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Some of my suggestions/ideas

Discussion in '[L4D2] Points Reloaded' started by SViper, Aug 6, 2015.

  1. SViper

    SViper Junior Member

    1. Today I saw you putting down Asia servers and EU server is always out. Actually I see a lot Europeans at USA server.
    So why not changing EU server into Survival or Custom Campaigns with maps like: I Hate Mountains, Suicide Blitz 2 and other popular ones. Or even into Survival Custom Campaigns with maps like -Helms Deep- Reborn and other popular ones.
    I suggesting this, because would be very interesting and enjoyable to play Points Reloaded in Survival mode or with Custom Campaigns
    2. Add new not existing in L4D2 weapons/guns to make game little bit interesting.
    3. Add something similar to Guns/Weapons leveling system like in Borderlands 1 or something like that.

    If any of these ideas/suggestions will be rejected, then I don't mind.

    BTW is there place to read about Pets?
     
  2. Mute

    Mute Head Administrator Staff Member

    For 1) There was a custom map server up at one point, but it wasn't played very much at all. Probably due to the fact there was only two campaigns available. To potentially rectify this, instead of a custom server, perhaps allow players to vote to change to a custom map, provided, say, 3/4 of players have the map installed and vote for it. There has been a few survival stuff done in the past (Helms Deep, and another map which name I can't remember), but these are usually event stuff.

    For 2) I don't know ​how difficult it actually is to completely add a new weapon, given how the only real new 'weapon' I've ever seen on other custom servers is the Fire Extinguisher becoming a pseudo flamethrower of sorts. Also, what kind of weapon would you add without making it similar to pre existing weapons?

    As for pets, there is only the Charger Pet, which could only be obtained from the aforementioned event.
     
  3. SViper

    SViper Junior Member

    1. Roger that.
    2. It's hard to choose when there is a lot weapons/guns in this world.:P
     
  4. Stefeman

    Stefeman Head Administrator Staff Member

    We've tried this around 8 times in our entire history lol. While it could get busy for 1 or 2 days, they will eventually run empty 24/7, which is why we usually only set them up them for special events. On top of that, there are tons of crashing issues with custom maps after latest valve updates and our plugins would need to be thoroughly tested with different custom maps to avoid crashes. It's overall a huge work to set it up, and people will grow tired of it after first night.

    It's not rewarding for marvel/HC/Erik to spend 6 hours on something which only gets played for 2 hours and then runs empty for rest of the month.

    In normal scenario the server cannot "use" anything which the client dosen't have. If we put insane tank model from Lord of The Rings onto the server and your gameclient doesn't have that exact file in correct subfolder of your installion, what you see will be a large "ERROR" model instead of that badass tank.

    As above, the client also needs the mapfile to play in custom campaign

    The same applies with other item/gun/world models and even sounds. You cant "play" what the clien't dosent have. Of course you'll only need to download and place them to correct folder once.

    While we have a way to forcefully transfer these files to clients upon connecting, it would still require HC to spend endless amount of work to develop plugin that employs them from ground up. On top of that it's not very practical to transfer the files. Sure, while it only needs to be done once, due nature of L4D2, there is no "Download manager" with "% done" as you see in CS:S and CS:GO. Instead, the user will be presented with prolonged black screen during downloading and starts to think the server is not working. User with slow connection could hang for minutes while the one with fastest wouldn't connect any faster than 10 seconds. It gets even more impractical when transferring entire maps; the downloadsize + time grows, and the skybox cannot be transfered correctly so you'd have a pink sky filled with black squares or small error messages depending on map. You would instantly notice how cubic it is, and thus it would ruin the atmosphere on dark maps.

    We've tried this before for a short while, and it did not work out well after the initial acceptance, thus we disabled that downloader system, and it's not even tested whetever that same method would still work with a game version in years forward.

    While it's entirely possible to create some sort of different bizarre weapons out of existing models/sounds/effects, its a huge work lol. And you'd have to consult HC for that. So rather than trying it at the moment, hes currently focusing on improving the PR mod as whole and developing the Hidden Infected. But sure, nothing is impossible as long as we'd have enough manpower (coders/plugin experts) to try something. So if any of you are proficient with coding stuff for L4D2 or other source games, hit us up. We're certainly open for anything new :D
     
  5. erik

    erik MG Donor

    Excellent reply, you pretty much said it all!!!

    Trust me when I say THANK YOU, because it would have taken me 10 pages to say the same things! :) We might do custom campaigns again, it's just that the Workshop makes it tirelessly impossible, as you said. If we could somehow get something that's somewhere IN-BETWEEN clientside downloading & automated, we'd be much better off.

    Awesome reply, thank you again,
     
  6. erik

    erik MG Donor

    BTW @ the original post - don't worry about your ideas getting rejected, or whatever, everyone who comes onto these forums does so with the exact purpose of discussing ideas.
     
  7. SViper

    SViper Junior Member

    3rd idea/suggestion is here. I will read this epically long answer for first 2 ideas/suggestions later.:P