dc_demonslayer wrote:


Another issue that I plan to bring up later is the frequency of loaded maps. Too many players will vote/play maps that they do so well on and not try other maps that may be more difficult to play -or- does not fit your style of play. With the number of good maps available, playing the same old maps day in and day out just because players are comfortable with them should be tossed out the window.

I do not know the precise number of maps we have on the server but there are over 4,000 different maps available for download.

I keep a list of all the maps here:

http://www.gametracker.com/clan/D-E-K/forum.php?thread=46293

We currently have about 260 invasion maps and around 285 total. The map vote repeat delay is 75, about 25% of available maps. That's a good ratio, I wouldn't go much higher than 35% (100.)

It's a much higher ratio than the old DC setup. I'd have to look up the exact numbers, but there were a lot more maps to choose from, but also a lot of maps that were kind of "meh." I've trimmed down our map list several times, not so much to get rid of bad maps, but because of redirects going down, so I needed to be more selective as to which ones I added back.


EDIT:

I was actually expecting more, but DC had 355 invasion maps and a total of 432 maps.
The mapvote limit was also 75, but only 17% of the available maps.

Sorted by type:

Old DC / New DC
AS 30 / 1
BR 22 / 13
CTF 120 / 44
DM 186 / 186
DOM 27 / 11
ONS 46 / 15
VCTF 1 / 10
TIR 0 / 5


So I'd say we have a better ratio of playable maps. CTF maps were probably the biggest offender in terms of slow/unfun maps.

In addition a number of maps had more than one version that were virtually identical, such as Toys Story, Waisten, AcidPipe, Cutlass, and all the various maps that came in both a CTF and a DOM or BR version, like BridgeOfFate, ElecFields, TwinTombs, UCMP2-Sublimity, etc. I've slimmed it down to just one version in most cases. We do have a few maps like PacMan that can only be played in different game modes (INV and DM) and the various Deck and Campgrounds maps that are all quite different from each other, despite sharing the same basic layouts.

ONS in particular I trimmed down to only small maps since huge maps like Dria and Dawn aren't very fun in DM or Vehicle Invasion modes. I also merged Vehicle Invasion into the regular INV map list, using regular maps that I added vehicles to such as Duality and Bob-bomb Battlefield and VCTF maps. Vehicle invasion on ONS maps was very slow, so I don't think people will miss it in its old form.

I have had one person ask about Monster Assault. I would need to add some AS maps, but I'm not sure how popular that mode was, or if we'd really benefit from bringing it back.

jefejefejefe wrote:

I have had one person ask about Monster Assault. I would need to add some AS maps, but I'm not sure how popular that mode was, or if we'd really benefit from bringing it back.

I would like to see that come back. It was always nice taking a break from regular invasion. It wasn't played much though, so I can understand a decision to remove the game type.
However, it might be possible to make assault better. Problems of note with the old DC Monster Assault were overpowered monsters (low leveled players suffered), poor experience gain (I believe), and Engineers couldn't use constructions. If Monster Assault were improved, it might live on.

I'd like to hear a few more people chime in before I really consider adding in Monster Assault, I believe you were the one person who asked about it.

Also, I'd like to mention that I just glanced through the map list and counted approximately 60 maps that I've edited for one reason or another. This counts maps that I made entirely, maps that I spent 5 minutes fixing bugs on, and everything in between.

One other source of unfun maps were the huge map packs like CBP, UCMP, FP, and others. The maps weren't evaluated on their individual merits, and in most cases it was hard to remember exactly which ones were fun and which were not. That's one reason why we only have a few of those maps, another was due to redirect issues due to the maps sharing common files but those files being slightly different on the old public redirect. There's a few I could see bringing back from each, but the packs had two other things in common: a lot of small "hardcore" DM maps, and a lot of huge CTF maps. These just don't work very well for invasion.

I don't really care for MAS play.