I have a question. Why is it that there are apparently like 50 different maps available, but for the ranked ladder you can only play like 12 of them? It seems like one solution would be to allow more maps and more bans. I for one can’t stand Hill Fort, but it just so happens that I hate nomad more, so I use my one and only ban on Nomad. Can’t we just increase the number of maps? And what happened to Fortress?
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Some of the maps are not really popular. If you add more maps, some of the current maps will be played even less. If you have more bans and just only want to play a unpopular map, you will have very much waiting time. I dont think that is great.
The current system of just refreshing the map pool every month will fit better. Since you can easily play a single map for a month, more players just wanna try out a map. After the month, they get a refreshed map from the monthly rotating. I dont think increasing the number fo maps is really the way to go. Maybe we can have a slight increase of number of maps every month, but dont add all 50 maps within the game to the MM system. I dont really think that will work.
Note: An option for me can be swap out MegaRandom for full random. Full random will pick one of the maps within the game at random. I think that will be a better map than the current MegaRandom.
You mean Fortress like regicide fortress? I hope the devs will add queues for other game mode (other than RM or DM) to MM too. Regicide, KotH, Empire Wars, …
This option is an interesting idea for sure, and implementing it would already improve the system. However, I don’t think it completely fixes the issue because it would allow people to play on their favorite map only if the matched player also chose that map. You can be matched with a player who didn’t favorite that map. Meanwhile there could be other people in the system, playing at the same time as you, and who have the same favourite map, but who didn’t get matched with you.
Unless the algorithm prioritizes matching people with same favorite map together, there’s still much room for improvement.
As for the current matchmaking system, you can keep the same kind of algorithm and still allow people to “choose” to play only 3 maps, by lowering the number of maps in the pool to 5 and allowing 2 bans. This way you’d still always have a common map with a matched player.
You can also change the matchmaking system and add a matching criteria based on map picks.
Currently the system just matches players based on their ELO. It could match players based on their ELO and the chosen maps. In that system, if 2 given players do not have any maps in common, they can’t be matched against each other. But that’s a good thing : those two players just don’t enjoy playing on the same maps. If they are forced to play against each other, one of them is not gonna enjoy his time because he will be matched on a map he dislikes.
Edit : that being said, realistically most people will at least have Arabia in common so most people will be able to be matched against each other at least on Arabia. Those who ban Arabia will have less players to be matched against, but that’s just a consequence of not wanting to play what most people are fine with playing.
For 1x1 6 bans out of 9 maps should be the norm, every time they add another map that no ones wants to play and forces you to ban that maps additionally to ur previous maps, hillfort a cancerous map, terrible design, not berries and not consistency with the gold placement, you might have wood in the back or you may not.
Megarandom is fun when going random civs, now it is all about mongols.
4 lakes is a disaster as map, there is not a certain build order for that map, even pro players take bad decisions for that map and how to blame them, the fear is real if you know the other is fish booming, so everytime is about sneaking vills to make docks, if pro players struggle with that map imagine lower levels.
Islands, come on, no one liked that map before, why would they like it now?
Nomad in 1x1 is a permanent ban for most players, why haven’t they removed that map after several patches?
Arena is fun at lower levels, at certain level it is all about monks, castle push and fast imperial, the devs shouldn’t be pushing maps that can be won by market abuse and 3 farmers, because i remember cysion saying that they want more complete players in the ranked list, abusing market with no eco behind is not a representation of skills. Until they fix monk randomness conversion rate the map shouldn’t be there or make an arena map with the same resource placement but with palisade walls.
I am afraid they would go back to alpine lakes or some other map that would use one of ur 4 bans, so at least give us more bans, so we can have a good game in our limited time to play ranked.
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BlockquoteSome of the maps are not really popular.
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Some of the maps were very popular and are still not available. For example Yucatan. I used to play this all the time back in the day with AOE 2. Now it is not available, except if I play unranked perhaps. A lot of the current maps I do not like them, but I would see them less if there were a larger map pool. And I do not understand why they replaced Fortress with Hill Fort. Hill Fort sucks, and is definitely harder to play than Fortress.
It would be nice if they opened it up to some kind of poll before they made decisions on: These are going to be the only maps people can play.
Source? Cysion is still part of the dev team? I knew he was on of the people behind FE.
The current MM system is a better system to ask for complete players. I do also like that part of MM. On the other side i am not really sure if you can change some behavoir after 20 years. Most players just love Arabia and wanna play only Arabia. So i really like they encourage players to be more complete players, but i also think players should have more control over the maps/settings they like to play.
Hideout is replaced by Hillfort in the map pool. Fortress was never part of the map pool. I do like Hideout more than hillfort.
I also like Yucatan, but this map was never played that much. At Voobly 0,6% of the games was played on Yucatan. You can really say that map is popular. I wouldnt mind if they put Yucatan in the map pool. When i played that map, i was mostly focused on booming, not rushing, so i dont really know if i still would enjoy the this map. I also think Mongols will be the top pick, because of all the wild life.
Arabia, BF, Nomad and Arena were the only maps with a pick rate above 1% at Voobly.
I made the following thread for suggestion of maps in the map pool:
Maybe you can add your suggestion! I think both suggestions will be goood!
Cysion is still part of Forgotten Empires who are the main team working on Definitive Edition.
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I think the main issue is player number.
Right now I have to wait between 1 and 10 minutes when I queue up with my friends for a teamgame. If you split the ranked que into different map pools the wait times are going to increase. That is not something the devs would do.
What I would like to see in the map pool:
11 maps with 5 possible bans
1-4: the essential maps that never rotate:
Arabia, Black Forest, Arena, Nomad
map types that rotate with similar maps:
5 - Gold in the middle type map
(Golden pit, Gold rush, El Dorado…)
6 - defensive map
(Hideout, Hillfort, Fortress…)
7 - water style map
(Islands, Mediterranean, Coastal…)
8 - Random style map
(Mega Random, Slightly Random, Full Random…)
creative choice maps:
9 - fan favourite
(the non essential map that was played the most last patch)
10 - user choice
(The Devs make a survey in-game and give 5 maps. The players can choose their favourite to be implemented on the next rotation)
11 - Devs choice
(The Devs choose map number 11 according to what they thin is missing from the mappool)
This would be my favourite (and realistic) best way for map rotation (for now).
(Of course, if the player numbers keep increasing the Devs will have the option to split the que into different mappools…)
Sorry I didn’t mean Fortress. I mean Hideout. Apparently they replaced Hideout, which I liked, with Hill Fort, which I and most people cannot stand.
There are 200 maps. Devs decided to create a monthly map rotation – this will happen once in a while. Maps that “you” like will get replaced by maps someone else like. Its life.
Some websites show statistics for bans. Hideout was on the pool for 2 months and on the second month the number of bans increased - which must be why it was replaced. I am sure Hillfort draws more bans than Hideout, so I would not be surprised to see it removed next rotation.
I am in favor of up to 8 bans - map pool is a great idea and should bring more diversity, but the meta is too stale in most of them because of resouces imbalance and after playing 2-3 games you already saw all you had to see. Mongols on MR/Scandinavia/Serengetti, Spanish/Mayans/Burmese on Hillfort/Hideout, Japanese in Four Lakes.
Add to the above that the other maps are all closed maps (except Arabia or Nomad - that no one plays) and the current bans are not enough after a few games.
Playing 3 Arabias in a row prove to be more diverse than playing a sequence of Serengetti, Hillfort and Four Lakes. Even though they play differently between them, every Serengetti game is the same. Every Hillfort game is the same…
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I like the idea of a more systematic approach towards map rotation. Maybe some sort of this was introduced with splitting the pools for 1v1 and tg. But I guess we will see how that continues. Still, the categorization of the maps would be highly contested.
For instance, I would completely disagree on labeling bf and nomad as essential maps. Although many people like them, also many people hate them and they certainly don’t feature the most competetive settings (along with popularity the main criteria for the ranked map pool imo). If it was up to me, I’d go with ara, arena, gold rush and cross. Other people will have other choices, making fixed maps quite a delicate matter.
Also a pool with 11 maps should feature at least one (standard-type) hybrid map which isn’t included in your list.
Do you have a link for that? I can only see the play rate (which isn’t exactly the same as a ban rate) and only within the current patch.
You are correct, its play rate.
If devs dont want to change much, I believe they could take a look at the map pool and think that:
Arabia, Serengetti and Four Lakes are top 3 current pool, which should indicate the playerbase prefer open maps, specially land.
Arena, Hillfort and Golden Swamp are the middle, cool. I believe these are the maps where the bans shoudl be targeted at depending on your preference / what you feel like playing. Again, land maps have a better play rate.
Mega Random, Nomad and Islands are the least played maps - two of them seem to be fixed on the rotation, which I don’t get considering even if all three are added they still see less play than any of the top3 for this rotation – and Serengetti is a “civ win” map for Mongols. Islands “full” water map, which I reckon we should have once in a while. I believe these 3 should be in a rotation of their own. Using a ban on one of them is fair. Three bans suck.
I would have:
Fixed Arabia
Fixed Arena
Monthly Rotation: MegaRandom/Nomad/Islands
Monthly Rotation: Open Land Map I
Monthly Rotation: Open Land Map II
Monthly Rotation: Open Land Map III
Monthly Rotation: Closed Land Map I
Monthly Rotation: Open Hybrid Map I
Monthly Rotation: Open Hybrid Map II
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I agree with you you somewhat on your map preference but consider this:
Arabia, Arena, Nomad and Black Forest are the only maps with a playrate above 1% on voobly (and have been pretty much for 10 years). There has always been a small community of players that almost exclusively play on one of these maps.
That is why the Devs consider those maps essential and do not rotate them.
Similarly there is a part of the community that wants to go all random every game (random civ and random map). In my opinion this is why Mega Random is also always in the rotation.
Now, something that would be cool (but unlikely to be implemented) would be an evolving Mappool depend on Elo.
Imagine this: when you reach 1250+ Elo (1v1) you reach the “advanced” rank and your Mappool becomes the “advanced” Mappool when you play against other 1250+ Elo players.
In this (for example) Black Forest gets replaced by Yucatan.
When you reach 1500+ Elo (expert rank) Yucatan gets replaced by cenotes.
When you reach 1750+ Elo (pro rank) cenotes gets replaced by Sahara.
Since many beginner player (on average) prefer closed maps and more advanced player (on average) prefer more open maps this would be a good solution for everybody (on average).
What do you think?
First Mountainpass game - vill fight, gg min 2. Free puntos. RNG Maps suckkkk!!!
Seriously the map pool this month is horrible. Cant believe they removed 4 lakes and Nomad to put Bog Islands and kept Hill Fort
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+1
Not to mention Kilimanjaro and Continental 
Many people are already complaining about the map pool, including lots of top ELO streamers.
Another added example to the long list of why we need more bans and/or Arabia only queue. (if it still wasn’t obvious already)
Unlimited bans, if you ban many maps you probably should have to wait more time. Simple as that.
Let me play arabia.
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I think no TC starts must have the rule of no vill fighting before TC is up. On higher levels this is kinda an unwritten rule. For lower levels, it isnt. Vill fights also happens on Nomad.
I do like nomad, but i dont like the vill fighting.
I do not like it either, but unfortunately our TCs were in range of one another, I was Britons and he was Persians. I had to take the fight… RNG =/
-If there are 9 maps and 5/6 bans that means it is possible to never get a match.