===[TASK]=== Splitting Maps to only showcase the "best"

[Sturm]

On 4/7/2019 at 11:53 PM, Sturm said:

Hi everybody! After all these excellent updates from the various artists, inside this game community,  maybe it's time for a task force to update the game maps? Maybe also to review the various old maps and.. eliminate some of them?! I believe that the most recent quality parameter for maps is higher than the parameter adopted during the game development primordium.

Hi again! Seeing that the idea above seems to have been well accepted, how about opening a specific ==Task== topic for this? I, particularly, do not feel comfortable for such a task, I am just a novice bard, lol. But I am sure there are experienced players and developers who, along with the community, may try to establish some principles and parameters for good maps and clean up the map base. Sometimes less is more.

[nani]

1 hour ago, Sturm said:

Hi again! Seeing that the idea above seems to have been well accepted, how about opening a specific ==Task== topic for this? I, particularly, do not feel comfortable for such a task, I am just a novice bard, lol. But I am sure there are experienced players and developers who, along with the community, may try to establish some principles and parameters for good maps and clean up the map base. Sometimes less is more.

Removing old maps sounds wrong, placing them under an "old" filter  would suffice. Not like they weight much anyway

[Sturm]

4 minutes ago, nani said:

Removing old maps sounds wrong, placing them under an "old" filter  would suffice. Not like they weight much anyway

Obviously, I find much value in the past work of the community, but I disagree that all work dedicated to the game should remain "ad eternum" on the vanilla version. It seems to me not only desirable but something to be expected in the context of collaborative work. We could have a repository of maps to be downloaded, but the vanilla version of the game should be curated, refining the maps with each new version.

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

4 hours ago, Sturm said:

Obviously, I find much value in the past work of the community, but I disagree that all work dedicated to the game should remain "ad eternum" on the vanilla version. It seems to me not only desirable but something to be expected in the context of collaborative work. We could have a repository of maps to be downloaded, but the vanilla version of the game should be curated, refining the maps with each new version.

I am very much in favor of streamlining the maps in the game. There are currently 90 random maps in the game, of extremely varying quality. Many of them don't really follow any kind of theme, some are generic, some are specific, some are "novelty" maps. I'd rather a game have 10 supremely high quality random maps, than 90 random maps that are "all over the map" in quality and theme, lol. That's not to say that the game should only have 10, but 10 amazing maps would be better than 1000 mediocre maps.

Ideally, each map should represent the game at its best. New players booting up a map that looks and plays bad would not bode well for the rest of the map set as far as setting expectations. Part of the problem is that the maps can only (understandably) use the assets that the game provides and the assets themselves vary in quality too. It would be great to go back and either (preferably) update or (unfortunately) eliminate some older legacy assets which are just not up to snuff, then adjust the map scripts accordingly. Some kind of overhaul is needed, definitely.

Discussion can be had about how to organize the maps too. Novelty maps, like Snowflake Searocks I think should be organized separately from maps which are highly focused on the game's themes like Jebel Barkal. Just to name a quibble.

Sorry, went on a tangent. Hopefully I didn't annoy anybody like @elexis

Edited April 10, 2019 by wowgetoffyourcellphone

[Sundiata]

+1 for iterative updates to maps... (Which is already being done to a degree by people like elexis and his random maps). It's just not a one man job. Scenario maps could even be updated by interested community members (I can't because Atlas is bugged out on mac, always has been for me, on 2 different macs)...  

Systematically updating the poorest looking assets is a sure way of improving what we already have. No need to delete maps if they can be improved upon. But some maps really do need a lot of improving (more than just assets)... I think all "standard" skirmish and random maps should always pursue the highest level of naturalism feasible. All fantasy/novelty maps should be purged from the main lists, and get their own fantasy category. A lot of people can't stand those kind of maps, myself included.

Shouldn't "random maps" be called "procedural maps"? The term "random" is very confusing actually... 

I don't think alpha 24 is happening any time soon, so it actually offers an opportunity to the artists for a larger scale update. I'm personally trying my best, but I work so slowly... Should be able to do a few assets though... 

PS: take care of what maps are at the top of the lists, because of the alphabetical order. How many more times do I need to watch a youtube vid of a newbie playing Acropolis bay??? The first map people play should be one of the best looking ones (first impressions matter!). Perhaps with the new cliffs Acropolis bay could be really improved, but I'm honestly even bored of the name... After so many years, let another map take the top position please. 

Also, some of the map previews are really unnecessarily ugly. Like Guadalquivir for example... Why??? lol... It's like deliberate poor advertising, lol... 

Spoiler

Map preview:

 

Actual map (free to use this as preview if someone feels compelled):

 

 

Edited April 10, 2019 by Sundiata

[Nescio]

7 minutes ago, Sundiata said:

PS: take care of what maps are at the top the lists, because of the alphabetical order. How many more times do I need to watch a youtube vid of a newbie playing Acropolis bay??? The first map people play should be one of the best looking ones (first impressions matter!). Perhaps with the new cliffs Acropolis bay could be really improved, but I'm honestly even bored of the name... After so many years, let another map take the top position please.  

Or just make random maps the default.

[Stan`]

19 minutes ago, Nescio said:

Or just make random maps the default

Doesn't seem like a good idea, not all random maps are good in an artistic sense.

27 minutes ago, Sundiata said:

Shouldn't "random maps" be called "procedural maps"? The term "random" is very confusing actually... 

Well actually it should be random/procedural  They are random because of the seed, and procedural in the way they are generated.

27 minutes ago, Sundiata said:

Also, some of the map previews are really unnecessarily ugly. Like Guadalquivir for example... Why??? lol... It's like deliberate poor advertising, lol... 

Well it's old... Also worth noting, the art department is more active now than it has been in the past 5 years.

2 hours ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

If some of these can just be updated, then boom, a lot of the maps that use them automatically look a ton better. Same goes for the existing terrain textures. 

I have a few things in my eyecandy mod but I need to improve my skills more... https://github.com/0ADMods/eyecandy

6 hours ago, Sturm said:

Obviously, I find much value in the past work of the community, but I disagree that all work dedicated to the game should remain "ad eternum" on the vanilla version. It seems to me not only desirable but something to be expected in the context of collaborative work. We could have a repository of maps to be downloaded, but the vanilla version of the game should be curated, refining the maps with each new version.

Well it's actually not the case, if I had more hands I'd do some improvements over some building assets. The issue is there is no one working on skirmish maps. @niektb was the last one, and he is now retired. If @wowgetoffyourcellphone wants to propose some updates to the existing non random maps, I guess I can review them.

By the way wow what do you think of the last berry bushes by bigtiger ?

Remind me I need to package @Bigtiger's mod with his permission to include the new biome in the game.

[elexis]

2 hours ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

10 amazing maps would be better than 100 mediocre maps

That would leave the best impression for a player who plays 10 maps. But we also want to keep players entertained for as long as we can. The ones who suffer from 0addiction cycle through all of them.

A map downloader be sufficient for multiplayer, but I wonder if we still shouldn't distribute them for singleplayer.

A mapfilter might do already for the existing maps. Or even better would be improving all of the maps to be as beautiful as the best 10 best maps. It's not only weirdo maps like Polar Sea or Survival of the Fittest that you refer to but for example also maps that don't look so nice but still relate to the games themes like Anatolian Plateau or Belgian Uplands.

So perhaps the fastest way to achieve your goal would be changing the filters this way:

Quote

Best Land Maps

Land Maps

Naval Maps

Trigger Maps

Demo Maps

All maps

?

[Nescio]

36 minutes ago, stanislas69 said:

Doesn't seem like a good idea, not all random maps are good in an artistic sense.

Then simply remove the sub-standard maps from the default filter.

[elexis]

I always proponed to rename "Default" to "Land maps", that's what it's actually filtering for IIRC.

If you remove ugly maps from the "Default" filter, then there's no more "Land" filter, but there is clearly demand for that filter. (That's why I had proposed to add a new filter above.)

 

Edit: Filters could also become checkboxes. ([x] Ugly, [x] Land, [X] Naval [x] Scripted [x] Demo)

Edited April 10, 2019 by elexis

[Stan`]

2 hours ago, Nescio said:

Then simply remove the sub-standard maps from the default filter.

If you want to review them, be my guest

 

[Nescio]

1 hour ago, elexis said:

I always proponed to rename "Default" to "Land maps", that's what it's actually filtering for IIRC.

Some default maps have a lot of water, though (e.g. Gulf of Bothnia).

1 hour ago, elexis said:

If you remove ugly maps from the "Default" filter, then there's no more "Land" filter, but there is clearly demand for that filter. (That's why I had proposed to add a new filter above.)

More filters would be nice. Ideally players ought to be able to create custom filters as well.

1 hour ago, elexis said:

Edit: Filters could also become checkboxes. ([x] Ugly, [x] Land, [X] Naval [x] Scripted [x] Demo)

That would certainly be an improvement.

1 hour ago, stanislas69 said:

If you want to review them, be my guest

Well, I don't know what you consider “good in an artistic sense” or “ugly”.

For me, (AI) playability is more important than aesthetics. Personally I think the majority of the default maps is quite decent, although I dislike:

• trigger maps (Danubius, Extinct Vulcano, Jebel Barkal, Polar Sea, Survival of the Fittest)
• square maps (Latium, Phoenician Levant)
• condensed real world maps (Marmara, Mediterranean, Red Sea)
• artificial maps (Canyon, Gear, Harbour, Snowflake Searocks)
• maps with little resources (e.g. Anatolian Plateau, Atlas Mountains)

[EDIT] Perhaps the last couple of posts (starting with https://wildfiregames.com/forum/index.php?/topic/25431-task-trees/page/8/&tab=comments#comment-372418 ?) ought to be split off into a separate discussion.

 

Edited April 10, 2019 by Nescio
maps != trees

[elexis]

2 minutes ago, Nescio said:

Some default maps have a lot of water, though (e.g. Gulf of Bothnia).

The definition of Naval maps is that enemies can only be reached by building ships. On Gulf Of Bothnia, ships are an alternative to land warfare.

You won't find a map under Naval where you can attack the enemies via land, at least if you play them the way they are intended to (english channel, corsica, ... one team per island/continent).

4 minutes ago, Nescio said:

square maps (Latium, Phoenician Levant) 

Square maps are deprecated in Atlas, although I guess Pyrogenesis RTS engine should always support them if it wants to be an RTS engine.

Last alpha many square maps became circular, those 2 are the only ones where I don't know how they could work on circular maps without changing the way they were designed. Square maps have 27% more map area than circular maps of the same size, this changes gameplay drastically.

8 minutes ago, Nescio said:

• trigger maps (Danubius, Extinct Vulcano, Jebel Barkal, Polar Sea, Survival of the Fittest) 
• square maps (Latium, Phoenician Levant) 
• condensed real world maps (Marmara, Mediterranean, Red Sea) 
• artificial maps (Canyon, Gear, Harbour, Snowflake Searocks) 
• maps with little resources (e.g. Anatolian Plateau, Atlas Mountains) 

Atlas Mountains doesn't have few resorces. Canyon isn't much more unnaturally appearing than the other maps, is it? Mainland, any of the maps with random hills etc.

I wouldn't know how to distinguish naturally looking from unnaturally looking maps with tags.

Ratumacos is a realworld map, but not condensed?

We can let players add their own tags, but the question is which maps we should hide from new players by default.

So perhaps it should be a "Best maps" category for the 10 or 20 best maps, and then if players like the game and want to play more than that, they can chose the other filters (but which filters are to be provided).

[Nescio]

7 minutes ago, elexis said:

Canyon isn't much more unnaturally appearing than the other maps, is it?

Yes, it is. Canyon has broad, straight roads connecting each one's starting position and the map centre.

8 minutes ago, elexis said:

Ratumacos is a realworld map, but not condensed? 

Kerala, one of my favourites, is also a real world map; that's not the issue. The problem with Marmara, Mediterranean, and Red Sea is that too large an area is squeezed into a map, with a result that channels disappear or are too narrow for ships, even on giant; e.g. the Bosporus:

15 minutes ago, elexis said:

We can let players add their own tags, but the question is which maps we should hide from new players by default.

So perhaps it should be a "Best maps" category for the 10 or 20 best maps, and then if players like the game and want to play more than that, they can chose the other filters (but which filters are to be provided).

Default maps should include those that are perfectly playable on single player.

“Best maps” sounds subjective, although I suppose such a filter wouldn't hurt, provided it isn't the default.

[Stan`]

Topic was split.

[elexis]

38 minutes ago, Nescio said:

Yes, it is. Canyon has broad, straight roads connecting each one's starting position and the map centre.

I think the point is about regularities that would not occur in nature. For example the perfectly symmtrical islands and ring on Gear. But roads are manmade, and men can also can create small passages between the canyon. The regularity / radial symmetry is observable on most maps. So at least it may be difficult to draw a line.

42 minutes ago, Nescio said:

1 hour ago, elexis said:

Ratumacos is a realworld map, but not condensed? 

Kerala, one of my favourites, is also a real world map; that's not the issue. 

With realworld map I didn't mean the portrayed location, but the fact that it uses a NASA heightmap.

43 minutes ago, Nescio said:

The problem with Marmara, Mediterranean, and Red Sea is that too large an area is squeezed into a map, with a result that channels disappear or are too narrow for ships, even on giant; e.g. the Bosporus: 

It's not a problem to players who check from the map presented to them whether there is passability, rather than people expecting passability from the geographic design.

I guess you are right however, there contradiction that the map design says the map shall reflect the terrain accurately while the realworld terrain has this distinct quality of being passable to ships there, and that this is a quality lost by downscaling (whereas the shape of the terrain is not lost when downscaling).

Which would mean adding passages, but that would falsify the terrain shape. So it will be a tradeoff.

48 minutes ago, Nescio said:

Default maps should include those that are perfectly playable on single player. 

Last time I checked in multilpayer and singleplayer I could play the same way.

And I suppose we don't want to provide a list that is intentionally false in any case.

People in the past have decided that naval maps should not be listed by default - probably because players start with the expectation of starting a land warfare game and don't want to find out after starting the game that they started a naval map unintentionally.

Regardless whether it's a good choice, I think the filter labels must be clear - "Default" doesn't tell you anything what's in there, "Land" does. (We wouldn't be discussing now what the purpose of that filter was if it had been labeled more precisely.)

Map quality is determined by both gameplay and aesthetics, so if we want to sort out the ugly and the weird, we should find a good wording for that.

And I suppose it won't be possible without changing the Dropdown to Checkboxes to satisfy the "beautiful" maps by default and "land" maps by default at the same time.

[coworotel]

2 hours ago, elexis said:

Filters could also become checkboxes. ([x] Ugly, [x] Land, [X] Naval [x] Scripted [x] Demo)

[coworotel]

19 minutes ago, elexis said:

Map quality is determined by both gameplay and aesthetics, so if we want to sort out the ugly and the weird, we should find a good wording for that.

What about "realistic" for maps that are not "weird" (like gear or snowlflake)?

[Gurken Khan]

1 hour ago, Nescio said:

“Best maps” sounds subjective, although I suppose such a filter wouldn't hurt, provided it isn't the default.

Maybe it would actually be a good way to go, having a curated list of recommended maps be the default selection.

Stating the type behind the name, eg [Schlumpfhausen (ugly)], could warn people to pick maps of a type they don't want to play.

Then I'd like to have check boxes to include types of maps, and I'd actually like to have it expandable so I can include/exclude certain maps. For example I think some of the naval maps are simply sub-par, or no fun at all to play; like when you hardly have any space to build, but have a civ like Persians who simply need some space for their buildings...

[elexis]

15 minutes ago, Gurken Khan said:

For example I think some of the naval maps are simply sub-par, or no fun at all to play; like when you hardly have any space to build

Mapsize depends on the selected mapsize, unless you're talking about skirmish/scenario maps. Tiny maps are too small for every faction, a gimmick. Also "Normal" is too large for 4 players on many maps and just right for 4 players on other maps, depending on the area covered by water and hills.

Which maps do you mean are sub-par or no fun at all to play? Island maps like Cycladic Archipelago or Islands are designed to have play expand. Other maps like English Channel can be set to large for 8 players, since half of the map area is water.

17 minutes ago, Gurken Khan said:

Schlumpfhausen (ugly)

[Gurken Khan]

19 minutes ago, elexis said:

Also "Normal" is too large for 4 players on many maps and just right for 4 players on other maps, depending on the area covered by water and hills.

My default setting is 'medium'. I don't think it's ideal that the same settings don't lead to the same kind of 'playability'; if I want to play a randomly picked map, I shouldn't have to adjust the settings for a specific map beforehand, since I don't know that this specific map is coming up...

 

20 minutes ago, elexis said:

Which maps do you mean are sub-par or no fun at all to play? Island maps like Cycladic Archipelago or Islands are designed to have play expand. Other maps like English Channel can be set to large for 8 players, since half of the map area is water.

I didn't like Dodecanese; no space to build, no land available where I could place a CC.

Spoiler

I don't like the fake treasures on Cycladic Archipelago. I really strongly dislike that Archipelago always has fish on land.

Spoiler

 

On British Channel I hated the Thames.

Spoiler

It got fish, I can use fishing boats, I intentionally built the harbor as far on shore as possible, but at the end of building a warship I have to find out I can't release it from this port to the sea...

 

And there were maps where I thought my ships should be able to go places, but they weren't. And in combination with having to use the biggest & dumbest units (ships) all the time...

[elexis]

18 minutes ago, Gurken Khan said:

My default setting is 'medium'. I don't think it's ideal that the same settings don't lead to the same kind of 'playability'; if I want to play a randomly picked map, I shouldn't have to adjust the settings for a specific map beforehand, since I don't know that this specific map is coming up...

But when you select "random map", then you want to be surprised whether the map comes with 30% map being water, 20% hills, or 100% land?

For this map-aera problem, one could make it so that the map area relates to the passable map area, not the total map aera, but not sure if that makes it really more expected.

If map authors are good, every map is unique, so the problem can occur with any setting. For example on a map with many hills or water, Regicide is a different deal.

That we have a "random map" item to begin with implies the design principle that random maps adapt to the settings given by the user, not the other way around. It actually has been wished that random maps can restrict the settings that the user can chose, for example requiring a specific victory condition or mapsize. Then "random" won't work anymore without reinventing that (random selection from the maps that support the chosen settings. That has the disadvantage that the user can't predict which maps are subset thereof).

It's not uncommon in multiplayer games to remain for half an hour in the gamesetup stage to make 8 players (and the other 6 players that wanted settings and left again) happy with every possible setting. So anything that will shorten that period without reducing the setting expectance will be benefitial.

26 minutes ago, Gurken Khan said:

I didn't like Dodecanese; no space to build, no land available where I could place a CC. 

Yes, that was bad. I had already removed 20-30% of the forests and there is still too few space. The map author actually said it's the intention of the map that players have to use docks and chop wood. So I still think there is more deforestation necessary before I play that map.

27 minutes ago, Gurken Khan said:

I don't like the fake treasures on Cycladic Archipelago.

They aren't fake. I guess you're asking for tooltip that tells you that you need a merchant to pick it up.

28 minutes ago, Gurken Khan said:

I really strongly dislike that Archipelago always has fish on land. 

Which is just a random bug, that doesn't break the gameplay experience in such a way that it would have to be removed from the "acceptable map" filters.

31 minutes ago, Gurken Khan said:

I can't release it from this port to the sea

That always happens when there is enough space for a dock but too few space + a dock + a ship passing it.

That's the case on about every map that comes with a small river or passages. Might be fixed by making docks not placeable in places where there is only space for a ship. But then players report that as a bug that they can't build a dock there. So eh, not sure what we're supposed to do. Players at least can expect from the size of the ship and the dock that this will be blocking in some areas. For this specific maps the thames can become larger.

33 minutes ago, Gurken Khan said:

biggest & dumbest units (ships) all the time... 

which I suspect is part of the reason why the "Land" filter is the "Default" one. But all of this feedback is feedback for ship and map development, not for the gamesetup filtering, no? English Channel in particular is one of the better than the worse maps IMO.

[Sturm]

Well, all this discussion inevitably suffers from a good deal of subjectivity. But, pls, allow me my "50 cents"

1- As subjective as it may be, it may be good to try to establish at least 3-5 evaluation parameters (not fixed or silly rules) for a good map in order to make the process less subjective. Anybody wanna try?
2- It would be nice to have a parameter of numbers that we want. What would be reasonable to present to the "standard player" inside the vanilla game? Maybe 4 types of maps with about 30 maps each? So, we would be talking about 120 maps, which corresponds to a lot of time of gaming and discoveries ... To me,  90 maps just in the "random maps" is something "over" and not very useful for a new player...

3- I think, and then I do not know the technical difficulties of this, that extra maps should be offered just like the mods, via a "download tab". Perhaps even with the possibility of evaluating them and, over time, migrate the best-ranked maps to the vanilla version.

Edited April 10, 2019 by Sturm

[Gurken Khan]

35 minutes ago, elexis said:

For this map-aera problem, one could make it so that the map area relates to the passable map area, not the total map aera, but not sure if that makes it really more expected.

Might be worth a try.

 

38 minutes ago, elexis said:

Yes, that was bad. I had already removed 20-30% of the forests and there is still too few space. The map author actually said it's the intention of the map that players have to use docks and chop wood. So I still think there is more deforestation necessary before I play that map.

Yeah, I saw that one spot where I could've 'docked & chopped'; but to aim my whole game play to that, only to be able to build a full set of my civ's buildings? 'Luckily' that was one of the games that crashed, so I didn't have to go through with it...

 

42 minutes ago, elexis said:

They aren't fake. I guess you're asking for tooltip that tells you that you need a merchant to pick it up.

So, that's what's up. Good to know!

 

44 minutes ago, elexis said:

That's the case on about every map that comes with a small river or passages. Might be fixed by making docks not placeable in places where there is only space for a ship. But then players report that as a bug that they can't build a dock there. So eh, not sure what we're supposed to do. Players at least can expect from the size of the ship and the dock that this will be blocking in some areas. For this specific maps the thames can become larger.

As a first step the ridiculous size of the ships could be decreased. And maybe I'm just a bit daft, but 'expecting' anything in this regard is always guesswork for me. I wish it would be easier to tell what waters are 'ornamental', and which are navigable; or in this case with the Thames, to what degree they are navigable.

 

58 minutes ago, elexis said:

which I suspect is part of the reason why the "Land" filter is the "Default" one. But all of this feedback is feedback for ship and map development, not for the gamesetup filtering, no?

If we are talking about picking maps from the material we've got, it's both?

 

 

[Nescio]

How and where are the map filters defined actually?