RAGL s04 map pool

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Wippie
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RAGL s04 map pool

Post by Wippie »

As SoScared states in his season 03 evaluationtopic:

The map pool being the hottest topic leading into Season 3 is something that should be addressed first. Players can expect the map pool for Season 4 to be more predictable as a dynamic list of likely maps will be posted on the forum within the month of July. This list will function as a sort of rank but not necessarily as an indicator as to what map plays best, meta driven or popular but rather what maps are suited for the leagues agenda which will be clearly outlined (and probably altered) in the upcoming RAGL map pool thread. The final pool, of preferably no more than 10 maps, will be picked no later than 1 week before the first week-round of the season so that players will have a decent chance of getting familiar with the pool and perhaps even start specializing on certain

I would love to see some map suggestions and selection suggestions in this topic. Ill start:
A Nucleair Winter by 3.Lucian, plays out brilliant, looks even better.

To be clear, I am not calling the shots and not part of RAGL organization. I just want to gain some momentum towards season 4 addressing the no.1 issue of season 3 first.

All suggestions welcome

For inspiration the mappools of S01. S02 and S03:

S01:
  • Behind The Veil
  • Dual Cold Front
  • Dual Vegetation
  • Forest Path
  • Keep Off The Grass 2
  • Northwest Passage
  • Ore Lord
  • Sidestep
  • Singles
  • Tournament Island
  • Warwind
  • Winter Storm
S02:
  • Behind The Veil
  • Crossfire
  • Desert Rats
  • Dual Cold Front
  • Keep Off The Grass 2
  • Northwest Passage
  • Ore Lord
  • Sidestep
  • Singles
  • Tournament Island
  • Warwind
  • Winter Storm
S03:
  • Agenda
  • Behind The Veil 2
  • Desert Rats (revised)
  • Green belt
  • Keep Off The Grass 2
  • Northwest Passage (revised)
  • Patches
  • Pitfight
  • Rocky Ravine
  • Winter Storm 2
------------------------------------------------
Maps currently in the official mappool (Playtest 20170722)
  • Behind the Veil
  • Desert Rats
  • Dual Cold Front
  • Green Belt
  • Keep off the Grass 2
  • Northwest Passage
  • Ore Lord
  • Polar Disorder
  • Siberian Pass
  • Sidestep
  • Singles
  • Snow off
  • Warwind
  • Winter Storm
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Suggestions from outside off the official and/or RAGL S1/2/3/ map pool:
Edit: Please also share your thought on the selection criteria and selection procedure.
Last edited by Wippie on Sun Aug 06, 2017 12:56 pm, edited 13 times in total.

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Clockwork
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Post by Clockwork »

A good all round map pool with only the best competitive maps is the only course in my opinion. My preferred map pool is:

Sidestep
Warwind
Dual Cold Front
Pitfight
Behind the Veil
Desert Rats

It's a very short pool but I'm only picking maps I know are good competitive and will give out good games. I hope for the next map pool maps are picked because they're good and not for the sake of new maps which was apart of the huge storm that was last seasons map pool. I've only seen one new map in my eyes that deserves a spot with the legends that are DCF Warwind and Sidsestep and that is Pitfight.

But we should try new maps more to see if they are competitive viable but not just throw them into the pool. Maps I suggest should be trialed out are:
Nuclear Winter
Ysmir
Hellcats
River Crossing
Big Boys Don't Cry
Belly of the beast
Sirrico
Borrowed Time

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Doomsday
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Post by Doomsday »

Great to see some discussion about competitive map pool.

I agree with Happy's list but I need to add Green Belt. I think Agenda and Winter Storm are also good.

I've been working on with some small maps because I think Desert Rats is the only good small map in RAGL map pool.

All testing, comments and criticism is appriciated for following maps.
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Wippie
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Post by Wippie »

Happy wrote: Maps I suggest should be trialed out are:
Nuclear Winter
Ysmir
Hellcats
River Crossing
Big Boys Don't Cry
Belly of the beast
Sirrico
Borrowed Time
Would you be willing to try these out and post your results?

Also, what is you opinion on the "new" maps in the official map pool? It would be great if they are usable.

Ill try to keep a suggestion/nominees list in the opening post.

.1
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Post by .1 »

Definitely think we should try and add some new maps to the pool. Would need to test them out so that we can see what should stay and what should go. I think there should be a balance of micro and macro maps as well.

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Clockwork
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Post by Clockwork »

Ive tried some of them out and I think they're decent and should be in the map pool however that's my opinion and not everyone else's. Everyone else must also be in concordance to pass a map through like the 6 I listed for a pool.

Il'd say a lot of the new maps in there are not viable competitively but I dunno about Siberian Pass I think it should be played a bit more it does follow the 3 lane ideal and it has a good share of eco.

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Wippie
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Post by Wippie »

I've added Kyrylos suggestion in the S03 evaluation topic to the list. Also added the 2017 map contest winner in the RA 1v1 category Monty Hall

@Happy, you've mentioned some maps that did not very good in the map contest, could you please explain why you would prefer Sirocco, Hellcats and Ysmir over Mountain Pass for example?

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Orb
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Post by Orb »

RAGL has always shifted what maps are popular in the competitive scene. Keeping a rotating map pool is important and I see it in all competitive ladders. Keeping Sidestep is a given due to how popular it is. But I'd like to see a lot of new maps.

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Clockwork
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Post by Clockwork »

Wippie wrote: I've added Kyrylos suggestion in the S03 evaluation topic to the list. Also added the 2017 map contest winner in the RA 1v1 category Monty Hall

@Happy, you've mentioned some maps that did not very good in the map contest, could you please explain why you would prefer Sirocco, Hellcats and Ysmir over Mountain Pass for example?
Second place in the map contest was polar disorder and I'm certain it was because it was pretty. I have never ever seen it played once and I've never heard someone suggest we play it before so I wouldn't take the contest rankings seriously.

The mountain pass eco situation is not good which is a common complaint but it is a nice map layout and pretty, maybe a revision is needed like how some maps were revised for S3?

noobmapmaker
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Post by noobmapmaker »

Personally I think we first need to know, to some extent, how S04 will be organised. Worst case scenario: person X organises S04 and picks his own list.

I do think and hope the person(s) who will organise S04 will be sane and open to suggestions and discussions like this, so it does make sense to discuss the mappool now - in my opinion.

However, in order to actually get to some kind of selectionprocess, I think we should have some kind of objective way to select the maps. An idea that comes to mind: make a longlist of all maps that are presented by anyone. They can be good and bad. Then reduce it to about 30 maps, I hope we can do this just by discussing them. If that turns out to be impossible we'll just vote on the longlist. Then have a voting procedure where people who play in RAGL S02, S03 and S04(?) are allowed to send in their 10 favorites. Sum up all votes and the top 10 is the final maps.

To sum up: discussing which maps are better and which are not is too subjective and will lead to endless discussions. So we need an objective method to select the maps.

A suggestion for objective method:
1) gather all suited maps, for example by having people posting them in a thread + all historical RAGL maps. This results in ~50-100 maps, I presume.
2) then we'll discuss the maps and cut away a large chunk based on very basic map judgement: chances are unequal or its plain bad (super chockey or extreme high eco). This is a subjective stage, but hopefully it results in 30-40 maps remaining.
3) every player makes his top 10 favorite list and sends it to a neutral person (=secret voting), who throws that into a excel list and then we get a top 10 of maps.

We could even delete stage 2 and just vote on all maps...

Edit 1: Im willing to proces the votes and then present the results of all votes so everyone can check to see if I processed them correctly.

Edit 2: Id like to suggest these maps for the longlist-mappool:
Stone Throw Away - by Mo - http://resource.openra.net/maps/22340/
Allmighty Petrodollar - Lucian - http://resource.openra.net/maps/22178/
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Wippie
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Post by Wippie »

noobmapmaker wrote: A suggestion for objective method:
1) gather all suited maps, for example by having people posting them in a thread + all historical RAGL maps. This results in ~50-100 maps, I presume.
2) then we'll discuss the maps and cut away a large chunk based on very basic map judgement: chances are unequal or its plain bad (super chockey or extreme high eco). This is a subjective stage, but hopefully it results in 30-40 maps remaining.
3) every player makes his top 10 favorite list and sends it to a neutral person (=secret voting), who throws that into a excel list and then we get a top 10 of maps.

We could even delete stage 2 and just vote on all maps...
As a alternative I would like to propose to gather a 'Map pool commity', consisting of the organization and/or well established community members. I dont know, please let us know what everyones opinion is.
noobmapmaker wrote: Edit 1: Im willing to proces the votes and then present the results of all votes so everyone can check to see if I processed them correctly.
Thank you, your services are more then welcome. Lets await the responses for a bit before doing the labour
noobmapmaker wrote: Edit 2: Id like to suggest these maps for the longlist-mappool:
Stone Throw Away - by Mo - http://resource.openra.net/maps/22340/
Allmighty Petrodollar - Lucian - http://resource.openra.net/maps/22178/
Added

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3.Lucian
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Post by 3.Lucian »

Wippie, Happy, Noobmapmaker - thank you all for nominating A Nuclear Winter. I do really appreciate your enthusiasm.
I'm honestly thrilled and humbled it has been so well received, and I would absolutely love to have it appear in the next map pool for RAGL or whatever fixture may replace it.

noobmapmaker
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Post by noobmapmaker »

Wippie wrote:
noobmapmaker wrote: Edit 1: Im willing to proces the votes and then present the results of all votes so everyone can check to see if I processed them correctly.
Thank you, your services are more then welcome. Lets await the responses for a bit before doing the labour
Yes indeed, only if that is the way the people would like to go. Let us keep collecting good maps first!
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Mo
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Post by Mo »

We need some decent naval maps in this pool. It's about time naval gets some attention and this will be a good way of testing it competitively.

Having made 8 different maps and spectated many games on each, I've found general patterns with some of these maps, and my top maps in order are as follows:

1. Timorous Expansions - despite slightly longer games by a factor of ~1.5, this map sees naval action vs land in tier 3 games with counter navy on navy. Most dynamic naval play yet.

2. Stone Throw Away - (recent map so not much tested, but small enough to see some shenanigans of MCV moves, soviet rushes and vulnerable to tier 3 if you get there).

3. Portent - mainly naval on naval. You won't see much naval vs land here. If it weren't for the island the waters may just be useless.

4. Stagnation - Gunboats usually.

It goes without saying that in these naval maps, the production of naval is given the same opportunity as any other production queue type. Naval is not completely forced in the same way air or tank play is not forced. I'd say it's somewhere between air and tanks in priority. You don't complain about having to build air or tanks vs opponents, so why the stigma against naval? (except balance because we won't know until it gets played correctly, and that needs maps).

EDIT: I see you've also suggested the same. I'm equally humbled as Lucian is :)
noobmapmaker wrote: Edit 2: Id like to suggest these maps for the longlist-mappool:
Stone Throw Away - by Mo - http://resource.openra.net/maps/22340/
Allmighty Petrodollar - Lucian - http://resource.openra.net/maps/22178/
Last edited by Mo on Thu Aug 03, 2017 12:08 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Blackened
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Post by Blackened »

Orb made a valid point about how SoS treated the map pool.

I think first we should decide if we want to experiment with new and exciting maps or go with tired and true maps.

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