A Plea for More Balance on Vanilla

[johnny]

I'm making this plea not just in my own interest but also in behalf of the regulars (what few are left) on vanilla.

I think it's fair to say that things a bit out of hand with the addition of maps to the rotation, to such an extent that vanilla maps--or those that were added way back when and could therefore be considered, on tastyspleen anyway, to be vanilla maps--are now in the minority on this server. I was just on there when the map changed to colour; I typed "nextmap" and saw that the next 10 (TEN!) maps--and possibly more, but 10 was all that was shown--were maps that have were added last year, presumably in the interest of making vanilla more attractive and to get some mutant maps a bit of exposure to players who might enjoy them but who don't know anything about them because mutant is for all intents and purposes dead.

The addition of these maps has done nothing to attract people to vanilla; indeed, I would argue that it has driven people away. And if you think about it, adding maps from mutant doesn't seem like a very good idea: few people play at mutant anymore, perhaps because of the maps? (I don't know, but there's some reason it is so underutilized.) I don't see how adding those maps (that people apparently don't want to play)--and other non-vanilla maps--would attract people to the (ahem) VANILLA server.

Another problem is the requirement for a certain number of active players for certain maps to come up. While I think it was a good effort to prevent very large maps from coming up when there few players on the server, it has further skewed the map rotation toward non-vanilla maps. Here's just one of many examples: The other day I was playing on vanilla with about five other players. I saw that an old favorite of mine, mine3 (yes, I know others hate it), was due up next. But when the map change came, it wasn't mine3 because there weren't enough "active" players (more on that in a sec). Which I guess would be okay but for the fact that the map that did come up (non-vanilla) was every bit as large, if not larger, than mine3.

About the "active" player requirement: I gather that "active" is defined as a player who has scored a frag in the past minute or two (I know it's something like that). That seems a bit harsh, especially for newbs like me, who might go several minutes without getting a frag, and I am hardly the sole newb on vanilla.  Also, it doesn't take into account a player who has just joined or who has had to step away from the game for a minute or two. As much as I appreciate the effort to prevent unsuitable maps from coming up, I would like to ask that the "active player" requirement be either done away with or modified to make it less draconian. And while I'm at it, I hasten to add I appreciate everything you do, even if it is merely to read this post and decide to blow it off. 

I have no problem with many of these maps; some have been a welcome addition. But could we perhaps relegate them to being available on request rather than being part of the rotation? Or at least some of them to restore more of a balance between vanilla and non-vanilla maps? (A poll would likely be in order here, though if such a poll were undertaken, greater weight should be given to vanilla regulars or former vanilla regulars. I must say that the people requesting the addition of those maps are scarcely to be seen on vanilla.) Again, I think adding that many "new" maps to the rotation has not had its intended effect--quite the contrary.

Failing that, could vanilla2 be set up be like the vanilla server of, say, 18 months ago, with the same map rotation, same maps available for mymapping, same time limit, same frag limit?

Finally, thanks again for all you do, and please feel free to ignore this request!

Cheers,

johnny

P.S. Sorry for the shitty composition/typos/etc. here, but I'm doing this on my phone on a truncated lunch hour!

[quadz]

Aloha,

About the "active" player requirement: I gather that "active" is defined as a player who has scored a frag in the past minute or two (I know it's something like that). That seems a bit harsh, especially for newbs like me, who might go several minutes without getting a frag, and I am hardly the sole newb on vanilla.

Just to correct this perception up front: "active" status includes both frags and deaths. So a player simply needs to be active on the map, part of the fray. If you're fragging, or being fragged, you're active.

 

I was just on there when the map changed to colour; I typed "nextmap" and saw that the next 10 (TEN!) maps--and possibly more, but 10 was all that was shown--were maps that have were added last year

Ah. I'll bet that's where dm1-8 were recently removed from the rotation. Initially, I'd intended to interleave the new maps into the classic rotation: classic-new-classic-new-classic-new... But over time it's drifted a bit, and the recent removal of dm1-8 would indeed have left a lengthy span of customs in a row.

I saw that an old favorite of mine, mine3 (yes, I know others hate it), was due up next. But when the map change came, it wasn't mine3 because there weren't enough "active" players (more on that in a sec). Which I guess would be okay but for the fact that the map that did come up (non-vanilla) was every bit as large, if not larger, than mine3.

Based on the rotation, I'm guessing the one that played was ranbase2.

There's indeed quite a disparity between the two in the current config:

wallfly/config/map_settings.cfg:set maps/mine3/minclients 8
wallfly/config/map_settings.cfg:set maps/ranbase2/minclients 4


All else aside, I'm more than happy to receive suggestions for improving these values. They're the result of my going through about 900 maps, rapidly, and making my best guess. No doubt several could use some adjustment.

The addition of these maps has done nothing to attract people to vanilla; indeed, I would argue that it has driven people away. And if you think about it, adding maps from mutant doesn't seem like a very good idea: few people play at mutant anymore, perhaps because of the maps?

This may be a distinction without a difference (in the present context), but generally mutant maps are allowed all manner of custom textures and environments; whereas those on vanilla are typically restricted to the stock texture set. So that distinction was generally maintained when adding new maps to vanilla.

But in any case, to the general point:

Vanilla is my favorite Q2 server, and is the first place I connect when launching the game.

A few years back, the player base seemed to reach some critical threshold, where Vanilla went from being populated most any time day or night, to being populated only in spurts during the day, and then emptying out. And it seemed to me it was most likely to empty out when the rotation switched to a map whose size exceeded whatever the active players were willing to deal with.

For me, an ideal solution feels like it would be to find a configuration that remains as much like classic Vanilla as possible while the player count is high, but which adapts dynamically to lower player counts by switching to maps suited to fewer players.

Adding map-skipping based on active players was an attempt toward that end, but it has the side-effect that the rotation has to be loaded up with extra maps that end up being played regardless—even if the player count is high enough to sustain purely classic Vanilla maps.

So it was definitely a partial/imperfect solution.

But I'm inclined to agree the Vanilla rotation probably has an excess of custom maps at this point.

My inclination might be to try stripping it down to the classic Vanilla maps, plus a subset of small customs that are time-tested and well-liked, distributed sparsely throughout the rotation, to provide a "fallback" for when the player count is too low for larger maps.

(I'm also happy to try reducing the "minclients" value on any maps where it seems set too high, such as mine3, etc.)

Here's the current Vanilla rotation (with the dm1-8 maps recently removed.)

hangar1 rene24 corn3 lab dmpak2_3 paradm4 command stellar aerowalk strike johnnydm4 city1 fury 4u2map15 boss1 japang boss2 ven_dm2 torment dakyneq2 fact3 bugdm5 hardange colour unrdm1 semper06 wasted pandm8 uultrav kolddm3 daf2dm1 arma5 dkshaft xldm5 subzero giftdm6 apq2dm1 campgrounds tastydm2 campcity ware1 grunt ware2 grom_dm3 jail2 ohmdm3 bloodrun mintro corn2 mine1 rene51 4u2map12a mine2 worn ztn2dm3 mine3 ranbase2 frdm3 fact1 ztn2dm4 power2 q2rdm13 trdm04a waste1 hammer waste2 match1 ztn2dm2 waste3 rvndm1 biggun knuckledm1 redyard

I'll try making a pass through it and reducing it to mostly classic maps, with some fallbacks for low player count. (Everything will still be available via mymap.)


Regards,

quadz

[quadz]

OK, here's an attempt a new Vanilla rotation:

base1 base2 japang base3 stellar bunk1 ware1 ware2 aerowalk jail1 jail2 campcity jail3 hardange jail4 jail5 security campgrounds mintro mine1 mine2 ztn2dm3 mine3 mine4 fact1 tastydm2 fact2 corn2 power1 power2 frdm3 cool1 waste1 knuckledm1 waste2 ztn2dm2 waste3 biggun hangar1 corn3 hangar2 torment lab command strike rene24 city1 city2 dmpak2_3 city3 grunt boss1 boss2 train grom_dm3 fact3 space q2rdm13

This is the classic single player maps rotation, with a couple categories of custom maps interleaved:

Fallback maps for when player count is low: stellar aerowalk hardange campgrounds ztn2dm3 tastydm2 frdm3 ztn2dm2 torment rene24 grunt grom_dm3

Plus a few larger customs, if player count is high enough: japang campcity corn2 corn3 knuckledm1 dmpak2_3 q2rdm13

I guess we can see how this plays, in practice. (Feedback welcome.)

[johnny]

Thank you so much! I really like what you have come up with, and I hope it translates into more vanilla activity.

Also, thanks for clearing up my misconception re: "active" status.

And of course, thanks for all the hard work you put into providing a place for us all to play!

[johnny]

OK, here's an attempt a new Vanilla rotation:

base1 base2 japang base3 stellar bunk1 ware1 ware2 aerowalk jail1 jail2 campcity jail3 hardange jail4 jail5 security campgrounds mintro mine1 mine2 ztn2dm3 mine3 mine4 fact1 tastydm2 fact2 corn2 power1 power2 frdm3 cool1 waste1 knuckledm1 waste2 ztn2dm2 waste3 biggun hangar1 corn3 hangar2 torment lab command strike rene24 city1 city2 dmpak2_3 city3 grunt boss1 boss2 train grom_dm3 fact3 space q2rdm13

This is the classic single player maps rotation, with a couple categories of custom maps interleaved:

Fallback maps for when player count is low: stellar aerowalk hardange campgrounds ztn2dm3 tastydm2 frdm3 ztn2dm2 torment rene24 grunt grom_dm3

Plus a few larger customs, if player count is high enough: japang campcity corn2 corn3 knuckledm1 dmpak2_3 q2rdm13

I guess we can see how this plays, in practice. (Feedback welcome.)

On second look, there are some real vanilla maps that real server-clearers that I think had been removed from the rotation at some point: mine1, jail 1, train, and space are the ones that spring immediately to mind.

Any chance of pulling those out for request only?

Thanks!

[quadz]

On second look, there are some real vanilla maps that real server-clearers that I think had been removed from the rotation at some point: mine1, jail 1, train, and space are the ones that spring immediately to mind.

It's a bit of an experiment, now that we've got the minclients capability.

For example, it will skip train unless there are 10 active players. I'm curious how that will work out. (If it still manages to clear a full server, then, we can remove it again. Same with maps like fact2, hangar2, etc.)

[johnny]

On second look, there are some real vanilla maps that real server-clearers that I think had been removed from the rotation at some point: mine1, jail 1, train, and space are the ones that spring immediately to mind.

It's a bit of an experiment, now that we've got the minclients capability.

For example, it will skip train unless there are 10 active players. I'm curious how that will work out. (If it still manages to clear a full server, then, we can remove it again. Same with maps like fact2, hangar2, etc.)

Sounds great--thanks!