Custom Map Feedback Weekend

Frozen

This stemming from the recent custom maps thread is just an idea I had that I didn't want to have drowned in the thread. I'm really not sure what the effort level would be for development, but my intuition is that it isn't very high.

Why don't we try to set up a small project with the PDT where they advertise that the map (ns2_ayumi) needs the communities help and feedback to balance and get ready to go.

With some more effort you could add to the value by having skins (or something smaller/easier) made in theme of the map. Then have special weekends where if you play atleast 10+ rounds lasting 10 or mins with 12 or more players you get a piece of gear for free that you would pay for after. Have x of these weekends and if you play in 10+ such games in each weekend you get a special ayumi icon to display by your name that you can't get any other way.

I don't think it's a groundbreaking idea, and the bulk of the programming effort would appear to be coding this "achievement" nature of the event. The feedback system should obviously be standard but you can really just have a front page link that pops open the steam browser.

Coinciding this with a free weekend(s) or other playtime incentive would be great. Just spitballing this out.

SantaClaws

Sounds like a good initiative to me But I think it would be better to leave the pdt out of it. The community has to stop relying on the pdt for everything. If the pdt wants to contribute, I'm not saying you should refuse it. But don't wait around for the pdt to get on board, that's a poor strategy imo.

Also, keep in mind, if the community itself can successfully raise an event, without the assistance from developers. The developers would have a better incentive to help a repeat of such an event.

So for now, I'd suggest; forget about achievements and skins. Perhaps try and push a draft tournament or a provinggrounds tournament, played on a couple of new maps. And get your favorite community servers to play some custom maps. Convince @HEllrunner2k or @wooza and the like to, just for the weekend, remove the holy map Trinity from the map rotation and replace it with ns2_ayumi ie.

Zavaro

Spark Crafter Collective meets every weekend to play some legit and experimental NS2 maps. You can always hop on by and play some cool games on things like Facility and Uplift. The skin thing requires a lot of work for UWE, and their time is limited and focused elsewhere, but we can still have highly rewarding games with cool feedback from people by participating in SCC or running a custom map pug. I'll make a new post for custom map resources for people to use in the creation channel in a short bit. I think it'd be great to get this stuff more out there.