Effective immediately, the map played in week 2 of the WDL Winter 2015 season will be changed from MAP14 to MAP23.
Why is the map being changed?During a practice tonight, one of the WDL teams performed an exploit on MAP14 (32in24-4 MAP09 aka "Generic Gray") that has been previously unseen in competitive play. The exploit worked in the following way: after taking a lead, a team can take the enemy flag into a teleport room with teammates. It can then become impossible to return the flag or make the players in the teleport room leave for any reason. Players teleporting in are stuck in place for a moment without being able to turn in any direction. This leaves them vulnerable to ssg fire from the team holding the flag. Even when attempting to send multiple men in, they can alternate fire. There are also 4 shells in the room - meaning they will never run out of ammo. This is a game stopping exploit that can go for a full round and is not the type of play that we ever want to see in the WDL.
What were the options?The league was faced with three different routes to take in regards to this new information:
- Modify the map.
- Pick a different map.
- Do nothing.
All six captains were made aware of the situation and acted as representatives for their teams in the situation. It was decided that the captains would pick and vote from a pool of replacement maps, or vote to keep and modify map14. Seven maps from the WDL2015 wad were ranked in order from most preferred to least preferred. MAP23 (RAGECTF10 aka "Mercurial") was selected as the most preferred map from the pool and chosen as the replacement for week 2.
Is it fair to change the map now?There was a general consensus amongst captains that it was fair to change the map. The main points were:
- Team availabilities are typically not even due until Tuesday night, meaning most teams are still gearing up for the week at this point.
- All three games were already scheduled for Saturday times, meaning all six teams would be aware of and receive an equal 4 days of prep time.
- Teams typically have at least a minimum of four days to prep in a common WDL week (the end of a week to a potential Thursday game).
Comments/CriticismI have to apologize for not having the foresight to see this potentially game breaking bug on MAP14. After playing hundreds of games on it and seeing it played in previous league seasons, this has never been a known and used tactic. I, and others, believe it is in the best interest of the game to not have 9 minute game-breaking periods that cannot be countered. It has been mentioned that, perhaps after this season, we will take another look at the map and possibly tweak it to remove the exploit while retaining the general gameplay and spirit of the original.
If you have thoughts on the matter, feel free to vent them here and now. Thank you.