eytanz
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Note - this discussion responds to posts in this thread

agaricus5 wrote:

Doom wrote:

MeckMeck GRE wrote:
The best of course is Bavatos Dungeon but making a hold like that is maybe too hard for anybody here expect about 5 members. Look around how holds => 6.0 look like.

Maybe it's just me but I don't really like it that everyone is comparing anything with Bavato's Dungeon.

I agree. All holds are different, and each hold is more or less unique, with its own style of layout and puzzles. Comparing holds so generically doesn't say much about the hold itself

I suggest looking here for some tips about making good holds.

5) Aim for fun, not difficulty.
Remember that people will play your hold because they think they'll enjoy it, not out of some unspoken duty. If your hold is unreasonably hard without being fun to figure out, people will stop playing it.

That's why I think that Bavato's Dungeon might not be a good example for beginner architects unless they really know what they are doing.

Also, I think the definition of "unreasonably hard without being fun to figure out" is different for different people. I made a hold that contains lots of difficult puzzles with emphasis on manipulation of monsters in large areas, efficiency, timing and large hordes, which some people find fun, but which I guess others find tedious. At another end of the genre spectrum are holds like "A Quiet Place", which places emphasis on manipulation of small groups of monsters in small areas and puzzles with specific solutions. Again, some people enjoy working out what specific solutions are, although I don't myself.

It's funny, because I consider "A Quiet Place" and "Bavato's" to be immensly similar on this scale - both are holds that allow very small margins of error in most rooms; you really have little choice about how to go about solving things. Sure, they enforce it somewhat differently, but essentially I think they require the same type of mindset from a player.

But I definitely agree that that's not the only type of "good" hold possible, nor that everyone should aim to emulate it. People should try to develop their own styles; if those styles are similar to Bavato's or A Quiet Place that's good, if they're different, that's also good, maybe even better because that's more variety. As long as the holds are bug-free, and not gratituously annoying (big hordes for the sake of big hordes, unfair tar mazes, etc.). Heck, probably there's a crowd for gratituously annoying holds too somewhere.

What I don't think is fair about the scale is that it itself is too generic. I think when most people use it, they rate holds relative to whatever else they have played, without taking into account what the holds are. I'm guessing that larger holds with more puzzles might, on average, be more "fun" than smaller 30 minute diversions, simply because they're larger, and so smaller holds don't get represented as well as larger ones.

I think the biggest problem with the rating system is that not enough people vote. With a large populations, this sort of problem would go away, but since at the moment a hold is lucky to get 10 votes, the scores skew easily and can't really be compared to each other.

Probably allowing ranking from within the game would help a bit.

[Edited by eytanz at Local Time:05-17-2005 at 03:44 PM]

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Blondbeard
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Eytanz wrote:

I think the biggest problem with the rating system is that not enough people vote. With a large populations, this sort of problem would go away, but since at the moment a hold is lucky to get 10 votes, the scores skew easily and can't really be compared to each other.

Probably allowing ranking from within the game would help a bit.

Well, I think that goes for the architects forum process as well. I felt pretty confident when the only person that had said anything about the second level semed to like it. And another problem is that it might be more fun to say something good than to say somthing bad about another players hold.

Anyway it would be really good for the holdediting process if it was easy to rank each of the separate rooms. A ranking system within the game might just be the key there.

Aim for fun, not difficulty? It would really be kind of stupid to post a hold where my goal was to irritate people. My intentions when I try to make a difficult room is that it should be fun to figure out how to solve it. That and that it shold leve a sense of satisfaction once you´ve actually solved it. But I guess it´s not so easy to judge what it takes to make a pussle fun to solve. I guess one has to let other people try it and tell you what they thought. As many peoples as possible. Otherwise you might end up with a room you thoght was funny witch others will find anoying and timeconsuming.

Hmm. The conclusion is that I might have bypassed this problem if I had just waited for a little more opinions. Then I could have changed the boring rooms (hopefully not all). As it is now I have to curse my own eagerness to post the hold . Well... hopefully I´ve learned something, and it also appears that most of the voters don´t find my hold outright boring. At least that´s something.

[Edited by Blondbeard at Local Time:05-17-2005 at 05:54 PM]

MeckMeck GRE
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That "Rate the rooms instead of the holds" is a nice idea. It would offer every hold a statistic about the best room / average best level and the most crappy room..... However theres a problem. Think of someone will rate something similar to Deep Hold. Just 200 rooms..... wont take a minute.... However this could be solved by makeing an ingame popup that will ask you everytime you solverd a room the first time and left it "Hey ! Rate it (1-10)".

Tim
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[Sorry, but be prepared for a long post...]

Blondbeard wrote:
Well, I think that goes for the architects forum process as well. I felt pretty confident when the only person that had said anything about the second level semed to like it.

Actually, from the replies I can guess that "the only person" did like the hold. The problem being, vAmpir is a very good player who finishes holds in speeds like Stefan, which is probably something I want to be as well... Veteran players will see the first level and guess it's really easy... By the way, I gave a very high score for your hold, not because it deserved a very high score, but definitely higher than a 3 (a few days ago), because it is well written and very challenging.

And another problem is that it might be more fun to say something good than to say somthing bad about another players hold.

That is of course true, but testers usually comment on holds they like (or able to play) anyway. And I must say I did want to comment on your hold, but I had some very busy weeks lately. But if you still want my (very short) comments: well, level 1 was really fun. Level 2 was a bit too hard (for me) though. I guess, for your next hold, you might want to tune the difficulty jump a little bit more. But that's a purely a personal opinion. I'm sure many very good players will not agree with me.

Aim for fun, not difficulty? It would really be kind of stupid to post a hold where my goal was to irritate people.

I wouldn't mind if a hold has a goal to "irritate" people, as long as it's really fun. There are easier holds that got a good rating -rowrow's hold for example- and they are usually very funny, but not irritating.

My intentions when I try to make a difficult room is that it should be fun to figure out how to solve it. That and that it shold leve a sense of satisfaction once you´ve actually solved it. But I guess it´s not so easy to judge what it takes to make a pussle fun to solve.

Back to your hold, I think you actually did succeed in both of the points. The only problem is that, (and I'm a bit sutck in 1E in the second level), after doing the room for many times (and dying), I really don't want to go through doing the walking on the 200+ trapdoors again. Some checkpoints in that room could helped a lot.

Hmm. The conclusion is that I might have bypassed this problem if I had just waited for a little more opinions. Then I could have changed the boring rooms (hopefully not all). As it is now I have to curse my own eagerness to post the hold

I am very sceptical that you will get more testers if you had waited a bit longer, since the hold is a bit hard. I do notice that the harder a hold is, the less reactions you will get. And, besides, you can still change the hold, but only specific rooms. But if a hold has challenging rooms, then it will be compared against those "unreasonably hard without being fun to figure out"-holds. If it wants to come out as the better ones, then it should try to be "reasonably hard" or "fun to figure out". Personally, your first level succeed in both of them, and the second one is a bit too hard for me. But that's because I'm a lousy player.

Eytanz wrote:
I think the biggest problem with the rating system is that not enough people vote.

Absolutely! I think I will vote some more holds today I've already finished long ago. Tomb of Nomb for example, was a very fun hold, without the horrible difficulty I find in some other holds.

By the way, about the "fun" thing, I'm afraid it's very hard to answer what fun is. For example, there are a lot of people claiming they find my holds to be fun, but I never got the answer why that is. [Of course it might help if I ask that question first ]

-- Tim

[Edited by Tim at Local Time:05-18-2005 at 10:01 AM: spelling]

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Blondbeard
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Tim wrote:

I am very sceptical that you will get more testers if you had waited a bit longer, since the hold is a bit hard. I do notice that the harder a hold is, the less reactions you will get. And, besides, you can still change the hold, but only specific rooms.

Interesting. I´m sory to go of topic, but I may actually change the hold? That´s good news. That way I could open up ways to get to rooms that those who get stuck will never see. And I could very well add a checkpoint among the trapdoors. By the way: That green door in 1E is just kind of stupid. It only hinders players from choosing in wich order to complete the rooms. If I can make the rooms better I would really like to do that.

But how? It would be realy nice of you to tell me how I change the hold. Sory you´re stuck, by the way. Schiks solution was kind of butiful.

MeckMeck GRE
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Maybe we shall also give a little more points. Since there are good holds like Blast Castle / Deep Hold / Mine one which were quite underrated (3.3/3.7/4.5). However a voting client from ingame is a good idea but Erik just said few weeks ago in another thread that this will never be made.

schep
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Yes, the forum has allowed changing holds in the past and will again in the future, as long as you do not delete or add rooms or levels. There hasn't yet been an automated online way to do it since JtRH came out, but in the meantime Schik has been manually updating a few. So for now, the method is to PM or email a friendly request to Schik.

Schik
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MeckMeck GRE wrote:
However a voting client from ingame is a good idea but Erik just said few weeks ago in another thread that this will never be made.

Where did he say this?

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Tim
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MeckMeck GRE wrote:
Maybe we shall also give a little more points. Since there are good holds like Blast Castle / Deep Hold / Mine one which were quite underrated (3.3/3.7/4.5).

Hey! Note that I only said that I will vote more often, not that I'm going to hand out more points! Let's say that I believe one of these deserves a lot more points than the other two, at least in this current form. But I'm not telling you which one, yet

-- Tim

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MeckMeck GRE
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I have a feeling that you mean Deep Hold. Its the work of 1 year or more I think. But Blast Castle and mine also needed about 2 months work and are now behind Holds like Tackersmoor or similar which may be work of 40-80 minutes

Tim
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I will give you a hint: if I can recall, only one of them is, in the current form, finishable. The reason: I cannot give final ratings to holds when it cannot be completed.

I hope you agree this is a fair reason

Note that the one that is finishable had a very strange sense of difficulty, the further you get, the easier it is.

-- Tim

[Edited by Tim at Local Time:05-18-2005 at 06:49 PM: changed]

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