I just want to mention that even the some of the largest companies in the world experience problems.
I'm sure some of you noticed all of facebook's services went down yesterday because of a bad BGP configuration - https://blog.cloudflare.com/october-2021-facebook-outage/

With the amount of work the FAF dev team has been putting in and the improvements they've been adding, I'm both impressed and applaud you for it.
The recent patches that the dev team has been pushing to FAF definitely introduced stability issues which caused a lot of users frustration, but as with all software, stability is hard and always will be hard. All it takes is 1 mistake in the hundreds of changes that get deployed to cause a problem, so I simply wanted to say thank you, I and many other users understand the difficulty of development, especially for such a long standing project.

I’m convinced we should separate PC into two positions. Product manager (basically what FTX is doing now) and an actual PC who tries to create an inclusive environment and focuses on what the players want.

Ethos:

I have proven myself consistent in maintaining mapgen lobbies and responsibilities across many years of being a FAF icon and have over the time proactively taken additional responsibilities in order to keep the FAF interesting with mapgen lobbies. I will continue to host precisely the same mapgen lobbies for my next mandate.
Future Plans:

Mapgen
Over the last year I have worked with nobody to create a thriving mapgen community and continue to work with nobody to drive mapgen down people's throats. This is intended to give people some spice in their lives so they keep playing games as it gives people new maps that incentivize playing while also eliminating the inevitability of lame ass games.

Essentially, you will need a to accept that mapgen games are the best then begin either hosting them or playing them. Once you've accepted this you will become a better player and enjoy faf more. In addition, when you begin playing mapgen you will become of a new class of player. You can look down on those who do not play mapgen as the plebs that they are.

This in turn allows will provoke these plebs to begin playing mapgen so they too can join the elite club. Slowly FAF will become a utopia of mapgen savants.

Mapgen
I'm planning on hedging the FAFLive channel as a way to garner interest in mapgen from the rest of the community. With about 100 reliable viewers at any general point in time and (hopefully) aiming for 250-300 during this year's mapgen tourney, we should be entering the realm where sponsors may be interested in helping support mapgen events. Ideally this results in both more mapgen tournaments and more exposure for mapgen through coordinated media campaigns and connections to real world firms.

Matchmaker
Since there has been a lot of interest in revisiting the concept of polling for maps, I will completely ignore the idea and replace every map with mapgen. In order to minimize work on my end, we will never have any new ladder map rotations, mapgen will be forever.

I also plan on working with nobody to create a better matchmaking algorithm that will forcibly queue players up for mapgen games if they are not in one.

I also want to fish around and find someone to help me create a way to force more mapgen down people's throats.

Tournaments
I will be trying to fish for additional individuals to help out in utilizing tournaments as a way to promote the 2v2 mapgen games. Mainly, hosting events that are based around mapgen such as doing an invite for the top 8 or 12 players and having them choose teammates through a Captain system.

And to reiterate, I will be working on these new projects on top of the work I do in the link above. Nothing is getting dropped.

I commit to:

Communicating with as many FAF players to let them know that there will only be mapgen games going forward
Organizing a schedule of the FAF mapgen nights
Organizing tournament directors who will run mapgen tournaments for players
Gathering feedback from the FAF project community to completely ignore it and only create more mapgen modes.
Presenting and represent this information in the best interest of making mapgen the only game mode.

I do not take the Councillor Pledge because it is folly and the current writing of it calls for several current Councillors to resign or be replaced. Read: "I understand that if I am unable to perform these duties, I will resign or be replaced" & "I will spend at least 4 hours per week working on These Responsibilities" in combination with "avoid bringing FAF into disrepute"

I will instead pledge:

I will work to accomplish my own interests and pushing mapgen. When interests of the various user bases collide or the user base clashes with contributors, I will work to create a compromise that best serves none involved. I will maximize my own interests.
I will maintain the same level of work ethic that I have maintained through all my years on FAF, very little.
I will act as the voice for no players across all levels of FAF while also acting as a brick wall.
I will pledge to work on both making a new Councillor Pledge and holding current Councillors responsible for their failure to uphold mapgen games as the dominate game mode. They should be expected to justify why they do not play mapgen games.

And that last pledge point will be my first action as Player Councillor.

@ftxcommando said in New Player Councilor Discussion + Removal Announcements:

Now, does that mean polling to gather input is bad? No. But it also doesn't mean it's the solution to every problem. Nor does it mean you need a Council position entirely devoted to it, particularly when there is no real authority to give out to the role that makes any sense.

Does a councilor position need to have authority? I don't think so.
I view a councilor as a dedicated role that has responsibilities it must uphold, if that means the councilor needs authority to fulfill the responsibilities then sure give them authority, if not then don't.

I don't see harm in introducing a position that focuses entirely on gathering information from players, whether it be polling, chatting, or whatever means necessary.
This councilor would be the pulse of the FAF player base and provide valuable input to other councilors to drive their decision making. I don't think this will take away from any singular vision of FAF the current PC has.

It's like any company, there are positions for gathering information from customers, there are positions for executing on that information to deliver a product customers want. It's just a matter of how we want to define a councilor.

@thomashiatt said in New Player Councilor Discussion + Removal Announcements:

Go gather information without being a councilor.

Let me iterate on my definition.
The new position would be expected to maintain a pulse on the FAF player base so the other councilors can rely on them for accurate and useful information. So from this I would say my councilor definition is slightly different, someone who doesn't necessarily have authority, but has responsibilities they MUST fulfill.

The issue here is people don't think FTX are fulfilling that well enough, he's being dismissive, he's a brick wall to talk to, etc. I'm sure you've read it all.
So either he steps up addresses these complaints, someone else is voted in, or that responsibility is delegated to someone else via either a councilor position or via FTX (which I don't think he will, correct me if I'm wrong here FTX)

Now, am I going to do that? No, I'm not interested nor will I have the time. Is someone else willing to do that? Sure why not.

Does that give you enough detail for you to provide a less snarky and more constructive response?

Can you make a UI mod that adds the sheesh sound effect to chat like a chat taunt. Can you also make it audible to all players if they have the UI mod, similar to the emoticon mod.
Here is a sample sound https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YgT6XABqS5Y

@ftxcommando Isn't this only for aeon torp bombers?
The other ones use normal torps (unless this was changed since 2013)

Somewhat related

Did you know aeon destroyers and czar uses depth charges instead of torpedos, which for those that don't know cannot be blocked by anti torpedo defense.

I think this video explains it all.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1HB4viGvzfU

@snagglefox said in Code Wars Episode IV: A New Hope:

Even if we somehow had the money, and SE was willing to sell, it'd probably be better to just put that much money towards developing a new, modern game.

That wouldn’t be very forever of forged alliance forever.

Make the mercy an anti air weapon that has massive AOE and can take out huge blobs of ASFs and intis. Really make air play spicier and more frustrating. /s

Inb4 people complaining hoards of cruisers building harms is broken

@ftxcommando said in Decrease air unit HP:

“there’s no reason” it’s called simulated projectiles and one of the defining unique things about the game.

I remember epicly blocking a nuke with a czar to save my ACU because my anti near it wasn't loaded. If I couldn't do that well then this game would be dead to me.

@aulex said in Need UI Mod? Let me know:

Can you make a UI mod that adds the sheesh sound effect to chat like a chat taunt. Can you also make it audible to all players if they have the UI mod, similar to the emoticon mod.
Here is a sample sound https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YgT6XABqS5Y

I'm so sad this opportunity was passed up on.

I just want to mention that even the some of the largest companies in the world experience problems.
I'm sure some of you noticed all of facebook's services went down yesterday because of a bad BGP configuration - https://blog.cloudflare.com/october-2021-facebook-outage/

With the amount of work the FAF dev team has been putting in and the improvements they've been adding, I'm both impressed and applaud you for it.
The recent patches that the dev team has been pushing to FAF definitely introduced stability issues which caused a lot of users frustration, but as with all software, stability is hard and always will be hard. All it takes is 1 mistake in the hundreds of changes that get deployed to cause a problem, so I simply wanted to say thank you, I and many other users understand the difficulty of development, especially for such a long standing project.

First off nice work and congratulations!

@brutus5000 said in Mordor: A journey comes to an end:

• Would I do it the same way with the knowledge of today?
  Not for all money in the world. Back then many people disliked the fact that I wrote a java based desktop application and recommended a web based approach and they were right back then (and even more 5 years later). But still I do believe that it was the right choice for me personally as the one who invested all that time. Simply because Java was a language I was familiar enough to get it started and enough help and references to get it working. If I had chosen to learn all the web related stuff, I probably would have been stuck at some point and lost interest. Also I wouldn't have learned all the painful issues when writing desktop applications.
  So even though I usually frown upon web developing, today I understand why things are the way they are and have a much better understanding of the problems that they solve (better).
• Maybe at some point in the future I will restart and do all the things in a web application. Just to get the same learning effect I had with mordor.

I think I'd agree with web development being a terrible ecosystem, but I do agree and stand by that same opinion that web is the way to go (let it be electron or a browser), even when I was working on some odds and ends in FAF I think that sentiment was shared across at least a few developers.

@deletethis said in **Platinum question**:

..all races have at least a t3 aircraft carrier (uef needs to make a t4 for it) actually, but there's not much reason to make them apart from the cool factor (I think the seraph carrier used to have a longer range tac than the cruiser, but that's no longer the case at the very least).

This is incredibly wrong

@valki Yes they do (atlantis for uef), also fatties, cybran cruisers, I don't remember if any other units can.

I do find the idea of very low fuel times with AOE regen with air staging interesting. I'm thinking 30 seconds of fuel on asf or 1-2 minutes on an inti, maybe teammates air staging also works if possible. Basically forcing air staging dotted around the map and more tactical positioning. Sounds like a cool variation for the very boring air play today.