A new map classification system

Feedback & Ideas about Custom Maps.

A new map classification system

Postby Stryde » 30 June 2020, 05:04

APPROVED MAPS
Approved maps are current PB2 maps that have been submitted for approval request and playtested by the map approval team along with other PB2 players.
- gives 5 LDR to mapmaker by default for approved map (up until a certain LDR level)
- affects kills count, deaths count, kdr, skill points (traditional properties of approved maps)
- 1.0 XP & 1.0 skill points given to players (default values)
map examples: any recently approved maps

APPROVED ROTATION MAPS
Approved rotation maps are a combination of recently approved multiplayer maps and other random approved maps
- gives same amount of LDR to mapmaker as an approved map (default is 5 LDR for approved map?)
- affects kills count, deaths count, kdr, skill points (traditional properties of approved maps)
- 1.5 XP (50% more XP given than approved maps) & 1.5 skill points given (50% more skill points given than approved maps) to players
map examples: any recently approved maps

LEGACY MAPS
Legacy maps are old school approved PB2 maps that are still popular and fit for approval/only require slight modifications to be fit for approval. These maps are defined by the number of votes over time, number of plays over time (to a lesser extent) and if map is still fit for approval.

- map must be 4 years old, have x number of votes (x - let's talk about it, minimum 80+ votes?)
- map must be fit for approval requirements OR map must only require slight modifications to obtain legacy map status
- affects kills count, deaths count, kdr, skill points (traditional properties of approved maps)
- gives same amount of LDR to mapmaker as an approved map (default is 5 LDR for approved map?)
- 1.5 xp given (50% more XP given than approved maps) & 0.5 skill points given (25% XP given of approved map) for players

LEGACY MAP LIST/MAP EXAMPLES (all of these maps are currently or have previously been approved within the past year):
Spoiler: Show More
max teabag-highrise (map-highrise)
max teabag-arena
max teabag-railwars
max teabag-lab
cahir-area_51
cahir-4_teams
cahir-raywars
cahir-portal
audir8-redlantern
stryde-sniper
stryde-sniper2
stryde-sniper3
stryde-sniper4
alex543-batlefield
dm0
Eric Gurt-dm1
Eric Gurt-railwars1
Eric Gurt-railwars2
Eric Gurt-railwars3
Eric Gurt-ftp1_mp
Eric Gurt-level1_mp
x death-realwar
aslang-fightforthebase
XFrostByteX-towers
XFrostByteX-lasertag
XFrostByteX-snipezone
Krow-district13
Krow-moshpit
Krow-raywars_old
Krow-combat (reworked as map-combat)
Spike Nitros-smb
Spike Nitros-rgn2
132-railwarz
Reject-sgw
Reject-fallen
Rejcet-fallen2
iJer-sector
x D-sniper
Raffine-urbanwar
XnX-railwars
Sphinxz-shotgun

This legacy map list is not a complete list of maps that immediately satisfy the criteria I defined, but these are the maps that would immediately be considered a "legacy map".

====================================================================================================
Summary
Approved maps give 1.0 default XP and 1.0 default skill points to players
Rotation maps give 1.5 XP (50% more XP than approved maps) and 1.5 skill points (50% more skill points than approved maps) to players
Legacy maps give 1.5 XP (50% more XP than approved maps) and 0.5 skill points (50% less skill points than approved maps)

Rotation maps encourage playing on newer, highlighted approved maps that are swapped out on a weekly or bi-weekly basis.
Legacy maps must meet current approval requirements or require minimal modifications to meet current approval requirements and still support past maps of PB2. (This may also make it easier to demarcate and transfer old school popular PB2 maps between PB2 to PB2.5 or PB3).

If possible to define a category of maps from "approved map" and "rotation approved map" with distinction between amount of skill points given and amount of XP given, it seems possible to repeat this with another category to give increased XP but decreased skill points (or potentially no affect on skill points) - a "legacy map" category.
Last edited by Stryde on 30 June 2020, 15:28, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: A new map classification system

Postby mingo1 » 30 June 2020, 05:13

“Outdated” maps still fit for approval go for less skill points but more XP. Dude this is sick.
If people care enough about XP it’ll motivate them to bring the old maps back into the rotation.

Love it!
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Re: A new map classification system

Postby Girl_Power » 30 June 2020, 05:59

I am in favour of this idea.

Love it!
Forever young, ever strong, ever brave.
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Re: A new map classification system

Postby phsc » 30 June 2020, 06:59

I really like this idea, however I see a problem in it, that problem being mostly long term, the values:
-map must be 4 years old, have x number of votes (x - let's talk about it, minimum 80+ votes?)
and the XP and skill points values for each map as well.

My problem with this is that such values are not perfectly balanced and fair to some maps, and they also are not going to work very long term, and the multiplier values can fix that.
So my first suggestion is, instead of 4 years old, what about, being released in the 1st half of PB2s lifetime? or some other value, 4 years is not bad but, that goes back to 2016 which I personally think is kind of new still, for this game, maybe 5? I think years is pretty complicated, game version could work much better for this but I don't think there is really a way to know what version some maps were released in, since the newer features is what I think greatly differs such maps, as well as the impact of such features in map making.
But what about a formula that changes based on the time?
something like 2*XP for maps from 2010-2012, 2012-14 being 1.75, 2014-2016 being 1.5, 2016-2018 being 1.25, or a formula that follows a pattern like that, I also think that starting on 2010 is better than 2011 because of our current year and it is also easier to understand and apply patterns to, as well as how 2011 and 2012 were the true big years for PB2 and kind of putting them over the others, but long term it would become like 2010-2014 which could also express that, mostly with 2013, the pattern could be like original 20% of the game duration giving a 2 multiplier, the 20-40% being a 1.75, etc.
Setting lower limits could also work, instead of capping it at 2 maybe 1.5 is the better value, up to discussion.

Also I don't think votes are a good way of going about it because of how less and less players get to play the game with each year and long term it could be pretty weird, maybe 26 rates? the classical value for giving 3 and something LDR? because a lot of modern approved maps get very little rates and get approved and long term nobody remembers them.
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Re: A new map classification system

Postby Stryde » 30 June 2020, 07:18

Phsc wrote:My problem with this is that such values are not perfectly balanced and fair to some maps, and they also are not going to work very long term, and the multiplier values can fix that.

Legacy map status is meant for old approved PB2 maps that are fit for approval still or require minimal modifications to be fit for approval in todays ranked environment (i.e. adding backgrounds to maps, syncing doors, updating weapons.

Spoiler: Show More
An example of this would be alex543-batlefield and Spike Nitros-smb. Alex543-batlefield was recently unapproved due to glitches being present/outdatedness but will probably be updated, in which case would be put onto the "map" account and made a legacy map. Spike Nitros-smb is already remade and would classify as a legacy map (minor modifications to map were made to fix floating walls by adding backgrounds to them).


Phsc wrote:So my first suggestion is, instead of 4 years old, what about, being released in the 1st half of PB2s lifetime? or some other value, 4 years is not bad but, that goes back to 2016 which I personally think is kind of new still, for this game, maybe 5?

This would be best to provide a hard cutoff for the time scale, but I guess any maps between 2011 and 2015 would be considered for legacy map.

Phsc wrote:something like 2*XP for maps from 2010-2012, 2012-14 being 1.75, 2014-2016 being 1.5, 2016-2018 being 1.25, or a formula that follows a pattern like that, I also think that starting on 2010 is better than 2011 because of our current year and it is also easier to understand and apply patterns to, as well as how 2011 and 2012 were the true big years for PB2 and kind of putting them over the others, but long term it would become like 2010-2014 which could also express that, mostly with 2013, the pattern could be like original 20% of the game duration giving a 2 multiplier, the 20-40% being a 1.75, etc.

This is something that is taking a simple idea and making it overly complicated by assigning different XP rates to what year the map was made. It's hard to track when these old maps were originally made as well.

Phsc wrote:Also I don't think votes are a good way of going about it because of how less and less players get to play the game with each year and long term it could be pretty weird, maybe 26 rates? the classical value for giving 3 and something LDR? because a lot of modern approved maps get very little rates and get approved and long term nobody remembers them.

I think votes are the best way to determine if an old map was popular. Back in 2011-2013, voting on maps was actually very common to do, hence why many maps from the old PB2 era have over 400 votes (see many of Max teabag's maps, my maps, Eric Gurt's maps, Cahir's maps, etc...)
Old school maps had to be playtested and hosted frequently in server before becoming approved. Now, people can create approval requests for brand new maps that have 0 votes. Some new approved maps don't even have more than 5-10 votes while many old school maps had 70-100 votes. This is why modern approved maps have very few ratings on them.
No new maps will ever qualify for a legacy map title either (at least in PB2), so I'm not sure why you are bringing up the point with modern approved maps.

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Re: A new map classification system

Postby phsc » 30 June 2020, 07:33

Stryde wrote:
Phsc wrote:My problem with this is that such values are not perfectly balanced and fair to some maps, and they also are not going to work very long term, and the multiplier values can fix that.

Legacy map status is meant for old approved PB2 maps that are fit for approval still or require minimal modifications to be fit for approval in todays ranked environment (i.e. adding backgrounds to maps, syncing doors, updating weapons.

How is this a reply to what I said? like I got the general idea, but this is not correlated with what I said, but ok.

Phsc wrote:So my first suggestion is, instead of 4 years old, what about, being released in the 1st half of PB2s lifetime? or some other value, 4 years is not bad but, that goes back to 2016 which I personally think is kind of new still, for this game, maybe 5?

This would be best to provide a hard cutoff for the time scale, but I guess any maps between 2011 and 2015 would be considered for legacy map.

This gets to a big problem, the way maps evolve is correlated to updates, not pure time, the real best way to differ old and modern maps that also considers time and PB2 map making advancements is using versions of the game and not years, the problem with a hard value is that, some big update might be released and make everything that came behind it feel really outdated (like the decors update), a hard value might work if we had a period with a ton of updates (like recent times) but not if we have a period without a ton of updates, I actually change my view to using game versions and try to check for time (can staff check for that? really depends on it as well).

Phsc wrote:something like 2*XP for maps from 2010-2012, 2012-14 being 1.75, 2014-2016 being 1.5, 2016-2018 being 1.25, or a formula that follows a pattern like that, I also think that starting on 2010 is better than 2011 because of our current year and it is also easier to understand and apply patterns to, as well as how 2011 and 2012 were the true big years for PB2 and kind of putting them over the others, but long term it would become like 2010-2014 which could also express that, mostly with 2013, the pattern could be like original 20% of the game duration giving a 2 multiplier, the 20-40% being a 1.75, etc.

This is something that is taking a simple idea and making it overly complicated by assigning different XP rates to what year the map was made. It's hard to track when these old maps were originally made as well.

I think making it's inner working complicated is not a problem, just show the values on the map, also what about saying when a map was probably originally released on the map page as well? kind of like accounts (which also does not work well but say it can be wrong for old values and etc.), but yeah this is making it too complicated, true.


Phsc wrote:Also I don't think votes are a good way of going about it because of how less and less players get to play the game with each year and long term it could be pretty weird, maybe 26 rates? the classical value for giving 3 and something LDR? because a lot of modern approved maps get very little rates and get approved and long term nobody remembers them.

I think votes are the best way to determine if an old map was popular. Back in 2011-2013, voting on maps was actually very common to do, hence why many maps from the old PB2 era have over 400 votes (see many of Max teabag's maps, my maps, Eric Gurt's maps, Cahir's maps, etc...)
Old school maps had to be playtested and hosted frequently in server before becoming approved. Now, people can create approval requests for brand new maps that have 0 votes. Some new approved maps don't even have more than 5-10 votes while many old school maps had 70-100 votes. This is why modern approved maps have very few ratings on them.
No new maps will ever qualify for a legacy map title either, so I'm not sure why you are bringing up the point with modern approved maps.

Yes, the problem is that in 4 years in the future, some more modern maps that might be played today will get many less votes than older maps, and until then, more modern maps will also fit the category, this is just because of the total active players of the game, but I actually went to check for some more modern maps that are kind of popular and like, ditzy-uprising has 102 votes, so I guess that value works, but what about maps made these days? I actually have no idea since I don't play approved maps these days but some modern maps do get some play... right?
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Re: A new map classification system

Postby Stryde » 30 June 2020, 07:51

Phsc wrote:Also I don't think votes are a good way of going about it because of how less and less players get to play the game with each year and long term it could be pretty weird, maybe 26 rates? the classical value for giving 3 and something LDR? because a lot of modern approved maps get very little rates and get approved and long term nobody remembers them.

I think votes are the best way to determine if an old map was popular. Back in 2011-2013, voting on maps was actually very common to do, hence why many maps from the old PB2 era have over 400 votes (see many of Max teabag's maps, my maps, Eric Gurt's maps, Cahir's maps, etc...)
Old school maps had to be playtested and hosted frequently in server before becoming approved. Now, people can create approval requests for brand new maps that have 0 votes. Some new approved maps don't even have more than 5-10 votes while many old school maps had 70-100 votes. This is why modern approved maps have very few ratings on them.
No new maps will ever qualify for a legacy map title either, so I'm not sure why you are bringing up the point with modern approved maps.

Yes, the problem is that in 4 years in the future, some more modern maps that might be played today will get many less votes than older maps, and until then, more modern maps will also fit the category, this is just because of the total active players of the game, but I actually went to check for some more modern maps that are kind of popular and like, ditzy-uprising has 102 votes, so I guess that value works, but what about maps made these days? I actually have no idea since I don't play approved maps these days but some modern maps do get some play... right?[/quote]
Quite a few more recent approved maps like ditzy-uprising, Phsc-sniper have quite the number of votes and plays. Eventually when PB3 is released, legacy status can be split by eras: 2011-2015 legacy map era, 2016-2020 legacy map era.
2011-2015 legacy map era will have criteria defined more by number of votes to the map.
2016-2020 legacy map era will have criteria defined by number of votes to the map and number of matches hosted to the map.

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Re: A new map classification system

Postby king4k » 30 June 2020, 10:47

This idea is great! But I have some suggestions about the details.
Firstly, the main reason of this idea is to classify the old and new approved maps, but there are still some old maps keeping its popularity now, so it does not seem suitable to just simply classify by ‘age’ or ‘historical votes’. I suggest that the ‘activity index’ can be used as a measurement (Eg: the number of MP matches started in 6 months, etc. )

Secondly, I don’t think people care too much about XP cuz it’s not as competitive as skill point, and not an eye-catching stuff, maybe something should be done to raise players’ interests?

Thirdly, the reason why a bunch of maps becoming outdated is because there’s no unified place for players to check the approved maps’ IDs, once they forget the developer’s name, they’ll unable to play the maps, and which will be buried in the dust of history. So a new column is better established in the CUSTOM MAPS page and sort approved maps by classification/ activity index/ initial letter, etc.

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Re: A new map classification system

Postby mrblake213 » 30 June 2020, 11:28

I think this is a direct suggestion to old maps that are getting unapproved.
In my opinion, if a map is getting unapproved, it might be because it doesn't fit the current map requirements anymore.

However, if the map just needs a little tweak or improvement to be deemed 'approvable' in today's time. The Custom Map Approval Team can easily make those improvements by editing it themselves.
The "map" account (https://www.plazmaburst2.com/?a=&s=7&ac=map&id=1736484) is currently being used by the Custom Map Approval Team to 'enhance' or 'update' old maps to fit the current map approval requirements. This was done when people were complaining about x death-realwar.

I think a Legacy Approved map is unnecessary and would only confuse things.

Just to note, approved maps in rotation currently gives more SP

Tempus wrote:Additionally, these blue highlighted maps give x1.5 times more Skill Points vs regular approved maps (multiplier might change). The stakes are high and it's meant to be that way. That's why we will possibly have higher standards for these maps & restrictions.

viewtopic.php?f=116&t=24091
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Re: A new map classification system

Postby yi en » 30 June 2020, 12:20

A very quick Summary about this forum.


Let's bring more of my ideas in this system.

Approved Rotation Maps (ARM) can be used as season's ranked match names, which we can use the PP system for the ranking system. Every season consists 1~3 months, thus the top X players will received the rank for a month until he is dropped out from the rank. PP will remain reset after map rotation changes.

Approved Maps (AM) will remain unchanged imo, with a bit of numerical changes which I am ok with what stryde says.

Legacy Maps (LM) is a system which we are going to put old, not so famous, yet completed the requirement of making a map approval into that box for veteran players who feel nostalgia with it. As we can't just unapproved a map just because it is not famous, so this is the home for them and we will be remake them someday.

So I guess that's all?
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Re: A new map classification system

Postby Stryde » 30 June 2020, 14:08

king4k wrote:This idea is great! But I have some suggestions about the details.
Firstly, the main reason of this idea is to classify the old and new approved maps, but there are still some old maps keeping its popularity now, so it does not seem suitable to just simply classify by ‘age’ or ‘historical votes’. I suggest that the ‘activity index’ can be used as a measurement (Eg: the number of MP matches started in 6 months, etc. )

Legacy maps are classified by when map was made (between 2011 and 2015) and how popular it was after it was made in that timespan (by number of votes, by number of matches started - to lesser extent because impossible to track how many plays maps had before 2017).
Take Stryde-sniper series or EG-railwars series and compare to kubakuba's Lost Control or Bad Lands series. Stryde-sniper and EG-railwars series made back between 2011 and 2013 (early PB2) and have a large number of ratings and number of plays in recent years. EG-railwars series probably has less hosts now than either of kubakuba's approved series, but kubakuba's approved series should not be considered legacy maps just because they have most plays within the past 6 months - none of his maps were approved back before 2015. By your suggestions, kubakuba's maps would then qualify for a legacy map status because they have been hosted more in last 6 months.

The further intention behind idea of legacy maps would be able to contribute to PB3. When/if PB3 is released, maps from PB2 will probably be requested in PB3. Legacy map category can be defined by 2011-2015 maps, or 2016-2020 maps. See viewtopic.php?f=152&t=24452#p211442

king4k wrote:Secondly, I don’t think people care too much about XP cuz it’s not as competitive as skill point, and not an eye-catching stuff, maybe something should be done to raise players’ interests?

Perhaps yes but this is a very simple system. It's best to develop system over time rather than suggest very complicated ideas like Phsc's idea that makes the task of implementing change like this seem time-comsuming. XP is not supposed to be as competitive as skill points are in the first place. Giving more XP for legacy maps but less skill points is a way to keep people playing these old school maps. By letting players accumulate skill points from the legacy maps (even if less than traditional approved maps/rotation maps), these maps then must be held accountable to be somewhat playable in PB2 current state, but this may change.
Leaderboards are designed for most eliminations, most skill points, most level developer rank. Perhaps there is a way to make a leaderboard for most XP.

king4k wrote:Thirdly, the reason why a bunch of maps becoming outdated is because there’s no unified place for players to check the approved maps’ IDs, once they forget the developer’s name, they’ll unable to play the maps, and which will be buried in the dust of history. So a new column is better established in the CUSTOM MAPS page and sort approved maps by classification/ activity index/ initial letter, etc.

Not at all. The reason why maps are becoming outdated is because these maps were made in old map editor which was not as developed as the advanced level editor most PB2 users are familiar with. In fact, there is one place to see all approved maps if you click on the site logo: https://www.plazmaburst2.com/?a=&s=7&ac ... &id=663495


==========================================================
mrblake213 wrote:I think a Legacy Approved map is unnecessary and would only confuse things.

Just to note I'm not suggesting all old PB2 approved maps become legacy maps, only ones that are fit now for approval that were made between a certain time period (or ones that have been remade like you said on the "map" account.)

insofar as: viewtopic.php?f=116&t=24091
I feel if maps can be defined to be in rotation or not in rotation with distinct advantages to XP gain and skill point gain, I feel another set of maps can be defined as a new category with distinct changes to XP gain and skill point gain.

==========================================================
yi en wrote:Legacy Maps (LM) is a system which we are going to put old, not so famous, yet completed the requirement of making a map approval into that box for veteran players who feel nostalgia with it. As we can't just unapproved a map just because it is not famous, so this is the home for them and we will be remake them someday.

So I guess that's all?

Some legacy maps that I included in my original post may not need remaking either, but yes, I believe this summarizes the notion of legacy map well. Just wanted to clarify that legacy maps are old maps still fit for approval requirements that were once famous/still are famous made from 2011-2015, not just any approved map that was made from 2011-2015.

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