Map Statistics

Father Brandon

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Are any statistics available for the average play-time or total play time on maps (besides starting maps like Edana)? I'm curious to see what the current map meta is now as it may help me get some ideas for what people are enjoying the most.
 

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That would be an interesting statistic, although I don't think one exists, besides just an estimate. I'd ask in the MS:Continued Discussions to see what people play the most, and what they like. Unfortunately, it's not uncommon for someone to run a map for days but still dislike it.
 

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Used to have a log diver that dealt with this, but I'm trying to figure where I put it. I think it maybe was something I did while I was overseas and neglected to take it off the laptop that has since taken up permanent residence on the wrong side of the pond.

Tends to be whatever the newest map is remains the most popular for like a year - this is in part exasperated by the fact that it tends to both have the newest item and the lowest spawn chance. "Popular" and "liked" tend not to be the same thing in MSC. The maps with the highest praise tend to be among the least played - with the exception of Thornlands (which people are always begging for "more like this").

Personally, a map that has both a hang out area, and something to do, periodically repeatedly, tends to be what I most look forward to (kinda Thornlands meets Helena). For this map, an Eshu Ewok village safe zone, with a periodic raid event nearby (not necessarily involving the villa) would be the best way to go, in my dreams, at least.
 

Father Brandon

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That would be an interesting statistic, although I don't think one exists, besides just an estimate. I'd ask in the MS:Continued Discussions to see what people play the most, and what they like. Unfortunately, it's not uncommon for someone to run a map for days but still dislike it.

That sounds like a good idea. If someone wants to move this thread, feel free to do so. I wanted to post here first just in case the stats were secret. Unfortunate to hear about running maps constantly while disliking it.

Used to have a log diver that dealt with this, but I'm trying to figure where I put it. I think it maybe was something I did while I was overseas and neglected to take it off the laptop that has since taken up permanent residence on the wrong side of the pond.

Tends to be whatever the newest map is remains the most popular for like a year - this is in part exasperated by the fact that it tends to both have the newest item and the lowest spawn chance. "Popular" and "liked" tend not to be the same thing in MSC. The maps with the highest praise tend to be among the least played - with the exception of Thornlands (which people are always begging for "more like this").

Personally, a map that has both a hang out area, and something to do, periodically repeatedly, tends to be what I most look forward to (kinda Thornlands meets Helena). For this map, an Eshu Ewok village safe zone, with a periodic raid event nearby (not necessarily involving the villa) would be the best way to go, in my dreams, at least.

Let me know if you find the log diver, would be a cool read.

Makes sense and is understandable, more liked content would be nice. I'm trying to channel my inner Thornlands for Eswen, trying to have as much cool stuff to do as possible while also being a hangout spot. I'll need a number of NPCs and quests going on and I like the idea of a possible raid. The giant tree plaza and some surrounding houses will be the place to hang and I'll need to think of some good spots (besides the caves and an open field or two) for fights. Would anyone or anything bother with raiding the abodes in the highest cloud touching trees?
 

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Moved. Torn between here and Maps, being that this is a map discussion, but I think this makes more sense.
 

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Would anyone or anything bother with raiding the abodes in the highest cloud touching trees?
Lore wise, probably *relatively* safe from the other two groups of elves. Tolerated by the mainstream elves, for now, if not always in the past, save for some monitoring and mild occasional harassment of the "pay your taxes" sort, and the Rammata ain't got no beef with em, being renegades themselves. I suppose there may thus be sympathizers among the Eshu harboring fugitives from the latter group, and that could lead to a conflict quest. Beyond that, there's all sorts of flying wild critters, magical and otherwise, if ya wanna make a platforming fight high in the trees (there's a flag for increased fall damage, if you wanna be cruel about it, though the climb back up might be punishment enough).
 

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(there's a flag for increased fall damage, if you wanna be cruel about it, though the climb back up might be punishment enough).
How do you activate this? I need increased fall damage in the map I'm working on now but if I recall correctly, the increased fall damage on bloodrose doesn't really amount to much. Is there a way to actually make falling dangerous?
 

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Hrmm... Looking at it, ya currently need to set it up in the map_startup script, but I added a map flags global property recently, should likely move it over to that. Tempted to make one where ya can set any cvar (in this case, it's mp_falldamage), issue being that said cvars might stick on map change - though I suppose I could just shove them into an array for restoration on map change. (Server vars won't save if the transition crashes - and a full reset on each map change is gonna be default behavior for DS in the next patch anyways.)

if I recall correctly, the increased fall damage on bloodrose doesn't really amount to much. Is there a way to actually make falling dangerous?
It's just the default Half-Life fall damage instead of the 10 max, but it's aimed at a mute post-grad MIT physicist, who only has 100hp, so yeah, it probably can't be that bad, lest we do something code side to make it work by percentage of health or some such.
 

The Man In Black

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I can do that. I could also do a separate cvar (or map property) multiplier and custom damage cap.
 

TheOysterHippopotami

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do something code side to make it work by percentage of health or some such.

I can do that. I could also do a separate cvar (or map property) multiplier and custom damage cap.
Can you rig something up that will increase fall damage based on a players total weight so that the fatter you are the harder you fall? Could you also add a multiplier if the player is wearing platemail as opposed to a vest? That would allow me to create a boss fight where players are faced with the choice of either taking heavy damage directly from the boss, or taking severe fall damage if they get knocked off the mountain side you fight the boss at.
 

The Man In Black

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That would allow me to create a boss fight where players are faced with the choice of either taking heavy damage directly from the boss, or taking severe fall damage if they get knocked off the mountain side you fight the boss at.

My god, man. Do you want the players to murder you or something?

I mean, I certainly can do that, but if we're getting this complicated it might be better to just call a game_fall_damage event or something so the scripts can manage it better. Might also work better, since rather than a potentially sticky cvar system the mapper just sets parameters to the game master (or the game master checks the map name)
 

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My god, man. Do you want the players to murder you or something?
Hm, do you think this is a bad idea? I like the idea of making players pick their poison (and I can see quite a few uses for fall damage like this in other areas) but if players don't like the idea i'd be open to something different.
 

The Man In Black

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I think the biggest complaint about atholo was the whole throwing people into pits of death thing, which is kind of what this is, but maybe your boss' attacks will actually be dodgeable or less likely to end in instant death. This is in public, though, so I'm sure others will weigh in.
 

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My god, man. Do you want the players to murder you or something?
Just one of Oyster's sadistic and slightly ill-informed ideas, this is common.

But in all seriousness if the map is difficult enough people are just going to chug leadfoots or exploit it in a way they can avoid or lessen the likeliness of having to take fall damage. Fall damage relative to weight is something Oyster has mentioned to me on many occassions and I have always told him no. No one is going to sacrifice their 50-60% armor to take less (easily avoidable in at least based on the current maps if normal falling damage were to become a regular thing on all maps) falling damage. In the game's current meta It would be insanely aggravating to be taking more falling damage for just simply carrying around equipment you always want to have on you like plate armor and bow/crossbow ammunition(the weight of this shit adds up, maybe the quiver of the archer could be like a BoH for ammo?).

Sorry about getting off topic but I don't really have much to add to the original topic that hasn't already been said, new map with new item=big play time etc etc.

Though Undercliffs will pretty much segment itself firmly near the top for the rest of time if it keeps its reputation for being a crazy potion farming map, even when people get (or give up on getting) Shadow Lances.
 

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In terms of the boss fight being mentioned above, I will give my two cents. I think the boss should only aggro you if you enter a certain area he's protecting... and I think that it should choose between either fighting, or throwing one from the cliffs. Perhaps it can target whomever is closest to the thing it is guarding, while anyone else who may be attacking it... it will break off and throw them from the cliff. I don't think it'd be wise to have it doing both because it'll be incredibly annoying to deal with, while it's flying back and forth like a crackhead with ADHD. It should choose between two scripted events where it either is targeting the one closest to the thing it's guarding, or it will attack whomever is attacking it.

I say this based on principals of good game design, and cooperation.
While one is distracting the boss, others will be picking it off. While others are picking it off, one can be tanking and doing damage to it. There is absolutely no excuse for having this thing randomly fly between person to person. It should be a very deliberate and thought out strategy to deal with this boss.
 

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My god, man. Do you want the players to murder you or something?
I coulda swore you two met before now... (Not that Oyster and I aren't in a fierce competition for most likely to be murdered by MSC players, in which I'm sure I'm in the lead.)

Meh, the weight thing I see no workable mechanic for. I mean, even if leadfood or some sploit doesn't get you out of it somehow, what are you supposed to do? Galat all your stuff before you go after the boss? That's less game design and more inconvenience. I do like the level of creativity involved in the idea, but I'd rather it go into the sort of line of what's going to keep the players on their toes, force them to work together, and keep the action going, rather than "immersive AF" statistical terms. I suppose some folks are into that, but it seems that lot is populated by far more designers than players - many of whom suffer from what I refer to as "antagonistic DM syndrome". Not that I'm not guilty of it from time to time.

I do like the idea of a sort of king of the mountain mini game for sake of variety though - keeping the boss in or out of an area to prevent adds from flowing in, him healing, or some such. I mean, equally exploitable, but at least the players are actually doing something beyond pre-battle inventory management, which is, well, not particularly exciting.

Weight is also one of the core mechanics I've long wanted to strip from MSC. It's original intent is to act as a level requirement for various items/weapons, forcing light-weapon players to branch into heavier weapons, and it never functioned in that role very well.
 

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king of the mountain mini game

Phlames is no match for 2 to 4 players cramming him into a corner with leadfoot or bearclaws when he wants to transform, so I'm not sure how this would work.
 

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Yeah, like I said, exploitable - it's just the nature of ideas of this sort add an aspect to actual gameplay, rather than just being a "realistic" inconvenience.

Someone once wanted us to remove the HP bar for "realism". I explained that, realistically speaking, you generally*know* when you're dying, but thankfully Nvidia gave up on their pain generator attachment, figuring sticker shock would be so much more painful anyways. (Also their Smell-a-Vision.) ...Not that you can't indicate the player is wounded in a plethora of other ways, but not really the sorta game we've got going here.
 

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what are you supposed to do? Galat all your stuff before you go after the boss?
Put it in your bag of holding?
That's less game design and more inconvenience. I do like the level of creativity involved in the idea, but I'd rather it go into the sort of line of what's going to keep the players on their toes
Ideally this fall damage nerf would be combined with a small buff to your push back resistance. The heavier you are the harder you are to push or throw around, but you take more damage if you actually get pushed off of something.

"realistic" "realism"
I actually am not suggesting this for realism sake but because I can see a lot of creative uses for it when making maps (such as a boss fight like this where the primary threat is from fall damage).
 

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Well, like I said, I applaud the effort, just dunno about the angle of approach. I mean, if you want some players to be heavy and some to be light, that would at least add more to the strategy of the encounter - thought the idea was just to get as light as possible before facing the boss, and that's just, kinda meh.
 

Father Brandon

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I like fall damage based on % of max health as a middle ground between 10 damage and damage based on weight. As it is, the 10 damage is dangerous at low level and doesn't mean much at higher levels with a large hp pool. I wonder if any boss encounters would be affected hard by this though. How many maps have boss encounters where you fall from a far height and face-plant to get into the arena?
 

The Man In Black

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Off the top of my head:

I think the push into the spider room of calruin2 might cause fall damage if you miss the pool
Getting down from the top of Garronroth (or whatever his name is) would also cause issues. Makes horrors in that room even more annoying (somehow...)
Any monster that throws becomes more dangerous when not landing in death pits. Atholo, Keledros (re-animated), Ice Djinn, and so on.

But it would probably be best to make this map specific through one of the various methods we brainstormed for backwards-compatibility and all.
 

Father Brandon

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Lore wise, probably *relatively* safe from the other two groups of elves. Tolerated by the mainstream elves, for now, if not always in the past, save for some monitoring and mild occasional harassment of the "pay your taxes" sort, and the Rammata ain't got no beef with em, being renegades themselves. I suppose there may thus be sympathizers among the Eshu harboring fugitives from the latter group, and that could lead to a conflict quest. Beyond that, there's all sorts of flying wild critters, magical and otherwise, if ya wanna make a platforming fight high in the trees (there's a flag for increased fall damage, if you wanna be cruel about it, though the climb back up might be punishment enough).

I think some flying magical monsters would be perfect. The trees are so high up I'm going to have to do the magic of 'cloud cover' (you'll most likely take a lift and get teleported to the tallest tree tops), so I can either teleport players who fall through the cloud back into another area of the map or I can slay them.

Off the top of my head:

I think the push into the spider room of calruin2 might cause fall damage if you miss the pool
Getting down from the top of Garronroth (or whatever his name is) would also cause issues. Makes horrors in that room even more annoying (somehow...)
Any monster that throws becomes more dangerous when not landing in death pits. Atholo, Keledros (re-animated), Ice Djinn, and so on.

But it would probably be best to make this map specific through one of the various methods we brainstormed for backwards-compatibility and all.

You're right, making it map specific seems to be best at this point.
 

The Man In Black

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so I can either teleport players who fall through the cloud back into another area of the map or I can slay them.

Not sure how much work it is, but doing the opposite of mini-skycastle would be a nice effect. You have a miniaturized version of the map (possibly under the clouds to save on world polys), when they fall, black out the screen after a moment (a la heras) to signify blacking out from fear or whatever, then play impact sound and trigger_hurt
 

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Not sure how much work it is....
That would be really awesome, though I've done more than enough mapping to know, also a lot of work.

Would have to obscure the horizon with one of the weather fog effects or some sprite clouds, otherwise you'll be floating over a giant square and any screenshots will end up as evidence for the flat earthers. We can tweak the distance of the fog effect - think fog_white weather might not give you much view distance. Might also need to do something to make it client specific, so only the folks in the clouds get it. Come to think of it, adding a "touching client only" feature to mstrig_weather would be both fairly simple and useful.

I think some flying magical monsters would be perfect.
Speaking of things that'd be awesome and a lot of work...
manticore.png
Worth it for a proper lore map though. Could use these on the ground *and* in the sky, have a full set of attacks in both flight and walk modes (flight being primarily projectiles). Already tweaked up the model to compile, but it's complicated enough that scripting the bugger could take months. (Also thank @Hush.)
 
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