online training servers map change

[adminless]

following the success of the change of glacius into spacius I think that at this point nobody would understand that I keep running custom maps (the ra3maps) at the online training servers specially considering that they are available exactly as-is on the local client (ex. \exec training1). looks to me that the real interest (and mostly the effort) in running customs maps has faded overall from the community so today I followed the trend and I replaced the online training servers custom maps by a couple of Quake III Arena standard ones. in my opinion this is probably the best idea for these spare servers, not that I expect them now full/top busy, let's speak the truth, there's even not that much people left still running Quake III Arena as to full all these many servers (matter of fact, full two servers and have other two active already on a daily basis is as good as it gets) but I hope that this at least should draw some activity/attention toward these servers and, as well as with spacius, help bring some more fun and variety to the community.

I chose as replacement for the online training1 and training2 servers q3dm12 and q3dm15 respectively. in my opinion these are the very best choices considering the circumstances (variety, settings, size etc). q3dm12 even ran at the main server for some months, sure it stopped doing it for a reason, it didn't really work out on UnFreeZe however I think that for a training/warm up server, essentially a ffa slugfest, it's a great idea to get it back. q3dm15, probably most of the same, it didn't even run at UnFreeZe for more than a few games but for obvious reasons I think, however this now is probably a great opportunity to give this map some playtime too even if only casually. overall, I think it turned out "pretty good" for what these servers are, spare servers, and hopefully this will serve to also deliver those maps that were requested by some and make the absolute most of the entire Quake III Arena assets (after spacius and this change all that is left from q3 is just q3dm0/q3tourney5/q3dm19 which pretty much are "demo" maps not really of interest and q3dm9/q3dm10/q3ctf3 that even ran regularly at the mainstream servers but were too full of tunnels/campers and overall they rated just as "ok" maps falling short of the mainstream "top" quality standard).

as with anything this can always be subject to further changes on the future at convenience so any feedback/suggestions are welcome but by now I feel like this should "complete" (to some reasonable extend) the servers for this coming 20/21 fall/winter season.

[imprecise]

hello Adminless

thank you for the changes and for your work on the training servers

what is the attendance percentage of training servers?

because I never see anyone on these training servers ...

what can we do to increase their attendance, do you have any suggestions?

my suggestion: weekly or monthly training sessions and suggest players to participate if they want to improve

I therefore encourage good and very good players to volunteer to lead training sessions

and maybe after we'll play nice games more often

thanks in advance to all

[adminless]

before the change the activity was similar to that of glacius, that's it, death server. glacius was averaging like 2/3 connections a day (thanks to the occasional duels that happened here and there) while the training servers were averaging like 1/2 connections a day (i.e. almost every day there was someone who connected to heat up for some rounds and/or to test some settings/cfg before going for the main servers). however just on the first day after the change there have been considerable activity. I mean as I said, not that they've been full/top busy or anything, but just as we speak there's people playing and across the day there was various 4/6 players games going. quite frankly, that's well beyond the current expectations for these servers and a dramatic difference so I think that this change, as well as with spacius, has been very positive.

for the rest, I don't think I'll focus too much on these online training servers, they are just that, spare servers. I wouldn't stress too much about them, I mean, it's awesome that they still get some activity but it's probably much more productive to focus on the support spacius/ctf servers instead.

[adminless]

ok, following the current demand and suggestions for custom maps at the Quake III Arena fpsclasico servers report here that finally today I loaded ospdm1 at the training2 server and hence I moved q3dm15 that was running 24/7 there into training1 for a rotation along q3dm12. additionally as a small revision now that there's actually a (tiny but yet a) "rotation" there I lowered the fraglimit into 50 from the previous 100. initially I set such a huge fraglimit because since there was no rotation it didn't really matter but probably it was too "hardcore" for most, specially on the original top ra3 maps. ok, I believe that change now should address that and probably make training1 a bit more "mainstream" and fun for everybody (not just the over the top hardcore players). training2 in the other will still stick to the previous fraglimit of 100 and so far I made it ospdm1 24/7. given there will be enough interest and so I might add also a (small) "rotation" there or just change the map just like now. by now I think ospdm1 apparently is what has been requested the most and probably out of the rich repertoire of maps on the provided official client one of the best for deathmatch. anyways, as usual, special with the secondary support server it will subject to revisions/changes as needed so stay tune for more stuff.

[PacMan]

I use training server time to time for rail practice amongst other things

[adminless]

sure, I mean, beside casual games and fun here and there the training servers are there for that basically, train/test the things out as even their name suggest. btw as mentioned that it was intended previously report that yesterday night I finally replaced the custom map running 24/7 on training2, ospdm1, with 6++ by now. as expected the changes didn't really make any difference on the actual activity of the servers then as just a couple of guys showed for ospdm1 even though they had requested it, after analyzing the repertoire of maps at the official fpsclasico client as well as the servers I determined that probably by now the best fit for training2 is 6++. of course, the best maps for the training servers were the original ra3 maps but as also mentioned early probably they are too "alien" for the general public and also since the original setup is exactly included on the provided client it was probably a much better option run other maps at the online servers instead. on that regard, I think that probably the current setup of doing standard maps on training1 and leave training2 as custom maps promotion is the way to go. therefor I analyzed the assets at disposal and came with the suggested map pool you have on the poll I added on this thread then please make sure to cast your vote and make your voice heard on what maps you would like to see at the training servers.

in my opinion, at the time being, giving the circumstances I think of those 6++ is the best pick, I feel like it should provide just the perfect balance among popularity/standard/custom assets as well as the original ra3 style and be a ideal fit for a training fragfest (a.k.a. ffa) specially even more considering that's missing from the other servers (on glacius it got replaced by the newer and better bloodcovenant remix). anyways, that's by now as I said depending on the interest/poll results and circumstance I may change it again or even add a small rotation between then, as usual, we'll see. anyways, that goes for training2, training1 I think it will stick to the current mini q3dm12/q3dm15 rotation which I think is what offer the best all around setup.

[adminless]

ok, following this year changes/updates with the maps/rotation as 6++ finally made it to the baltic/glacius2 server I replaced the custom map that features at the training2 server (6++ at the moment) by octagon that it had came out as a training request during the league and for other than that it was mostly unused among the package assets. you can get it here or preferably just by installing the whole thing (i.e ioq3v6-unfreeze-client-v20.5a.zip and/or fpsclasico-client-community-edition.zip) as you should to simply get everything at once and doesn't have to worry about anything else. with this I believe the changes with the training servers should be done at least by now as usual so for anything else just let me know.

[adminless]

just as small update on this since the follow up of these servers (the current fpsclassico ffa one) has ended really becoming more of a mainstream one than a "training"/spare one (I mean, it really replaced glacius as the people third choice/option) and q3dm15 finally made it on the main ones I changed once again now the rotation here into a more deathmatch mainstream one by now (pro-q3dm6, q3dm7, q3dm8, q3dm11, q3dm12, q3dm14 and q3dm15, i.e. the "tops") and we'll see then how it does.

[Schneewittchen]

Hi, i play until 2 years on your ffa server, but i miss more maps, it would be great to have a bigger selection. For example, the "BlackCathedral"

[adminless]

hey welcome to the forum. thanks you for the request but unfortunately as brought on the other servers as well, custom maps are not really a option for public servers as people (the vast majority, like virtually everybody) don't have them installed which mean they just couldn't play it (i.e. empty server). as wrote above the ffa server currently runs up to seven (standard) maps which are the best choices for ffa. if you would like to have another (standard) map considered to be added you can probably request it as well although as I'm telling I don't think there's really much else to chose from and/or to add/do to that server.

[Schneewittchen]

Is it possible to upload a personal skin to the server?
My own Skin mod?

[adminless]

if you mean skin/models (just the players you see when playing) they run locally on the client not on the server so you can install any model/skin pack you want on your client independently of the server.

[Semisek48]

One more idea about the map pool. It is true that there is not much of maps to choose from, but i noticed that the server is running large maps like q3dm12 and q3dm14 even if is half empty. It result in that firstly there is more bots on the server then players, which is always not ideal and second the map rotation will become very repetitive soon. I am not really much of a experienced FFA player, but i can imagine that from the basic maps maybe also q3dm2, q3dm3, q3dm5 or q3tourney3 could work nice.

[adminless]

I know, in line with the answer at the other request thing is that server was initially intended just as a training server for the UnFreeZe ones and it wasn't even really expected to be that populated. now given that it's finally getting busy as well I guess that probably I can add the rest of the standard maps along with other different changes to it on the next days. thanks for input.

[Semisek48]

Yea, i hope it will continue to grow, it is fun to play also something different then freeze tag from time to time. Thanks for you answers.