Christmas Decoration [Mutator/ServerActor]

[Pegasus]

Why even stop there? Hell, are you desperately low on health? I say, let's replace the big keg o' health with a rotating Big Mac and switch trails of health vials up with Pepsi bottles! Armour pickups and jumpboots can find suitable standins in popular leather jacket and designer shoes brands! But, wait, with weapons and vehicles as part of the game, why not reskin the Bender and slap a Toyota or Ford sticker on that pickup-lookalike sucker? Or have your shock rifle covered in a Ruger/S&W skin? Not to mention there's all sorts of banners, monitors and screens throughout various maps with pointless crap flickering on 'em that could have ads for popular stuff easily pasted over it instead. The sellout festive possibilities are endless!

You really see nothing tacky or gauche about a mutator including commercial products as replacements of stock pickups in some feigned association with its overall festive theme? You really see no insult to players' intelligence and abuse of their prior trust and goodwill should a server they frequent stoop to product placement by using such content?

IMO Nutella is as likely to have anything to do with a Christmas theme as ppl would be likely to smile coming across any of these other hypothetical promotions. I can't believe we're seriously debating this...

[Zon3r]

*sigh* giving up. We are not debating this, you are

[EmanReleipS]

Peggy, if you are worried about including brands, we can certainly cut that part. I was under the impression that no one was completely serious about this, anyway. If Wormby really wants to put time and effort into it to do something fun and crazy for us, we would all appreciate it, but no one will be mad if it stays the (already awesome) way it is.

IF Wormby should decide to change any map for us crazy people, maybe a simple name addition (like "Foundry-ChristmasVersion") would let people know that it's only temporary madness that will soon have an end. That should reassure players who don't like the changes.

(To be honest, I don't associate Nutella with Christmas, either...)

[Pegasus]

*sigh* giving up. We are not debating this, you are

My apologies, I mistook this,

Sorry Peg, but i think you are overthinking all of this. why would anyone leave the server because of some xmas decorations? It's something new, will cause some laugh, i know it would make me smile[...]

...for arguments against an opposing view and in favour of your position, i.e. debating. Oh well. Will try to keep that in mind for future reference.

[...]IF Wormby should decide to change any map for us crazy people, maybe a simple name addition (like "Foundry-ChristmasVersion") would let people know that it's only temporary madness that will soon have an end. That should reassure players who don't like the changes.[...]

The reason this custom code n' content has been bundled as a mutator/serveractor (just as is the case with ONSPlus, AntiTCC, TitanTeamFix and other packs) is because it's the easiest way to apply these changes to any map loaded on the server automatically. Embedding that content by hand in each of the maps on CEONSS' roster (~100) would take an inordinate amount of time and effort by a single map editor (or even a group) just to achieve the same result for a few weeks and the cost/benefit ratio of all that work, plus the bandwidth required for all regulars to each grab the altered map versions from the server's redirect, would make the proposition even more unrealistic (pardon the pun) to boot. Easiest way to put such minor tweaks in effect and then disable 'em again is in the manner they've already been designing; trust the Worm, it knows what it's doing .

[...](To be honest, I don't associate Nutella with Christmas, either...)

I know, right? It's more of a breakfast/snack thing, AFAIK. Also a reason why that whole tangent has been throwing me for a loop :/.

Also,

[...]
Peggy
[...]
Wormby
[...]
Wormby[...]

Starting to get a bit worried now :o.

[Dalyup!]

Regarding the mutator's effect on gameplay, from the maps that I have played, and from what I recall about the popular maps in general, statues are rarely even used as part of the decoration so it's uncommon to see the meshes. The ones that do have them usually have their statues placed in unimportant or rarely ventured areas so their affect on gameplay/balance is minimal or nonexistent.

That said, if someone does figure out how to exploit them in a frustrating manner then that seems reasonable grounds to disable it or blacklist it for that map. They're cool and all but I'd rather have balanced gameplay.

[Zon3r]

This is just a casual talk, for fun. Don't worry, noone's gonna put bigass nutella jars in the middle of the map. You know, i haven't see you on the server for a long long time, come and have some fun, you are starting to sound like an old man yelling at the kids for playing on his lawn

[Wormbo]

FYI: I've considered doing trace checks for the colliding parts, but couldn't come up with a viable solution so far. If you have specific maps where the placement algorithm fails miserably, just tell me and I'll add exceptions or try to come up with more sophisticated workarounds. (There are already some exceptions, e.g. for a specific mesh on DM-DE-Osiris2.)

[Xac]

Why even stop there? Hell, are you desperately low on health? I say, let's replace the big keg o' health with a rotating Big Mac and switch trails of health vials up with Pepsi bottles! Armour pickups and jumpboots can find suitable standins in popular leather jacket and designer shoes brands! But, wait, with weapons and vehicles as part of the game, why not reskin the Bender and slap a Toyota or Ford sticker on that pickup-lookalike sucker? Or have your shock rifle covered in a Ruger/S&W skin? Not to mention there's all sorts of banners, monitors and screens throughout various maps with pointless crap flickering on 'em that could have ads for popular stuff easily pasted over it instead. The sellout festive possibilities are endless!

You really see nothing tacky or gauche about a mutator including commercial products as replacements of stock pickups in some feigned association with its overall festive theme? You really see no insult to players' intelligence and abuse of their prior trust and goodwill should a server they frequent stoop to product placement by using such content?

IMO Nutella is as likely to have anything to do with a Christmas theme as ppl would be likely to smile coming across any of these other hypothetical promotions. I can't believe we're seriously debating this...

The dystopian picture Pegasus paints is quite worrying and, is probably where things would lead if Nutella were included, it is the thin end of the wedge after all. He is quite right, we can't have commercial products in our maps, we'd most probably contravene some trade mark laws etc and get ourselves in trouble. In any case, we shouldn’t endorse any product for free, they should pay for the privilege, to help run the server. I suppose we could have CEONSS own brand nutty chocolate spread, I’m sure it would be better than Lidl or Aldi’s version, but as has been said, it’s not very Christmassy.

I’m sorry if anything I’ve said has come across as disrespectful to the people who work on the maps we play, especially Wormbo, I think he is a genius and I’m extremely grateful for the all the work he does. I thought it was nice that he was joining in with the banter. Sorry Wormbo if I’ve upset you.

I can understand the desire to keep things high brow, however, aren’t the Christmas mods meant to be a light hearted touch to reflect the season’s festivities? Therefore I’m sure there’s room amongst this thread’s intellectual dialogue for a bit of fun.

I hope someone is not going to be visited by the ghosts of Christmas past, present and future?

Christmas? Bah Humbug!

[EmanReleipS]

The reason this custom code n' content has been bundled as a mutator/serveractor (just as is the case with ONSPlus, AntiTCC, TitanTeamFix and other packs) is because it's the easiest way to apply these changes to any map loaded on the server automatically. Embedding that content by hand in each of the maps on CEONSS' roster (~100) would take an inordinate amount of time and effort by a single map editor (or even a group) just to achieve the same result for a few weeks and the cost/benefit ratio of all that work, plus the bandwidth required for all regulars to each grab the altered map versions from the server's redirect, would make the proposition even more unrealistic (pardon the pun) to boot. Easiest way to put such minor tweaks in effect and then disable 'em again is in the manner they've already been designing; trust the Worm, it knows what it's doing .

Okay, gotcha. I get how it works now. I don't think any of us want Wormby to spend money or sleepless night on this. If one or two additions to the mutator would be possible, feasible and not too extreme (based on consent here), that would be neat. But like I said, it's perfectly amazing the way it is now.

[...](To be honest, I don't associate Nutella with Christmas, either...)I know, right? It's more of a breakfast/snack thing, AFAIK. Also a reason why that whole tangent has been throwing me for a loop :/.

I think the reason Xac mentioned Nutella wasn't so much Christmas, but rather that
a) Anik posted here, who is currently desperately searching for her Nutella, which was hidden ingeniously by her boyfriend
b) Nutella jars bear a greater resemblance (in rough shape) to Health Kegs than Chocolate Santas do...

I'm sharing Xac's worries about possible copyright infringements.
But from the start, I think we just meant "a product like Nutella", using the name of the most popular/common brand as a representative for the kind of product we meant. I actually found your idea of using Pepsi cans for health vials extremely funny, but not because it was the brand Pepsi...do you know what I mean?

Also,

[...]
Peggy
[...]
Wormby
[...]
Wormby[...]

Starting to get a bit worried now :o.

P-e-g-a-s-u-s, and you are worried about me? To quote thee: "trust the Worm".