reason to not have random generated maps on ladder.

The map making community!

How can the map making community express there terra forming genius and have their maps make it into the ladder competitive scene if ladder maps are randomly generated?

I wouldn't mind playing on random maps but I'm sure there are many map makers that want their creations on ladder.

Especially after they get their hands on new map editor.

Just food for thought.

Wait... Who said that the maps were going to be randomly generated?

Nothing confirmed, there are just members of the community that want the ladder to have randomly generated symmetrical maps.

I was ok with either point of view until I thought.......wait.....we have a part of the community that loves to make maps.

I don't want random maps unless we get an API to get the ground data I need for my minimap mod that I plan to complete to get an insane advantage in ranked games.

Unless the map generator can get at least as good as AOE2 at making balanced maps, people won't bother with random maps anyway.

I think random maps is a massive strength of PA and would rather see less "map memorization" if at all possible. So random symmetric maps would be just fine by me.

However, I'm not as interested (personally) in the "Single moon, 1v1, final destination) style of play... I'm much more interested in multi-planet team games. And in those cases, the blind guess of what planet your opponent might spawn on - or fly off to, and at what time - creates a much larger random element than any symmetry can fix. So by that logic, the only planet that needs to be symmetric is the starting planet to ensure a fair start.

As a second note, it'd be more helpful to have standardized planet layouts for the competitive ladder, while keeping the planets themselves randomized; it'd be a desirable compromise to have an expected meta for "X moons, Y planets, a gas giant", while still having random terrain that the players need to adapt to.

ah, i see. I would like both to be honest. Custom made maps can have much more ineteresting gameplay while it also is cool to not have the same maps all the time. I don't think it matters that much in terms of map memorization. I think 2 minutes is enough time to study the map and use a viable tactic. I do not feel that players have an advantage because they have played the map a lot more then me. (Unless it is a naval map or something)

Well in TA / Spring, players used to concoct some really exotic plays based on specific features of maps that wasn't necessarily obvious on first glance, so experience with certain maps was a very very big advantage.

Terrain has a bit less impact on games in PA (though many of the lava maps in the current 1 v 1 pool can be won or lost based on spawn so it still applies to some extent), still once player generated maps are available they'll probably be designed in ways that mean experience with a specific map is helpful.

I must admit I'm with @mered4 that being able to quickly assess a new map and play accordingly *is* a skill and on of my advantages over some player imo (I've been playing these games for a *long* time, I'd like to think I've learned *something* from all that otherwise ill spent time ).