It's simply astouding. Most of the 1v1 10x10 maps generated with the "tournament" setting are better than most ladder maps. It feels a lot like AoE2. Definitely wouldn't mind seeing generated maps on ladder.
Would it be possible to have some 10% chance of getting a brand new mapgen map on ladder?
Hello, I’m a long term supcom player having started in January 2013 with some breaks inbetween. I started by playing only teamgames, many of them in such glorious maps as the original Gap of Rohan and Senton. Eventually my interest shifted and I became primarily a 1v1 player. You could say that I’ve been through all the phases of fafdom, from a beginner teamgame player to #1 ladder. As such I’ve developed an understanding and appreciation for a variety of different styles of enjoying the game and am uniquely positioned to represent the playerbase. This is my application for the 2021 player councilor (PC) race. If you read carefully you might not only learn something about me, but also about the other candidates.
In the spirit of keeping the post short enough for most faffers to not tldr through, I have omitted some important responsibilities of the PC such as:
I will also try hard to represent players' voice when it comes to opinion about the balance. If you are interested and want to read more, other applicants have gone into much more detail about how these reponsibilities relate to the PC role.
Tournaments have historically been one of the main responsibilities of the PC. Previously we have seen a focus on giving the community big high level tournaments that the people who the PC represent strive to have the skill to participate in. In the current PC race we have seen a more grounded approach as candidates have proposed tournament scenes around the 1671 ladder rating range. While the spirit of hosting more mid-tier tournaments is wonderful, I don’t see why we’d stop around that specific rating range.
As PC I will be promoting tournaments for average joes that are able to reach the most people. While there will still be some beginner players that may not be able to participate, higher rating players have historically not had too much trouble getting in. Overall we’ll have a tournament scene that reaches as many players as possible.
I will also take a closer look at the sometimes contentious relationship between tournament directors (TDs) and players. Specifically I will ensure that all prize money is given out and that all players are treated fairly regardless of their relationship with TDs.
As the PC I will have direct responsibility over many things, including promotions. Social media has always been underutilized in FAF promotion and I think we are missing a great opportunity. I will be looking to bolster our social media presence with the addition of the official FAF TikTok channel. This will increase traction with especially the younger audience.
I will look to increase the faflive viewership to about 2500-3500 concurrent viwers for this year’s LotS. I will also establish the Russian, German and Finnish language faflive streams for the event.
Moderation is a subject that is near and dear to my heart since - as all of you surely know - I have a bit of a troubled past. It is imperative that each PC applicant discloses the extent of their respective criminal backgrounds. I was temporarily muted in 2013 by our rightful leader Ze_PilOt, I have been repeatedly accused of smurfing (my original account was permabanned, but everyone knows who’s behind the wheel!) and there have even been rumors of rating manipulation on Dual Gap. I know my record is not quite as impressive as the other applicants, but I hope to still qualify.
In the “Why would you have left FAF?” thread we saw just how many people feel uncomfortable with the amount of toxicity in the community. Clearly the current arrangement is not working. I pledge to take the weight off moderator’s shoulders and fire the entire moderator team. Instead I will be surveying FAF activities like a hawk over aeolus and dual gap games.
Recently we have seen a great boom in FAF developers and are in risk of having exhausted all meaningful work. As PC I will have a tremendous responsibility to make sure all of my underlings have excellent work opportunities. I will make sure such opportunities are provided in the continued development of the Python Client.
A particular issue that has haunted our community, and most players have undoubtedly suffered from, is cancer. It comes in many forms: astro, dual gap, phantomx, the list goes on. I will divert some of our development resources to launch a cancer research initiative. I’m confident that with my guidance we will surely crack this persistent group of diseases. Talks with major players in the pharmaceutical industry have already commenced. We will of course limit the supply of our cancer cure in order to maximize profits (as is customary in the industry), which will be promptly pumped into mid-tier supcom tournaments. Unfortunately many of our patients, such as astro players, may not be able to afford the treatment, but this way we will finally be able to afford tournaments for players around the 1671 ladder rating range.
The birth of FAF association will be a threat to the current balance of power in the council of Seton’s. I will prioritize cementing the lawful position of the PC as the ruler of FAF by any means necessary. If it comes down to it together with my supporters we will perform a storming of the FAF association. FAF will officially go back to being a just monarchy, ruled by the rightful heir of zep. He ruled firmly but fairly and was gone too soon. Together we will do what is right by his memory.
In the new order council seats will be determined by trial by combat performed by the applicants. Once the application period ends we will hold a series of showmatches (watch live on faflive) between the applicants. Applicants may choose a champion to fight in their stead. This arrangement will ensure the strength and stability of the FAF organization.
Thank you for reading and voting. I am looking forward to my 80 hour workweeks! Just to check that you could hear me properly I have to ask: is it loud over there?
I would like to thank my right hand man Swonkoll for his help in writing this application. I would also like to thank my left hand man ArchDemon for reviewing an earlier version of this application. Thirdly I would like to thank my third hand man Tex for existing. Therefore the application has been moderator-approved. So back off.
^Title
Example situation: if you assist a damaged t2 mex to t3 and forget to take assist engies off after mex is finished, you have to pay a big repair tax.
That's not the only case, just in general repair is almost never worth doing. The only case where I've found it useful is sometimes repairing a damaged transport after inty tried to kill it at the opening. But that's literally the only case I can think of.
@judahx said in Calling for nine2 to resign as Promotions Councillor:
Pretty sure FAF has some toxicity.
Just a little follow up to this: searching for the n-word on the FAF discord server brings up 23 pages of results 
Most occurrences are from select few users (yes, including ftx).
Obviously the amount of messages in each server is different, but I searched for the n-word on a few other
loosely similar discord servers for reference.
FAF: 568 occurrences
Sanctuary: 0 occurrences
Immortal: Gates of Pyre: 0 occurrences
Godot Engine: 30 occurrences (note that this is a very big server)
Pocketwatch Games: 11 occurrences
BRNK: 3 occurrences
A Year of Rain: 0 occurrences
RTS Games Lovers: 1 occurrence
Bannermen: 0 occurrences
Now it's not exactly a secret that this word is generally frowned upon and racials slurs are forbidden in virtually any public space, at least in western society. It does not matter how you feel about this word personally. Do you think it's silly that people are upset by a mere word? Do you think that people should grow a thicker skin? Do you find it cringe that people are getting mad by proxy even though the word does not relate to them directly? Again, it does not matter what you think. The community will be judged regardless of how silly you think it might be. Even the people who do not care about the n-word in the slightest take it as a massive warning sign "toxic community ahead, steer clear".
And why is it that you feel it necessary to use problematic language?
Let's be honest it's really fucking childish. Also moderators need to get their shit together.
And no, this is obviously not the only form of problematic communication in FAF, but this fruit is hanging so low that it's undeground in Onkalo, the world's first permanent residence of nuclear waste.
Problem:
Fix: detailed below.
T1 engis should live with low hp from one bomber pass. Some combination of the following:
Bombers should be capable of economic damage (other than t1 engineers)
Make up for reduction in damage if necessary
Note that all changes should apply in all faction matchups
Side effects
Exact values can (should) be played around with to find a good balance.
In this thread: high rating players claiming aeon gun is broken and low rating players calling it a skill issue
There used to be a ground decal mod, where some custom decal would appear at your spawn location. I think it might be this one https://forums.faforever.com/viewtopic.php?f=41&t=12450 but not sure. Anyways, spawn decals would be a cool reward.
RAS SCUs aren't strong, lategame aggression is just super weak. Same thing for t3 arty. It's a massive mass investment, but it's not like you can just mount a land attack lategame. Navy situation is a bit better, but it's a bit too slow paced too imo. Balance team might want to consider playing around with some stat changes for all of t2+ (scale change magnitude by tech level) to provide more mid/lategame aggression opportunities
@melanol said in Open the FAF wiki:
How about we test out Elon Musk's direct democracy and vote on this issue? (And maybe even start doing this for almost everything.)
Why are u crediting a scam artist with the simplest most obvious way of democracy that existed since ancient greece, probably ever since the dawn of language?
I agree with opening the wiki, but I can't with good conscience upvote ur post when u include paragraphs like that xd
@jip said in Matchmaker Team Sentons 4v4 TMM Inclusion:
@Lord_Asmodeus / @FtXCommando I'd like to see you enjoy a game of about 1200 average rating where the air players are equally rated, yet one air player is a 'setoner' and manages to make an escorted strat before the other air player even has a single ASF.
The game is essentially over at that point. As beach / rock / mid player you didn't even participate yet. How is that fun for anyone involved but the air player with the strat?
While this doesn't invalidate your point given the current state of things, I'd just like to point out that this is a balance issue and things don't have to be this way despite the game having existed in such a state of air balance ever since the beginning.
On another note, I think it's sad that perhaps the best map in the entire game is so hated due to it being so good that it has developed a dedicated community around it. It seems to me that most (if not all) of the prejudice against this map is based on people not wanting to play against sentoneers rather than intrinsic qualities of the map itself.
1v1, 2v2, 3v3, 4v4 should look like checkboxes, and "Play" should look like a button. Like this: 
@nex said in How exactly do we expect low rated players to play the game?:
@clyf yeah, the rating system isn't designed to handle large teams
On the contrary
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/wp-content/uploads/2006/01/TR-2006-80.pdf
It's not the responsibility of anyone to sacrifice their evening playing games that they don't want to play. Furthermore, I don't think most low rating players would appreciate playing with much higher rating players on a regular basis. You can only get crushed so many times until you start to feel terrible.
Yes, there's clearly a problem onboarding new players. However, telling people to just play more with low ratings players is not a viable solution.
On a related note, I've been playing ladder in a different game recently where the matchmaking range is far too broad. I have 73 wins and 15 losses. It is not fun for me that the majority of my games are essentially meaningless stomps. I don't think it's fun for the opponents either.
I don't think the name and shame in OP is very nice.
For me personally the biggest hindrance in reading balance posts is the argumentation. This applies across the board to all ratings really. If there was a nice summary of everyones point of view I would likely read them, however in reality the threads tend to be branching arguments which rarely add any real substance and often appear more socially motivated than motivated by any enthusiasm to contribute to balance. Discord "forums" are particularly bad for this reason. I'd like to see just some nice bullet points or lists of pro/cons and such.
@waffelznoob said in Lots of people rage quitting in 3v3 TMM:
as a rage quitter, i apologise. i will do better
Can u also stop playing 10min chess when lobby is 7/8?
@exselsior said in Why would you have left FAF?:
The only change that has been mentioned that I think would count as actually having to relearn core gameplay is engy mod and that was more than 3 years ago. E storage and mass fab changes are relatively speaking so trivial that for anyone even remotely competent at the game it would take little to no effort at all to account for. And if you’re not somewhat competent they’re not big enough changes to matter whatsoever for you anyway.
Not just more than 3, that was like 9 or 10 years ago (2013-2014)
One of the best things about supcom is that anything that could be described as cheese barely even exists.
@nex said in Why would you have left FAF?:
@blodir I have also seen people talk about making it dynamic, but back then it wasn't very well received, as the micro potential and thus the gameplay changes drastically with input delay.
So if micro became better with lower ping this would either put players at a disadvantage that have a high ping to the relay server or (in the case of pure p2p) would make every game feel completely different on how well you can micro your units.I can see that people find it off putting to have such a high input delay (though to me it always felt kinda natural), but I think that's part of the charm of supcom and people who don't like that are probably better off with a different game.
Yea apparently it's possible to have at least synchronous adaptive input scheduling.
I don't think there's any charm to high input delay, though I see the benefit of consistency in such a small community. Like if you could always get games entirely within your region it would be a non-issue, but if people got used to playing with low input delay and then have to play with high delay the next game I think they'd be pretty frustrated even if technically the overall experience is better.
But yeah with current sim tick rate we can at best reduce it to max 200ms delay, which is still dramatically higher than eg. sc2 (I'm pretty sure they have around 50ms ticks). Still a lot better than what we have currently 
@nex said in Why would you have left FAF?:
Supcom has an inbuilt input latency, which is independent from both the sim latency(which comes on top, if at all) and network latency(which the input latency is meant to compensate for).
so no matter how good your ping is you will have those 500ms of input lag. this could in theory be a variable lag, but from what I can remember it's fixed (and apparently to 500ms), to make every game feel consistent.
so every tick (or possibly every frame) the game collects your inputs for tick n+5 and sends them to all other players.
At tick n+5 the game checks if it received inputs from all players and if not pauses.
So these 500 ms are currently fix. assuming the game might take about 100ms to send your inputs(if it gathers them all over the course of a tick and then sends them once) then you get up to 100 ms of extra lag (if you press right before it's send you get 0ms, if you press right after a send you get 100 ms extra lag), so on average that is 50 ms lag, which you could halve by doubling the sim rate, so you'd gain 25ms on average but the 500ms (which is chosen so that players with a ping of up to 250ms to each other can play together) will always come on top of that, so the net gain is between 5-10%so tl;dr there is a 500ms inbuilt lag to compensate for any network lag, which overshadows any amount of lag introduced by the sim tick rate.
Yes, I talked with Jip yesterday and he confirmed that inputs are scheduled for 5 ticks in the future. It's possible to (almost) completely eliminate this by scheduling the inputs at a proxy server like sc2 (or seemingly BAR). Basically they asymmetrically schedule inputs based on latency, such that people with high ping to the server have higher input lag than those with low ping to the server. So in those cases input lag is totally dominated by sim tick length.
I get what you are saying now though, I thought you were saying that there's some nebulous other source of input lag or that network latency dominates, which is not true. It's just a somewhat arbitrary value of 5 ticks chosen to be acceptable by gpg in order to avoid writing dynamic scheduling logic x) Even in pure p2p it should be easily possible to communicate input scheduling changes based on latency (though then the scheduling has to be synchronous).
