Powerup spawns

[protest boy]

I remember when Maimer first made middleground, the bomb was already spawned in the center of the map right when the game started. I can't figure out how to do this. Was that a bug that's been since fixed?

[tmm3k]

Probably something to do with loading times, i.e. he set the spawn time to 30 seconds and it took you like 29 seconds to load the map.

[nesnl]

I remember this as well. I actually liked it when the bomb had already spawned on neutral bomb maps because it gave teams a reason to get to the middle of the map in the first portion of the game. As it works right now, on maps like middleground and the core, teams just zoom to the center and fight aimlessly for the first 30 seconds until the bomb spawns. People often use this time to destroy turrets as they "wait for the game to begin" at the first bomb spawn.

I think that at the start of all maps all power ups should already be spawned, regardless of spawn time. This will give incentive for teams to work towards things like the bomb right at the beginning instead of wasting the initial part of the game.

Also, I want to repost my idea from last time that there should be some type of server control for power up spawn times. In small games a 30 second bomb timer works well, but in the big games a timer of a much shorter duration would be better I think. Maybe something like 10 seconds. It's frustrating being in a huge game and the bomb finally spawns to only have someone like TheCapedAvenger just grab it and drop it instantly only to make you wait another 30 seconds for another bomb.

However, this could create a problem in that some of the servers that allow for big games aren't always full. Basically, you want a larger spawn time when the population is low and a short spawn time when population is large. This problem could be circumvented by introducing defined conditions for specific power up spawn times. Such as if there are less than 14 players then it stays at 30 seconds, if it is between 14-22, spawn time is 20 seconds, greater than 22 spawn time is 10 seconds. It could also work well as linear equation such as the power up spawn is 30 seconds with anything up to 14 people but for every one player in the game after 14 then the power up spawn time drops by 1 second down to a limit of 10 seconds.

This might seem overly complicated, but I think it would work best instead of making tons of map iterations with the only change being power up spawn time. The last thing I want to see is people having to choose to vote for maps like "tbd_thecore_smallgame" "tbd_thecore_mediumgame" "tbd_thecore_largegame". Ideally, I want to be able to make a map that can adjust from anything from a 14 player game up to 34 players and beyond without having to worry about these small issues.

[Karl]

i agree that powerups should start out spawned but then you have the problem of people who load faster get an advantage... but we'll probably just add a "warm up" timer or something at the start of map changes.

[DiogenesDog]

Adjusting powerup spawn timers dynamically by player count seems like a decent idea, but hrm. I really think that just letting the mapmaker do this is okay, as long as the map has an appropriate number of players.

In Maimer's last post he talks about making a map that can adjust from between 14-34 players, but... Is there really a map layout that would make sense and be fun for that wide a range of player counts? Seems like people might be looking at this from the wrong angle, and what we really need is a few maps where everything is deliberately set up for these extremely large servers.

[Triped]

Originally Posted by Karl

i agree that powerups should start out spawned but then you have the problem of people who load faster get an advantage... but we'll probably just add a "warm up" timer or something at the start of map changes.

You'll need that feature for tournaments at least.

[Ginjiro]

Yeah i think that feature would be very cool. Very often i feel robbed when map changes and when i spawn theres a bomb already in my face. lol