32 wips, only 8 entries. Help me out here.

Armadillo of Doom

Group Founder, Lover of Pie
aa
Oct 25, 2007
949
1,228
Edit 1: What do you all think of this?; http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?p=47033#post47033

I'm hoping you guys can help me figure out what happened. From what I could find, we had 32 contest wips and potential entries. 3 of the 8 submitted were created by moderators. I'd really like to know if I could have done something differently. Is getting reminded once a month not enough? Would having one every 2 weeks be better? Allow more or less time b/c people lose interest? That's really all I can think of. Share your thoughts, cuz I'm at a loss right now. Here are all of the official ones, plus the potentials. Also please note that the entries are playing on the server right now; http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?p=47000#post47000

http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=3891
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4501
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4399
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=3745
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=3820
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=3719
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4701
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4689
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4339
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4665
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=2752
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4510
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4278
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4471
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=3921
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=3806
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=3810
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4486
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4368
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4337
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4397
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4097
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4266
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4128
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=3775
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4009
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4067
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=3927
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=4004
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=3952
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=3940
http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=3617
 
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YM

LVL100 YM
aa
Dec 5, 2007
7,135
6,056
You've got haywood down as eligable, its 3 stages and thus not. pl_tripple also isnt since its got multiple tracks

But even with 8 out of the remaining 30 something has gone a bit wrong...
 

Apom

L6: Sharp Member
Sep 14, 2008
366
65
Well, you could also say that doing a quality PL map (even single-stage) is no easy task, and that having eight of them for this contest is pretty good actually. I mean, how many good custom PLs are there around that aren't in this contest? Hoodoo, Goldrush, Badwater, and uuuh... Cave maybe?
 

Nineaxis

Quack Doctor
aa
May 19, 2008
1,767
2,820
I'd agree with Apom, when was the last time eight [more or less] quality maps were released at the same time for our enjoyment? Sure, eight is only one-fourth of thirty-two, but it is still a lot for the custom mapping world, where quality maps trickle out slowly and rarely.
 
Feb 14, 2008
1,051
931
I started one, but it kind of started to fail after a bit so I stopped the WIP. I did get halfway through another announced one, but that kind of lost momentum as well.
 

Spike

L10: Glamorous Member
Feb 13, 2008
716
82
Yeah I told I can't join the compo because only 15% of the map is done, i can't even submit an alpha because it's not even alpha. Sorry guys, maybe next time
 

YM

LVL100 YM
aa
Dec 5, 2007
7,135
6,056
Eight times four is thirty two, I'm pretty sure.

yes but just like 1/2 gets it's own name (a half) 1/4 gets its own name too (a quarter)

You'd never say one twoth or one fourth, you always say half or quarter, its just the way fractions works.
 

Cerious

L420: High Member
Aug 10, 2008
455
133
Argh, so many promising maps also had wips. pl_alpine, pl_railroad (though I bet the creator is still working on that), pl_crossfire. Meh, at least we got some very, very good quality maps for the contest (Frontier, Cashworks, Repository, Zig, Stovepipe, Reservoir, Halfacre, Tranquility).
 

Artesia

L6: Sharp Member
Nov 11, 2008
278
72
youme 1/4 can be correctly said as one quarter or one fourth.
 

Termaximus

L5: Dapper Member
Jan 11, 2008
229
32
Well I did not submit mine (which is a solid beta) because I thought 1/15 at 0:00 meant midnight tonight, not midnight last night. I'm so busy with work, school, etc I just skimmed the thread yesterday. This really sucks because it was good enough to submit last night, but I wanted to tie up a few loose ends tonight. Oh well, I'm sure the other contestants would have blown me away.
 

Armadillo of Doom

Group Founder, Lover of Pie
aa
Oct 25, 2007
949
1,228
Well I did not submit mine (which is a solid beta) because I thought 1/15 at 0:00 meant midnight tonight, not midnight last night. I'm so busy with work, school, etc I just skimmed the thread yesterday. This really sucks because it was good enough to submit last night, but I wanted to tie up a few loose ends tonight. Oh well, I'm sure the other contestants would have blown me away.

That's the second time I get to tell Youme "I told you so" :p Please upload your map, I'm going to allow the exception here.
 

Termaximus

L5: Dapper Member
Jan 11, 2008
229
32

grazr

Old Man Mutant Ninja Turtle
aa
Mar 4, 2008
5,441
3,814
Well my failure was down to leaving the payload setup to the last minute and stubbornly building it from scratch in an attempt to learn something rather than copy and pasting it from badwater for the sakes of a release. It would have been much easier, but i didn't need half the entities and my map had a unique theme and finalé in the end.

I feel a bit odd about this as i could probably have released a beta if i had devved the map in the first place.. Plus with only 8 entries i think half were started before the competition was even announced or atleast adapted for the competion there-after from existing projects. 3 months is a long time.. but it is not a long time to get an advanced beta out on a map. Especially for those with many life commitments, and especially especially when the competition is run through the academic year, and deadline's on the busiest time of the year for students. It looks like for me and my trend in trying to attend competitions is that i'm only able to map at a slow pace because i have little time to spare to this hobby because i'm on a course that requires the majority of my time as it's 100% course work. I only managed to release avante because i had 4 months over summer to piss about with. The payload is also a tricky setup for the best of us, i lost count of the number of bugs Youme had to iron out for hoodoo and/or half-acre. 4, 5? Not to mention how many beta's other people had to go through to make a payload that didn't stall or fly off the tracks or something.

3 and a half months was perhaps premature for a whole map when regarding people who don't have a lot of time but.. we could probably discuss how best to tackle fairness in these regards untill the cows come home. The expectations were certainly higher for those in higher education and/or with jobs.

I'm dissapointed in myself to have failed in having a working beta. But i just had other more important commitments at the last minute. I don't think it was down to anyone other than the mappers themselves who can be blamed for the final resolution. But in future i think what we can take from this if if you're running a competition through the academic year you probably wanna compensate for such commitments. If this was in summer... I think it would have been a different story. Some people i imagine had a lot of time over Christmas to catch up but a lot of U.K. Universities set loads of essay's and coursework over this period; as i said, i get my 3 weeks Christmas break now. After the competition deadline -.-
 
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Cerious

L420: High Member
Aug 10, 2008
455
133
Indeed, the payload competition requires a lot of time for thorough testing, gameplay, detailing, and finding all the little bugs. Hardly any maps in this compo (except for halfacre and zig, which seem to be really solid final/near-final maps) are flawless or perfect, and are very large. A small map in a good, 3 month timeframe would be particularly helpful for new mappers, and I believe an arena map would be particularly easy to make in this time constraint.
 

HojoTheGreat

L5: Dapper Member
Nov 11, 2008
206
34
As mentioned earlier, I really do think having 8 high-quality entries is a fantastic accomplishment! Sure there may have been 30 WIPs, but doesn't that simply mean that goal #1 of the competition, to get mappers to familiarize themselves with the Payload gametype, was accomplished? It's quite difficult to keep up momentum when creating a new map, and ESPECIALLY when learning all of the new materials that need to be implemented.

Also, to be brutally honest, who has time to play 30 maps, let alone 8? Even after this competition I, sadly, imagine maybe 3 of the entries will catch on and be added regularly to public servers. It's just so hard to get the word out, and when you're not the creator of hoodoo or mach4 etc., it's even harder. For our parts we should all be spreading these quality maps across our servers to support our community and mappers, but it's going to be a hard-fought battle to spread interest.

So I say chin up! Think of it as quality, not quantity, and over the next few months perhaps many of those WIPs will reach fruition, and we can space out community releases better :D.

Plus you got VALVe's interest based on the competition, I'd say that's a pretty damn good accomplishment!
 

trainRiderJ

L5: Dapper Member
Mar 14, 2008
203
31
WIP threads are a double-edged sword because you can see how your entry stacks up to the competition before actually submitting anything. I'd imagine most of the people were dissuaded sometime during the course of competition, believing they had no chance of winning.

Considering 8 people ran that gauntlet and were able to submit quality maps, I think you have a pretty successful contest. Imagine if all of those became official maps, it would nearly double the map count!

Having said that, I have to admit that I hate payload as a game type and wish something would be done for the competitive community :( More push cp and especially more gravelpit-style maps please!