Mapping Requirements for Releases

FiveM Resource Development Discussion
1

Continuing the discussion from Releases Rules and FAQ:

As someone who spends a TON of time trying to get mapping to work well with one another in our server from a multitude of developers… I feel that there needs to be a method of “standardizing” mapping.

Players get tired of crashing becuase two different maps from developers don’t work well in the server together.

This makes it tough without any method of resolution as mappers essentially blame server owners for having another developer’s mapping present in the server.

If the nature of Cfx is to be a community project, and server owners and developers are meant to work together to provide a space for players to play and make attractive projects, it would be in everyone’s best interest if there was a method to ensure mapping could be compatible across developers without crashing.

Either there needs to be a feasible devkit released for developers to continue to support Cfx and the projects hosted on the platform or utilities to ensure compatibility implemented to account for errors that result in crashes, or monetization policy for non-compatible resources be evaluated and established.

The amount of money we spend on content we can’t even use in our servers is ludicrous. “What’s good for the goose is good for the gander.” Essentially meaning if developers are motivated to make outstanding content, server owners are motivated to make outstanding projects, thus increasing overall attraction to the platform… everyone wins.

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I love this idea, however you pointed out the problem and the challenge with this and other modding:
Money for the cost of obscurity.

As it stands today, there’s still a lot of mystery around map-modding and map-model making because you knowing something new potentially gives you the leg up (AKA the advantage) against the person next to you.

This means you can sell your map for x% more than the competition.

I agree there should be a framework for modding, but that would require the best map modders to come together, share information between eachother and decide a framework for stability that the rest of the community can abide by.

But if they did that, they’d be almost directly shooting themselves in the foot as most if not all of their customers don’t know how to make maps at all…

I don’t agree with this, and would hope to be wrong, but if there’s a quiet part to be said out loud, it’s this.

As for the map you purchased, figure out the problem map, and contact the creator of that map. They should at LEAST owe you some level of support for your server.

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There are a few assumptions made in my post:

  1. Supply and Demand
  2. Opportunity Cost
  3. The “invisible hand”
  4. The benefits of cooperation to facilitate competition

Here’s what I mean by assumption 1:

Supply and Demand plays a huge part in how a market and pricing works. The money people charge is related to the value of their work. If I see mappers I consistently crash as a result of their assets, I just stop buying their work altogether. Thus, they lose a customer and money. If multiple mappers make mapping for the same facility, then it just comes down to perceived value the customer has as to what they want to go with. Example: Apple and Android. They are both phones, they do the same things, generally, but users will die on a hill as to which is better. But to a degree, they have to cooperate due to government regulations and polices.

Assumption 2:

Opportunity cost is what a person gives up to have something else. I’m an Operator. I don’t want to be a developer. But due to the cost for me to hire someone to do development work, I have to develop. So the third option is to buy assets/resources. This is a more feasible option, but presents additional technical debt for me to install, configure, balance, etc. Mapping has a significant Opportunity Cost due to the technical debt that is asserted over Operators for trying to get mapping to “play nicely” together. It isn’t worth my time to learn how to make maps, so, the main developers still benefit from my opportunity cost if they were all able to publish work that didn’t cause crashing due to conflicts.

Assumption 3:

The Invisible hand refers to the hand that guides the market. People will produce what they want and buy what they want. This invisible hand will guide prices for both sides and ensure a fair and competitive market, provided there are other options present in the market place.

Assumption 4:

Should Cfx provide support for mappers to more effectively create add on mapping, and should mappers work together to increase their capabilities, they will start producing more maps. In addition, if they are able to teach people to some degree how to develop mapping, this produces an educated support structure for developers. With more developers comes more competition. Competition fosters the need for innovation and improvements. If some of the really bad mappers were the only mappers on FiveM, then thats all we would ever have. But because some mappers do teach and provide education, there are more developers that rise through the ranks. The better mappers will motivate the lower quality ones to want to learn and do better in addition to motivating the other mappers of the same caliber to find ways to do something better/different to stand out. Through cooperation, we foster competition and everyone wins. The best make the most money and charge the highest prices, with the price scaling down with the lower quality work.

In summary

Developers and Operators are the revenue for Cfx. So, Cfx is essentially the government body that ensures all of our success provided we all play by the rules. But we need more from them. We need them to pivot us from being a stepchild locked in the back yard shed, and consider this is a thriving community of users looking for an opportunity to create something AT THEIR OWN COST OF TIME AND MONEY which in turn increases game sales for R*. The big picture is beautiful and truly awe inspiring, but we could go so much further…

I know there are purists that believe this should all be free and open source, as much as I understand there are predators on here looking for any opportunity to take advantage of hard-working good people.

But Cfx is what it is now and all we can do is find ways to promote a strong environment for all of the professionals operating and developing within its scope.

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I disagree with the part where you mention that creating mappings is “mysterious” or inherently tied for revenue strategies. Building 3D models can be approached in countless ways and with various techniques, success rate really depends on testing your tecnique with RAGE-tune-repeat process that require a lot of knowledge the community cannot give, since you need to figure out your favourite software before approaching mapping. However, the core issue lies in how FiveM servers handle the map streaming.

Map resources are often streamed without checking for conflicts or duplicate files, making it difficult for server owners and developers alike to identify what’s going wrong and where. GTA processes 3D models in blocks (for instance, with collision data), which means that any modification by one developer requires a manual integration with changes made by another developer to ensure everything functions smoothly.

The main challenge with maps, in my opinion, is that we’re modifying a world that wasn’t designed to be altered piece by piece by different developers working on local project files. The GTA engine is built to manage tightly interconnected block utilities—such as ymaps for world props, decals, trees, lights, LODs, light LODs, and so on.

To address this, the best solution I’ve found is to manually resolve these conflicts for the client who requests them and then include these fixes in a release update. This approach keeps everything as seamless as possible, and it stills can create conflicts, if you start another map nearby, because GTA wants that files to be that names to override the default one, you always end up with 2 different collision models, but with the same name. This is just an example, but you likely will have broken collisions for both the mlo’s. broke lights and flickering with occlusions, etc… a lot of file-types are dividedd into the block logic, so is very hard to make a more general method.

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Let’s do a cross compare between even blender and lua for example.

LUA is an entire object oriented programming language that takes years to master, however, there are plenty, and I mean PLENTY of resources online (wealths of youtube tutorials, dis-c’s, and githubs with many, many, many tutorials on various aspects) of testing and creating cool stuff using LUA. And it’s ABSTRACTED OUT to the context of creating ‘cool stuff’ in fiveM

I dare you to find me annnny alternative for map making with blender that abstracts the ‘need-to-know’ stuff for blender and Sollumz. You can’t - even their dis-c sometimes discourages people from asking for help.

Obviously anyone can learn anything, however, for the sake of simple map creation, (something that people may only want to make ONE of), it’s a waste of time to learn, the ins and outs of blender, every single keyboard shortcuts (to which there are many), proper topology, process shortcuts, etc.

There are even things in BLENDER NATIVE that are annoying to try to look for…

But my point is, it seems most people that are successful in the mapping sub community of fiveM (which seems to consist of people already in the 3d modeling space, or spent the months to learn as I did) would shoot themselves in the foot if they were to open up their resources to the public because they would possibly stand to earn less money.

I encourage you to ask any well known map modder to make a tutorial. There are a few out there that are hard to follow or outdated. By far the best one I’ve seen is some german tutorial that doesn’t even touch on the processes of exteriors. (It’s GOTTEN BETTER, mind you, but it’s still very secretive, almost taboo, to ask about)

I say all of the above to say that due to just the nature of historic events, right now, there’s a bubble - Inside the bubble is a wealth of knowledge that map makers are unwilling to share likely for the sake of profit (which mind you is understandable if you have a family to feed), but good luck convincing those individuals in that bubble to ‘play fair’ for a sense of the greater good and a direct hinderance to them…

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This actually reinforces my original point: R* Cfx needs to make map development documentation more clear for folks to create without causing outlying issues.

I agree with this as well!

Yes, anyone that has spent any amount of time trying to make maps congruent can see this. Its beautiful to see the engineering behind it, but infinitely frustrating for us to be able to do our jobs for our player base.

This is, at the moment, the ideal mindset for a mapping developer to have. Unfortunately, not many of them share this sentiment, and if they did, then perhaps this post would be a non-thought.

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I don’t mean for mappers to make their assets public, I mean for Cfx to make access to developing coherent cooperation between addon maps more feasible, but I understand what you mean.

Here in lies my other point, as server Operators, so do we. And if the assets we are putting in our server aren’t conducive to retaining players, and this effect accumulates and propagates through other FiveM projects, this becomes an overall detriment to everyone involved. Without Operators, mappers don’t have a job, at least not in this space.

8

One more point to add:
I believe, presently, the ideal dynamic would be for mappers to work in regards to developing mapping, exclusively with ONE project (example). Then, sell the results of that development, abstracted out from the niche design, for sale to other projects.

With the current state of FiveM development, this is ideal because it allows mappers to work directly with Operators to create quality content on a regular basis and more acutely determine the wants and needs of the project AND the player base.

Other projects that aren’t able to facilitate this type of relationship, benefit from projects that are able to produce a ton of mapping.

Speaking for myself and my project, I would love to have a mapper come on board, use our server as a muse for creation, then sell their creations for their own profit. We benefit from consistent mapping and the mapper benefits from having content available other servers may need/want. I don’t want to earn any money from the mapper, that isn’t my place. I want to earn my money from my community’s support for building a solid project. I may be the only Operator to have this mindset or I may not. But given the current circumstances, the dynamic, to some degree needs to shift to improve the overall dynamic of the professional environment for ALL of us to be successful.

Not saying anything anyone has said here is wrong, as everyone is entitled to their own perspectives, but I feel there is a better way to do things; through productive and clear communication and understanding, perhaps we can find a way to elevate the platform on our side.

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