Map Vote Reform/Suggestion Thread

[Pig]

This is something that came up tonight about our current map vote system:

Martin Gooner King jr.: yeah i think this server's only problem is map vetoing

Multiple people have expressed their issues with the current system, a few I remember off the top of my head are:

• Map pool includes many unpopular maps that people refuse to play, causing a drop in player counts.
• Some maps are played every night, causing map fatigue.
• Lesser known maps have less chance to win against popular maps
• Some game modes struggle to win (eg. ctf/pl) when against a very popular cp map (eg. cp_5gorge).
• Map nominations are used up within the first minutes of a map switch, giving players with a better connection an greater influence on the map vote.
• The third and fourth map option hardly ever win.
• Extending a map is very rare.
• This isn't how valve official servers used to work.

I will explain that last point for those who may not know. In the past, valve official servers used to play a pre-made map rotation. When you wanted to play, for example control point, you would choose control point from the quickplay browser, and be sent to a server running a control point map. When the map timer ended the server would automatically change the map to the next map in the rotation (eg. cp_granary to cp_well) unless the map vote setting was on. If end of round voting was enabled, then players would be presented with a choice of the least played maps in the rotation, or to extend the current map. If the majority of players on the server wanted to choose a map during the round, you could put a map up to a vote. If the vote passed, after the round ended, the map would be changed. Notably, the server would stay on the same gamemode unless players chose to switch to a different gamemode.
I believe we should consider adopting a system similar to this, for these reasons:

• Next map vote offers similar functions to !rtv, however it is better because it allows the current round to be played out, and offers players a good idea on what would replace the current map, so they weren't voting blindly.
• Players don't really want to choose from four random choices. In reality, players tend to say things like "we should play payload next" or "I really want to play harvest after this". While there is a democratic appeal to putting multiple map choices against each other, it doesn't really measure how many want to play a map next, just how many prefer one choice over another.
• "Upset" votes are more likely when you ask players in isolation. cp_deadwood would be unlikely to win in a map vote between cp_foundry, balloon_race_v2b, and koth_harvest. Even if players like cp_deadwood, immediately the two top choices would be balloon race (meme choice), versus foundry and harvest (serious choice). Even if deadwood got a few votes, it would never clear the other serious choices and make the runoff vote. BUT, if you made a simple next map vote for cp_deadwood, you could judge the map on its own merits.
• If enabled, the end of round vote could allow for some lesser played maps more play time.
• If desired, the server could stay on the same gamemode until a next map vote, which would feel more similar to old quickplay.
• The next map vote could be restricted to only be allowed once X minutes have passed on a map, to allow enough time for players to join, and to eliminate insta-rtving a map.

The particular vote percentage requirements could be adjusted (eg. 75%) to encourage players to find a broad consensus before putting a map up to vote. This would encourage constructive communication over the mic and text to build a viable coalition of players. (eg. "Hey who wants to play foundry?"). This is more engaging than the current system where players who join first may silently nominate maps, wait 45 minutes, and then have their nomination win (because it was a popular map in the f1 slot), or wasted (because someone else nominated rd_asteroid). If no next map vote passed, players could then have a choice of some lesser played maps, or a random map from the rotation if desired.

[Pig]

I want to also bring up an edge case that could be used to influence the map rotation under the current system. As of today, if you wanted to control the map rotation, you can ensure that some maps will NOT be played, at least within the first several hours of a session. It works like this:

• Join a castaway server sometime before the session.
• !nominate a map you don't want to play during the session (eg. !nominate koth_harvest).
• !rtv
• You are now playing the map you don't want to appear later. Simply leave now or repeat steps 2 and 3 for other maps
• When the session starts, players will be unable to nominate these map because they were recently played.
• (optional)Repeat on other castaway servers for redundancy.

[protons]

I want to also bring up an edge case that could be used to influence the map rotation under the current system. As of today, if you wanted to control the map rotation, you can ensure that some maps will NOT be played, at least within the first several hours of a session. It works like this:

• Join a castaway server sometime before the session.
• !nominate a map you don't want to play during the session (eg. !nominate koth_harvest).
• !rtv
• You are now playing the map you don't want to appear later. Simply leave now or repeat steps 2 and 3 for other maps
• When the session starts, players will be unable to nominate these map because they were recently played.
• (optional)Repeat on other castaway servers for redundancy.

I would sometimes see this happen on the Singapore server. Someone would join very early and play all the arena maps so that during the scheduled session, all the arena maps can't be nominated.

It also annoys me a bit whenever a server changes map, 4 players immediately press their !nominate <map name here> to rig the nominations. This should NOT happen, and it might as well be being forced to play the favorite maps of whoever has the fastest computer and internet. I also noticed that whoever is the first to !nominate a map gets a big advantage since the first nomination will always be the F1 nomination choice.

[Gabber]

"Some maps are played every night, causing map fatigue."
Physically impossible, lil niglet. You yap on about the map cooldown later in the schizopost, so you should know that we CANT play the same maps daily. YOU ARE FULL OF SHIT!!!

"Lesser known maps have less chance to win against popular maps"
What does this even mean? Maps that people like win against maps that people don't? Ok nigga. AND? Yeah, upward is probably going to beat ctf_vikings most of the time. So what kid? The important part is that we're constantly changing gamemodes and we play more obscure maps and have a greater variety of gamemodes on Castaway than any other stock TF2 server in existence. Go look at serverbrowser.tf to verify that if you please.

"Some game modes struggle to win (eg. ctf/pl) when against a very popular cp map (eg. cp_5gorge).
Map nominations are used up within the first minutes of a map switch, giving players with a better connection an greater influence on the map vote.
The third and fourth map option hardly ever win.
This isn't how valve official servers used to work."
Nice headcanon. Every single one of these is made up. Fantasy. Fiction. Make-believe. Fairytale.


The system we have works 99% of the time. These "reforms" are an embarrassment aimed at solving "problems" that don't even exist in reality, coming from some kid who joined 2 weeks ago. The idea that f3 and f4 never wins is my favorite piece of made up ZOG propaganda. Just blatant lies. Retards looking to change something that works perfectly smoothly by creating some elaborate nonsense plan is how everything turns to shit. e.g: Meet Your Match !

@random the nomination time restriction needs to go, or it should be 40 seconds long MAX. The idea that people can't nominate because they're connecting for 5 minutes is communist gobbledigook with absolutely 0 basis in reality. STOP CATERING TO RETARDS!

[cyber]

I personally still want to see full version of cactus canyon being permanent instead of being a weekend only thing.

[Asmo]

The good point you brought up is that there needs to be a cooldown on nominations. Aside from that everything else you said is drivel.

[Pig]

Sad to see toxicity on the forums. We can be better than that.

[random]

I added a timer to nominations last night, first at 5 minutes then I changed it to 1 minute. That should be plenty to allow people to connect

I don't think the f3/f4 problem really exists at least from what I've seen. People usually will vote for whatever the people on vc say to vote for, which isn't restricted to any specific slot. If there's a "bad" map on f1 then it doesn't get voted for. I think more people are actively thinking about their choices than you might expect.

We have a built in cooldown that prevents maps from being played too closely in a row. Of course this isn't perfect. It's something like a 10-15 map cooldown, I forget what I have it set to, but it persists between restarts. Trouble is that it's set to a number that is good for all regions. NA has long sessions so often we go through that entire cooldown in one sitting, which means you can play the same map two days in a row. I don't think it happens that often despite this.

Less popular maps losing to more popular maps is just the nature of things. In any community server, the player base is collectively going to have a specific taste for certain maps and those will get played much more than any others. You can't really avoid this because it's human nature. Yes, if we were in a world where we had ad hoc valve servers then you could join a server and play maps that are less common. But we are a community server with a tight knit community, not a bunch of strangers. Our map taste is well known and there's a few favorites that will generally always win out. But if they don't get nominated then they can't win every time. And despite all this I still see popular maps lose when everyone agrees we aren't in the mood to play it, something like a high intensity map of foundry isn't great at 3am when everyone is tired and wants to chill, so we vote for something like asteroid or harvest.

Lastly as I state on a disclaimer on the front of the steam group, this is a compromise we have to allow people to play the maps they want, as we don't have the player base for 20 servers running different maps where you can join a different server if you don't like the map. In fact I think the popularity thing would be worse if it was a single next map vote as people would just put the vote to a popular map every time and then we'd rarely see more. Having a vote between multiple maps gives the others in the vote a chance at least.

[Pig]

I added a timer to nominations last night, first at 5 minutes then I changed it to 1 minute. That should be plenty to allow people to connect

I don't think the f3/f4 problem really exists at least from what I've seen. People usually will vote for whatever the people on vc say to vote for, which isn't restricted to any specific slot. If there's a "bad" map on f1 then it doesn't get voted for. I think more people are actively thinking about their choices than you might expect.

We have a built in cooldown that prevents maps from being played too closely in a row. Of course this isn't perfect. It's something like a 10-15 map cooldown, I forget what I have it set to, but it persists between restarts. Trouble is that it's set to a number that is good for all regions. NA has long sessions so often we go through that entire cooldown in one sitting, which means you can play the same map two days in a row. I don't think it happens that often despite this.

Less popular maps losing to more popular maps is just the nature of things. In any community server, the player base is collectively going to have a specific taste for certain maps and those will get played much more than any others. You can't really avoid this because it's human nature. Yes, if we were in a world where we had ad hoc valve servers then you could join a server and play maps that are less common. But we are a community server with a tight knit community, not a bunch of strangers. Our map taste is well known and there's a few favorites that will generally always win out. But if they don't get nominated then they can't win every time. And despite all this I still see popular maps lose when everyone agrees we aren't in the mood to play it, something like a high intensity map of foundry isn't great at 3am when everyone is tired and wants to chill, so we vote for something like asteroid or harvest.

Lastly as I state on a disclaimer on the front of the steam group, this is a compromise we have to allow people to play the maps they want, as we don't have the player base for 20 servers running different maps where you can join a different server if you don't like the map. In fact I think the popularity thing would be worse if it was a single next map vote as people would just put the vote to a popular map every time and then we'd rarely see more. Having a vote between multiple maps gives the others in the vote a chance at least.

I agree with you, those are good points and I think you’re right. I still think this is a good thread to keep open for future debate/discussion about map votes in the future. I want to hear what other players think is the optimal system.

I will just say that I would prefer to play a variety of S, A, and B tier maps over just the S tier maps. Castaway is the only way I can stand tf2, so I’m not going to get to play gullywash or badlands on casual or anything. That’s my main concern so any system that allows that I would support.

A topic that probably has more broad consensus in the community is culling bad maps from the map pool.

[Pig]

Also inshallah castaway will have 20 full servers running 24/7.

[Buchou]

People really do go on the server hours before the session to make sure we can't play asteroid or arena or hydro or something. It doesn't happen every night or anything but I have definitely seen it happen more than once. That shit is gay and needs to go somehow.

[random]

People really do go on the server hours before the session to make sure we can't play asteroid or arena or hydro or something. It doesn't happen every night or anything but I have definitely seen it happen more than once. That shit is gay and needs to go somehow.

I have something in place that prevents this in particular by stopping people from doing rtvs when alone, but it doesn't work if there's more than one person on the server. Not a great solution other than to mark a map as not having been played unless there were like 8 people on. Which can maybe be done

[Buchou]

I have something in place that prevents this in particular by stopping people from doing rtvs when alone, but it doesn't work if there's more than one person on the server. Not a great solution other than to mark a map as not having been played unless there were like 8 people on. Which can maybe be done

I mean even 8 seems low. That's only 4v4. That's more "near dead server and we're just dicking around" than "actual session."

Would be a good measure regardless.

[Nota]

Yeah nobody likes the Nomination disable timer, it’s way too long in it’s current state, you should be able to nominate a map after the “Waiting For Players” timer ends, which takes about 10 seconds after the server loads a new map

Also RTVing when alone on a server is fine, if I’m seeding a session and get there before anyone else, why should I be punished by being stuck on a map I don’t like with no players. If it’s about the people who nominate maps they don’t like before a session starts, that can be easily avoided by one or two players joining and preventing that. That’s not a player issue nor an RTV issue, that’s an issue with people not wanting to seed outside of desired times (I.E. trying to start NA before 6:00pm EST

[random]

Thoughts on a dynamic timer? Something like 10 seconds after the first person in the server joins a team, instead of making it a fixed number of seconds

[Scout]

Thoughts on a dynamic timer? Something like 10 seconds after the first person in the server joins a team, instead of making it a fixed number of seconds

Sounds like a fine compromise I suppose

[Nota]

There’s legitimately no issue with nominations as they currently stand, if you miss your chance to nominate at the beginning of a 45 minute game, just wait for a player to leave, RQs occur every game. Anytime I don’t get a nomination in, I wait for a player to leave, and when one does I try nominating, 9 times out of 10, that player had previously held a nomination slot before leaving

[Appolz (with a z)]

There’s legitimately no issue with nominations as they currently stand, if you miss your chance to nominate at the beginning of a 45 minute game, just wait for a player to leave, RQs occur every game. Anytime I don’t get a nomination in, I wait for a player to leave, and when one does I try nominating, 9 times out of 10, that player had previously held a nomination slot before leaving

Bro knows the real !nominate meta. Alternatively if you want to be a pillar of the community you can snag a nominate slot and then sit on it until near the end of the map when people start trying to nominate and then switch your vote to something the people are requesting.
or you can be like me and !nominate burg to keep the vote from splitting between too many goated choices

[random]

Nominate delay timer has been removed while we figure out some sort of solution that satisfies both NA and SG