Creating an ultimate fastest map experience

[Arpi~]

Hey guys! Briefly I'll mention I've been playing since VGT and I have great appreciation for both the game and the staff that have always run the FMP leagues behind the scenes. Love and respect for you guys.

I'm a senior programmer/software developer and I see a good opportunity I think I should at least mention here.

There's an obvious hindering factor of competitive fastest map play which has been there since day 1, which is that it's not "natively" supported in SC, nor SCR. This results in less fluid experience overall in terms of finding games, managing ladder, communities and so on. I'll note here that this does not suggest anything about SCW or how it's run (SCW is an amazing thing).

I see a very well-fitting solution for this, which would be to use the ShieldBattery engine to setup a new infrastructure. This would result in a new launcher client, and of course a ladder system. All played games and players as a result of this would be obviously automatically integrated/processed.

Since the framework would be custom you get the benefit of shaping it in any way. But a couple of obvious features might be: chat/friend system, lobbies, ladder, seasonal approach, profiles, matchmaking etc.

In terms of which fastest maps you would play on, or how all the smaller details of this would work out I don't know yet, but maybe a solution would work where it's like the current SCR ladder map pool: you could select which maps you veto. But that's more like a detail right now.

Overall, you would have a launcher similar to the Battle.net launcher, but it would be dedicated to the fastest map league genre. You would be able to see chats, add friends, engage in matchmaking, play ladder matches, and all the usual.

As I see enough capacity, free time for myself to develop this project, I'd gladly do it. But obviously, if I present this idea and people either don't care or the response is "nah we're good" then... yeah.

The engine: https://github.com/ShieldBattery/ShieldBattery

For clarity's sake, SB already comes with a launcher, but it would be replaced with a new one.

Thanks

[RoNin]

Hey Arpi, im a developer and wouldnt mind helping out on this project, i think its a great idea. Thanks for stepping up to the plate as im sure people would love to see this. Ill check out the github link and see if i can run it. thanks

[RoNin]

if im not mistaken it looks like it runs off of a node type framework using ts ?

[StOnE]

Im senior developer too, i have a jr-developer (viper) and qa semi senior (sword). if we can help u. let me know

[PuMa]

Love it! Man, I tried to push for this years ago, suggested people used Fish server to counter ping issues, pushed for Shield Battery couple years ago. Shield Battery is amazing but unfortunately I could not get people to migrate. It's so tough to get people to change even though its for the best. One can only dream that instead of fighting all the time(I know, unrealistic), one day, the community unites and agrees to support projects like these, there aren't that many people left who are going out of their way to modernize the stability of the servers, or contribute to SC. EVEN when Blizzard had a budget and a team they didn't invest into the servers, actually I think they did but only in Korea. We are lucky to have people who are fans of the game build something amazing like Shield Battery, Launchers, maintain leagues, ect... Shield battery's only problem is population cause the launcher is great.

[sM.Zik]

It's a good idea and project, I just think we shouldn't try to fragment the already very small fastest community atm. Something to keep in mind

[Arpi~]

Appreciate the responses!

Based on the responses I think the next step would be to create the barebone of the project and have an initial, basic version up and running, so anyone could just get it and see what's up. It'll probably be easier to conceptualize the whole thing that way.

Yeah I think the client is just Chromium running under the hood. Most probably the best solution is to keep it as NodeJS and just redo the web components in it.

[PuMa]

It's a good idea and project, I just think we shouldn't try to fragment the already very small fastest community atm. Something to keep in mind

Agreed, it's the one thing that concerns me, splitting the small community.

[Mana[DD]]

Looking for a program that blocks editing. Thank you if you can make it happen with what you're proposing on this thread! 😊