I second this

BADLANDS BACK PLEASE

fuck villa and bagel at least give us one of these back for a season and then poll which people preferred lol

billdozer this is where u run a blands/granary/villa/bagel/cp_newmap cup and have everyone rank the maps afterwards best to worst

https://i.imgur.com/zk58XNj.png

badlands may have a bad last but villa has a bad everything. no need to force it

badlands is the best goddamn map in this game

anything would be better than villa bro

badlands, granary, reckoner, ashville, yukon, dustbowl, I don't even care at this point

if u think bagel is bad u r objectively wrong

99% of koth haters are copers who would rather look at a choke than take an even team fight

this is also big overlap with the badlands lovers who enjoy looking at choke gameplay (very fun)

i like bagel :(

default badlands was really bad and u guys acting like its not is just nostalgia taking over. not sure how the prolands version played out.

granary is fine though and i want it back

bring them back, its time

granary has unironically been my favorite map since 2012. badlands was second favorite. i wanted new maps but this is like a monkey paw wish scenario

I still want reckoner

@europeans thoughts on prolands vs regular badlands?

well as a european and neutral party i'd say the improvements on prolands are considerable and doesn't take anything away. just an objective fact.

Well I can't argue with facts.

down fro gran pro, but badlands is a terrible experience unless you like getting backcapped or just never leaving last

just dont get backcapped pussy

All versions of prolands are epic. Badlands' door frames in lobby are too low, but even then its still a better map than most in the current pools.

Believe it or not, losing 1 round is not that bad, especially seeing as it gets you off of last and lets you reset.

yes this but backwards,

granary is bad and choky badlands has a lot of chokes too but granary has no flow to it. literally just a flat ass map for 5 points

Tfw you run a cup to inspire other people to run more cups and you become the "run a cup" guy

bagel is the best koth map, and villa is so bad it's a significant downgrade from propaganda.

I play soldier so technically I prefer granary to badlands, but either map is a big upgrade from villa.

why not just stop doing weekly maps and let every (paid) division do pick/ban from the top x maps voted on every season. i get it league structure is fun and RGL likes to Make The Rules, but just let people play what they want at this point. at least adding granary and badlands back in as an option makes it so these monthly map threads don't have to happen.

furthermore, a pick/ban system means people can scrim whatever fucking maps they want and don't have to play x map for 3-5x every night for a week. degens can scratch the granary/badlands itch in scrims and remember why it's awful to play, and then they'll be the first maps banned in the process anyways.

seems like a blatantly obvious solution

badlands is probably the strongest soldier map in the game if you know how to play it smh these zoomers

and the pick/ban vs weekly map thing is a bit though to say, main rationale for switching back is to make it more fair: for people trying to make playoffs it can be super lame to bad RNG into a map your team is worse at for an important match (vs being able to ban your worst map and have an even playing field)

however i did kind of like that we at least were forced to give bagel/villa a shot and learn it (probably better for mappers' perspective in getting feedback), and scrims just make more sense sense being able to watch demos and map review each week. it also just rewards teams that can adapt to every map and are more well rounded which is good imo. and it's WAY less of a scheduling nightmare than having to figure out two nights' maps every week in advanced and then having half your scrims be the other teams' map and not being able to really focus on your strats (i think its kind of overkill for below invite tbh)

villa is not even bad ure just stuck in time

you're right villa is not bad, it's downright fucking awful

this, this, aand this.

bagel is as good as viaduct if not better (way better for soldier copium i guess who dont know a clue about how to play viaduct) and definitely better than clearcut

hot take alert
the moment badlands comes back you mfers are gonna get hit with the reality of that map and beg to get it swapped back out with something different fr. tho ngl granary would be nice again, but not to replace villa but instead dogshit process or maybe metalworks

badlands has so many fun options for midfights, granary is "bro how about a flat space with 4 giant boxes" what a mid woah

Problem: Nobody can agree on which maps are good. It's actually impossible to find a map that everyone likes, just look at the responses in this thread (and elsewhere). Some people hate Badlands, others hate Bagel, others Gullywash and Process, etc. etc. You will never have a map pool that satisfies the community. As a tie-in to that, people are divided on if KOTH is good or if 5CP is good.

Problem: TF2 players are allergic to trying new things, specifically maps. See the participation in various New Map Cup events over RGL's history. Their immediate reaction to a new map is "it sucks because it's new/weird" or "it sucks because I don't know how to play it." Turns out you have to actually play a fucking map before you know how, crazy.

Problem: If you make non-Invite divs run pick/ban, I'd wager teams would just ban all the newer maps and repeat the same three to four degen pug maps all season long. Oh wait, I don't have to wager because ESEA did that already and we saw how that turned out.

Problem: RGL's methods for handling the map pool are absolute shit. Need I remind everyone that they seriously tried to claim that people hated Granary after last season because it was the least popular map from a SEASON 2 POLL. Then they don't run Granary in the most recent New Map Cup. They could actually do proper things to get the playerbase's opinions on maps or facilitate new/old maps being introduced but nah. RGL not using common sense yet again.

So what we have are a myriad of problems and RGL isn't helping anyone with how they're going about it. And we will continue having this discussion until the end of time. Man, remember when in ESEA we just voted out Granary and then voted it back in? Good times.