread on its own, but it is well within the realm of possibility.
Additionally, having @camper style maps available to play does absolutely no intrinsic harm to the AC community. Period. First, they're sorted below official maps in the server list (an excellent way of skewing a newcomer's decision towards official maps, IMO). Secondly, people looking for the type of gameplay AC provides will quickly recognize them as garbage, and join another server playing an official map (i.e. one at the top of the serverlist). Third, experienced players have preferred servers, often with reasonable admins, and as such are never forced to play on @camper or similar garbage maps.
Now, to explain why I consider the limits to be damaging:
Essentially, I believe that creative restrictions in any form are bad for any given art. I include AC mapping in this. These restrictions will only motivate people making garbage maps to find ways to circumvent them. Furthermore, they will only serve as barriers to people interested in making unique maps that legitimately consider AC style gameplay. This is counter-productive to having high quality maps, since you need a large number of producers and products, filtered by the critical consumers I mentioned earlier, to have a vibrant artistic ecosystem (of good maps that people enjoy playing).
TL;DR:
Map restrictions are unnecessary and damaging, and we should rely on the members of the AC community to control map quality.
Thanks.
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I 100% agree with you!!!!!
@camper sucks
map restrictions should be remvoed cause they're un needed
I agree!!!!
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i agree that @camper maps are crap
BUT
map restrction were put on to make players make maks within the map restrictions beacuse the maps with higher ceiling, more open space, and everything else are more laggy... they make client lagg and therefore unplayable...
i think it's nice to have this restriction cuz they are not hard to follow and im sure @camper bug will be fixed within new version
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(24 Dec 11, 07:57PM)Milandrag Wrote: map restrction were put on to make players make maks within the map restrictions beacuse the maps with higher ceiling, more open space, and everything else are more laggy... they make client lagg and therefore unplayable...
Players who experience bad performance on those maps simply won't play them. Natural selection works pretty well like that.
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I agree, map restrictions would not be necessary if you could manage to "cultivat[e] a specific culture of admins and players ... who have respect for AC mechanics and gameplay."
There are plenty of admins and server owners who fit this bill, but the number of players who simply don't care (or even prefer gameplay-inhibiting commentary-art instead over actual, playable maps) is vastly greater.
If you can find a way to change the preferences of those thousands of players, your suggestions are quite appropriate.
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(24 Dec 11, 08:15PM)V-Man Wrote: If you can find a way to change the preferences of those thousands of players, your suggestions are quite appropriate.
I wouldn't really try to change their preferences. I'd aim for more segmentation in the playing populace. Essentially, crap players with crap tastes play on crap servers that allow crap maps. Conversely, players with good tastes play on good servers that only allow good maps. To each his own.
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Sounds like a huge schism, but then again this game was made to fork off, right? ;-)
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(24 Dec 11, 06:31PM)MasterKaen Wrote: First, they're sorted below official maps in the server list (an excellent way of skewing a newcomer's decision towards official maps, IMO).
No.
Not yet afaik. Default sorting option is by ping iirc.
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ping first, then it checks what / serversortpreferofficial is set to.
Can't remember what that default is, I think 0?
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24 Dec 11, 08:49PM
(This post was last modified: 24 Dec 11, 08:52PM by Ronald_Reagan.)
The answer is in your link :D, 1 is the default.
tbh, it doesn't really do much. The servers being played rarely amount to more than one page, and a noob isn't likely to notice ping. I didn't. I also tried to join empty servers and wondered why no one else was there.
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Just have a look around the maps and you'll see all kinds of wierd gltiches, like textures randomly appearing, the renderer failing. Just keep an eye open for them and you'll spot them. They are the main reason the restrictions exsist. (From what I gather.)
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(24 Dec 11, 11:19PM)SleepKiller Wrote: Just have a look around the maps and you'll see all kinds of wierd gltiches, like textures randomly appearing, the renderer failing. Just keep an eye open for them and you'll spot them. They are the main reason the restrictions exsist. (From what I gather.)
I don't think that's correct. Else, we wouldn't be seeing the aforementioned glitches, right?
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If map restrictions are removed make a wildcard switch to block it.
*
-A ac_*@cam*
And freaking do not touch switch that stops non admin from uploading maps...!!!
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Considering Rattrap follows the restrictions and has unholy lag, I'd say we need....
More map restrictions.
xD
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I've read 100% of your message.
You should know that:
-The first Headshot city map style (what you call now "@campers" maps) on the 1.1 is MEGATOWERS_REWIND by |Kip|cHipS.
-MEGATOWERS_REWIND is obviously over the map-restrictions and the mapper who made this map is a very good mapper cause this map is playable everywhere (yeah i know, the next version will stop it, thanks to Brahma...).
-All maps who are not officials are filtered and apears at the end of the list in the MS (even apollo's maps on the TyD ladder servers).
-I started on a fun map (Ezjemvill) and i'm proud of it.
-Everyday i try to have as many fun as at my AC starts on Ezjemvill but it's not possible.
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25 Dec 11, 02:08AM
(This post was last modified: 25 Dec 11, 02:08AM by titiPT.)
(25 Dec 11, 01:09AM).ExodusS* Wrote: -Everyday i try to have as many fun as at my AC starts on Ezjemvill but it's not possible.
I must say, i'm with ExodusS on this one.
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25 Dec 11, 02:29AM
(This post was last modified: 25 Dec 11, 02:30AM by MasterKaen.)
titiPT, .ExodusS*, and I are all in agreement then. I'm saying to remove the map restrictions, and let you hooligans play whatever awful map you like. Leave it up to the admins to choose whether or not that map gets played, not the devs.
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(25 Dec 11, 01:09AM).ExodusS* Wrote: You should know that:
-The first Headshot city map style (what you call now "@campers" maps) on the 1.1 is MEGATOWERS_REWIND by |Kip|cHipS.
I would also be tempted to say that half of the members on these forums knows this |Kip|cHipS.
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(24 Dec 11, 08:49PM)Ronald_Reagan Wrote: The answer is in your link :D, 1 is the default.
I also tried to join empty servers and wondered why no one else was there.
LOL ditto. took me like at least 5 months to figure out what an empty server was lol
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First off, the invisible hand-theory doesn't even work in economic environments, why in hell would it work at art. Secondly, don't confuse mapping with art. ;)
Actually, not long ago things used to roll exactly like you're suggesting, MasterKean. No restrictions at all. Not even a max for player slots on servers. I'd even say that's the spirit where cube initially comes from...
Unfortunately, this kind of freedom only works as long as the majority agrees on certain "standards" and maintains a consensus on the very basic aspects around the game. When the community grew huger and huger, suddenly a lot of people found their way in here, which no longer cared what this game was supposed to be. In fact, they came here in order to tell what this game should be like.
That's when the whole system collapsed.
There're two options to this. Let everybody do as they please and turn this game into a mess or try to enforce the used-to-be-accepted standards.
At this point you probably can see, why no economics-theory will match this case. You do not have to satisify the customer in first place, but the producers (devs), since the whole development - and in this respect the support of a multiplayer game infrastructure - depends on their will to either spend their spare time on this game or not.
On a very personal note. I'd rather see this community shrink back to a few dedicated people, than watching how this game is turned into a mess.
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(27 Dec 11, 06:13PM)Mr.Floppy Wrote: ... enforce the used-to-be-accepted standards.
So now the discussion is, "what method would be the best way to do this?"
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i think the current method is fine, now it's fixed.
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@Mr.Floppy
"invisible hand-theory" is emergent behaving of complex systems (here economical) which we can describe but we don't understand the origin. (or it is very complicated to get it) It is a process used nowadays for example in agent systems which are used in modern machines(aircrafts). Emergent system is great challenge for understanding. It can be ofc used for art, there we can find some emergent behaving, for example evolving the styles. I know nothing, what is driven or regulated how you suggest in art. I think it is even impossible, it wouldn't be art then.
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27 Dec 11, 08:50PM
(This post was last modified: 27 Dec 11, 09:12PM by Mr.Floppy.)
I agree with lucas.
These few restrictions aren't such a big deal and really only block the "broken" kind of maps.
Sure this method isn't the most convinient and sure, quite a lot of maps got blocked due to false pickup distance calculation, like there's a wall between two pickups and so on... But, I guess this short comings are fixed now and afaik the restrictions haven't got expanded much further and are rather easy to grasp anyways, aren't they?
The only real alternative method I can imagine would be re-coding the whole editor and remove the capabilities to create unhealthy arrangements, in first place. Though, let's face it. That's not going to happen soon, if at all. Given there have been loads of mappers being able to create high quality maps with the current editor, I doubt that's the big issue here.
Actually, all the mappers who've been reading the docs and trying to get their maps best compatible with the engine, have always been working within the now-enforced boundaries. Nothing new for those then.
Mappers, which try to push things up to their limits, will need to be more creative in order to get things working. I actually, do count myself into this group.
And all these pseudo-creative wannabe dadaists, who never gave a damn about the engine and it's capabilities... Well, why should we care while they couldn't even be bother to rtfm once.
- edit -
@Alien:
Adam's invisible hand relies on rational decisions. That's where the theory fails. Actually, humanity has proven it's irrational nature more than once and in the end, "rational" is a matter of definition anyways.
However, whether one's agreeing to such theories or not doesn't help here. This kind of theories come in handy as an argument as everbody starts agreeing, only because it sounds familiar. It seems like nobody is understanding it doesn't even fit this case. Therefore, get back on topic and leave the big words to big issues.
This is about mapping, which at best can be dealt with like a "craftsmanship". That's the level you should be argueing at.
Thanks. :)
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All decisions are rational, only spectator from his subjective view can think it is irrational. The player chooses map because he likes it. In the comparison with dev's choice it can looks like irrational. Should we learn him rational choice from the dev's view? In economic it is the same, some people think it is irrational and try to plan economic and then they are surprised people under them haven't fulfilled needs because it wasn't in the plan.
"Craftsmanship" has specification of final product, art haven't. Probably some mappers here don't want to fulfill someone's specification and create what they want. It is called "default" vs "custom" mapping.
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IMHO:
No mapping restrictions = little to no incentive for mappers to produce quality maps for this engine/game.
Some mapping restrictions = quite a lot of incentive for mappers to produce quality maps for this engine/game.
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(27 Dec 11, 11:29PM)Bukz Wrote: IMHO:
No mapping restrictions = little to no incentive for mappers to produce quality maps for this engine/game.
Some mapping restrictions = quite a lot of incentive for mappers to produce quality maps for this engine/game. So true. And a random fact even with a good PC on the map the restrictions block out your FPS is gonna drop below 30. I just tested it yesterday. Around 20 FPS on headshot city, and lower on other maps.
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Well, first I'll address the economics analogy. I don't think it holds because in economics producers are compensated by consumers in some tangible way. Mapmaking differs from this in that the producers bear 100% of the costs (by investing their time) and receive no remuneration, often not even gratitude.
As far as my choice of the word 'art', I used it because in my Lockean view of human nature, art is something made for the enjoyment of others without the precondition of compensation. Of course, in the real world art is almost always made with the expectation that the artist will profit from it. 'Craft' would really have been a better word to use, but I wanted to convey the idea of 'pro bono publico'.
Ultimately, it's all moot. I see now that the majority of people supporting my view fundamentally misunderstand it. My mistake for using four syllable words. And if I had been aware of the elitist cynicism (which I'm sure will be called 'realism') of the devteam, I wouldn't have made such a naive and altruistic post.
I'll close by asking for a mod to kindly lock this train-wreck of a thread.
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3 devs who were not even on the team at the time the restrictions were implemented reply to your thread, and suddenly, the opinions turn into that of the entire dev team. Flawless logic.
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