[Suggestion / Opinion] Community Involvement and Map Submission Process - Part 1

Another problem with voting: How to get an accurate representation of what most of the community wants. It would have to be on Halo Waypoint to be anywhere close to official, and even then only a small fraction of the community would vote.

While public vote can be a good way to show what people are looking for, it is a terrible way to ensure that quality content reaches matchmaking. I don't feel it should be a factor in determining what goes in.

 

i dunno man. i feel like those ppl that made the effort to vote would be more likely to have an educated or at least sincere opinion. i would almost prefer it was here on forge hub and you had to do a little digging. you want that 12 year old that makes weird moaning noises into the mic all night to vote for your maps? well i guess you don't want any kind of vote. I'm not sold one way or the other, but if it counted for a 1/3, that would give everyman the ability to have his voice heard, without giving the decisions totally over to the mob.

 

It wouldn't be fair to have voting only on Forge hub, a fan website that is not officially sponsored by the company. Very few people come through here compared to Waypoint, so it would be an incredibly skewed data set. If you want voting, it needs to be designed so that anyone who plays the game can easily have a say, which means the most people possible have to know about it. I'm still not for it at all, but if it's done it needs to be done fairly.

 

I mean there is no system that is "fair" to everyone and that will simultaneously make the best decisions for everyone. and I think if you aren't willing to put in the effort to open a new browser tab, you deserve a vote. all that said i don't want to pull you into a debate dude cuz I'm not really pushing the vote thing i'm just thinking outloud.

 

It's cool, I'll drop it after this. I know it's all conceptual, and that no system is 100% fair. That said, keep in mind that probably 99.9% of Halo players have never heard of Forgehub. Forcing everyone who wants to vote on a super official topic to a fan website seems weird to me, and I honestly think it would bias results. It would be the same deal if it were on any other website besides Waypoint, at least the way I see it.

 

Blueprint was the best thing to ever come from the Cartographers system. Shame Homeboyd was succeeded by Alzarahn rather than a certain other prominent member that actually understood level design and valued abstaining from biases (but I got driven out by butt hurt kiddies anyhow and no point fussing over spilled milk).

I don't see the system changing. Adding more people would help to diminish the influence of particular members that currently hurt the groups composition, but it wouldn't be much of a,positive change... it really depends on who gets added to the group, who they're friends with, who they arent, and what their design philosophy is. It's more about the group dynamic than size of its roster.

Unfortunately, much like with Blueprint, certain individuals will never be accepted for various trivial reasons. I can say with absolute confidence that I am one such individual that would never be allowed membership, and for that alone, I have zero faith in it being improved upon through the addition of other members.

 

Exactly. If duck doesn't like you, yain't gettin in.

It's just and stupid on the other end. If the CC's do like you, you get right in no problem regardless of ANYTHING else.

 

hm.... crawling out from my rock at request from nitro.

i miss blueprint, its where i grew up in the community. the place may have been private but it was, for the most part a nice team effort across different maps with minimal bias, most of the fighting was over difference in map theory more then selfishness. it honestly wasn't hard to get into either, all you had to do was request to join and you'd be added.

no guys, a system where the community votes on maps is never going to work. the issue obviously being the most popular people will almost always get there maps in regardless of quality and no amount of trying to make it anonymous would work since it requires people looking at the maps which popular personalities can easily share and easily be recognized. the other problem is something along the lines of tyranny of the majority, just because the majority of people choose it does not mean its a good map and could easily be very very bad. i think the whole community attitude around station 9 back in h4 displayed this perfectly.

yes the cartographers more often then not choose their friends map and i have done a fair amount of bashing for this in the past, however, more recently i don't think this is as much of an issue because the cartographers are friends with most of the people who push out high quality maps on a regular basis, so, being friends with them is an efficient method of finding quality maps for consideration. i have also seen a couple of the current CC's meet new people with potential, work with them and help them grow and succeed. my issue with bias now comes from how some CC's will heavily favor their personal style of map over others regardless of it it's the better option or not. i'm fine with having bias towards certain styles as long as you're open and have a good understanding of others for more accurate assessments.

i don't think adding more CC's to the pool is going to help anything, in fact i think it could make it worse because i've heard in the past of CC's having to make sacrifices with each other on maps resulting in supbar maps getting through. more CC's would just mean more infighting and compromising potentially allowing for more supbar maps making it in. replacing some problematic CC's with new healthier blood i'm all for though. choosing replacements should be based on their ability and have nothing to do with how close a friend they are to current CC's as well.

transperency i think is the biggest issue. we, as a community want to provide good quality maps to be used how ever this is nearly impossible when everything is done through back channels while the community is splintered with a lack of focus. if 343i would announce what category of map they're looking for a month in advance it would cause the community to get together and focus their efforts on that specific category which, i would think, would result in higher quality maps to choose from and a larger pool. the public tasks would also be a great motivator to get more people interested into forge and involved in the community as a whole.

when it comes to finding maps i think that should be left mostly up to the CC's as long as they aren't only looking at their friends stuff. some things i think would be nice would be testing lobbies people could submit their maps to for consideration a long with streaming it. but, this brings it's own risks of being overly flooded with nothing but garbage for hundreds of maps and people getting outraged at lack of recognition their maps they think are good but are really ****.

remember, the CC's job is looking for a needle in a haystack while having a bunch of angry rats waiting to bite for not "finding" their hay.

 

There have been rumors around about potential candidates for the position of CC. I would just like to start by saying the following.

1. If the candidate started forging in Halo 5 they should not be considered. That is absurd.
2. You have to have a strong understanding of level design.
3. You have to interact without bias, or self promotion. If your content is worthy it should be nominated by another.
4. Again, if you started forging in Halo 5 gtfo
5. Must know how to communicate efficiently or directly.
6. Being able to generate quality content is preferred as it demonstrates your knowledge of forge and level design.
7. Being nominated for consideration is a privilege. Do not suck **** to obtain that position, or increase chances. The best thing we need right now is brutal honesty, dedication, and work ethic.

With that being said, I do not think simply adding members to the group is a viable solution. It does not change anything. Change is alternating the roster or method. Most preferably both. If we simply add 2 or 3 members to the roster, their opinions will most likely be beaten out by the current members and we'll be right back at square one.

Purely Fat, Multilockon, and Secret Schnitzel are my official nominations. They are all unbiased, educated, and overly qualified. Really they are. I do not believe any of these individuals would simply settle for less than what is possible.
And I know for a fact they would not push their own creations.

 

How did you manage to download the maps to begin with then? Did you also go completely black on the forums to prevent being exposed to the knowledge of who made what? I'm sorry, but I'm calling complete and utter bullshit on this claim here.

 

Actually, I think I completely misspoke there. Rereading it that doesn't make any sense. Sorry about that, finishing school has my brain a bit fried. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I will say however that author did not matter then, and does not matter to me personally. Disagreements with a person and disagreements with design choices are completely different fields, and should be kept separate.

 

I think the best system would be to have a bunch of balls with map names on them and the we release them into a tank with a bunch of sea lions and based on what the sea lions pick that would be the map pool.

No but seriously there are a ton of great suggestions in here and I think we all agree that it should be transparent and that Nokyard should be the richest forger of all time.

 

I've been relayed personal information about the MYM contest about why I wrongfully placed outside the top 3, as well as not being featured after the contest. It was a personal bias against me. I was screwed out of any recognition I deserved. This information came from another judge.

 

That's a pretty arrogant response. You don't get to decide who deserves praise and recognition from a contest you did not act as a judge in. If you would like a full breakdown of why Olympus was not in the top 3 I can explain in full, and I can assure you that despite any animosity the decision came down wholly to the quality of the map itself. I would appreciate it if you could try to refrain from insulting the maps that were in the top three by insinuating their inferiority. If you do want to discuss any of this, once again, do it via PM.

 

I am not being arrogant at all, let's be clear. I loved Moo's map and everything aside, I would have voted that for first place anyway. Martians map was a good contender as well, I'm not denying that. The third place I found to be a completely random decision. I participated in almost every testing lobby for the contest and that map was not very enjoyable for the majority of sessions we played, not only for me, but my entire team. That says a lot when we win the match and still don't enjoy it. Not only that, but the map had terribly exploitable areas.

I don't care about the prizes. I don't care about coming just short of 3rd place, but me and multi didn't even get into the top 10 submissions. It isn't a matter of just getting praise, it's about quality assurance. Honestly, there was not a more well forged map in the contest pool. It played well, and would have played better with 8v8 settings.

All of this aside, It was supposed to be featured. Psychoduck dismissed this request from War. Contest aside, I was still wronged. There's no denying it. This isn't me being emotional or arrogant, this is me presenting facts.

I am not going to PM you. If you have anything to discuss, do it here. This is about CCs. A specific example none the less. It needs to be put out in the open. I've been passive for too long. No more.

 

I support this method for obvious reasons

 

The reason I asked you to take this to a PM is because this is a thread about how the CC system could be changed, not a place for you to complain about how you think you should have gotten a better place in a contest. The CC Salt thread was closed a few days ago, and this is not an attempt to resurrect it. But, since you insist:

That you and your team did not enjoy your games on Entrenched is anecdotal evidence. That you didn't enjoy it and had games you didn't like are not things that are wrong with the map, they are personal experiences. I don't personally enjoy games on Sanctuary, that doesn't make it a bad map. As for exploits, I did not know of any myself, though that does not mean they did not exist. If they were out of map issues they would have been fixed, as those are not design flaws but bugs, and we did not judge any of the maps on bugs.

"Honestly, there was not a more well forged map in the contest pool." The entire judging panel disagreed with you. The central structure and terrain looked nice, and the map played acceptably for One Flag CTF, but the structure was incredibly simplistic to defend and did not reward defense for moving out into the rest of the map. I do not care how well your map would have played for 8 v 8, the contest was not for 8 v 8. It was for 5 v 5, this was established from the beginning. The map was over-scaled for 5 v 5, and vehicle-infantry interaction was weak due to the entire central structure's lack of accessibility to warthog turret fire. The infantry-vehicle space was mostly open fields, and besides the cave/ teleport area did not provide interesting approaches to the base. While the map did improve a lot over the course of the many play tests that we held, It was inferior to many of the other One-Flag CTF maps we tested. Because of that, it was eliminated earlier than those maps. It is as simple as that, you can continue to complain about it or you can learn from it and make a better map.

As for a feature, that's not my territory. I have no knowledge or authority speak on that. It's Duck's channel, he can feature what he wants.

Edit: You can take the feedback or leave it, I'd rather not clog up the thread anymore than I already have. You can have the last word if you so choose.

 

This is me speaking my own opinion, not speaking as an Admin of the website...

I know some of you are upset about the cartographers, and I'm sure you're not just attacking particular people for the fun of it. Regardless, everyone had their chance to speak their mind in the previous thread, and there's little to be gained by continuing it here.

This thread has been created to discuss how to improve/eliminate the underlying problems with the current system that's being used to determine which community made maps make it into matchmaking. Continuing to bring the focus to individuals that you have a problem with impedes the opportunity for a deeper discussion, even if your gripes are completely justified.

Suppose you're successful in ridding the CC group of the people you have a problem with...then what? Do you think that's actually going to solve the underlying problem that you're upset about, which is one of favoritism/bias. News flash, everyone has a bias. Eliminating particular people that have a bias that you don't like will do nothing to actually remove favoritism and bias from the process.

Nitro's entire purpose in creating this thread is to discuss the root cause of the problem and try to address THAT. By bringing the focus back to an individual/personal level, you're losing out on the opportunity to engage in a deeper level of discussion. If you really have the communities best interest at heart, put your focus on eliminating the impact of favoritism/bias rather than focusing on eliminating specific people.