Well done Nobody.

DXMP_Rooftop_Revolution, probably one of the best ever DXMS maps and most suited to altfire. It was made by Ketchup.

I notice this was removed too. This is an altfire version of DXMS_Rooftops. Chees reminded me of this map.

Also I am seeing two issues on server. I didn't speak it on server, but I notice players now shoot grav through walls and also on DXMP_Cargoyard, some nublets like to find the gap in the player blocks and go beyond them, making it almost impossible to see them and kill them, yet allowing them to jump and snipe over the blocks.

I noticed that DXSG_CMD and DXSG_Orbital are pretty popular. It's making me think I should add more ways into the spaceships.

When I have finished moving house, I will attempt to get hardware/data sorted and tackle these maps which need editing.

Best Altfire experiences for me are DXMP_Altfire_Prodigy, DXMP_Command_Post, DXSG_CMD_VI, personally I would be tempted to focus the ALTFIRE experience and have fewer maps to choose from, like say five DXSG maps along side ten (max) normal maps, with one or two smaller maps to mix up the action.

Not sure if Cathedral is special enough to have on the maplist, and perhaps Silly Fortress could be cut.

I completely disagree with you Chin for one simple reason, it's unworkable, with so many mappers and different kinds of maps around, you can't decide for other people, because you're just one person and there are so many different views. You don't give any reason for having a small list, just it seems like you want to remove everyone's maps. If focus is your goal, then Command_Post and Cargoyard are not really suitable maps, but you would remove Rooftops and Cybris and host Cargoyard. It doesn't make sense at all.

In plain English, who am I, you or Noodz to remove Mantra's last map and gift to altfire. Rooftops as well, it's a legendary map that Ketchup made and one of the best player maps ever made, besides being arguably the best DXMS map, if you ignore Scoutz and Spirit, which are more like RTKM maps. DXPZ Cybris is unprotected too, it's there for people to see what is possible and learn from it. I would re-add this and I would re-add Rooftops, Canyon_Base, even Amtrak, Abandoned and Pacman if people are still crying for them.
As Krisz once said "who are we to say"... he's completely right, it's not for you or me to decide, but the players. Again for that reason I would leave SillyFortress, it's like his one and only contribution to the servers and it's got humour, which is largely absent in every one else's maps. Seeing it from all angles than just playability.

What I would do, is make sure the vote isn't alphabetical and that maps can't repeat.

Currently I find it playable and massively enjoyable, but sometimes a bit stale when it's either CMD/Orbital or Prodigy/Cargoyard in constant cycle. It would be great if you couldn't vote like prodigy/ other / prodigy / other for example, that the vote forces a third map or second choice, if a map showed up in every other vote. I don't see any logical or workable way to have a small map list, it is just massively narrowing the options for players and making the mapping community competitive too. I'm done getting upset about this, but I will give my opinion in threads like this, I know I am right, these additions are getting voted and people are enjoying them, it makes no sense to have a small list or for one or two clan members to be deciding on the quality or appropriateness of fellow or past mappers works. It can't work and it should be obvious.

It forces me to compete and challenge with this approach, because right now I am about to ADD maps to altfire, such as Prodigy edit, Bioweapon, DXSG_Nexus, I hadn't imagined some other mapper would be deciding what altfire work I can show and what I can't, 5 sg maps and 10 other maps doesn't even cover the current number of mappers in DX that have made an altfire map.

I think you've addressed two equally important, but fundamentally different issues. The problem is that you can't solve them both in the same time.

On one hand you're trying to make sure that the pool of maps we have is structured based on what players enjoy and vote for the most. And on the other hand you're also trying to have maps in the pool that were made by contemporary mappers as a sign of respect for their efforts, which is completely legit and I support this idea. As a veteran mapper you know this better than anyone: sometimes you might end up spending weeks or months working on a map and upon release find that players never really play it. This might also make you feel that your time has gone to waste in a sense, obviously no one likes that.

I personally think that a possible solution is having a much larger map selection than we have now. We have to bring back maps that we know were popular, regardless of how much we may dislike them (who are we to say, right?) and in the same time advertise new releases and have them available on the server.

I'd also suggest introducing an announcer system that sends automatic messages in chat, perhaps every 5 minutes during each game. For example: "DXMP_Orbital_V341 has just been released! Try it out now!" The announcer would be updated simultaneously with the map pool itself so it wouldn't be a lot of extra work, yet it might actually grant a lot more exposure to fresh maps.

I think one way we've been trying to 'force' people to play new maps was by making the map pool smaller and thus making sure that some day, someone is going to be playing the new releases. I think that's not the right way to go about it, instead we should probably include old favorites as well as fresh things in order to keep people interested. You are right. Pacman is coming back.

~[FGS]SaSQuATcH~ wrote:On one hand you're trying to make sure that the pool of maps we have is structured based on what players enjoy and vote for the most. And on the other hand you're also trying to have maps in the pool that were made by contemporary mappers as a sign of respect for their efforts, which is completely legit and I support this idea. As a veteran mapper you know this better than anyone: sometimes you might end up spending weeks or months working on a map and upon release find that players never really play it. This might also make you feel that your time has gone to waste in a sense, obviously no one likes that.

To be honest it's simple marketing. If you host 10 maps, it takes a player very little time to know them inside out, if you host 100 maps, there's a reason for players to spend more time on the server.

There isn't much incentive to map for altfire, if it means you have to make a fight with other players to get it hosted either. Other mods have barely 2-10 maps, but altfire has a really large number of maps. Also by not restricting opportunities, there's no conflict, no biatching, no need for politics. Also it takes the pressure off one person. I've done it, Chinny's done it and Noodz has done it, sat there and tried to balance the list or trial an experiment on altfire, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. It really is better letting the players decide, I can see how it is impossible for one or even 3 people to be 100% correct.

I agree with everything you are saying, but I was partly referring to maps that for whatever reason never got hosted or got removed by someone, for whatever reason, despite regular interest and comments about that map.

We have to bring back maps that we know were popular, regardless of how much we may dislike them (who are we to say, right?) and in the same time advertise new releases and have them available on the server.

You took the words out of my mouth, you said them years ago to me during an argument, but you are totally right, "who are we". It's a good point about marketing, I can help there, rejoin the FB group and can run the moddb page we have.

The way we record popularity could/should be recording votes in total, not just which maps won votes. Also my other frustration is that not enough time is given to map testing. Bladerunner flopped on release, but look at it now. I can think of DXMP maps like this.

I'd also suggest introducing an announcer system that sends automatic messages in chat, perhaps every 5 minutes during each game. For example: "DXMP_Orbital_V341 has just been released! Try it out now!" The announcer would be updated simultaneously with the map pool itself so it wouldn't be a lot of extra work, yet it might actually grant a lot more exposure to fresh maps.

Very true, I can see with a big list, people need to know where the new stuff is. I think the announcer could tell people how to vote and other basics of the console and I think like you said, it has to be done via forums, social media and all channels.

Obviously there is a reality of people's time and energy for upload and I wasn't trying to start any argument or complaint, but I do miss these maps definitely. I'm not saying maps should never be removed, but I find players are repeat voting two maps and not interested in any others.

The ideal in fact would be to have 12 maplists and rotate the maplists on a monthly basis, this would keep players hooked all year round. Unfortunately players are likely to vote maps with vac in the spawn and maps like Prodigy/Abandoned/ constantly.

I would debate imposing mapping rules or issuing guides like "no vac available in spawns", "must have ammo crates on roofs", "must have medbots and medkits plenty", "does not need biocells or repairbots", "environment must block player at edges"

would love to recode bio rifle to have no effect on your team at all and recode grav rifle not to kill through walls. Gravity-world right? I love Orbital and the things you can do with a grav-rifle, but the downside is vac in the spawn and some nublet shooting you through the walls.... and dare I mention Devastator, I presume removed due to noobination?

I could be wrong on all this, but that's my opinion, it's like a museum with few visitors, because the art is all locked underground.

~[FGS]SaSQuATcH~ wrote:Pacman is coming back.

It is?

ShadowRunner wrote:What I would do, is make sure the vote isn't alphabetical and that maps can't repeat.

You got a point there. That's what I'm planning to do for years already.. a new mapvote with a kind of score system, where each map receives some score points when getting voted.
Each mapchange reduces the score of all maps by one score point.
Maps can just be voted, if the current score of the desired map is zero.

Well, a lack of time and desire avoided this to get done yet.

We all think differently to one another, although we do share some common ground here and there. I do have reservations about long map lists however and these are shared by some of our current server hosters. I guess the problem is with a large maplist most people will not even bother to vote, put off by the selection perhaps. It would be amazing to have a small picture alongside the map in the mapvote window.

Edit: Just noticed a larger map list in one of the servers which surprised me.

Is there anything that exists that sorta does a random lottery draw for choosing a map? no voting just pure random, but a good random that produces few hourly repeats, so the order of rotation is different continuously.

Yea I think call of duty does that

Actually, DX supports that too.
At the config section [DeusEx.dxmaplist], you can specify a property called CycleType.
If you set the property value to 1, the map order will be random.

Mind that a full random map cycle allows the possibility of two out of three 'random' maps being identical and that's something we suggest should not be the case.

Meh.. I've been trying to figure out the intrinsic sense of your post for the past 6 hours and I'm still uncertain what you mean.

I was very high when I wrote it.
What I meant was that COD seems to use a random cycle of maps but it's a controlled random, it doesn't allow repetition, which means you can't play play map A, then B, then A again (two out of three of those maps are the same, ye?).

Or in short, a randomly determined order to cycle through.

ie. 5 maps, order could be 3,2,5,4,1 and that would repeat indefinitely

I ran the 0 augs server for many months with a map cycle, most people enjoyed the cycle as often too few maps are ever voted. No matter what you do people will complain however, even when you bend over backwards!