Introducing: The Altitude Ladder

[nobodyhome]

For all the rest of you who actually have legitimate issues brought up: stay tuned, we are going to take some steps to address the problems that have arisen recently, hope that they will help. Thanks for all your support.

[Pieface]

You know what, I have a better idea than you leaving the game. How about you stay, and create a better ladder system than the one nobo has coded? I'm sure it will be a very rewarding experience for you to put some actual work into making things happen instead of just complaining.

[morelikeATTITUDE]

"then forgot about it when your inconsiderate raging distracted me, causing me to just ban you. Oops! "

actually my raging was quite considerate, thanks
inconsiderate raging would have resulted in me saying nothing and considering nothing - hence inconsideration. regardless, so nice of you to admit that a single player like me is more than enough to distract you from your duties at hand.

you pretty much prove the point for me that you're incapable of doing what you're doing at a satisfactory level, and therefore more people need to be brought in.

as for your tearfully woeful diatribe on how hard you have: tough. you volunteered. do a good job at it or don't do it at all imo. if you want compensation for your work, then maybe your work should be of a higher caliber so as to demand compensation. in the mean time, continue to log on to fly cartoon airplanes and ban people who aren't mates of yours, because that's the angel you currently take.




it's really quite hilarious that you refuse to do something because i'm the one who requested it. as if spiting me is more important to you than the community.

[elxir]

Originally Posted by elxir

yo I just got DC'd from ladder #3 in like 3 different games. Every other server works fine for me, I joined normal #4 no problem afterwards to test. All of phong's servers were coming up as unresponsive for me.

My ping was ~70, not spiking.

Any ideas?

So, I just checked my ladder ranking and saw that I now have 15 ping kicks. I had zero prior to this issue starting, and I'm wicked confused. Ball ladder takes place on #4 (no ping limit) 99% of the time.

I do occasionally have ping issues as some can attest to, but I do not play ladder when it's spiking and AFAIK I have never been ping kicked from ladder due to a visible spike on the tab/score screen.

I check the score screen every few seconds to 1) see scores and 2) keep tabs on my ping. I would notice if it were spiking so much that I got ping kicked.

Now, when I get kicked the game simply says "server connection lost" or something to that effect. Normally when I am ping kicked, it is quite explicit about that.

I talked to someone else whose name is escaping me and he said he occasionally had this issue on ladder to.

Any ideas/settings I could check? I'm 99% certain it is not my internet because I am used to what happens when it spikes. The game gets real choppy, etc. On ladder, everything simply *stops* and planes fly in circles, sound dies, etc.

0_o

[nobodyhome]

I would safely say you don't have to worry about the ping kick stat. The tracking for ping kicking is rather unreliable at the moment, so we've never taken an action resulting from data gathered from the ping kick stat. So you don't have to worry about being banned or anything.

[Pieface]

Originally Posted by morelikeATTITUDE

as for your tearfully woeful diatribe on how hard you have: tough. you volunteered. do a good job at it or don't do it at all imo. if you want compensation for your work, then maybe your work should be of a higher caliber so as to demand compensation.

So in your opinion, it would be better to have no ladder at all than a system that doesn't follow your every desire. But you said that you wouldn't play the game anymore unless there was a ladder that satisfied you, so why do you care whether or not it exists? It seems to work well enough for the other 99% of the people who play on it that your opinion isn't going to make him take it down.

To be more constructive, how exactly would you like to see the ladder changed? Would you like more enforcement of bans, a better balancing system, or what? You'll notice that the reason people have a problem with you is not that you came here with suggestions, but that you came here with a vendetta against the creators and no positive ideas. Many people here have posted ideas to make the ladder better, and the Admins have listened carefully to each and every one. Heck, Esoteric even designed the balancing system that is being used now instead of the one nobodyhome, Maimer, and eth originally came up with.

I'll say this again: don't post about how much you hate the system unless you are willing to offer constructive criticism or design something better yourself.

[Harmonica]

Originally Posted by Smushface

Harmonica, just to clarify your position, you're saying that you agree with the reason behind the temporary ban of (morelikeATTITUDE aka redfangOC) but believe that ladder has become the center of Altitude which you view as a bad thing.

Sort of -- I should have clarified a bit more. (I didn't really have any opinion on the ban before, but after seeing this latest discussion I fully support the ban.)

I think it would be wonderful if the ladder became the center of Altitude -- except that it seems (from my error-prone viewpoint) that playing ladder causes people to go offline much more quickly than playing pubs. Having enough players for ladder games seems to be a perpetual issue, as indicated by the number of "come join ladder" requests that get sent out. Other servers, public or private, don't seem to have that issue.

So, subjectively, it seems as though something about the ladder experience is driving people offline. For me, the incessant mid-game leaving/specing ruined my fun, but that's just me. Aside from the few people who are just bad sports about losing, are there other things that drive people away?

There's clearly a lot of interest and desire for ladder games, and I think that's a good thing. I'd love to see ladder reach its full potential, but it seems to still have some issues remaining which may have a negative effect. But again, this is all just a personal observation/guess -- made even more unreliable by my absence from ladder lately. =)

[Deathblade]

Getting tired of getting kicked from your server because people like {ball}'n are faggots

Pretty retarded getting kicked from servers just because people don't like you, no other reason.

[Deathblade]

Ladder is a joke.

[tgleaf]

Originally Posted by Deathblade

Getting tired of getting kicked from your server because people like {ball}'n are faggots

Pretty retarded getting kicked from servers just because people don't like you, no other reason.

So you act like a total jerk for your entire Altitude career and then wonder why people don't want you around. Again, this.

There is really no need to call anyone a "faggot." I don't know the details of your feud with blin, so I don't know if you're right in being pissed off, but just watch the language.

And really, do you need to steal the {ball} tag just to feel good about yourself? Was I not clear enough when I said that you couldn't join {ball} last week? I guess if you can't join 'em, pretend to join 'em? This is just sad.

[Deathblade]

Originally Posted by tgleaf

So you act like a total jerk for your entire Altitude career and then wonder why people don't want you around. Again, this.

There is really no need to call anyone a "faggot." I don't know the details of your feud with blin, so I don't know if you're right in being pissed off, but just watch the language.

I was kicked because I told blin to calm down after he was raging and telling everyone to f*ck their selves after he lost a game where one of his teammates dropped at the end of the game, and we scored before someone on our team dropped out.

I'm guessing others just used it as an opportunity to vent some frustration, which is bull****.

[elxir]

Any word on what is causing several of us to randomly DC from ladder?

[nobodyhome]

Not sure. I've experienced it myself, what I've found is that it kicks you off, and if you try to get back into the server, you get stuck at the "connecting to server" window. Your internet is fine, so are all the other servers. If you try to connect several times eventually it'd let you in (but you have to cancel and retry if you get stuck, otherwise it just stays stuck).

Phong, if you see this, can you comment on the issue?

[nesnl]

Ladder Season 1 "Officially" ended at 8PM EST today. The ratings won't be reset for a little while as nobodyhome is busy coding new features and we want to have the new feature release coincide with the ladder reset. However, that doesn't mean we can't name our champions and allocate the coveted community points prizes.

Season 1 TBD Champions:

1st Place - Esoteric - 150 Community Points
2nd Place - Matattack - 100 Community Points
3rd Place - Flight 666 - 50 Community Points

Season 1 Ball Champions:

1st Place - Brillo - 150 Community Points
2nd Place - Nikon - 100 Community Points
3rd Place - a frail old lady - 50 Community Points

Overall Most Games Played:

1247 Games - Apathy - 100 Community Points

----------------------------

Don't let the "Official" season end keep you from playing more games. Keep enjoying the ladder and look for the new updates and ladder reset for Season 2 in the near future.

I will be contacting Lamster about the distribution of the Community Points prizes. Please allow some time (at least a few days) for the transaction to occur. Also, please do not change your name during that period as it will make it harder to assign the points.

[blln4lyf]

Originally Posted by Deathblade

I was kicked because I told blin to calm down after he was raging and telling everyone to f*ck their selves after he lost a game where one of his teammates dropped at the end of the game, and we scored before someone on our team dropped out.

I'm guessing others just used it as an opportunity to vent some frustration, which is bull****.

LOL, so not what happened.

[blln4lyf]

Originally Posted by nesnl

Ladder Season 1 "Officially" ended at 8PM EST today. The ratings won't be reset for a little while as nobodyhome is busy coding new features and we want to have the new feature release coincide with the ladder reset. However, that doesn't mean we can't name our champions and allocate the coveted community points prizes.

Season 1 TBD Champions:

1st Place - Esoteric - 150 Community Points
2nd Place - Matattack - 100 Community Points
3rd Place - Flight 666 - 50 Community Points

Season 1 Ball Champions:

1st Place - Brillo - 150 Community Points
2nd Place - Nikon - 100 Community Points
3rd Place - a frail old lady - 50 Community Points

Overall Most Games Played:

1247 Games - Apathy - 100 Community Points

----------------------------

Don't let the "Official" season end keep you from playing more games. Keep enjoying the ladder and look for the new updates and ladder reset for Season 2 in the near future.

I will be contacting Lamster about the distribution of the Community Points prizes. Please allow some time (at least a few days) for the transaction to occur. Also, please do not change your name during that period as it will make it harder to assign the points.

Congrats to everyone.

[tgleaf]

Just a huge huge thanks for creating and updating the ladder. It's been a great addition to Altitude, and it's even more impressive considering it's a volunteer effort!

[DiogenesDog]

What tgleaf said. Thanks a lot, guys. Altitude ladder is awesome.

[ufo]

<3cha nobo, all this troll nonsense shouldnt even get responded to.

morelikeATTITUDE? psh...more like morelikeALTITUDE

[elxir]

suggestion: code in a "force spectator" mode if one team loses a man. sometimes teams like to be pricks when they are losing and don't spec till they catch up to you.

so, is there a way to force teams to spec "next death" or something. i.e. red is down 1, next blue death cannot spawn unless someone else specs for him.

can it be done?

[D4rt]

I've got a good suggestion: let us donate money via PayPal or something. I'm sure you'd get a buck or two.

[York]

+1 for the donations.

so beacause it isnt reset, will our scores change at all?

[elxir]

hey if/when you guys reset the rankings, can you archive the current ones somewhere so we can track player progress and whatnot

[nobodyhome]

Yes, the old information will be saved somewhere, but it will be some time before I can get it back up on the website for you to view. The person responsible for making the website (eth) has left Altitude so website development in general will lag =x.

[elxir]

that bastard!

[nobodyhome]

yeah i'll give like several days notice before the ladder gets reset, so if you want to view your old stuff you should take a screenshot =x

[cipso]

Hey. First of all, thank you for all ladder work!

I'd like to suggest small change to autobalance feature.

If there are too many connected people on ladder server, many of them don't get chance to play because they are not fast enough to join in the lobby, and others yell at them to spectate (because they have joined as last). The way it is now, there are people who sit all the time, and there are people who play all the time. Ok, maybe not "all the time", but you get the idea.

I'd like to see autobalance working differently ... all interested people join and autobalance feature chooses 12 players who will play (or 10 for tbd). If there were more people, autobalance will pick only 12. It would be nice if it can give preference to people who sat last game or who didn't play as much as others recently.

What do you think?

[DiogenesDog]

I like cipso's idea! wooo

[tgleaf]

It's been suggested before, and yes, it's a good idea.

But I believe Nobodyhome is the only person working on ladder and he's volunteering his time. We can't expect changes any time soon.

[wolf'j'max]

the ladder is broken, the custom commands don't work anymore.

~wolf

[nobodyhome]

Should be back up now.

[Flight 666]

Please, Captains game in ladder. pls.

[Ajuk999]

Thanks Nobo, the Altitude Ladder has helped Altitude in many ways.

[phong]

Originally Posted by nobodyhome

Not sure. I've experienced it myself, what I've found is that it kicks you off, and if you try to get back into the server, you get stuck at the "connecting to server" window. Your internet is fine, so are all the other servers. If you try to connect several times eventually it'd let you in (but you have to cancel and retry if you get stuck, otherwise it just stays stuck).

Phong, if you see this, can you comment on the issue?

If there are any connectivity issues or concerns please contact me (pm, email) when the problems are relevant so I can take a look.

[nobodyhome]

I haven't noticed the random kicking in a while now, the server was probably just out of whack for a bit. Thanks phong.

[[Y]]

Can we add some more bad maps to the ladder servers? I don't think we played enough bad games tonight.

Oh, and in before the QQ and the rage and the "BAN FU" demands

edit: skip to the last line of post to avoid wall of text

I apologize, nobo. Useless rage is useless. Twenty minutes ago I was playing in ladder 2, and locomotion came up after a vote for start_random. Most of us agreed that we didn't want to play that map, so we tried voting custom_stopTournament, but it fails by one percent :|. It's a while before someone decides to initial the vote to custom_stopTournament again, but by that time they hit twice (probably because a couple of us were circling around or not trying), so obviously any subsequent attempts to go back to lobby fails. Pein leaves in an effort to convince people to custom_stopTournament, but it doesn't work and we play 4v4 on locomotion. Five thousand hours later, we lose. No big deal, right? It's one game on an unlucky random map pick. Then comes tbd_woods. Sad game was sad. After that someone once again votes for custom_random, and tbd_justice is picked. We play 2v3 for a few minutes while everyone downloads the map (2v2, since I was circling around and spectating) and the other team manages to land a full bomb hit. Everyone else finishes downloading, and we jump into the game. Woken (on my team) pings at 999, and my other teammates soon join in the orange-red ping lagfest. Since this is the third bad map in a row, we've been bombed 2v2 in the beginning, Woken was bomb running, and this game is so lol, I go fire up some torrents to fit in with the rest of my team. Radium then announces to the rest of them server that I was lagging on purpose. Rage ensues and I get kicked. Woken then expresses surprise on mumble that he wasn't kicked too, despite lagging on purpose just like I was. I guess the rest of the server didn't know that since Radium failed to snitch on Woken.

Basically I'm just asking that middleground (3 hour games are bad) and locomotion (4 hour games are worse) be replaced with tbd_radioactive and tbd_cube since they could use some testing anyway.

[nobodyhome]

Not sure what you're trying to say? If you're trying to say that there are some bad maps up on ladder that you want to be removed, it might be helpful to actually tell us what those maps are and why you think they're bad. Also would be nice if you could make some maps for us that are better than the ones we already have.

On the other hand, if you're just here to QQ about having a bad experience tonight, then I guess I'll just move along.

[[Y]]

sorry, see wall of text above

[York]

FU, you heard NOBO, GO BUILD A MAP!

[Stormich]

After playing Justice yesterday I think it's a little gem since it was made symmetrical. IMO the only thing it needs is 1-2 more turrets low. I like justice cause it plays so fast.