Contest Outcome Shocking? Maybe NOT [Archive]

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Mike Nomad

03-22-2007, 06:57 AM

After having had a few hours to think over the results of the RO mapping contest, I cannot say I was "shocked, dismayed or disturbed" over the outcome.

I was however, disappointed in not seeing Zhitomir and TractorWorks in the top running. Perhaps the contest needed a "Top Five" instead of three. I don't know. I do know this; the winners got there because they had high scores in all areas of judging. I am also aware of the heavy duty campaigning and that went on behind the scenes where buddies, constituents and fans, directly and indirectly, prodded the "powers that be" attempting to influence the outcome of the contest.

That's a very normal occurrence in all walks of life. I congratulate the contest judges for not allowing themselves to be unduly influenced in the performance of their duties.

Now, for my personal feelings...

While Slyk and I may have our differences, I believe his works and those of Drecks' were all excellent entrants. That aside, I must again reaffirm the final results as, in my perception, fair and irreproachable.

I respectfully submit the following missives to substantiate my conclusions;

From: TWRamm-Jaeger;

I know this probably won't make anyone feel better, but getting 3rd place out of around 40 maps submitted for the contest is an amazing achievement, and something to be very proud of.

The judging for the top maps was VERY close, and we looked at all aspects of the map. Yes, maps got extra points for being more ambitious, but being ambitious wasn't a guarantee of winning. As I've told Slyk privately, if Berezina didn't have some of its issues (optimization problems, bot pathing issues), it could very well have been the first place winner. It certainly had nothing to do with the winning map having a TW like setup.

The map contest was kind of like a pro skateboarding competition. You get more points for attempting more difficult things, but you still have to nail the landing. Smolensk was a map that nailed all of its tricks (gameplay, balance, bot pathing, optimization, graphics, polish, etc) , even if they weren't as difficult.

As I have told Slyk, Berezina is one of the TW Dev's favorite custom maps, and our hat goes off to all the after-hourz guys and all the hard work they've put into their maps and custom add-ons. Its people like them that make the RO Modding Community great.

__________________

and then .....

From: [RO]SasQuatch;

Contests are always tricky. I agree with what Ramm said here.

I was even convinced nothing could have topped Berezina when we started the contest, and I knew Leningrad had high chances of winning too. But when you dissect maps like we did, and give straight points to different aspects of level designs, the outcome can be quite different from what you expect.

I want to congratulate Slyk, Drecks and the AHZ team for doing an awesome job, and for creating projects that make me wish I was a custom mapper again sometimes. :)

__________________

In closing, I again congratulate the contest winners. I must also congratulate all the winners.. that's you and I and all the RO players who are enjoying the fruits of this Mapping Contest in more ways than one. We have the great and well done maps (all the maps) and now, the new mappers spurred on by the excitement of the contest.

I must also mention the vibrance of the Red Orchestra platform. Here we are, over a year later since the formal release of RO OSTFRONT 41-45 and its still going strong, strong, strong... and I might add, heavily supported by Tripwire who have never, ever let their levels of support and communications falter for one moment.

Congratulations to Tripwire also! :bravo:

Mike Nomad

03-22-2007, 07:11 AM

AHGN (AHZ) RO Map Survey

The Tripwire Development team will decide which map deserves the top spot.

How would the community decide if they had the choice to vote?

Lets find out, what maps do you believe deserve to be in the top three, and which map deserves the top honor?

Each drop down menu contains a list of maps submitted in the contest, select which maps you believe should be in the top three.

This report contains a detailed statistical analysis of the results to the survey titled AHGN RO Map Survey. The results analysis includes answers from all respondents who took the survey in the 48 day period from Friday, February 2, 2007 to Thursday, March 22, 2007. 201 completed responses were received to the survey during this time.

Survey Results & Analysis
Survey: AHGN RO Map Survey
Author: admin@after-hourz.com
Filter:
Responses Received: 201

Berezina Beta 5 by Slyk......................................233
TractorWorks Beta 4 by Slyk...............................175
Zhitomir1941 Beta 3 by Drecks............................173
Lenigrad Beta 5 by Dr. Guppy...............................149
Smolensk Stalemate Beta 3 by Xendance..............133
Black Day July by Moz.........................................095
PariserPlatz 2 by SchutzeSepp.............................075
Mannikkala Beta 2 by Mr.Neutron..........................031
Tcherkassy Beta 2 by EscAz................................023
VolgaOST Beta tochiri..........................................0 19
Hochburg 1943 by Killer9999................................015
Zavod by Drevlin........................................... ......011
Korosten Beta 3 by RichZap.................................009
Novgorod Mountains by Killer9999.........................008
Static Defense by SnakeDude................................007
Brest Fortress by Six Ten.....................................007
Trench Hill 1944 by Subv3rsioN..............................005
Lodz Beta 4 by Killer9999......................................00 3
Kryukovo Beta 2 by Rak.......................................003
Orsha Clearing Beta 3 by Killer9999.......................003
Roter Boden by Stalker 24....................................000SOURCE (https://desktop.websurveyor.net/wswebtop.dll/WSPubReport?esid=143818&subaccountid=47416)

__________________

Be advised; the results shown reflect a mere two hundred or so participants. Needless to say, the Red Orchestra Platform consists of many thousdands of individuals. Therefore a wise and prudent conclusion would be that the survey, like most surveys, do not offer a general consensus of the entire community.

Mike Nomad

03-22-2007, 07:24 AM

Above is the small, informal vote offered to the community in the AHZ Forums, RO Forums and our forum... there may have been other areas it was offered in that I am unaware of.

Understandably... since it was an AHZ sponsored event, the active members of the AHZ forums eagerly participated. I must admit I voted too as did many of the RGN members. I did so out of curiosity to see if my choices coincided with the formal contest judge's choices.

Not surprisingly they didn't. I had chosen;

Berezina
Zhitomir
LeningradI only wish there had been five winner slots. But... what do I know? All I based my choices on were the "enjoyment factors" of each map. To me.. a map "makes the grade" by the various levels of exuberance put forth by the players themselves. Not by mapper/user campaigning or any other extraneous and equally useless indirect influences put forth. In a sense, we are all winners. We now have 32 more great maps to enjoy.

RGN has four Red Orchestra Servers running. All OWNED and operated by us free of charge for all users to enjoy. Those servers and their user map vote records told us a great deal. So much so, that I again must say; "the formal outcome of the RO Map Contest is indeed fair and well done."

TruSlaughter

03-22-2007, 08:49 AM

I'm a little shocked that Zhitomir didn't place in the top 3 but I guess all infantry hurt it. Berezina had bot pathing problems and Leningrad which I liked had problems with the tanks if you had no engineer. Smolensk had those beat because even tho it only had the halftracks the map played smoothly, that's my guess. My picks were Zhitomir, Leningrad, Pariser Platz. Anyway, thanks to all the mappers for their hard work and congrats to the winners.

JAKL

03-22-2007, 11:21 AM

We had a chance to crunch the numbers to break out the votes per placement so here are the updated results.

Overall 459 people clicked the link to view the survey, 201 completed the survey and submitted the results. The report can be viewed at:

AHGN RO Map Survey (https://desktop.websurveyor.net/wswebtop.dll/WSPubReport?esid=143818&subaccountid=47416)

The scoring is broken down as follows:
First place = 3 points
Second place = 2 points
Third place = 1 point

Top 7 By Total Votes
Map............................Votes
=====================
Berezina.......................235
Tractor Works...............178
Zhitomir 1941................174
Leningrad.....................149
Smolensk Stalemate.......133
Black Day July................95
Pariser Platz...................75

Votes for each place (top seven). Entries for the remaining maps gathered five votes or fewer for each place.

Map............................1st.........2nd.... ......3rd
==================================
Berezina......................46..........38...... .......21
TractorWorks...............35..........28......... ....23
Zhitomir1941...............30..........27......... ....30
Lenigrad......................26..........23...... .......25
Smolensk Stalemate....24..........25.............11
Black Day July..............12..........19.............21
PariserPlatz..................10..........12...... ......21

OneShot

03-22-2007, 06:49 PM

I for one did not participate in any of the "informal" polls either here at RGN or at other sites due to the fact I never was able to play/experience all the maps for myself, even though I was in fact one of the people that looked at the polls without casting a vote!

Curious I guess or just surfing around. There were what just over 20 maps total in this phase of the contest? My on-line gaming time is very limited unfortunately. I did get a chance to play quite a few of the maps more than a few times, although rarely on a full server. Many times when I found a map I had not had the opportunity to check out or play the server was empty.

I did "look around" most of the maps in the contest, but without actually playing the map to an end, against other players, not bots, I felt my opinion or vote would be biased to just the few maps (probably half of those in competition) I was able to compete on with other gamers. Perhaps that is why the poll participation was in my opinion so low?

Barely over 200 people voted in a community of players that is not just national, but in fact worldwide! I've seen nearly 200 people at the RO forums during a weekday daylight hour. I'm no statistician, nor a poll expert, but with such few people actually participating I would have to question any conclusion that I would draw from the sampling and results. Just not enough data (votes) for me not to be able to rule out skewed results IMO.

I would at the very least hope all whom voted had given each map equal playing time before reaching their decision. Perhaps that is why TW used the criteria they did in deciding their winner? After all this was a TW/RO contest, why should the winner be anything other than what the developers felt best met their standards for their Sim?

The winning map I believe they felt should be perceived by all RO players, new, experienced, novices, experts, as FUN! No matter what the skill level of the player is, he/she should be able to compete and enjoy the map without having a degree in history, military tactics, or game development.

Why do some believe this game must be played the way they perceive it should be played, as if they are elitist and they and only they are capable of truly knowing the true, deep, meaning and purpose of RO? RO is just a game everyone, and was developed to be fun for everyone, not just the purist.

At the risk of being accused of blowing smoke up someone's you know what I must still express my congratulations to the top 3, as well as to all the participants and my honest thanks for all their efforts. :bravo:

I think every RO enthusiast has won as a result of TW contest! I hope to play all the maps entered in the contest in the near future.

Until then, I will reserve my opinions.

Phaser

03-22-2007, 08:18 PM

JAKL

03-23-2007, 09:15 AM

Barely over 200 people voted in a community of players that is not just national, but in fact worldwide! I've seen nearly 200 people at the RO forums during a weekday daylight hour. I'm no statistician, nor a poll expert, but with such few people actually participating I would have to question any conclusion that I would draw from the sampling and results. Just not enough data (votes) for me not to be able to rule out skewed results IMO.

Polls are often drawn up by a sampling of the population. For instance political polls often contain as few as 1000 participants to which they then extrapolate the data for an entire nation. 200 people voted and given the fact that there are very rarely more than 1000 playing at any given time that's not a bad sampling. We couldn't force people to vote, all we could do is keep bumping the thread on the RO boards and see what happens.

So are you saying the Tripwire Dev's results were fixed?

Not at all...the TW devs were voting on a completely different set of criteria or perhaps a more in-depth criteria than I'm sure many of the people that voted in the community poll. Based on their criteria they came up with their winners. I can't say I agree completely but I understand their logic and the results seem fair.

The community vote was just an experiment to see how the community at large would vote if they so chose. What I can say is that in playing at our server and others (2Manny's and RTR usually) the most often played maps are usually the top five listed (not so much Leningrad), Lazur, Whateverovko, Pariser Platz and a few of the stock maps. Mike mentioned map voting on the servers being a good judge and I'd agree. Drecks doesn't usually get much publicity on the RO boards by the community or the developers, but I see his maps being played constantly as do Slyk's. There are other good custom maps out there and I like playing them as well, Mannikala being one of my favorites but from my experience playing I see the same maps constantly being voted on to play which I think is a better gauge of what the community likes. It just happens that it seems to mirror pretty closely the results of the voting.

OneShot

03-23-2007, 09:42 PM

Polls are often drawn up by a sampling of the population. For instance political polls often contain as few as 1000 participants to which they then extrapolate the data for an entire nation. 200 people voted and given the fact that there are very rarely more than 1000 playing at any given time that's not a bad sampling. We couldn't force people to vote, all we could do is keep bumping the thread on the RO boards and see what happens.

Jakl;
I appreciate what you attempted to do with your poll, not knocking it at all, it was fun to see the results. Also would have liked to have seen greater participation, but like myself, perhaps many did not actually have the chance to play all the maps submitted for the contest and thus withheld voting in fairness to all. However, again not being a "pollster," I do remember taking a class in college called Statistics, which dealt with the subject matter we are discussing. I agree with you that yes a small sample say 1000 American adults can accurately reflect the opinions of more than 185 million American adults.

But you should always ask yourself if the poll results have been "weighted." In national polls a process is usually used to account for unequal probabilities of selection and to correct demographics in the sample. However, you should be aware that a poll can also be unduly manipulated by weighting to produce some desired result. Not saying your poll was intentionally weighted Jakl, not in the least in any way. But given the fact it was an After Hours poll conducted by and indirectly administered by After Hours I would like to see what percentage of people that participated were in fact members of After Hours. If the percentage of AHGN members participating were high, then perhaps the results were "weighted" in favor of AHGN contestants.

Don't get me wrong, I think Drecks and Slyk have created some excellent maps. I really enjoy playing their maps, IMO thier maps are very challenging, graphically excellent and always fun to play, especially like all RO maps with more players. I would expect many of the AHGN members also feel strongly about these two gentlemen and share my opinion of these two guys. Perhaps, and only perhaps, members at AHGN may have voted the way they did in support of their Mappers. There's nothing wrong with loyalty, in fact, I would expect no less of any gaming net. Just pointing out the possibility. Without more info on the poll I have no way of knowing. That's all I was trying to say.

The community vote was just an experiment to see how the community at large would vote if they so chose. What I can say is that in playing at our server and others (2Manny's and RTR usually) the most often played maps are usually the top five listed (not so much Leningrad), Lazur, Whateverovko, Pariser Platz and a few of the stock maps. Mike mentioned map voting on the servers being a good judge and I'd agree. Drecks doesn't usually get much publicity on the RO boards by the community or the developers, but I see his maps being played constantly as do Slyk's. There are other good custom maps out there and I like playing them as well, Mannikala being one of my favorites but from my experience playing I see the same maps constantly being voted on to play which I think is a better gauge of what the community likes. It just happens that it seems to mirror pretty closely the results of the voting.

Could it be a coincidence? Definitely a worthy experiment Jakl! No accusations or disrespect to any members, certainly human nature to support or root for your favorite or "family member." Again without more "data" this is just an assumption on my part and I could certainly and easily be incorrect! Polls have been wrong in the past and I was just trying to point out the fact that your results may or may not accurately support your conclusions as to the way the RO community at large feels. Your conclusions above which supports play at the more populous servers and mirrors your results I find more compelling and agree with you that would seem to be a "better gauge of what the community likes." My only point being that for myself, I would like more "data" if possible. I do applaud you Jakl, and Mike, and others for creating these polls so that all of us could feel like we were actually having a vote in deciding the winners, which we clearly did not.

Good way to keep up the interest in the contest and the game.
Good job here at http://forums.raidersmerciless.com/images/rgn_27.png and at AHGN for promoting RO in the community!:bravo:

Drecks

03-24-2007, 07:55 AM

Mike Nomad

03-24-2007, 08:41 AM

We can discuss this for another two weeks but this won't change the result.

The poll and the contest outcome don't have much value for me anymore.
The same goes for the system they used to decide the outcome and the nice
congrats i recieved "for doing an awesome job !"

Guess this means the other runner ups have done the same "awesome job !"
otherwise i wouldn't be amongs them.

The "official" Zhitomir feedback i recieved made me curious for the feedback
some other maps recieved even the maps which made it to the top 3.
Would be interesting to compare this feedback with the used system they used.

This is the first real comment i did on this subject.
I tried to stfu, but as usually i couldn't.

All I can say is your very well done maps have always been a joy to play and offer on our servers. The maps should be allowed to "speak for themselves".

Unfortunately, many other ouside influencing factors may have come into play. I don't know for sure. But I do know this.. and you can take this to the bank. The maps you have offered;

Lazur
Wateverovko
Zhitomir1941
ZhitomirrevengeEvery single one of your maps have been excellent, fun to play, maps!!

I honestly believe that had the maps been allowed to stand on their own merit, you would have done much better. You should've ENTERED them ALL in the contest.

JAKL

03-24-2007, 01:16 PM

Wateverovko was entered in the first round of the contest and like Zhitomir didn't place. Wateverovko is one of those maps that never got any press on the boards but it seems like it is a very popular map to play in public play. I'll admit I never truly appreciated the map until I played it on a full server. It's one of my favorite combined arms maps.

Oneshot, all of what you said could be the case. We have no real way of saying who from our community actually voted. The only restrictions we put on it was to keep a person from the same IP voting more than once. We randomized the order of the maps listed in the voting so that when somebody went to vote the same maps were not always at the top thus forcing people to actually look for the map they wanted to vote for. I know I personally played every map that was in the contest and the top seven maps listed in our poll could accurately be described as the best of the bunch. I'd also add Mannikala and maybe Korosten to the list but there were several maps submitted to the contest that just weren't worth playing although we did over several nights of playing.

Drecks

03-24-2007, 01:31 PM

It was maybe two weeks ago i started to mess around in Wateverovko to see what i can do to make it more atractive:

less fog = better viewdistance
remove the high hill = Wider gameplay
better capsequence = better balanced end play
more buildings = more cover
more eyecandy = to rub it more in

But i don't want to spend more time in mapping for this game.
I will finish Zhitomirrevenge, i think beta 3 will be there over the weekend.

OneShot

03-24-2007, 04:36 PM

Oneshot, all of what you said could be the case. We have no real way of saying who from our community actually voted. The only restrictions we put on it was to keep a person from the same IP voting more than once. We randomized the order of the maps listed in the voting so that when somebody went to vote the same maps were not always at the top thus forcing people to actually look for the map they wanted to vote for. I know I personally played every map that was in the contest and the top seven maps listed in our poll could accurately be described as the best of the bunch. I'd also add Mannikala and maybe Korosten to the list but there were several maps submitted to the contest that just weren't worth playing although we did over several nights of playing.

Jakl;
Sounds like you certainly did all you could to assure the integrity of your poll. I never doubted it. As you stated you could not make people vote if they chose not to participate. I have heard others state around the community, like you have, that several of the maps are not worth playing. Also your opinion of the top seven maps are also vastly shared and agreed upon in the RO community. At least you gave every map a fair chance and all interested in playing had an opportunity to do so at your servers as I hope all server Admins did.
I know Mike had them loaded in rotation on one server at http://forums.raidersmerciless.com/images/rgn_27.png as soon as the were released and keep them updated. However, I do remember seeing people complaining about SchutzeSepp's map long after the fixes were out for his submission, so perhaps that was not the case everywhere? Very disappointing more people that had played all the maps did not participate in the RO polls. Guess that is the way things are today.

Last November in a election in my community fewer than 45% of registered voters actually exercised their rights to vote! This is a community of over 200,000 voters and the Mayor and several City Council seats were decided by a very, very small margin. Every vote does count. That is my beef against polls and especially political polling, heck before the polls even closed the major news organizations have declared winners. No wonder people do not bother then to vote after working all day if they feel their candidate has lost the election. Of course, this rant has nothing to do with the RO mapping contest or the forum polls.

I guess bottom line is if you like a map then play it and enjoy. I know I will!

Mike Nomad

03-25-2007, 08:09 AM

It was maybe two weeks ago i started to mess around in Wateverovko to see what i can do to make it more attractive:

less fog = better viewdistance
remove the high hill = Wider gameplay
better capsequence = better balanced end play
more buildings = more cover
more eye candy = to rub it more in

But i don't want to spend more time in mapping for this game.
I will finish Zhitomirrevenge, i think beta 3 will be there over the weekend.

Take some time out to smell the flowers...

A guy with your talent should never drop his artistic abilities. He should forever hone them and make them better than they were yesterday. I wouldn't be surprised if one day in the near future, you find yourself free-lancing making of maps for someone and getting paid for it.

Enhance Wateverovko, and then finish up Zhitomirrevenge. Believe me, you and I both know the users enjoy your maps. That's all that matters. I'd love to see an epic, well detailed Kursk done by you...

I know it would be superb. :wink1:

TruSlaughter

03-26-2007, 09:05 AM

Take some time out to smell the flowers...

A guy with your talent should never drop his artistic abilities. He should forever hone them and make them better than they were yesterday. I wouldn't be surprised if one day in the near future, you find yourself free-lancing making of maps for someone and getting paid for it.

Enhance Wateverovko, and then finish up Zhitomirrevenge. Believe me, you and I both know the users enjoy your maps. That's all that matters. I'd love to see an epic, well detailed Kursk done by you...

I know it would be superb. :wink1: I agree with Mike. Drecks, your talents are unbelieveable and your maps are the best and most enjoyable i've ever played. Keep your chin up and don't get discouraged. For those having no ability or talent to map, like myself, makes those of us and myself appreciate your hard work even more. Thanks again

TruSlaughter

03-26-2007, 09:57 AM

here's an interesting stat showing how many hours each map has been played in the last 30 days http://www.roscores.com/portal/desktops/finnishfrontlines/map_ranking.aspx

OneShot

03-26-2007, 05:13 PM

here's an interesting stat showing how many hours each map has been played in the last 30 days http://www.roscores.com/portal/desktops/finnishfrontlines/map_ranking.aspx

T3S;
Thanks for the link and that is in fact very INTERESTING is it not?
Amazing to me how the original RO stock maps still dominate to this day. I guess says a lot for the TW devs but I for one could not tell you the last time I played a RO stock map from the box!!

Mike Nomad

03-26-2007, 06:00 PM

here's an interesting stat showing how many hours each map has been played in the last 30 days http://www.roscores.com/portal/desktops/finnishfrontlines/map_ranking.aspx

Those stats have been "artificially pushed" by certain servers running DANZIG ONLY 24/7 and same goes for other maps that seemingly "dominate".

Its all BS numbers. The real numbers are in the Servers offering a variety of preferred maps.

For example; If three servers run the same map for a month, 24 hours a day - seven days a week... and other servers are offering variety, naturally the servers with the 24/7 map is going garner higher hours for a map than the others will.

That doesn't mean the TW stock maps are not good - some of them are great. But those numbers can be somewhat misleading. In fact, because of the servers running a single map 24/7, those numbers are definitely skewed and highly inaccurate.

OneShot

03-26-2007, 06:13 PM

Those stats have been "artificially pushed" by certain servers running DANZIG ONLY 24/7 and same foes for other maps that seemingly "dominate".

Its all BS numbers. The real numbers are in the Servers offering a variety of preferred maps.

For example; If three servers run the same map for a month, 24 hours a day - seven days a week... and other servers are offering variety, naturally the servers with the 24/7 map is going garner higher hours for a map than the others will.

That doesn't mean the TW stock maps are not good - some of them are great. But those numbers can be somewhat misleading. In fact, because of the servers running a single map 24/7, those numbers are definitely skewed and highly inaccurate.

Thanks for clearing that up Mike:wink1:

Drecks

03-29-2007, 06:35 AM

Thanks for the nice words, but i contributed enough for this game. Spend enough hours for it already and the only goal now is to release two Zhitomir finals.

The RO community can nicely wait for the MODS who are in the pipeline. These mod people must come up with some killermaps considering the buildtime is almost more then a year. And they where able to learn from the mistakes community mappers made in this year.

Meanwhile i'll be playing RO and maybe i buy BF2 when Forgotten Hope 2 will be released.

=GG= Mr Moe

03-30-2007, 05:58 AM

Drecks

03-30-2007, 06:05 PM

It will be our loss......:whaa1:

However, hope to see you in game more often DRECKS

Don't worry, You can count on that Moe. Mohairborne brings gaming
back to my own country. So i will try to make some stuff for that game
for sure.