Please review surf_ny_platinum, just watched most of a sever of 17 fail at the first stage for 15+ minutes and majority leave. Most likely too hard for non-veteran server going by that performance? Ultimately looking for maps that start easier and get progressively harder, rather than a first stage that stumps 85% of the server for 25 minutes. EDIT: Ok if I'm honest 15 people spent 25 minutes trying to do the first stage over and over rather than leave, but it didn't look fun by any strech of the imagination lol. It's also the first map I've seen 20/21 players on. Leave it to your discretion.
The thing is, that map is very straightforward and doesn't have any bunny hop sections. It's really quite easy in my opinion compared to surf_healthy, where only experienced surfers who can bhop can get past stage 2. I've played that map a lot and have seen people progress through the levels slowly. You are seeing 85% of the server stumped because many people literally don't know how to surf with the recent rise of popularity that csgo and streamers have brought to the gamemode. With the addition of ghosts (which is in the works?), they can easily spectate and watch somebody complete it instead of somebody having to manually go to level 1 and dedicate their time to doing the stage as an example for those who are stuck. The map is on the upper side of difficulty for the beginner server, but is not worthy of removal in my opinion (also a very classic map that many people know).
I don't know the Surf maps myself; it seems to have held 20/21 players for the majority of it's 25 minutes until the end. I guess I just usually see players make it to stage 2 or 3 before getting stumped so perhaps that's why I was confused. It's difficult without player feedback; most seemed happy to spend 25 minutes never getting past the first stage in this case, which is perhaps just part of the gamemode that I'm not getting. People did seem to move on slowly after the 15 minute mark, so perhaps just a learning curve. Bundt has advised there's less player-friendly maps than this one though in rotation.
The problem Surf has is indeed a steep learning difficulty. Platinum isn't really a difficult map - it just requires players to actually give it a go and get used to some slightly more tricky mechanics. The first stage is essentially learning how to air strafe with ramps, the second stage involves a controlled fall and the third stage teaches player small hops. If these players ever want to complete any of the maps on the server and / or play harder maps they need to know these basic essentials. I've been wanting to add maps such as surf_spacejam (below) however I've come to realise that in most of these cases, such maps don't easily teach basic skills and are more likely to lead to frustration. Coupled with the lack of good beginner maps and we're in bit of a drought. Tl;dr, you need to break your wrist until you know how to Suf!
Yeah I think as long as players are happy to struggle initially and get used to it which it looks like they are then hopefully should be fine.
https://gyazo.com/66e43be527bf607dbbe598e95532fed0 If I can get that high up on the first stage, it's fine.
surf_year3000 If the name sounds familiar it's because its one of the oldest arena maps that I can remember, however, it does fit all of our requirements of a tier 1-2 map including multiple levels (albeit short).
forbidden_ways seems ideal, however the ramps seem obscenely long. Again, how do people feel about this for newer players?
We could put it on there, and see how is fairs over a week? If we find players are struggling with it, remove it.
Longer ramps might be a good thing as people can learn how to surf on a ramp instead of having to worry about air strafing every 4 seconds