Why FAF has been progressing slowly (renamed)

[Brutus5000]

There were and still are quite a few technical debts that FAF sufferers from, that are constantly slowing down progress in development.
And there are many community members who throw shit at the devs if:
a) we change nothing
b) we change something they don't like
c) we change something and it causes a downtime
d) we change something and eventually break something

So the general rule is: no experiments and keep compatiblity.

But making changes while keeping compatibility is hard to achieve if you have these technical debts.
Let me list some examples of these technical debts:

• There was almost no documentation about certain aspects of FAF work. The code alone is very hard to understand if does some low-level file magic. One of the parts that are still in this state are the replay-servers. If we touch it, we may loose a lot of replays.
• We had a constantly inconsistent database. I.e. games refered to maps or players that were deleted. You encountered null values (=missing values) everywhere where you didn't expect them. Adding proper constraints (=database table rules) took months, but it should all be fixed now.
• We have a poorly designed replay format: It doesn't store the player ids (names can change) or faf map ids, it doesn't store the winners, if a different featured mod is used the versioning of faf and the featured mod gets mixed up, and the format itself that has no proper versioning of the replay file format. It's also neither plain JSON format, nor binary format, but a wild mix of everything. Furthermore it changed a few times in the past, so we already have a broken mess and touching it makes it just worse.
• The file patching system is ridicolous. Ignoring the fact, that the "patches" are many times even bigger than the new file itself, it is very difficult to publish a new patch. Parts of this problem are now covered by shell scripts and other parts are covered by API auto-deployment. But this is still not available for all featured mods.

dstojkov simply avoided those by starting from scratch. So he has no way to support our 2 million replays on different patch levels, all the existing ratings, all the featured mods, regular mods and maps.
If we had throw them all away, we would be much faster, but this is nothing the players or the devs would want. It wouldn't be FAF anymore.
I am absolutely sure if dstojkov's lobby had the same playerbase as FAF his progress would be slowed down as well, because suddenly compatibility becomes an issue.
And as a side note, he also doesn't have troubles of community members constantly creating new accounts and avoiding bans, uploading dozens of copies of their own maps while downvoting other maps, cheating in the lobby and manipulating ratings and/or insulting each other.

So the final question towards dstojkov was: why does he not contribute to FAF to get his favorite feature running, but instead tries to make a clone of FAF which finally would split the small community we have.

[TheKoopa]

I don't understand how people keep completely forgetting that the people pouring rivers of their own blood to keep faf afloat and improve it (even if that's "slightly" or "impercetibly" in your own humble opinion) are doing this for free, basically giving money (cause time is money), and yes there are donations but no they are not enough to turn this into a job that pays the bills, let alone enough to justify the time spent.

how people like biass and jackherer and so many others (this isn't ad hominem, I'm just too lazy to draw up the list to make it obvious it isn't) can address them in this way when they've brought literally zilch to the table other than heated and derogatory forum posts.

the mind just boggles.

If one wanted examples of shooting oneself in the foot one need look no further than faf forums.

people need to realize that the situation with faf is at an all time high favorable.

we now have full open source and free setup. no owners no threat of shutdowns resting in the palms of any single person

no single person can make threats to the well being of faf.

There are less bugs and networking issues then ever before

the return of many GPG-era features such as achievements

the return of meany endearing FAF staples : nomads, GW (soon)

countless recent enhancements : co-op, auto mass cap, auto OC, true vet, area commands, better formations, lobby quality of life (should come as a surprise we still get new ones on this since one would assume xinnony was the only one who could do this), tutorials (soon), shared armies (soon)

I personally can seen were you guys are coming from although, at the same time I feel like you all are tunnel-visioning and probably missing the bigger picture and given a couple more months all the puzzle pieces will fall into place making faf into whatever you feel like you've lost in it.

Jackherer was a moderator and biass is a td/mapper, thanks for invalidating their work

As for the developers, sure they work for free, but that is no excuse to take a client from a person that was working well for the end user and then turning the client into a coding playground

[PhilipJFry]

i don't think a single dev does this as their personal playground
they do it because they like this game and don't want it/the community around it to disappear

people like you talking shit might wanna step back and think more about how to contribute in a meaningful way instead of just accusing other people

[dstojkov]

dstojkov simply avoided those by starting from scratch. So he has no way to support our 2 million replays on different patch levels, all the existing ratings, all the featured mods, regular mods and maps.
If we had throw them all away, we would be much faster, but this is nothing the players or the devs would want. It wouldn't be FAF anymore.
I am absolutely sure if dstojkov's lobby had the same playerbase as FAF his progress would be slowed down as well, because suddenly compatibility becomes an issue.
And as a side note, he also doesn't have troubles of community members constantly creating new accounts and avoiding bans, uploading dozens of copies of their own maps while downvoting other maps, cheating in the lobby and manipulating ratings and/or insulting each other.

I didn t avoid it at all I builded the lobby so that everything from the content is versionned: featured mods, mods, maps. There is no ways you pick up a replay from the vault and it will not launch.
Even with the double amount of players my lobby would run fine.
I don*t have the same issue about rating because every featured mod has it own rating ...
Featured mod is a first citizen in my design basicaly the lobby IS a featured mod hoster ... faf was build on the assumption there will be only one global featured mod that is why It suffer all those issues

[Downlord]

I didn t avoid it at all

His point was that you avoided working with existing data, which is exactly what you did. It's easy to start with no constraints at all.

Even with the double amount of players my lobby would run fine.

The double amount of what it currently has, or the double amount of FAF? How can you tell? Did you test it? (Please don't answer, see below)

I don*t have the same issue about rating because every featured mod has it own rating ...

That has been discussed in a dev conference and IIRC it was voted against.

Featured mod is a first citizen in my design basicaly the lobby IS a featured mod hoster

Same in FAF

... faf was build on the assumption there will be only one global featured mod that is why It suffer all those issues

That's not true, whether the claim that FAF assumes only one global featured mod, nor that it causes "all those issues" (whatever you mean by that very vague claim anyway).


But all this is going off topic anyway. This thread is about why FAF appears to have progressed slowly, not about your lobby. It as never been about your lobby. And I had the courtesy to not pollute your thread with this discussion, so if you could stick to this thread's topic, too, I'd much appreciate that.

[dstojkov]

But all this is going off topic anyway. This thread is about why FAF appears to have progressed slowly, not about your lobby. It as never been about your lobby. And I had the courtesy to not pollute your thread with this discussion, so if you could stick to this thread's topic, too, I'd much appreciate that.

Actually I was poiting out what was making it progressing slowly I just compared to my lobby since there is no lobby i can compare with and it was not about to *promote my lobby*

[Brutus5000]

I didn t avoid it at all I builded the lobby so that everything from the content is versionned: featured mods, mods, maps. There is no ways you pick up a replay from the vault and it will not launch.
Even with the double amount of players my lobby would run fine.
I don*t have the same issue about rating because every featured mod has it own rating ...
Featured mod is a first citizen in my design basicaly the lobby IS a featured mod hoster ... faf was build on the assumption there will be only one global featured mod that is why It suffer all those issues

Good to know, but I actually meant you avoided migrating all of the existing data.
But if you are interested in doing that we are willing to provide you with the data. Maybe we can benefit from that too.

[jackherer]

Ah f*** me we should make that in french like for the olympics... Would be much easier for me

I'm sorry if my previous post has been seen as agressive, i didn't wanted to start such a drama. It was an answer with the same tone that you used with dstojko. A Tone that icedreamer use with me, qualifing himself of "world leading scientist talking to some farmer from oklahoma" and that made me stop giving my time and good will to FAF.
I was suggesting that with a different tone and a more friendly approach, from people leading this project (mainly dev coders). FAF could get more people in.

This wasnt directed straight to you Downloard and i quote myself for what i think about you.

Yes i'm very aware of that background work. And that Downlord has spend an incredible amount of his time fixing shit that the situation would be terrible without him. (i have nothing against him and we would need 10 Downloard)

Your answer is giving some nice information, but i don't think that isolate cut and comment half sentences put out of their contexte is the best way to analyze answer and get a nice debate. So i wont do the same, i'll just put under our both answer to Dstojkov topic, if people want the full context.

Spoiler: show

Hey Dstojkov,

Respect for your never-ending efforts. But I'll be honest with you now and you might not like it.

I wonder when the time comes where you admit to yourself that this project is a pure waste of time? I mean seriously, how can you not see that nobody cares about that thing you are building? Why would anyone want to switch over from a system with up to 1000 players every day and that is years worth of development ahead of where you are now, over to your new system that doesn't even provide the most basic features yet, that has 0 users and will likely never have any?

Why do you think that 10'000 players - who are already struggling to find good games fast enough because there aren't enough players - decide to move to a system with any less than 10'000 players? A system that lacks so many features? A system that has so many problems that the existing one already solved?

Why don't you realize, that you will never, ever be able to catch up with what FAF provides and thus people will never, ever use your system?

If you really think that your system is ever going to provide value to anyone but yourself, then I fear about your sense of reality.

Wouldn't you rather want to build things that are useful to people? Things they enjoy? Things that don't just waste your precious time for nothing? If so, why don't you just join our team and work with us? We'd love to get your help.

But if I'm getting this all wrong and you're just doing it for yourself, knowing that nobody will ever use it but just because you enjoy doing it. Well then, go ahead but I suggest to stop posting here. It looks very pitiful.

My answer

First of all you have any idea of how many people give up working with you guys? How many good will you discourage?

How much you guys miss a leader and a big picture vision? How it just looks like some kids coding their own little project and not giving a shit about what is really needed and about the players.

Why would anyone want to waste their time and code on a dying project that have more regress than improve since Sheoo's coup d’état (2 or 3 years ago if my memory is good...) And who end up with visionik spending his money to allow everyone to keep playing on Zep work.

The only improvement i can see is coop by Speed and server stability. All the rest was working same or better on Zep time.

So tell me concretely what have you guys build that was really usefull to the player? What real decisions have been taken to make faf expend and not regress?

I'm pretty happy faf isnt handle by Zep anymore who was like Trump, abe to push the nuclear button at any moment because he wasnt happy. I'm happy it became more open, but i'm not sure that "the open driven community project" being control by 4 nerd is a better thing than being control by Zep.

So yes we can thank big time Visionik, because if we had to wait for a rebuild from scratch like it was about to happen without Visionik help, we will probably all be playing on dstojkov lobby. His persistence and good will to make an alternative deserve at least respect, specialy from someone in charge ...

To finish, you say to him that he is welcome to work with you to join the "team" but that posting his work here is pitiful...

Like always faf "leaders" knows how to speak to people and discourage them spending time for faf ...

To begin Saying that you know how many people give up on helping faf leave me perplexe,

4e7.jpg (119.86 KiB) Viewed 2129 times

I think that top is what you know/see.


I disagree with you, it's not a democracy for now, it looks more a coder-deservocracy. Show you can be usefull by coding, that we can trust you, and you will have a sit at the table. (its how i see it).
I totaly agree that you've all make (the devs) some crazy work on the server, and i hear with great pleasure that lot of thing are fix (database server structure...) and that the kitchen is clean. I hope that at some point you guys will be able to go for new feature/restructuration and not only spending your time on fixing things.

I also wish that you guys make a real think-tank with coders, good and bad players one map players mod players retired players mappers modders casters... Make of it a real community driven project.
And you will not decide of what should be done with that only survey or because a few coder/dev thinks its how it should be done. Even if player frequentation is stable i think there is different way to read and exploit stats, and that the lack of expansion is due to how competitive/casual gamming/rating/balance is handle actually.
I think that to answer to te real problematics you can't base yourself on a survey because faf is 98% of lurkers and it ask a real reflexion to find the best way to make the biggest % happy playing and keep them playing.

To end this, Tatsu wtf!! I've also spend time for faf (infinite way less than Downloard i agree), i'm not tryng to be hatefull or derogatory i have no idea why you try to make me pass for a troll. Maybe read back my activity on the forum...

[Morax]

What indicates that FAF is dying? If I look at the number of players online I see that we repeatedly hit the 1k mark. I remember seeing the same thing last year, and the year before. To me, that's consistent, not dying.

To elaborate in a more English-friendly type:

What jack and most of us mean by "dying" is its competitive side, not the # of players online and the success of tournaments.

Proof:

1) Mr-Smith left because he no longer cares to keep learning the game over and over due to drastic balance changes and updates
2) Taffy quit because since he works now he doesn't have time to keep up with the drastic changes as well
3) Blackheart stopped playing regularly for likely the same reasons
4) galacticfear quit because you changed the balance in a way that makes traditional setons games FAR different
5) Many 1v1 players from the United States and timezone behind EU has quit because of players that quit for along the same reasons
6) Adding equilibrium to global points proved the devs are not making the right decision to PROACTIVELY improve the system and rather continue to just point out that we "do not understand the maths" or are not worthy

Ask them yourself if you do not believe me, but don't say "The devs care about the players and the community" when they do things the players of the community heavily dislike - that is absolutely wrong.

"We can't make everyone happy" is a nice excuse I hear going around, too, but doing things that make new players happy while veterans who are faithful to the community unhappy to the point where they leave is terrible.

[dstojkov]

"We can't make everyone happy" is a nice excuse I hear going around, too, but doing things that make new players happy while veterans who are faithful to the community unhappy to the point where they leave is terrible.

I quite understand you on that point ... I pointed out the same argument to Zep his aswer back then was : If the veteran can not adapt they can leave we have a plenty of new players who don*t even know what 3599 is

Yet years after see the ravage this way of thinking had ... And you know what has changed from back then ?

From this moment on I decided to begin my own stuff.