PTE build 75330-pte (please post feedback and bugs here)

i think replay search might be bugged as i cant find any of my old games (no mods).

with sentient replays mod and contact replays mod used to try search for other people, im still getting no replays.

and just tested this in stable build (no mods) and still wont find any.

edit: glad to know its already being looked into, i need those replays lol its were i spend most of my time haha

yeah i think both those maps played were a lot better than what we had at the beginning of the week. If you guys keep up this pace of listening to feedback and acting it then we're all going to love this game very much in the next 3-4 months.

While the new maps are certainly a great improvement on the old ones in terms of balance and competitive 1v1 fairness, I feel like a lot of what made PA exciting to me is being lost. I play StarCraft 2, and I like the fact that PA has the potential to be completely different, but that the current changes are making it more similar.

The maps feel very artificial compared to the original random asymmetrical ones, I now indeed feel like I'm playing on a map, and not a planet. I will concede however that the original 1v1 maps were pretty poor, and that the new maps are better gameplaywise. What I really don't like is that due to the symmetry you can tell where your opponent spawned, therefore negating early scouting and the element of surprise. I would definitely like to see random asymmetrical maps that are generated in a manner that provides mostly fair start positions for all (slight imbalances would be evened out by playing multiple ladder games, the best players would still come out on top). Would a fixed number of mex per start position not go a long way to making things pretty fair? Obviously throw in a few fake start positions so it isn't too obvious where the spawns are.

To keep everyone happy we may need a random and non-random ladder, but this is further splitting an already very small number of players on the ladder. I think PA needs to stand out rather than become more similar to existing games (other than TA, because TA was awesome ), and there is a tendency from the competitive players to want things to be like what they are already familiar with, and they want the game to adapt to that, rather than for them to adapt to cool new concepts.

The other thing that disappoints me is that I tried making a massive plateau by enlarging a CSG, but we still don't seem to be able to build on them. I'm fairly sure we used to be able to back in the day. Please can we have buildable plateaus/highground?

Also we need more people who aren't Uber rank to play the PTE so I don't get ridiculously stomped every game!

If you know your way around modding you can. It's a missing configuration that's all. Has been discussed already and I hope setting those attributes will be possible. It makes a huge difference I think.

I really don't know my way around modding are you saying that it would be possible to mod a CSG on a prebuilt system to be buildable for everyone, or would everyone need to install a 'buildable CSG' mod to be able to play?

It currently needs to be a server mod. So the host needs the mod, the other players would automatically download it.
Still a lot more annoying than just being able to place csg brushes with those settings.
I really hope Uber will add them.

A couple of things about the 1v1 Ranked maps (finally had a chance to play last night with Murcanic).

First, there isn't a lot of space for unit movement. On the Desert planet, for example, there are three chokepoints for each player's base, which leads to turtling and/or air strats (generally). Even without those three chokepoints, though, the rest of the map is just FILLED with CSG brushes. I have to stream through units in lines, which is never good for larger battles.

Second, they are just SO SMALL. There isn't any space for anything except RUSH RUSH RUSH. It's really hard to figure out if the maps are seriously affecting gameplay balance when all we have are these rush maps being thrown around. It would be nice to have larger planets (600-750 range) to help bring out the strengths of PA - large unit battles and map control.

Third, who came up with the *let's add a bunch of CSG brushes to block unit movement* idea? Does noone remember why our fav 1v1 maps were all on moons back in beta? Let me remind you: It's because they had the least amount of obstacles for pathing. Regardless of how well you guys have refined the algorithms, pathing still isn't 100%, and it probably never will be (like having a bug-free game - technically impossible to please everyone). That's no fault of Uber's - it's just the way things are.

Now, I'm not asking for a brush free environment (I can get that easily enough with moons), but it would be great if there was some thought put into the brush placement beyond *oh let's make a chokepoint there so the player is forced to do this and that*. You can go overboard, and I think that ya'll did go overboard. Can't blame ya though - you did just get this really cool new toy and you wanted to play with it.

600-750 is what I would call medium size. We should also get one or two 800-900 planets.
Yes air blablabla.... still want them. Why not have a planet or two were air is important...
the current 400-500 sizes are kinda .... well they are pretty close to comboxing maps. Tiny. TINY

Hmm... running the Linux version; unfortunately ran into a complete loss of arrow keys at one point, and a crash this morning.

Found that clicking Delete while Rotating a CSG deleted all of that type of CSG I had copy-pasted.

FYI, while visually this looks great, it has gameplay impact. Land is too slow, but I've saved most of a bomber snipe from the explosion.

It would be nice to have a "review last match" button in the leaderboards, that would send you to the replay of your last ranked match.

Also if we could get the ranked match maps on the uber systems list that would be great.

After playing some ranked games and navigating the menus here is my feedback for the current PTE build:

Bugs/Things that appear broken or that feel out of place

· Replays: When I select the filter "My games only" the list appears empty while I can find my replays in the list when selecting the filter "All recent games". The "Highest rated" option is not working (I guess this is expected) and the "Longest game durantion" option seems to be bugged as it does show some games of long duration but also some quite short games and, all of them, definitely not in decresing order order.
· Ladder Maps: Metal spot 3D models seem to be up-side-down at some locations or otherwise looking glitchy. One of the cracks of the ice planet has a visual glitch of something that looks like water and there is a somewhat strange-looking patch of what appears to be very shallow water.
· Leaderboards: Only the first 10 players of each levels are shown and there is no possibility to have a look at the complete list of players. "Uber" level is the most populated, this seems very counter-intuitive, so together with the inability to see the complete list of players makes it very difficult to ascertain how good someone ranked Uber (or indeed any other rank) really is compared to other players. When watching replays from players in the Leaderboards it shows the last PA game in general so it may show a non-ranked game. This needs to be fixed since if you want to watch a replay of someone because of his/her status in the Leaderboards then you are likely to also want that to be a replay of a ranked game.
· Matchmaking: When trying to requeue after a ranked game a message warning that you are still in a game shows up (when you are obviously not in the game any more since you can only press requeue after the game is done). The ladder maps are not available for custom games (maybe this is because they are being tweaked) which is very important for testing in a safe environment. If your primary colour is black it is nearly impossible to visually distiguish between unselected units of the same type (bots, vehicles...).
· Armory: The "Badges" tab shows an empty screen when clicked.

Suggestions

Overall, I have to say that things are looking better and they keep improving so congratulations for the good job. I recently wrote an extensive list of carefully-thought comments and suggestions (here: https://forums.uberent.com/threads/...-expanding-the-playerbase.65972/#post-1034185) , made by me with help of a big group of gamers from a couple of gaming associations I run, and I had no way to confirm that it got to Uber. I would appreciate if someone (@jables ?) could confirm that I did not waste these people's time by gathering their opinions and writing them in that letter to Uber, thank you

Along the ideas outlined in that post, here are my suggestions relevant to the present PTE build:

· Replays: Similar to implementing only ranked replays for the leaderboard button, showing the game mode in the list of displayed replays is very important. Displaying some kind of label that identifies ranked games is speacially important for what is arguably the most obvious use of the Replay browser: looking for the games of some specific player (because he/she is very good or plays in an interesting way). As running the raplay takes some loading time it will be nice to be able to spot ranked games before jumping in the replay.
· Ladder Maps: Not much to say for what is intended in the current build but here is a comment for the the future ranked map pool: At the current stage of development, custom-made maps should be the primary component of the map pool (someone having thought and designed these maps with a precise idea of the kind of strategies are favoured for it, hence ensuring diversity: smaller maps, bigger maps, rushable maps, turtlable maps...) but, at the same time, I believe having one random map in the pool (being symmetrical and of varying radius and number of mex within some reasonable limits) will content the majority of players. In this way given a pool of N maps (arguably N must be around something like 8-14 for each competitive season) the probability of playing in a randomised (but fair) map is 1/N. If, on top of this, we add a 1-map-veto system we could have the ideal map pool, in my opinion.
· Leaderboards: I would add an special, "cool-looking" (screen-filling, voiceover, sound effects, music...) animation for when your rank is changed, it will simply add to the satisfaction of stepping up a level or it will tease you to keep playing if you step down.
· Matchmaking: Once the game is ready to start, I would maximise the time that the VS screen (the one showing the players' names, rank (if not showed now it should be) and commander model just before jumping into the system) is displayed and will only close when the system is fully rendered, ready to navigate and to pick the spawn point. This is so that players who have purchased or earnt "cool" commanders or have high rank can show them off;in this way there will be more "wow! look at that awesome commander" moments that will contribute to more purchases in the Armory in the long run. Also, the commander static images (for more on this see below) need to adapt to the colours the players have chosen, it is worth metioning that there should be a systematic way (e.g. higher-ranked player goes first) to decide which player picks colour first.
· Armory: I am aware that the Armory is expanding and improving, and all the new commander models seem really good. But there is so much potential there for Uber to exploit that I need to reflect some of the thoughts that come to my mind every time I enter the Armory. First of all, the Armory looks visually dull as all commanders are shown in a rather sober, isometric image, always facing in the same direction and always with the same colour pattern (a blue and yellow combination that interacts poorly with the already blue theme used for windows and tabs). To add some variety, I would change the colours and add new static images that feel a bit more artistic/"badass"/"awesome"-looking so that they are a reason in themselves to purchase that commander (see above for more on showing off the static image of your commander before games start). Together with the addition of new or improved static images, I would add a submenu that opens when one of the commanders is selected and that lets the user visualise the 3D model (at least partially) and how it looks with different colour patterns; maybe these options should be limited/teased in an appropriate way that encourages users to buy the commander models. I am not sure what the "Badges" tab is intended for but if it is going to be anything that adds further customisation then I think it is important to implement it as soon as possible.

I hope this comments help.

A few system designer bugs now that I've been playing around a bit.

-on the metal planet it is really hard to differentiate CSG brushes, due to a massive jumble of textures that randomly appear once you activate the editor mode

-entering editor mode and then leaving without making changes just messes up the planet (might be only metal planets, and not sure if it had finished loading first, though I'm pretty sure it had)

-once in CSG edit mod trying to change the metal spot symmetry and spawn point symmetry is impossible, and changing it then exiting edit mode can crash the game

also just an annoyance, but you don't seem to be able to deactivate symmetry once you've got it going without rebuilding the entire planet. I'd like to be able to get a symmetrical base CSG layout and then build cool stuff on top, not necessarily symmetrical. Also, being able to change the axis of symmetry would be nice.

I thinked the ranked map pool should have its own tab.

The platoon fix is excellent. I now need to download the new PTE and test RCBM to see if this indeed was what was causing the AI to not create platoons.

Any news on some other things like modding improvements and fixes and maybe unit cannon? When can we expect AI.js and strategic icons to be loaded with the server mod rather than UI mod?

For the system editor that is shaping up real nicely. I was able to build a version of Fields of Isis from supcom (Look it up on the general forum)

I have the following feedback:

Improvements for system builder in order of importance:

• Make a visible orientation line so you can see where the mirror is (with a green line or something)
• Customize the spawn locations and make it so you can select which team spawns where (still a big problem on the map I created Fields of Isis) you have no control where each team member or player spawns.
• Tree and other attribute placement to landscape so there is more variation on the map
  
• speed up the rotation and growing/shrinking (with the shift button it is still slow)
• Customization of decals, water placement and ground formation
• A Four way symmetrically layout so we can make fair maps with 4 spawns
• Customize path-able layout to improve the pathing of units on a map

If this could be made possible we can start building very interesting maps that have replay value. I think the random maps is a cool thing but it does not add any replay value nor it is memorable as the maps of some other great statistic games I played (mostly SupCom)

To see what I mean with custom maps download Fields of Isis the map I made with the PTE build here: https://forums.uberent.com/threads/fields-of-isis-map-from-supcom-re-created-in-pa-pte.66091/

Not particular to this PTE, but it seemed like a good place to leave this feedback. The spectator view needs further work, especially in notifications.

Notifications suck

You are spammed with so many notifications that the grey areas in chronocam are useless, and the top notifications are difficult to parse leading to you ignoring notifications almost all the time. When you do want to click one it's being moved by the notification spam. Clicking an alert also changes my zoom level, which is incredibly disorientating. Some notifications have audio, and these are about the only ones I pay attention to, and I suspect that's the same for everyone else.

I need to know:

• That I saw an enemy commander
• That my commander is under attack
• That my commander has less than 50% health and do not continue to warn me of this over-and-over
• That my commander has less than 20% health and do not continue to warn me of this over-and-over
• That an enemy commander died
• That a nuke launched
• That a nuke landed
• That a nuke got shot down
• That a mega weapon has been spotted (nukes, anti-nukes, catalysts and halleys... Holkins suck, I don't care about them) for the first time (per unit, not per unit type)
• That I found player X for the first time on this planet
• That player X went into orbital for the first time
• That I found a T2 unit of player X for the first time

These are things which matter, these are key events which should be highlighted and reviewed, not that a T1 bot factory or radar got built.

Improving spectator view
Mobile count isn't a useful stat. 40 Dox are going to lose to 40 Bolos, so what does the number tell me? Nothing. I want to see total metal cost because that's the most useful representation of relative army strengths. Frankly, being able to pull up an army breakdown graphic like Starcraft 2 or PA Stats offer would be great.

Spectators should be able to select units so they can do things like get army counts, or track units.

Fabber counts should be X/Y so I can see T1 to T2.

Same problem for me in 74525. "My games" replays doesn't work anymore((