[SUGGESTION] 10 Minute Extender

This would be an absolutely fantastic thing to add and I think they should do it ASAP. I would have beaten many maps one map rotation sooner if this feature was in the server. I understand if there's some technical reasoning behind not adding it but as far as I know it's not that hard to add.

 

I mean you get an hour for the map on Hard Server, if you're not beating a map in an hour then you're probably still learning the map and getting used to it, in which another rotation won't hurt. I'm not sure how 70 minutes over 60 would change that so drastically.

The only thing is a lot of better players get bored after 30 minutes on a tier 1 map, and tier 1 players get bored of struggling on Fruits etc after 30 minutes. Not opposed to the idea really, just not sure if it's needed.

 

Adding an extender to the hard server wouldn't change anything drastically and I feel like that's my point. The hard server is reserved for players who are a bit better and are used to surfing at that point seeing as how they've completed the prerequisites to join. In all honesty, I would've suggested a longer extender of 30 minutes for the Hard server because that would make a bigger difference, but didn't want it to be too drastic as I fear it'd give a new problem of over-extending the map which is also why I suggested it work much like the RTV system not being able to RTV the following map if the current map was RTV'd. TL;DR: I see no flaws in giving an extra 10 minutes to players who vote on it.

I genuinely agree with you at some point in time a new surfer won't want to play an extra 10 minutes of Kitsune, but if the majority would like to extend (which that majority is still tier 1 surfers), then they should be able to vote on that. Again, a 10-minute extender with a map rotation cooldown wouldn't become annoying in the same sense RTV'ing isn't annoying. TL;DR: I disagree, tier 1 surfers would most likely enjoy playing for an extra 10 minutes seeing as how more of our maps are Tier 1 than Tier 2 such as surf_fruits.

 

Seeing as you opened this more for discussion than as a straight idea, I'll feed you some changes that are in testing at the moment.

The general idea is that a maps popularity (and other weightings) will dictate how frequently and often a map gets played. All maps will get a baseline of 2h 30m cooldown and the more popular a map, the longer the cooldown goes (currently capped at 50% of base time, so capped at 3 hours 40ish minutes). What I'm hoping is that over time it encourages players to try out other maps (and a greater selection!) with the opportunity to play it more than once or twice in a night. For maps required for the hard server, they would be unaffected by the popularity weighting and instead would remain at a flat 2h 30m cooldown. Should we find a map is somewhat unpopular (or more likely to clear out a server), we can add a penalised weighting (this can extend over the 50% cap) to ensure it's still available; but we discourage it.

Furthering that, a second change is that maps will also have soft vote cooldowns. What this means is that say a map has a 2h 30m cooldown. After 1hr 45 the voting for that map would actually open up, but with 25% effectiveness and from thereon, scale up to the full 100% strength so if people really want to play a map again and so soon, they can vote for it with reduced effectiveness.

 

I feel with that system people would put their votes into a map, then realize it's penalized and be disappointed, then feel they have to vote for whatever everyone else is voting for. I'd be interested to see the system live, but there'd be a fine line between frustrating the player by dangling a map infront of them that they can't get voted due to hardcoded reductions.

 

These changes aren't final yet; and there's some visual cues to explain what's going on with these.

 

My fears align with Kaiden's. I don't know if giving unpopular maps less opportunities to be played by damaging their voting weight would necessarily be a great idea. I'm not sure how to put it other than it merely sounds like a bad idea to punish maps that aren't as easy as other maps; however, I don't think it's a bad idea to give those maps shorter cooldowns. My thought process is if you're going to make popular maps have longer cooldowns it would seem you want unpopular maps to have a chance to be played as well, but then you go and give those maps reduced vote weight so it seems counter-productive.

Perhaps something color coordinated to indicate which maps were more popular? Green being the most popular and working down to red being the least.

 

That's the guy who kept telling someone to shut the fuck up and was wishing cancer on a person yesterday, minus points all round.

 

Someone's personality doesn't reflect on their surfing and the implication you believe that deserves you some minus points.

 

I mean you used an awful player's quote to justify your reason I nominate donating minus points to the more needy.

More on topic, with changes planned in terms of more colour-coordinated map voting and such, am interested to see how the changes play out. While extend may not be an option, maps could end up with half the cooldowns they currently have under certain conditions etc, will wait and see.

 

Jack this is skill surf you should be able to complete it with in the time frame given.

 

Regardless of the bump above, the "10 more minutes" comment is actually fairly pertinent. If we offer extensions; there'll always be someone going "10 more minutes" and someone else going "can't we change the map already?" The fact we're starting to see subtle jokes about this tells us that it's a stickler problem however it's one that isn't solved by offering an extension - instead by trying to have a way of maps being offered more frequently.

While it may come across as hyperbole you can't turn up at a shop that's just closed and go "give me 10 more minutes please". They're going to tell you to get the fuck outta there.

 

Regardless of the guys opinions of womens right to vote, for the 10 minutes I helped the player he progressed through the last stages and upon completing second to last stage he only had 15 seconds left. 10 minutes would've ensured completion or at least being able to attempt it. I don't agree with tunnel visioning bad players opinions on surf unless there's a reason for it and in this case I don't see the correlation between personal beliefs and surf skills. Furthermore, I agree with you that there could definitely be more options to consider like giving players more tries at a map. With up and coming changes and I'm also interested to see how everything will pan out.

Devin, this is skill surf where you can create the timer to go for however long you want. So if I gave you a map beyond your skill level with only 5 minutes to complete it, where I may be able to do it with ease, you'd fail time and time again. Does that make you poor at skill surf? Or was there not enough time given. If you're going to give some input how about putting some effort and thought into it before doing so :v)

The point of adding an extender is to offer the players a short amount of time extra to beat the map if they really want to. Like I said previously it would work like the RTV system where you wouldn't be able to use it again effectively giving it a cooldown as to not be abused. Moreover, players that get close to beating a stage and then have to wait an extra 2-3 hours to try the map again aren't going to pick right back up from where they were, they're going to have issues getting to where they were before since it's been so long before trying again. So I don't think that's a very handy "solution." Also worth noting, have you ever noticed that nobody uses the RTV function on the easy server? Yeah that's because nobody is saying "can't we change the map already." I don't know how often you actually play, but the prior "give me 10 more minutes" is more often the case and it is rare players are asking to RTV.

I won't even try debating the semantics of that "example" you gave, let's all just take a step back here and look at the core of what we're referencing. A game where the goal is to get from point a to point b in a certain amount of time where the more time you have the more reasonable reaching your goal becomes. Most servers don't segregate maps into easy and hard servers and their timers are closer to an hour for completion and on top of that they ALSO have an extender that can range from 15-30 minutes extra and even then they keep people coming back. Know this, I know what you fear and don't think I'm advocating to adopt a system that people will abuse to sit there and play Kitsune for an hour long and then do the same thing next map on Ace. An extender does not have to be super long and you can always give it a cooldown. So try looking at it objectively instead of how other servers implemented it poorly.

 

Like I said before; I wasn't trying to make this sound like hyperbole; simply that there's always the point of "omg i just want more time". Stats wise we actually see that RTV is used approximately one in every 9 maps across a variety of playercounts (though it's more common on <16 players than it is above) so it does get its usage. You're also right that we can limit how often it gets extended and the cooldown associated with it - however there's no element of fear with this; just a concern of working out what a player says what they want, what they actually want and the best way to implement something that actually works to best suit the need.