Custom Planets/Map Editor/symmetry! <3

It is possible to write server scripts that spawn in commanders at pre defined positions. However I am not sure how to best pass them around to other people.

@squishypon3: Yes such flat special brushes were what I was thinking. However I am not good with blender, so I've not looked further into it. Custom brushes sure would be quite nice for many reasons though.

They aren't obligated to make anything, but they really brewed a lot of excitement about PA's moddability so to never allow exact positioning of features would be a bit of a **** move . I'm sure it'll happen, but they have bigger fish to fry currently.

Not necessarily a waste of time. If Uber can't jump in to help us we'll need to optimize this way of doing it so much that it works out for us. But that's a lot of work to get right and always will have a performance penalty for those planets as well.

If uber can give this a nudge with just a few tweaks/hooks, it would be a very good synergy with the modding community. Ultimately I think customization of maps is going to be a really important feature for the longevity and diversity of PA games. I'm just chiming to say that I think even if Uber only provides the hooks and lets the modding community do this rest, this really should be a high priority task. The whole concept of autogenerated maps was based around there being far more diverse planet features creating more interesting emergent gameplay. It's pretty obvious that for various reasons this didn't really pan out. Now it is time to let the community see if it can come up with an interesting diversity of maps to fill that gap. Map diversity has been a consistent negative point in most of the reviews thus far.

For now could we just check random metal distributions till we find good ones then design maps around those?

I agree. I don't ask Uber to make a map editor. My map editor thread has a list of modding hooks that would greatly simplify the map editor and would make it more powerful at the same time. Most of those hooks are probably easy to implement for Uber, from what I can tell without knowing PA's source though.

Unpopular opinion incoming: you have been warned.

I find that planet depressing. Planets are supposed to be natural formations, and symmetry, real symmetry, exists nowhere in nature -- and especially at such a level. You are trying to impose artificial symmetry on an environment in which it feels completely out of place.

I know that everyone is liking the mod and the post and the entire thread, and people hate grumpy naysayers. Still, I felt that it is worth it to have a single voice heard that says "this is extremely anti-aesthetic".

You're free to have your own opinion imho. Yes a planet with mountains like that is even further away from reality than the random ones. But personally I care more about the gameplay implications.
Not to mention this is the very first planet superouman made using the editor, which isn't very easy to use either. Making maps play well AND look really natural is far from easy with it.
I like his work a lot.

Even from a mechanical standpoint I have a problem with symmetrical maps. But yeah, I am not criticizing his work as a modder. A lot of effort definitely went into that, and it's commendable. Still, you can put a lot of effort into a painting, and even a lot of skill, and still make something ugly... If he likes it, that's all that matters, but since we are posting our opinions here, and since everyone else is positive, I thought it wouldn't hurt his feelings too much if some random guy said, "You know what, I don't like this".

I am looking forward to more work from him and others, though, for sure. And if he or someone else can try their hand at something asymmetrical, I'd be delighted.

This is really cool, I really think there are big benefits for pa having a map editor.

Just wanted to add my voice to this, and I'm sure if its not to hard to do and enough people ask uber will eventually get around to it.

You guys doing all this modding are awsome...

Was playing with the black ops mod for Fa the other day, really its fantastic.
You all have my gratitude and respect

Something tells me the majority of competitive pa players will not care so much about realism.

They will care more about equal playing fields that create cool plays and varied strats.

Symmetry is actually a very very big part of nature. Have you never heard of the Golden Ratio?

My god, it's... beautiful.

I'm mainly aiming for symmetrical maps for competitive use. Asymmetry is extremely hard to do without giving one player a better spawn. Even it is a slight difference, on a relatively high level of play, it can make a difference.

Imagine you are in the finals of a 500$ tournament and you have the weaker spawn and you lose, you would be very frustrated.



In more than 10 years of StarCraft broo war and StarCraft 2, there was only one asymmetrical map out of a few hundred maps used in tournaments.http://www.teamliquid.net/tlpd/korean/maps/167_Fantasy_II

And you can still see a symmetry in the number of bases per player.

Remember all the rehosted games in all the tournaments in PA be cause the map was too asymmetrical.

Symmetrical maps also allow player to better prepare for specific strategies and they don't have to change their strategy because he had the wrong spawn.

But of course you can play custom asymmetrical maps for fun but I don't think they have their place in tournaments.

And to be honest my map is already too asymmetrical for my taste with the random-ish metal distribution and slightly different position of brushes.

If the system editor allows to make a fair metal distribution and distribution of brushes every time, it would be interesting to have at least one totally random map per tournament. It would promote players who have a better skill of inventing strategies on the fly.

What? Map editor! Give me that!!!!

I see what you are saying. I guess Clan Wars gets around this by having a league format?

you gonna hate me saying that ... and i realise this is early stuff and all ... but god damned that just looks so freakin unnatural .... like i seriously would hate to play on that planet ....

Haha, I'm sure it'd look much better with some nice aesthrtic brushes, also- more choke points and whatnot.

Also... More than like one brush to make the mountains! XD

Though, personally I think the mountains look insanely more a esthetically pleasing when in the forest biome.

Water is not easy it seems.