Sleepy Retard - Developer Application (Mapper)

**Banned User ID63** · 04-14-2019, 07:14 AM

Developer Application

Byond ID?

Sleepy Retard

Age?

21

Gender?

Male

How would you define yourself? (Coder, Mapper, Spriter):

Mapper

If Coder, what languages?

N/A

Any previous experience developing with SS13?

I've done one or two commits to TGMC, that's pretty much it.

Proof of any previous or current work:

LV:

Spoiler:

I find the atmos building restricting and hardly used, by the standard of when I play. By turning it into an open area, its aesthetically more pleasing, but more accessible for both sides to use while being less constrictive. With this, the original idea of an overgrown, flooded atmos building is replaced by a small pond, with flooded (wet) grass tiles, and abundant fauna. It also gives a place for marines/ambush xenos to extinguish themselves if needed.

Hydro Road - it's too open and closed at the same time. Lurkers lurking have an EASY job of doing so
but on evac, like, when all the aliens attack - its insane to do so, you either wipe the marines or just..can't do anything. The lack of cover and an extra angle of reliable attack makes it much more painful. This would make it slightly harder to lurk, while giving more space to duck and cover for xenos assaulting the evac as it's happening
The walls are semi place holder, I was thinking of replacing some with vines or thick foliage from WO.

Second one, sorta the same as the first - to make the assault on the end game easier. Plus, the storage is....it sucks, it looks like ass, and is only used because people walk through it sometimes. I have a feeling it's too bland and could use some vines, or maybe a small building, but the fluff can be worked out. I'm mostly concerned with the balance implications.

BIG RED:

Spoiler:

These first ones are just to make the caves more apparent:

Last one has some extra windows added to t-comms. Nothing big, just fluff.

I'm really not sure what the old purpose of this room was, but I changed it into a pharmacist. Everything is pretty easy to remove, barring vendors, but they have some actual legitimate use if brought back into the LZ. I added a smartfridge for fluff, same with the windoors, as it was previously lacking such.

Not much change besides accommodating the three new vendors removed from the now pharmacist. They have some pretty awkward positioning concerning the actual walkways, but so do the lockers on the other side. Not a huge issue. Also added a window into the cryogenics room, so from an RP perspective they could check up from inside the storage room.

Really minor change. Just added a door to the right side, it looked like it belong, and admin could use an extra entrance, anyways. Good for lurking xenos, helps marines passing by.

If two crushers are stomping down the fence line, with boiler support, it's a bit of a pain pass through. You can walk up north and around, but that can take too long in certain cases. It also provides a duck and cover location for xenos and marines pushing either side of the cave, unlike before where it would only provide cover for the right cave side, mostly xenos.

The fluff is it's a miner's hut, ripleys, bodies, and locker to represent that. I'm not super happy with how it turned out, but generally the fluff was an afterthought, and the balance implications were put in first. A miner hut made sense as it's close to the caves, the building really wasn't being used, and there isn't a mining base already built in - unless I'm forgetting something painfully obvious.

Just mirrored the resin door for containments, easier to access the monkeys. I've had problems on low pop where there isn't acid castes around to actually melt the damn things.

Added more windows so you can easily hop up north. The center was awkward because you had to jump over three window frames in total, due to the emitter + flaps. Ideally, you only have to hop over one with a crowbar or a pried open door.

I widened up these hallways, as 1 tile wide hallways are absolutely brutal and unfun to fight in. I kept the chokepoint in for the east side, as usually that is where fleeing xenos go through. Ideally, this spot isn't really fought in, but if it is, the wider space now makes it less awkward and annoying.

Usually there's barricades here. They don't really serve a purpose anymore, IMO, so I deleted them.

ALMAYER

Spoiler:

The idea behind this change is just to make life easier for MTs. While the amount of reactors has increased, the same amount of work is still there - you have to fix reactors six times, but this time you can fix three extra each time. I added more fuel in the middle for convenience, and extra recyclers because it is a pain having to wait for them to finish up, no huge benefit besides it's nice. If you notice, this isn't actually a proper map maker, I did this with a paint editor and whatever, I did it at work - but I can easily recreate it in DMM if needed.

So the two people manning the line don't fight over the attachments. Ideally, this would be with a rework making it so ALL req vendors share the same supply, as to not give double of each rare attachment, as well as making the ammo/apparel vendors closer to use, decreasing time in line. Not much else to explain.

How well do you know Git?

I know the basics of it, but fumble over it a lot. I've really only used it in the context of a single person project.

Your primary job is server development, not policing the server. You may be given Moderator-level of access but you should *not* be invoking any administrative actions unless there are no moderators or Admins online. Do you understand?

Yes

Anything else you'd like to add?

Personally, I'm mostly interested in applying to apply minor changes with convenience or balance in mind, after recommendation by a couple dev members.

I'm not really interested in designing huge, grandscale new things. I want to work on the small things, consistently pumping out these as needed, and generally maintaining and bug fixing maps.

I'm also a relatively OK spriter, but I personally feel like my style will not fit the direction that CM is currently going, so I don't think it's applicable.

**Cakey** · 04-18-2019, 05:58 PM

Hey Sleepy, thanks for your application.
Going to go ahead and start off with some questions.
Obviously it's clear that you're interested in making several balance/QoL changes for various existing maps, which is nice. We definitely have a need for mappers that want to maintain current maps. My only concern with this is that while you want to dedicate to handling only small changes like the ones above, you'll quickly run out of things to do. Within the mapping team, you'd be expected to potentially handle more than just tweaking areas, working alongside the other members of the mapping team.
How would you feel about creating nightmare inserts for other maps?
How would you feel about working with other mappers in contributing towards new maps?
In your opinion, what do you think is wrong with the current design for Ice Colony?
Thanks.

**Banned User ID63** · 04-19-2019, 11:32 AM

Originally Posted by Cakey

Hey Sleepy, thanks for your application.
Going to go ahead and start off with some questions.
Obviously it's clear that you're interested in making several balance/QoL changes for various existing maps, which is nice. We definitely have a need for mappers that want to maintain current maps. My only concern with this is that while you want to dedicate to handling only small changes like the ones above, you'll quickly run out of things to do. Within the mapping team, you'd be expected to potentially handle more than just tweaking areas, working alongside the other members of the mapping team.
How would you feel about creating nightmare inserts for other maps?
How would you feel about working with other mappers in contributing towards new maps?
In your opinion, what do you think is wrong with the current design for Ice Colony?
Thanks.

Nightmare inserts:

While I admit I am heavily biased against Nightmare as a system (as implemented with inserts, not as it's intended to be), I'm not really opposed to making inserts. I personally feel as if the ones currently in rotation on LV fail to serve any meaningful purpose besides making the gameplay worse, so I could give a crack at making inserts that are don't detract from the gameplay. Atmos swapping with the lake I have provided above could be one, and I think that would be a neat nightmare, without being a hindrance on gameplay.

Working with other mappers:

It depends. I'd definitely love to help balance out new maps, and figure out problem points with it, and ensuring the flow of gameplay was as palatable as possible. I feel like I could really help out with general ideas, and balancing within maps, something that Trijent needed from the start. It's pretty hard to properly implement a map's balance without stress testing it with a lot of people, but there are measures I could take with to make it stronger upon release. If applicable, or at all possible, with new maps I'd really want to take a chief interest on Hive locations and main supply routes. I can do details, fluff, whatever, but I feel like other mappers would have a more enjoyable time if someone worked out the nitty gritty gameplay balancing while they crafted a nice looking map, one to their eye's content, without being bogged down by balance. For example, I think Trijent is wonderfully sprited and designed, cosmetically, but from a balance perspective it's a bit of a hassle to do anything but meta rush. I also feel like xenos sort of have a hard time doing something that isn't making a hive in the purple research lab with yellow walls that I forgot the name of.

Basically, to sum it up, I have no issues working in a collaborative fashion as applying to a team would mean I would have to at some point - as long as I mostly focused on the balance and functionality. I don't have any problems with making things look pretty, or cosmetics, but I feel like I'd best be applied to making it work, rather than it look good, as I feel other mappers are more interesting in creating an engaging environment.

Ice:

I think Ice has many problems, but I'll quickly start with the shared problems between Marines and Xenos. I'll add fixes as well, but I think that's a little more than you're asking me, but I can't help it:

Spoiler:

Multiple "z-levels" (actually just teleports):

Definitely a huge problem with Ice Colony is the stalemates, draws, and grinding halts that ladders and elevators bring. If either side is guarding one of the ladders, then that ladder is almost effectively impossible to breach for Marines. Xenos can have a bit better chance due to Queens and screeches, but it isn't favourable and it isn't fun to do, plus it requires a Queen to de-ovi - which isn't really possible at all times.

To fix this, there's two ways I foresee: Merging the map to be one "z-level", allowing the underground section to be an extension of the top area would alleviate this problem greatly. It would allow for more marines to be able to breach an area, or xenos, without having to wait for timers to complete.

Secondly, ladders can be turned into staircases with seamless transitions. I believe one of the developers was already working on this. I personally believe this to be the inferior choice, as stairs are a bit awkward in their use on any server I've seen, and from what I've seen in gifs that the devs have put out as examples.

Snow:

Snow punishes both sides, and it doesn't add anything to have it be so punishing. Xenos can clear it a bit easier, but it's still tedious to do so. Getting stuck in snow is awful, and the fact that it's random doesn't help any better. When you walk into sticky resin, you know what's going to happen. You'll be consistently slowed unless you clear it with your tools available. Snow is the opposite. You might be randomly stopped, unable to move. You might not. It's not really consistent. The slowdown is painful.

To fix this, I would make snow have a slight, consistent speed debuff ONLY. No getting stuck in snow. That sucks, and isn't really fun. The other thing to make it less unfun would to make it easier to clear. For xenos, just one action instead of several to go from thick to no snow. For marines, having flares clear snow slowly due to heat, flamers working better, shovels doing it faster, really all these are needed.

Unused map:

In my mind, Big Red is the anti-thesis in this regard. It's map is used almost all round consistently, with viro being slightly problematic due to it's location. Ice, on the other hand, really only has a few key spots that are used. LZ1 -> T-Comms/Bar, Engineering (and really only once), Dorms, Excavation, Hangar sometimes for deployments, same with Dorms. Hydro, Warehouse, Mining Outpost, Admin, Garage, Medbay - these really aren't used whatsoever, unless a xeno runs in there to juke marines. Underground is a bit better in this regard, given that aliens consistently fight in all of it, to a certain degree.

I can't really give a fix besides overhauling the map, so this'll be all I put.

For marine specific issues:

Spoiler:

T-Comms:

It's in a very awkward and IMO bad spot. Prison + Big Red have the best T-Comms, being right beside or incorporated with the LZ. Trijent has it a bit more spaced out from the LZ, but otherwise can incorporated easily into the LZ defenses if needed. On Ice, it's sort of close to the LZ, but it is in a spot where it can easily be cut off from the LZ, and slowly whittled down. On the other maps, if you lose T-Comms, you almost 100% lose the FOB. On Ice, you can easily hold the FOB while not holding T-Comms. It's design also encourages some degenerate, grindy gameplay: five layers of plasteel making it almost impossible to siege down in a reasonable time, though this is mostly a problem for xenos.

To fix, well. Just move the T-Comms equipment south of LZ1, add a flank akin to Big Red's.

Cold:

Ice Colony wouldn't be Ice Colony if it was warm and tropical like LV, but thematic details really shouldn't be influencing gameplay as much as the cold does. It completely prevents CPR, it cripples you if you get huggered, and it makes recognizing who is who at a glance harder, though this is honestly less of a concern for me, but one that many people bring up a lot. Also known as lack of snowflake. The slowdown of the cold coupled with the slowdown of snow really doesn't help, though I had heard this was changed, I'm a but uneducated when it comes to Ice - the last five times I've played it are as Synthetic.

To fix this, while keeping the aesthetic, I have two ideas. One, is to make the coif no longer an actual mask slot, but something that just exists with the uniform. Attach the needed stats, make sure it insulates you, while not prevent CPR. While this could be a bit messy, I think the chance of losing your coif just makes Ice completely a bother to play. Another fix, almost the exact same really, would be making a coif an attachable to a uniform - I know other servers can have multiple attachables to the uniform, so it would be nice to see here.

For xeno specific issues:

Spoiler:

Uninteresting, and lack of good hive locations:

If you don't want to hinder your hive as a queen, you really only have ONE good spot to choose, that being the crashed ship. It's tight, has quick access to above ground, and exits to the rest of the cave system. 90% of rounds I've played on Ice have this exact hive location. It's good. It's effective. It's boring. There isn't really much good hive spots besides that crashed ship. Going above ground requires to to go into a faraway corner, and to dedicate your entire protection to thick resin walls. This isn't really a good measure, and you'll just get CASed to high hell and back. Underground, every other area has poor access, or too many entrances to be effective.

To fix, that's just some creative mapping work. Nothing indepth I can say.

LZ1 is a brutal, boring, and a slog to siege:

I could probably just leave that point just there, but I'll elaborate. LZ1 has TWO cardinal directions to attack in. From the west, from the north. There are three areas to attack it from, two being north, one being west. There is no effective flanks, and the only thing you can do is brute force it, or just slowly and painfully whittle down the marine numbers to nil. A huge problem I've noticed is that a Queen player just doesn't want to attack LZ1 - it's going to take forever, they'll lose a lot of xenos in the process, overall just not being worth it. This forces Queens to either lose on the Almayer, or wait a disgusting amount of time to break the FOB. Neither are fun, neither are options a Queen wants to pick.

To fix this, there needs to be a south flank, or something east. Preferably south so it can easily connect with crashed ship caves. Adding another direction makes holding the FOB harder, but not impossible. It also allows the xenos to quickly rotate between areas to keep applying pressure, forcing marines to swap spots.

**awan** · 04-19-2019, 03:38 PM

Hey Sleepy,

Ill be a bit blunt and direct.
Your app is a bit controversial.
The main issues that have been brought up are: (not in any specific order.)
1. A concern that development secrets will "somehow" end up in your discord.
2. Your behavior in the cm discord.
3. Your revolving door situation with the staff team.
4. Your history with tgmc.
5. Drama seems to always be near you.

Now, let me start by saying that I am going to assume number 2 will change if you are accepted.
And that will not be an issue anymore after that?

Second, there was talk about number 4 and that has imo also been cleared up in a positive enough way.

So that leaves 3 major concerns.
These are not my (personal) concerns but in general the things most likely to be discussed about your app when we discuss it.
If needed I can expand a bit upon the above points.
But I prefer to not bring up the specifics and assume that the above is at least understandable to you.
Hence I hope my post can give you a chance to address these issues.

**Banned User ID63** · 04-19-2019, 04:55 PM

Originally Posted by awan

Hey Sleepy,

Ill be a bit blunt and direct.
Your app is a bit controversial.
The main issues that have been brought up are: (not in any specific order.)
1. A concern that development secrets will "somehow" end up in your discord.
2. Your behavior in the cm discord.
3. Your revolving door situation with the staff team.
4. Your history with tgmc.
5. Drama seems to always be near you.

Now, let me start by saying that I am going to assume number 2 will change if you are accepted.
And that will not be an issue anymore after that?

Second, there was talk about number 4 and that has imo also been cleared up in a positive enough way.

So that leaves 3 major concerns.
These are not my (personal) concerns but in general the things most likely to be discussed about your app when we discuss it.
If needed I can expand a bit upon the above points.
But I prefer to not bring up the specifics and assume that the above is at least understandable to you.
Hence I hope my post can give you a chance to address these issues.

1: Nah. It's hard to leak dev stuff into my discord when several dev team members use it actively, it's not like it's something I plan on doing, and something I would manage to get away with either way if I wanted to. If I did, Dean would fire me before anyone else on the dev team could figure out why.

2: See thedonkified. Nothing else to say besides that. I have no problem not acting like a retard when needed.

3: Seems like a non issue. I've only been fired once, back in 2017, taken many extended leaves. Unless it's a crime to go on extended leave? Burning out is a huge issue with the staff team, and it's mandated that we take extended leaves instead of going inactive.

I simply took advantage of the system and used it as intended, going on extended leaves when I did not feel like I would best be a moderator, or really wanted to moderate. Again, this is exactly how the system was intended to be used, and I used it as such.

In regards to this and the dev team, I'd probably use it the same. When I cannot be fucked, or feel it's hard to continue without getting burned out, I fully plan on taking an extended leave. I do not want to be like the devs who stayed on the team for 9 months, but without actually being there. I think it's more honest and humble to say, hey, I need a break, I'll take extended leave rather than force myself to work, or to pump out low quality garbage instead.

4: I'm assuming that's already been cleared up, but I can expand on it. I personally know several staff members from TGMC, such as Rohesie and LaKiller. I think they're decent people. I don't think there's any bearing to this point besides I know people from another server. There is no connection to be made besides this, they did not leak the code, spread the leak of the code, they're using stole code - but they did nothing to get it in the first place. When I was staff there, I got express permission from Emerald Blood and SLC to head over for a while to help out.

I think this is funny this is a concern, though. It's my opinion that competition is inherently healthy, and TGMC shouldn't be looked upon as some sort of anti Christ. While I understand fully that DMCA did nothing to help their reputation, and that they were actively being toxic towards CM - TGMC really is just something different. They use stolen code, yes. I cannot deny that, but there's a point where you have to let that go.

5: What can I say besides that's correct? Cause never equals correlation, though. Just like when I was blamed for DDoSing the server, when the map changing failures began to happen, there's no substance to it. When I took my break earlier, I made a cryo thread with no details, besides telling the community good luck and have fun or whatever. There was drama, and my name was involved, but I didn't actively get involved.

Afterwards, several of my friends decided to get permabanned for dumb behaviour. Again, I did not. I might be near drama almost every single time it happens, but I'm not apart of it. I didn't start the last drama fiasco with Emerald Blood, nor did I take part it in. Again, I took a break at that point. Cause does not equal correlation.

**Deanthelis** · 04-20-2019, 11:14 PM

Sleepy,

After review of your application and the discussion on it provided in this thread by the team at our meeting today, we have decided to decline this application. Feel free to inquire via PM as to the reasons given.

Please feel free to reapply in six months' time.

User Tag List

Thread: Sleepy Retard - Developer Application (Mapper)

Thread Tools

Search Thread

Display

Sleepy Retard - Developer Application (Mapper)

Posting Permissions