@penguin_
I would love a mapgen only ladder queue. It would certainly remove the idea from newer players that they need map specific B.Os to play, and people wouldn't be focused on trying to rote learn maps off by heart, and start to actually learn the game itself instead!

@waffelznoob I do agree 100%, however newbies are in general terrible at improvising build orders, and thus gravitate towards rote learning instead in order to compensate. By removing their ability to rote learn, this lowers stress and will make them actually start improvising, because they know the other player has to do the same and therefore feel that the game is 'fair' (which makes them more likely to queue ladder). Perception shapes reality in this case and all that.

P.S And yes trees on Loki are fun to get out early bombers when you're lower ranked

@voodoo I understand that b.os are a big part of the game, especially once you get to the top tier where it starts to matter a lot. It also gives a lot of different style of games because you get maps like the ditch, loki, where it's really satisfying to get it right and just get an advantage right off the bat via your superior opening. However it's also what drives away a lot of newbies since they think (incorrectly, but you can never get rid of the idea) that they need to have B.Os down to a science for every ranked map before they'll even touch it, which lowers the number of players who are willing to get into ranked.

If there was a way that made it where lower rated players just get map gen (i.e anyone below 1500 in 1 vs 1), while above that you start getting special maps, that would be pretty awesome IMO, because the higher skilled players get their special maps that they can have home field advantage on, while the lower rated players can relax (especially since B.Os really don't matter much below a certain rating anyway).

@waffelzNoob I agree as well, any early raids or aggression usually forces someone who's just rote learning a B.O to revert to their natural skill level, but most players are around the 700 rating skill level or something. So what is natural for any 1400+ player is basically impossible for these players already, they're too busy trying to sim city early on to do any raids, let alone do first bomber micro. Some of those players might be good enough to improve, and my idea is just to make the game seem less 'scary' to them, so they can play in ladder and hopefully improve and give the higher rated players more competition eventually.

@cetea said in I can't hear some of the Audio or other Sound issue. What should I do?:

@cetea said in I can't hear some of the Audio or other Sound issue. What should I do?:

Everything worked perfectly before the latest unanticipated extended server down time, but now my audio has bugged out (i.e factory select sounds don't play, and some combat sounds don't play etc). Anyone know of a way to fix this, or why the downtime might have affected anything?

To add to this, (I am unable to edit the above post for some reason), I have tried resetting the game.prefs file here, as explained. I've also checked my audio settings and I am sure it is on stereo and on the right frequency (before I reset the game.pref file). Anything else I could do? Perhaps reinstall fa from steam?

EDIT: I fixed it by searching online on the steam forums for people with the same issue. Apparently for no reason at all, the only way to fix this is restarting Windows (turning it off and then back on does not work, only restarting works). To be specific, my issue was that certain audio sounds would only play once per game (i.e selecting commander sound, factory select sound, commander shooting sounds, music tracks etc, and then on subsequent instances, these sounds would no longer play).

@cetea said in I can't hear some of the Audio or other Sound issue. What should I do?:

Everything worked perfectly before the latest unanticipated extended server down time, but now my audio has bugged out (i.e factory select sounds don't play, and some combat sounds don't play etc). Anyone know of a way to fix this, or why the downtime might have affected anything?

To add to this, (I am unable to edit the above post for some reason), I have tried resetting the game.prefs file here, as explained. I've also checked my audio settings and I am sure it is on stereo and on the right frequency (before I reset the game.pref file). Anything else I could do? Perhaps reinstall fa from steam?

Everything worked perfectly before the latest unanticipated extended server down time, but now my audio has bugged out (i.e factory select sounds don't play, and some combat sounds don't play etc). Anyone know of a way to fix this, or why the downtime might have affected anything?

Hey, I know it's been a while for this thread, but given that it has heavy criticsm of the ASI mod, I wonder what people think about this:

I've kept most of the basic icons, but I do really like idle engineers as well. I picked a less intrusive version of it, and I think I can clearly count tanks without zooming in, as well as seeing their unit type. I find the mex icons just really useful for me when it comes to quickly counting the number of enemy t2 mexes vs my own for instance.

@blackyps

Got it working now, thanks again! On another note about modifying it a bit, anyone know exactly how I can delete certain icons from showing? For instance if I just want it to do mexes, radar, pgens, tmls, tmd, sml and smd, how would I go about doing that.

EDIT: I think I found the way, I can open the installation exe file and delete all the icons I don't like! However for some reason winrar is saying archive corrupted for now.

EDIT 2: Fixed it! Turns out I needed to edit the nxt file installed by the installer with 7zip, not the actual exe. Got it working the way I want now !

Thanks again to Cheese for linking the thread where Blackheart explained the downsides of the mod, I think this is the best of both worlds probably IMHO.

@blackyps said in Advanced strategic icons mod:

The files in replaydata don't use a different format, they are just copied over. I don't know why the ASI installer is failing, but I guess it just drops an archive in the folder anyway. You could locate it in gamedata and just copy it over, then it should work in replays as well.

That would be awesome! I'm trying to find where exactly I should copy the files over. I got an "Advanced strategic icons.nxt" file in my ProgramData/FAForever/gamedata; is the file I need to copy? And if so, where should I copy it to?

Yeah I just really need the mex icons, tml, tmd, nuke, and nuke def. The factory tech level and pgen icons also really helps me out as well, but those are the key ones for me.

Anyway, thanks for letting me know they still work in a normal game though!

EDIT: I would love it if there's some post where I can learn how to customize my own icon set, that would be awesome.

EDIT 2: I tried out redux strategic icons (small) after reading that thread where people argued the pros and cons of ASI, and I mostly love it, except I prefer how the mexes look in ASI. Is there any way I can replace the mex icon there with the icons from ASI?

ASI still worked for me as of the 2023 2.0 version of FAF, but with the latest version, it goes right back to the default icons. Anyone know of a way to make it work for the most recent client version? I really like the whole design, but especially the way the mex icons look.

@voodoo I understand that b.os are a big part of the game, especially once you get to the top tier where it starts to matter a lot. It also gives a lot of different style of games because you get maps like the ditch, loki, where it's really satisfying to get it right and just get an advantage right off the bat via your superior opening. However it's also what drives away a lot of newbies since they think (incorrectly, but you can never get rid of the idea) that they need to have B.Os down to a science for every ranked map before they'll even touch it, which lowers the number of players who are willing to get into ranked.

If there was a way that made it where lower rated players just get map gen (i.e anyone below 1500 in 1 vs 1), while above that you start getting special maps, that would be pretty awesome IMO, because the higher skilled players get their special maps that they can have home field advantage on, while the lower rated players can relax (especially since B.Os really don't matter much below a certain rating anyway).

@waffelzNoob I agree as well, any early raids or aggression usually forces someone who's just rote learning a B.O to revert to their natural skill level, but most players are around the 700 rating skill level or something. So what is natural for any 1400+ player is basically impossible for these players already, they're too busy trying to sim city early on to do any raids, let alone do first bomber micro. Some of those players might be good enough to improve, and my idea is just to make the game seem less 'scary' to them, so they can play in ladder and hopefully improve and give the higher rated players more competition eventually.

@waffelznoob I do agree 100%, however newbies are in general terrible at improvising build orders, and thus gravitate towards rote learning instead in order to compensate. By removing their ability to rote learn, this lowers stress and will make them actually start improvising, because they know the other player has to do the same and therefore feel that the game is 'fair' (which makes them more likely to queue ladder). Perception shapes reality in this case and all that.

P.S And yes trees on Loki are fun to get out early bombers when you're lower ranked