"Show modded games" filter change

[RK4000]

EDIT 3: Changed the original post a bit after some discussion:

Simple opinion: The "show modded games" filter should be changed to "Show unranked mods". I feel this would be more useful as it would still filter out the games hosting 40+ sim mods, while still allowing ranked mods to be displayed.

Reasoning: Right now it's pretty much impossible to get a modded game going even with a ranked mod that changes only visuals, because nobody has the "show modded games" filter ticked. This is completely understandable, as I myself like to filter out the games that run a massive amount of random mods. But, I feel a "Show unranked mods" filter is better for the reasons stated above. By what people tell me, most use it to filter out these massively modded games, while not necessarily wanting to filter out the few ranked mods that exist. However, with the current filter, that is a side-effect that happens.

By changing it into a "Show unranked mods" filter, the functionality of filtering out overly-modded games is still there, but with the added benefit of allowing ranked mods to get more exposure.

There's also potentially more incentive for mod creators to make their mods as good as possible in order to get them ranked, which is a very difficult thing to do. Due to this, there's no fear of having modded games outnumber the non modded ones.

Thoughts?

Also, with the current filter, the "game modes", so FAF, FAF beta, Phantom etc, are not counted as mods, and therefore still show up with "Filter modded games", so it's not like it's a strictly "show default FAF" filter to begin with.

EDIT: Regarding deliberately unranked games, hosted with default FAF or ranked mods, see post #3

EDIT 2: TL;DR: Change "Show modded games" to "Show unranked mods" filter to allow for better exposure of ranked mods, without cluttering game browser with overly modded games.

[RedX]

What about games are have been deliberately set as unranked?

[RK4000]

Fair point, those could be accomodated as well. Come to think of it, the filter should only filter out unranked mods. That way it won't filter out unranked games, but will still filter out unranked mods.

So basicly, the filter should be "Show unranked mods". This would still filter out the games with 20+ unranked sim mods, but won't filter out ranked mods or deliberately unranked games, hosted with default FA or with ranked mods.

In the end, that would function the same as the current filter, but with the exception of allowing ranked mods to be more displayed.

[keyser]

your best luck would be to make a github issue for this on the java client repo.
also i think this option is on by default, so it shouldn't impact the visibility of your games using your mod too much ?

[RK4000]

your best luck would be to make a github issue for this on the java client repo.
also i think this option is on by default, so it shouldn't impact the visibility of your games using your mod too much ?

Well, it's not an "issue" per se, the filter is working as intended. I'm proposing changing the filter itself.

It impacts it quite heavily. Yes, the default option is on, but most people have the filter switched off. I myself have it switched off, because it helps a lot with finding games I actually want to join. (as the games hosting 20+ sim mods, some not even in the vault, are certainly not games I want to join)

The few people that did join my games said that they would have joined sooner, if they saw I was hosting it. They joined because they saw my message in chat that I was hosting, not because they saw the game in the lobby browser. And this was told to me by multiple people in a short time span, so I am sure it's a problem. This change doesn't really hurt the original intent of the filter (which I'm sure is to filter out the overly-modded games), yet allows ranked mods to get more exposure, which I don't see as a bad thing.

That's why I'm asking for opinions.

[Medicraze]

I say it should be ranked if there are obviously no balance changes.

I would remove the "mod" filter and treat this sort of like a UI mod if it only provides a visual flair. Treating it sort of like an "HD" package for example (Minus the EA DLC pricing ofc).

RK is apparently working on a toggle button for the mod while in game. Sort of like - RTX on/off - or something like that. So that would be cool.

Anyway. You get my thumbs up bud.

[SneakySnake]

Logged into FAF for the first time in a year and I've been immediately conscripted into supporting this cause and I agree with anything RK deems is necessary. He's a gentleman and you wouldn't want to let him down now would you?

At this point I wonder if I'm RK's alt account.

[RK4000]

I neither confirm nor deny these accusations!

[Brutus5000]

I am pretty sure the server has a different opinion on what a ranked game is than you.
Uneven teams? -> unranked
One AI in the mix? -> unranked
FFA? -> unranked
I guess you might want to filter out ai games, but probably not uneven team games, if the game is not yet fully populated.
There are also 2 dozen additional rules and many of them only apply after the game, i.e. to many desyncs, game too short, mutual draw

If you rename the filter, people might assume that the game will be ranked once they finished it. But that might not be the case.
The client will probably not match the ranked criteria afterwards due to this cases, so it would be not userfriendly to indicate that it could

[RK4000]

Everything you said is correct, but check post #3, or the edits I made to the original post just now (to reflect the discussion in post #3). I'm proposing that the filter should be changed to only filter out unranked mods.

In this case (when using an unranked mod) the game is unranked regardless of anything that happens after the launch, so what you said shouldn't be a problem.

Anyway, if it's called "Show unranked mods" I think it should be pretty self explanitory.