Idea Blackout Duration

20 minutes seems a bit rash but 25 should definitely be possible, however we must keep in mind that if you play a 50-player game, caps are usually not that easily achieved and therefore a 5 min / capture (from 1 team) +5 minutes is useful, if this makes any sense

 

Every other map is 20 mins, so 20 mins seems reasonable.

The problem with Blackout is that it's an old config and Redslime would need to figure out how to adjust that.

However, reducing the time will nerf killstreaks. Idk how stat people would feel about that.

 

agre

 

Not a big issue.

 

I'd keep it at 30 for a map as popular as it, stalemates tend to only last very long in matches and regular games players die a lot easier and faster, in matches it's always open to change the timer down if both teams agree though.

I'd rather have the map 30 minutes and have a stalemate and some gameplay than reduce the time played and risk the chance of an all time stalemate.

 

I see both sides of this really, sometimes I get tired or bored in stalemates, but I can see where @Removers is coming from and can also see how there are some people who wouldn’t like it. I know in matches if you and the other rep agree on changing the timer on Blackout to 20 minutes, it can be done. But I think having @Miskey confirm that would be better, I know you can in PPMs and such, not 100% sure about official matches though. I see that generally people dislike stalemates, so doing things to change stalemates in general rather than on a specific map seems like a better route to take imo.

 

I think the 30 minute timer has the largest impact during matches rather than casual games. Personally I agree that blackout can be painfully long and boring but at the moment there are options to shorten it. Currently for matches blackout could be played for 30 minutes, or 20 minutes in a match if both teams agree to 20 minutes. I feel like if the default time is set to 20 minutes, people who prefer 30 minutes will have a much more difficult time getting both sides to agree on increasing the timer. One possibility is that blackout is made into two identical maps with different ID’s, one with a 20 minute timer and one with 30 minutes, this way teams can choose which one they want.

 

while we are at it, lets make it actually symmetrical and fix the misplaced block of sandstone in the middle

https://www.brawl.com/threads/64036/

 

I think this could be a cool idea since the stalemates do get extremely boring. I would also be in favour of adding a way to restrict stalemate length in other ways (for example, increasing flag posion over time). But I do think that the map doesn't really need to be 30 minutes as it gets slightly irritating after a while. Will hopefully be testing a 20 minute blackout game in the ppm that's today, will post how it goes here...

 

Definitely not both. I think a community vote could be used to decide which one they want in rotation maybe?

 

Teams could agree on shortening it for a match, yes.

Personally I'd like to see blackout remain the same in casual play but be reduced to 20 minutes & 3 caps in official matches. Blackout, or any other 5 cap map, is currently more valuable as a map pick than any 3 cap map assuming teams are equally prepared on their map picks. For this reason I think all maps should be set to 20 minutes & 3 caps for matches.

It would be extremely easy to make match configs for these types of maps.

 

Keep 30 minutes as the standard/in rotation, as Whiteout is also present in rotation (albeit slightly different, it's Blackout but 20 minutes)

 

To make it fair, I do agree that blackout should definitely be reduced to 20 minutes in matches (with the possibility of 3 caps instead of 5) but it can remain 30 minutes in casual gameplay unless the majority of the community are really wanting to reduce it down to 20 minutes (so far it doesn’t not seem like that is the case).

The proposed solution(s) to fix the issue [although im starting to refer to general stalemates and not specifically with blackout] with the long stalemates seems interesting. I am in favor of the more significant flag poison (assuming they hold it longer) but also another idea, just to throw it out there and not saying its the best, but in extremely conditions where if the stalemates last longer than 10 minutes, the medics are not able to heal the flag carriers. This may work due to the potential chance of a recovery actually happening but may be going too far.

 

I like and agree with increasing the poison taken the longer you hold the flag. The only problem I could see with this is the advantage it could give because, ultimately, it would depend on who stole first unless poison should take effect simultaneously to both flag carriers if both flags are stolen but it would be interesting to see how this could work in casual games where some people could care less to heal the flag carrier.

Getting back to the topic though, I agree with Miskey about keeping the current configurations to blackout with some adjustments to matches. puhdgy is also right in the aspect that there should be more focus on combatting stalemates rather than picking certain maps to edit. I am generally satisfied with the current configurations of all the maps though and don't really have anything else to add to the topic.

 

yes @Miskey #fairplay
and whenever i play blackout casually, im never looking at the clock or waiting for the game to be over since its such a quality map

stalemates on a casual server with 50 people definitely take less time than on the match server (unless that's just my experience), so again yes for miskey's idea

also, flagpoison

 

Well, I am not sure about decreasing the timer for Blackout, sure stalemates are annoying and boring, but if they are under 10-15mins then it's fine (imo). However there should be a rule added which prevents a 15min+ stalemate since some teams just can't put enough pressure on either carrier (e.g. tbf vs scr tournament match, no offense to either team, but it was really boring).