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So I've come back and I've been playing on the JB server for the past couple of days, and I've noticed something that I don't think many people have commented on.

Jailbreak is fun. It's base rules really do make it and enjoyable gamemode, and a good warden/guards make it shine even more. There's usually a clear distinction between the seasoned vets and the newbies in how well they know what they're doing and how they manipulate the mechanics. All the same, there's one thing that absolutely kills it for me: a stale map.

Don't get me wrong, jb_newsummer_v2 is probably the best JB map out there (at least for GMod), and SG's players are constantly creating new fun and inventing new ways to play it. It contains tons of interesting games as well as elements that can be molded to what the warden wants. If there was ever a better map for GMod JB, I don't know what it is. Of course, everything I just said is subjective. It also isn't my exact opinion. Nostalgia compels me to admire other maps that I played when I was active on Chessnut's Corner as well, some maybe even a bit more than newsummer. I would still say that, even objectively, newsummer is the JB map that is best developed for GMod.

Ingenuity can only go so far, though. To me, who was very active here in early 2015 and has played nothing but newsummer on JB for at least a year, aspects of the map are beginning to grow...well, old. There aren't many location-specific commands that can fool most people anymore, since a large portion of players are familiar with the map. The gameroom games are a bit bland to me, especially since they're relatively easy to master (I will give Deagle Toss and S4S the benefit of the doubt, since they are very rarely, if not ever played). Overall, it's becoming more and more difficult to find ways to spice up the increasingly repetitive rounds. After all, uniqueness is a big part of what drives fun.

So, what are the solutions to this ever-growing conformity of playstyles? Simply put, there are a lot of things that can be done. Adding more content to the server and tweaking the old (as Jake and Armpit are diligently working on) is a surefire way to add more possibilities; that is, until even this has little effect. Just as any other variable has limits in a constant environment, additions and fixes by themselves can't revitalize the server forever. Thus, we move next to cracking open the map in Hammer ("we" meaning whoever this post may concern/is addressed to). While I am in no way qualified to know what I'm talking about when it comes to this, editing the map to change things or create extensions could work. It could also upset people who are used to the current way the map works or don't feel the need to refine what isn't necessarily "broken".

This discussion then leads to what I am proposing: we add a new map to the currently nonexistent rotation. In my opinion, there is no better map to add to this server than ba_jail_blackops. Like newsummer, blackops is one of the most highly optimized maps for GMod, and also shares a lot with it. A lot of the games are the same (albeit with some minor changes/twists), but the map is very large and open, with a lot of areas to experiment and have fun. I know at least some of you are familiar with the map, but I have to assume that there is a portion of you who haven't played a JB map other than newsummer.

If today isn't yet the time to discuss this, that's understandable. But I do hope that this topic is one to debate, and possibly one to affect future progression of the JB server.

Of course, if I'm the only one with these opinions, I'll shut up.



“Change is the essence of life; be willing to surrender what you are for what you could become.”― Reinhold Niebuhr

-1/+1, rotations are autism, they completely ruin the rules, and thats why every other server sucks, but ive said time and time again that if they wanted to change their map completely, id be willing to make one specifically for sleek. I think a better option would be to edit the current map with more stuff, and id be willing to edit Jb_Newsummer for them if someone could send me the VMF. Ive got a few ideas for changes already if they were to go with that

As Jake discussed many times before, simply changing the map is very, very time consuming.

Everything would have to be reimplemented, almost like creating a new server all over again.

It's fine as it is.

-1

But...

Once before we tried having two jb servers to even out the amount of players we had and people could communicate between the two servers, similar to global.

But Jake soon thought it was pointless and removedthe second server.

Even though a second server would be time consuming, it'd be better than messing with everything already implemented on our current server.

-1 your suggestion though.

Dildo, literally no one is going to trust you with sleek's stuff unless you actually prove yourself worthy.

I know Deli but I dont know how I can somehow fuck the server up with a map edit because it would clearly be tested and wouldnt be able to permanently change anything until Jake added it.

hey homedawg tbh i play on sleek just because of the fact the map doesnt change although i agree it gets stale after playing 50 rounds of shoot or dont shoot on the lower armory wall. But honestly i think we should just keep it and we should have better wardens who know how to mix it up a bit.

We used to have a JB blackops server, it was okay, averaging around 15-20 players in the summer. When school started, the server was pretty much dead. Thats where I went from blackops staff to summer staff and where the BO server died.

>simply changing the map is very, very time consuming

I'm assuming this is because the JB server is running off of an extremely custom gamemode and current map change plugins wouldn't work? That sounds like the only reason that this would be impossible/hasn't been done yet.

Our JB server is centered around jb_new_summer_v2.

@Dildo
Here. I found my decompiled copy. https://www.dropbox.com/s/9jsvv068l9epr57/jb_new_summer_v2.vmf?dl=0

Denied.

lmfao what the fuck do I know

damn bro thanks armpit. I saw this as I was trying and failing to get vmex to work

I don't mind using other maps but I think the best way to do it is with separate servers. People can pick which one they want without being forced into it.

Another thing that we are trying to do is build games within the map. An example of this is deathmatch, though a simple one at this point.

I have thought about running on flatgrass and having a map built out of props, the possibilities for games are endless.

Problem with hammer is it is old, tedious, and overly complicated to use. Getting even a basic game built with hammer would likely be extremely difficult. Where with the prop construction approach we can create games with Lua as Garry intended.