Declined Bring back the old Bottiger's 24/7 Idle Trade

[GoldSrc]

This is a classic case of "If it's not broken, don't fix it." This perversion of an otherwise good map is no longer unique, it's just like any other idle server. There are already tons of know glitches and shit that people don't like. For the betterment of Idle regulars and nonregulars, I think Idle should be reverted. I know it's only been one day, but please take this seriously.

 

[Seminal Inhalation]

1. The numerous barriers around the invisible path is a very poor and dumb concept, BUT before I go on YES WE UNDERSTAND IT IS NOT SUPPOSED TO BE EASY TO GET TO THE DAMN GLASSBOX WE COMPLETELY 100% GET THAT YOU WANT THAT. However, this cuts off a decent-sized portion of the map making it feel smaller and more claustrophobic as opposed to the more open variants before it. There's even lots of parts of the path where you can't even JUMP. Fewer areas to go in, less fun and enjoyment to be had


2. The new invisible path is not well optimized and you can easily fall through it. I am not sure if the path has a new implementation, but half the time it seems the path will move or flat out disappear. Even if you mark it with arrows or stickies or other projectiles and proceed, you will find yourself falling to your death. That is not fun, it is needless punishment and makes you NOT want to go to the skybox. Now you simply have to hope that you either don't bug through the path or that you don't get sniped as you snail your way up (which originally could have been bypassed by jumping or surfing up to the box).


3. To an extent, the idea of a teleporter leading to the skybox/glassbox is an interesting concept, however with it being so isolated the skybox has become dreadfully boring. I'm assuming this is due, to a point, the complaint Jermaphobe himself had with his dislike of spawncamping and the new implementations have certainly discouraged them but in exchange for greater lack of playability.


4. The new map is simply bland as if I randomly stumbled upon another random idle server. It is not special. The additions of the actual physical skybox no longer being able to be entered, the surf given much less use and explosive jumping being made impractical due to the massive path barriers makes the server feel empty.


The previous versions made it feel as if you could do whatever you want and go wherever you like freely, but the current version contradicts that. Seems more like the creators want you to just sit in the bottom area like a good little boy scout and do little. The creativity has been sucked out and replaced with "nice and safe" implementations. The only two good ones I can think of are the night sky, which looks GREAT by the way, but the new daytime sky blinds you, on top of being dull, and the teleport to the skybox implementation. Hell, just getting rid of the bloody barriers would make for a massive improvement on the new map, but as it stands now it is dreadful. I have yet to see any regulars say anything positive about the map other than the night sky (I'll link them this thread to voice their opinions). The idle server is the main reason some people contribute/donate in the first place. It was a fun shitpost-like area you could mess around in, chill, mingle, make fun of the morons and the perks made it even crazier and unpredictably fun. Been on Skial since 2012 and donating since 2013 I believe?, but if this map is to stay, then I actively refuse to donate any further as the previous maps were the main reasons I donated at all. They were fun, they were different and I wouldn't have them any other way.



TL;DR. New map boring and small, no fun allowed.

 

[Magnetic A.D.]

I hate

 

[Wek Rorst]

I couldn't agree more with the above posts. When I first logged on today, I could've sworn that I chose the wrong server until I saw Bottiger's name in the center. I figured that I would give the map a fair chance and play on it, despite the aesthetic changes. (The day/night cycle is a great idea by the way, night sky looks ominous and foreboding... love it.) Much to my dismay, everything that was worth playing on this server for had been removed or just altered in an unfavorable manner. I have played on idle_awesomebox throughout the years and I have seen it grow and evolve. This is the opposite of evolution; this is what I imagine those no-name servers that you stumble upon at 3 AM to be like. Not only are the updated mechanics buggy as hell, but there is actually no conceivable space to travel in the map anymore. Want to rocket jump? Too bad. Want to sticky around? Sorry. The portal that leads to the skybox is one of the most useless additions that I have seen, and it also makes the skybox feel completely disconnected from the rest of the map. There are many more examples that I could list, but Seminal and others have already beaten me to it. The new map is dreadful and depressing. If Skial wishes to maintain an active player/donor base on this server, then I would suggest bringing back the tried and true awesomebox that we all know and love.

-Wek

 

[Trillium]

+1 and I just got used to the old map

 

[Angry Man Dan]

First of all, I just want to say that I really like how you can change the skybox. Personally I'm a degenerate light theme fan myself, but the fact that it can be changed is pretty cool. Anyways, idle has always been in an interesting spot in terms of moderation. Clearly there's not as much concern for balance or overall player experience (evidenced by donor perks and ability to spawncamp) and rightfully so, since it's just an idle server. And yet, there is clearly a line drawn somewhere, otherwise things such as aimbotting and undesirable sprays would be allowed. That brings us to why the admins would like for spawncamping to be more difficult to do in idle. It was stated via in-server announcement shortly after the change was made that we were never intended to be able to get to the skybox in 10 seconds (although without throwing too much shade, I can't help but wonder why it was left that way for almost 10 years -- I assume that it was a reason that was out of the control of the map makers or that they recently changed their minds), but at the same time that spawncamping should be possible. Without knowing why they drew the line here, it's hard to talk about if I think this is a good change. If it was simply on a whim, then fair enough. If it was out of consideration of player experience, or concern of people leaving from spawncamping, I just want to point out that it is now easier than ever before for the first team there to control the area. With the path to the skybox restricted to a single narrow line, it can be very easily defended, and when you add on to that the fact that donors tend to /swap to the team that is spawncamping, I fear that things may simply be hopeless for whatever team is getting camped. Sure they can drive out the invaders, but unless they destroy the tele the invaders will simply come back, and destroying that tele that leads to the skybox will be monumentally more difficult. I could be wrong, but that's just my hunch. Aside from that, really my only complaints are that the skybox is much more boring now and that the water inside the skybox is seriously glitched and gives me vertigo just looking at it.

 

[Bottiger]

This is a classic case of "If it's not broken, don't fix it."

It was broken. That's why we got people complaining over the years and making youtube videos about the constant spawn camping because it literally took 10 seconds to sticky jump up there.

Change is hard, and soon you will get used to it.... or not.

It was never meant to take 10 seconds to setup a spawn camp, I asked the maintainers of the map to fix it for many years, but no one could figure out a solution (myself included) until now. That's why the skybox had kill zones around it.

 

[GoldSrc]

It was broken. That's why we got people complaining over the years and making youtube videos about the constant spawn camping because it literally took 10 seconds to sticky jump up there.

Change is hard, and soon you will get used to it.... or not.

I completely agree about not allowing players to sticky jump to the safe zone, that was dumb to begin with. As for the rest of the server, it was completely fine. The path to the skybox wasn't broken (maybe, it was a buggy server from the start) and now it defidently is. I see where you are coming from bottiger, but I think this is too far.

 

[Seminal Inhalation]

It was stated via in-server announcement shortly after the change was made that we were never intended to be able to get to the skybox in 10 seconds

I remember that from last night. One of the map creators was talking through the console last night responding to people complaining and criticizing the new map. They kept repeating "Skybox is not supposed to be easy to get to. Skybox is not meant to be entered within a few seconds." Seemingly ignoring other complaints and only talking about the skybox. Then apparently the replies devolved into "cry about easybox." Wasn't here for that but if that was said, shame on whoever said it.

Aside from that, really my only complaints are that the skybox is much more boring now.

I second this. Skybox holds little purpose now other than making it a nice dark sky. If they just want to limit spawncamping, making the skybox obtainable only via that teleporter is more than enough without stopping everything dead.

the water inside the skybox is seriously glitched and gives me vertigo just looking at it.

As someone who is epileptic and has had vertigo episodes before, the water fucks with my eyes horribly. Not sure if it'sa coding error or what, but it needs a fix.

 

[Bottiger]

As far as I can tell, the path isn't broken. It just changes when people get off it, so you can't rely on markers you put down 5 minutes ago.

There are already people in the skybox now.

You can still spawn camp, it just now takes a reasonable large amount of effort to do so, similar to rolling toxic/god on RTD.

 

[Seminal Inhalation]

It was broken. That's why we got people complaining over the years and making youtube videos about the constant spawn camping because it literally took 10 seconds to sticky jump up there.

Change is hard, and soon you will get used to it.... or not.

It was never meant to take 10 seconds to setup a spawn camp, I asked the maintainers of the map to fix it for many years, but no one could figure out a solution (myself included) until now. That's why the skybox had kill zones around it.

Making the path lead to a teleporter that then leads to a walled-off skybox is enough to fix that. It limits people coming in and takes them longer to recover but it doesn't make everything come to a halt. Defenders gain more time to break the camp and counter it, thus the battle is more in their favor than before. The way it is now just stops everything dead and once people are set up by the teleporter, there's nothing defenders can do to stop it but sit and wait in the bowels of their spawn.

 

[Wek Rorst]

Why didn't you just make more kill zones around the skybox? Also perhaps the teleporter placement should have been restricted to the bottom of the ramp? I am online right now and the camping is even harder for the opposite team to stop since accessibility has been severely restricted. There could have been other ways to go about this...

 

[Bottiger]

Making the path lead to a teleporter that then leads to a walled-off skybox is enough to fix that. It limits people coming in and takes them longer to recover but it doesn't make everything come to a halt. Defenders gain more time to break the camp and counter it, thus the battle is more in their favor than before. The way it is now just stops everything dead and once people are set up by the teleporter, there's nothing defenders can do to stop it but sit and wait in the bowels of their spawn.

No it did nothing. People just sticky jumped directly to the the teleporter. That changed absolutely nothing.

Why didn't you just make more kill zones around the skybox? Also perhaps the teleporter placement should have been restricted to the bottom of the ramp? I am online right now and the camping is even harder for the opposite team to stop since accessibility has been severely restricted. There could have been other ways to go about this...

Because you could still jump there no matter how many kill zones you put around it. There has to be a hole for people to walk into and people that surf could always surf into the hole.

 

[Angry Man Dan]

You can still spawn camp, it just now takes a reasonable large amount of effort to do so, similar to rolling toxic/god on RTD.

If you've been watching the server, you will notice that like 30 minutes ago people were complaining about spawncamping and calling the server gay and declaring they were leaving when they were getting camped. I don't think this makes it any harder to spawncamp when all blu team has to do is walk into their engineer's tele. If anything now it's harder for red team to fight back. In fact this tele has been up the whole time untouched, which is something that would never have happened before.

 

[Seminal Inhalation]

No it did nothing. People just sticky jumped directly to the the teleporter. That changed absolutely nothing.

It did though. If engies wanted to make buildings, they had to make it on the ramp up to the tele leaving them and their buildings dangerously exposed to snipers, soldiers, demomen and donors, then go into the tele and walk from 1 side of the skybox to the other to make it into the enemy spawn. Now they do this with 0 fear of their buildings being destroyed as there is no reliable way for enemies to make it up to them. Donators and explosive classes were able to counter the enemy teleporters by jumping up and making quick work of them to protect their own spawn, now they can only turtle in their spawn until someone on the enemy team rolls toxic which they are then screwed. Just that few seconds of having to use the tele and building on the ramp makes a big difference as it allows the team being spawncamped to setup more with stickies. You only need a few stickies to kill even a donor heavy. With how it was before without the barriers, it left donors and engineers a choice: Either they leave their sentry on the ramp to protect the tele, or they bring it up with them into enemy spawn. On top of that, it would force 1-2 people on the spawncamping team to defend the teleporter from soldiers, demos and donors which can easily kill buildings and stop the camp traction.

 

[Angry Man Dan]

Oh yeah there's one small thing I forgot about. They removed the ability to warp to the map's real skybox when touching the hitch at the back of the train in the sky. I thought that was pretty fun and it would be nice if they could bring it back.

EDIT: also you can consider this a bug report, but it looks like the buttons that change the skybox are broken and don't reappear anymore.

 

[Wek Rorst]

The people who actually play on the server regularly, contribute to the community, and give the time of day to post on the forums about it are providing feedback on the changes. Read what the core of the playerbase has to say. This server has used the same basic awesomebox concept for years, and yet the playerbase is still thriving, even more so than in comparison with recent years. The previous awesomeboxes are why myself and many others even play on and support the server in the first place. They were unique, interesting, and most importantly, they were fun. This is idle_sadbox now.

 

[Wek Rorst]

Also, I agree completely with Dan, why would this have been removed in the first place?

 

[Lord Vader]

+1
I rarely go on idle servers these days, but looking at the controversy the map changed sparked, as well as considering the failure of the surf_ski_nova port, it doesn't look pretty.

 

[ρapa ρepe]

I only got on here to say that although I don't have years on my back on this server, it seems as though the fun was taken away from what I am hearing. As a somewhat regular, I wouldn't want to see those I met or know start to disappear due to the fact that over some complaints the server is being killed off along with those who kept it alive.
All I have to say is:
Sadge