Feedback/Thoughts on the Venator

[Fyi]

This is a post regarding how people feel about our biweekly rotation to the Venator.

Please give any positive or negative feedback on your experience on the Venator, and if there is anything to improve on to make the experience better.

Thanks.

[Seabass]

i havent played on venator in months and anytime i do i want to get off, its boring and theres nothing to do, anaxes is much better and its become an inconvience. 

[buhr]

remove it

[A-a-ron]

Imo I think the map is horrible, every time it’s been venator weekend I just don’t play. If it was any longer then 2 days I’d complain but it’s just 2 days so if people like it just keep it

Edited April 28, 2022 by A-a-ron

[BigZach]

I am not a fan, I think there are better venator maps. But the Base is so much better for down time compared to the venator. Especially when it comes to bunny hopping.

[Lyonaxis]

The venator is amazing when it's linked to storyline deploments like when we first got it and did the whole Anaxes thing, otherwise it's just 3 days of Naval RP. 

[Frank]

Venator is just Zzzzz, Events are so limited and rp just goes down when on the venator.

[Hanz]

I know so many people that just don’t play on venator and I don’t blame them. It screws a lot of things up like tryouts, trials, and one of our whole factions can’t play on it at all. At first I liked the idea, but at this point I’d rather be on base. 

[Whataburger]

idk, its nice but with the new map coming up. it kinda puts me on edge

[Bruiser]

Probably one of the least favorite maps I have. I'm going to be deadass, I haven't heard anything good about it. 

[Frank]

Tbh even for naval its kinda bad cos all what you can do is go into hyperspace and bunny hop in the bridge

[SquishyFishyy]

The venator is just a really weird place because sure its a change of scenery which is pretty good and who doesnt like a change of scenery. The main issue comes from the fact that you can only do like 1 or 2 types of events which become pretty stale and just becomes repetitive and boring. Not saying thats not the same for the main map but you have more opportunities for other types of passive roleplay and ideas. After a day on the venator its also not really colorful so its just bland and grey and boring which is kind of rough. Atleast on anaxes you can see the different colors of foliage. These are my opinions though and im not speaking for everyone here at all. Its just in general harder to do things on the venator in my opinion.

[EatenCookie]

It has its ups and downs but when people specifically don't play on it and no BH

[Slak]

For me and I know for many others it's a really big momentum stopper and really just kills the mood of wanting to get on the server. I have tried many times to play it, and currently trying to play it on a different life but still don't find any enjoyment. There is very small amounts of creativity I see coming from the events and roughly all are the same based on the ones I have attended. It may be me but I find it really annoying and find it as a way to just not want to get on the server and take an LOA.

[Bbstine]

[Bacta]

I said it the minute that Square announced it it will be extremly boring, the Venator only serves 1 Faction

The ability of a GM is limited to a extreme level when we are on a Venator, you can only do so much, my suggestion was gonna be having it where we use the venator to signal "hype" on the server using it only when a update cycle happens, all players are extremly demoralized because of the venator

 

IE: When a new map/update we will be on the venator, it will happen only like once every 3 months and generate hype.

[cpt.atomic]

i dont think its the map thats bad i think its the stuff that happens there or lack of things that happen there

[A-a-ron]

1 minute ago, cpt.atomic said:

i dont think its the map thats bad i think its the stuff that happens there or lack of things that happen there

Because of the map? 

[Soccer]

there isnt much to do on the venetor its and not alot of space. Flying is terrible,navigation is shit, and it laggs more than Anaxes 

1 hour ago, A-a-ron said:

Because of the map? 

Yep

 

[Edgar]

I like it occasionally, not as often as it is currently though.

[Bleach]

It was cool, but reality set in and people realized that it legit just a box and you get bored very quickly

[Pronto]

Venator trash. 

Anyone who has been playing since the dark ages like myself also simply cannot stand this map from years of abuse.

[Grief]

The venator is a bad map. Stats show that when we switch to venator our player count on the server drops down a lot.

[GregRocks]

Follow me into a picture. You're working in your dead end 9-5 office job. The ceiling tiles are tinged yellow, there's brown spots on them from the leaks. The lights buzz, the cubicles are all the same, you're only allowed certain decorations in yours. The endless clicking of keyboards and ringing of phones. The boss is awful, you're not allowed to talk to your neighboring cubicles, and the coffee is tasteless and sad. The start to every farming game out there. This office is the Venator. It's a sad place with no color, no love, and only Naval enjoy it. The population drops, people complain, and overall Venators are overused and out dated. The map isn't bad for what it is, but this Venator is lifeless and empty, just like that office. The event opportunities it presents are unique in a sense, but other than that there are no positives to this map. It even limits an entire class of players. (Bounty Hunters)

[Soccer]

1 hour ago, Pronto said:

Venator trash. 

Anyone who has been playing since the dark ages like myself also simply cannot stand this map from years of abuse.

i agree i am from the days of the old venators and this is the worst one

1 hour ago, Lovestruck said:

Follow me into a picture. You're working in your dead end 9-5 office job. The ceiling tiles are tinged yellow, there's brown spots on them from the leaks. The lights buzz, the cubicles are all the same, you're only allowed certain decorations in yours. The endless clicking of keyboards and ringing of phones. The boss is awful, you're not allowed to talk to your neighboring cubicles, and the coffee is tasteless and sad. The start to every farming game out there. This office is the Venator. It's a sad place with no color, no love, and only Naval enjoy it. The population drops, people complain, and overall Venators are overused and out dated. The map isn't bad for what it is, but this Venator is lifeless and empty, just like that office. The event opportunities it presents are unique in a sense, but other than that there are no positives to this map. It even limits an entire class of players. (Bounty Hunters)

This is Starwars not the back rooms

[Jayarr]

I only put 2-3 hours of work into the edit, so I'm not really attached to it in the end.
My only take on this matter is that 5th fleet will need to be removed, which I don't really mind either way. 5th was more of a fun project for me, so if the models aren't used outside of events, I don't really care on that basis. It's more-so up to the community, which the opinions so far seem to extend their reach well enough

[Hansen]

Tbh my opinion its boring and I dont like it its trash

[BlueBeetle]

I'm gonna give my honest opinion about the Venator we have right now. I think I can speak for many people who dislike the Venator when I say that the space is extremely small, which makes things boring and in turn makes people uninterested in playing on Venator weekends.

Personally, I enjoyed playing on the Venator the first time I was ever on it. A nice change of scenery. However, I quickly came to realize that the space was much more limited and made things less interesting to do. Many people feel this way now, and want to go on LOA's for the Venator weekends. All we have is the ship, and the real main area people can hang out on is very tight and small. This goes for both Clones on the ship and Jedi within the Temple. Unlike Anaxes, where clones have a huge open area both on base and off base, as well as three floors with more to do, AND an area outsisde of base to patrol and do things on, clones have the tightly packed hallways, MHB, and a just a few things. The Jedi area for the Venator is TINY as all hell, unlike Tython and its beauty and wide-open areas.

As a member of staff who loves hosting events, the Venator also restricts the creation of events heavily. The only thing people can do are just drop pods in MHB. We can barely do flying things as well since the skybox is super small. But Anaces gives us not only MHB and CY, but also Village, Caves, Aurek, and the trails around it, not to mention Endor, Geo, Umbara, and Tython.

Now granted, I will say that the Venator allows Naval to do more. This is its plus side. Naval have a larger area to be in regarding BCC, and they can send the ship into hyperspace. However, that's the extent of their power on the Venator.

That's my honest opinion about everything regarding this map. The change is scenery is appreciative, but most, if not all players enjoy staying on Anaxes without the weekend map rotation.

[Glory22]

The Venator would be fine if it had planets to travel to, or some other locations such as a space station or Separatist ship to go to. There's simply not enough present on the map to have good events that aren't repetitive.

Even adding something like the Steam Workshop::Half-Life 2 Tools (steamcommunity.com) which has a droppod that can go into the ship and then be able to spawn NPCs around it to have a nice RP way to get droids into places that usually aren't there. This would allow for more variety of events, where you can have a droid ship come in and drop enemies into places all over the ship to prevent the common type of event we have no where the only place they come is in the hangar bay.

Note that with this tool the typical thing to do is only use the droppod feature and not spawn NPCs out of it, but use separate tools to spawn the NPCs. Either the Chromium spawner or manually spawning NPCs can be used, or this tool can be added as well which works well with the headcrab canister tool. Steam Workshop::NPC Spawn Platforms v3 (steamcommunity.com)

 

Overall, most people complain about the lack of variety of events on Venator and the lack of things to do. Having these two added would help to fix both of these problems in my opinion. Having a space station would also enable BHs to easily be allowed when on this map as well.

Edited April 28, 2022 by Shrimp
add more

[Deku]

Honestly, whenever we’re on the venator I usually just don’t play and only show up for deployments. It’s just a waste of a weekend. It was nice at first, I still love the idea of a map rotation for the weekend, but venator is not it. It’s nice to have something new every now and again, but it makes it less fun when we can’t even personalize what we have. (Little off topic) but even if we took away map rotations, let a mf use perma props again please, part of the fun is seeing what people come up with for their bunks and honestly synergy has been such a snooze fest recently. (I know, server box go brr. Seems like everything breaks our beloved server box nowadays)
 

anyways, prop rant aside. The idea is solid, but poorly executed.. or rather, limited. The map we use for venator is god awful. I’d rather poke nails through my eyes than spend a weekend playing that piece of shit, and server numbers follow that same ideology it seems. Congratulations, you came up with the perfect way to turn the only members we have away from the server for a weekend. Now we can all go touch grass 

 

I understand and sympathize with server leadership though. We tried something, it didn’t work, we move on. I love the idea of a map rotation, but venator isn’t the way to go. At least, not the venator we have now.

[RadJames]

why

[Frostyyy]

the venator is a waste of time i actually hate my self when we are on it

[Ccmonty]

its just a clone of icefuses venator map WHICH EVERY SERVER USES. swap to extensive or get rid of it

[Slak]

3 hours ago, Ccmonty said:

its just a clone of icefuses venator map WHICH EVERY SERVER USES. swap to extensive or get rid of it

Extensive is probably the only good Venator map.

[Blood]

I have been a pilot main since I rejoined the server a few months ago, and I DO NOT LIKE THE VENATOR. People say the map is good for pilots but I just think the map itself is not fun to fly on. If there are more than 2 pilots up it feels too crowded. The map itself is okay in my opinion but ends up too small and cramped to have much fun. Not to mention that minging ends up much more noticeable and annoying.  The real problems are repetitive ass events. Droids in MHB, Droids in bridge. That's it. Jedi's get cucked, BHs get cucked, everyone who isn't naval or 5th fleet just ends up bored. In short, bad map please delete

[ThorpyVEVO]

unironically, fuck this map.

It is not fun, it distrupts RP and trials and the events are FUCKING STALE. The amount of people i've seen joke and actually go on a 2 day "LOA" cos of this map isnt funny. I played on this map back in 2018 (dont quote me it was a long time ago) back on synergy when defcon 6 was a thing and even that venator was better. This sucks. It was used in the past by other servers as well and it should stay in the past. I wouldnt mind going to like endor for the weekend cos at least its similar to anaxes in the sense we can go outside. No BH either, i dont even like BH rp but i know many do and it sucks we cant have it. It's a waste of time and only naval like it. 

 

P.S FUCK THIS MAP.

 

P.P.S I dont like this map.

[Hector]

Complete and utter ResidentSleeper moment 

[Aeon]

Outdated & Not Fun

[Mystic]

Map swapping is a great idea... just not when the map is years old and nobody likes it. It was refreshing at first (Like Deku said) but after a few weeks its all the same RP. A droid invasion! Bugs are munching! Oh no a commando hit the engine room!. There is zero RP for your normal troopers and falls under only Naval and support RP. Every event is at most a small shoot em up for most people. On top of that, There are 3 places to spawn droids. Each side hanger and MHB. All of which suck to fight in with more than 4 people, and it usually results in the GMs spawning droids (quite literally) on TOP of people. If the map lags then someone is either falling into moonpool or getting PK'd. 

And Personally, I NEVER play when it's venator. It's so discouraging to feel excluded along with the 50+ other people that disconnect immediately. Its obvious that the map is disliked when the peak hours often have 50-60 people compared to Anaxes 80+ even though people hate Anaxes.


TL:DR its too small for fighting and its only space flight based. RP is bad and excludes Jedi/BH and most troopers.

Edited April 28, 2022 by Mystik

[Kaptin]

First time on this map and while its cool that its new, I really cant see why it is its own map, this looks like it should a layer map on the main map

 

[Maestro]

L venator

[Brooklyn]

Founders: Put out poll for Venator Map Rotation
Community: OH MY GOD FINALLY YES YES YES MAP ROTATION YAY VENATOR

Jayarr: Updates map to increase performance and issues very quickly for the benefit of the players
Community: OH MY GOD THE LAG SUCKS WHAT THE FUCK

Fyi: Puts out a poll for feedback
Community: OMG THE VENATOR SUCKS WHY ARE WE DOING THIS I BOYCOTT THIS MAP

Me being toxic, but y'all mf asked for it. Provide a potential map to swap to for the weekend instead of saying it sucks. Yes, we get it, the map is small and old and people hate it. Name a map you want to switch to.

[Gears]

4 minutes ago, Brooklyn said:

Provide a potential map to swap to for the weekend instead of saying it sucks.

Here comes 10 Posts asking for Endor

[Mystic]

5 minutes ago, Brooklyn said:

Founders: Put out poll for Venator Map Rotation
Community: OH MY GOD FINALLY YES YES YES MAP ROTATION YAY VENATOR

Jayarr: Updates map to increase performance and issues very quickly for the benefit of the players
Community: OH MY GOD THE LAG SUCKS WHAT THE FUCK

Fyi: Puts out a poll for feedback
Community: OMG THE VENATOR SUCKS WHY ARE WE DOING THIS I BOYCOTT THIS MAP

Me being toxic, but y'all mf asked for it. Provide a potential map to swap to for the weekend instead of saying it sucks. Yes, we get it, the map is small and old and people hate it. Name a map you want to switch to.

the way the venator was introduced was great! so was the way it was utilized in the first few weeks. Opinions change, fast and often. After a month or so the maps limitations were exposed. It made people dislike it more and eventually spiraled into this as BH was limited, GMs were limited, Any troopers that aren't SUP or Naval were limited. I agree that people should be more open to posting new map suggestions and/or providing other feedback than "it sucks, L map, Bad map etc" But as for the love turned hate, Venator just finally got all of its opportunities used up and people got tired of it.  Like a condom! You use it once or twice and realize they're no fun so you cast it aside!

Edited April 28, 2022 by Mystik

[Brooklyn]

Just now, Gears said:

Here comes 10 Posts asking for Endor

I miss endor, but I know we can never go back. It crushes me to say that

[Baron]

[Cox]

If the events weren’t all the same shit it could be cool

[Maverick]

2 minutes ago, Baron said:

I accept. 

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1658535014

(Totally NOT a endor replica map there.)

[Marvel]

I like the venator but everyone else gets so depressed and uninterested that the sole purpose of the venator, a smaller space where player interaction is increased, doesn’t really work the way it was intended. 

[Bacta]

44 minutes ago, Brooklyn said:

 

Founders: Put out poll for Venator Map Rotation
Community: OH MY GOD FINALLY YES YES YES MAP ROTATION YAY VENATOR

 

@Mavelle they called me a madman

Edited April 28, 2022 by Bacta

[A-a-ron]

7 minutes ago, Bacta said:

@Mavelle they called me a madman

Time for titanbase rotation 😈

[Sa1]

This map kinda sucks ass frfr.

Edited April 29, 2022 by Sa1

[CruorFlumine]

Very boring, only really supports naval for rp, and ideas for GMs on it are very stretched. #notafan

[Juniper]

I liked the Venator the first time I was on it, it felt nice to have a change of pace. After a while now I can firmly say that I do not think it is a good idea. It only is good for Naval to do RP and that's about it. It makes GM's jobs harder, the map is very small and limited, and it simply is just boring because everyone just AFKs.

[Square]

This community consistently manages to decrease my estimated lifespan at an accelerating pace one forums post at a time.  

[Finn]

Yo ima be real, I like the idea of the Venator weekends. It's a nice change of pace , I don't have to deal with BHs so much, and some of the encounters are pretty unique.

I wish there was more that just the venator though. For everything the map does right, there's just not enough to sustain the current community/GM team to keep them entertained and on the server.  Even having 1 planet would be a huge plus. I understand that this is the most optimized version we can use right now, and the map isn't really that bad, it's just boring). I want it to work, I'm just sad it's not.

[Xylops]

The Venator itself is fine but it just gets really boring super fast

[Misfit]

personally, i have a love-hate relationship on venator. 

As a player, i love it. Its something different and its only 3 days max. Its semi nostalgic and 9 times out of 10 everyones in 1 of 3  spots so its easy to find everyone

As a gamemaster, i hate this fuck ass map. Theres not much you can do besides bugs b munchin, Pods b droppin, Box RP, Venator go dark or the occasional infection event and alot of times that goes to shit. I cant make a small patrol, i cant build on a different planet and deploy people there unless its ES, and i cant do alot of passive RP (not true but on the GM side it doesnt especially work to well unless theres some kinda attack/conflict). With the amount of GMs there are, alot of them are rushing to do things before quota aka not alot of variety in events before sunday and by then we're home again on anaxes. 

TLDR venator is cool but events are all the same with not much new.

[Hanz]

15 hours ago, Brooklyn said:

Founders: Put out poll for Venator Map Rotation
Community: OH MY GOD FINALLY YES YES YES MAP ROTATION YAY VENATOR

Jayarr: Updates map to increase performance and issues very quickly for the benefit of the players
Community: OH MY GOD THE LAG SUCKS WHAT THE FUCK

Fyi: Puts out a poll for feedback
Community: OMG THE VENATOR SUCKS WHY ARE WE DOING THIS I BOYCOTT THIS MAP

Me being toxic, but y'all mf asked for it. Provide a potential map to swap to for the weekend instead of saying it sucks. Yes, we get it, the map is small and old and people hate it. Name a map you want to switch to.

I hate this mindset so much. The community wanted something new while we waited for the real new map. We got something, tried it out for a bit and now do not enjoy it. We are expressing that here. While some people do just whine about it, most people are giving valid criticisms. We will forever be stuck with something we don’t like if we never express our dislike of it.

[Misfit]

15 hours ago, Mystik said:

the way the venator was introduced was great! so was the way it was utilized in the first few weeks. Opinions change, fast and often. After a month or so the maps limitations were exposed. It made people dislike it more and eventually spiraled into this as BH was limited, GMs were limited, Any troopers that aren't SUP or Naval were limited. I agree that people should be more open to posting new map suggestions and/or providing other feedback than "it sucks, L map, Bad map etc" But as for the love turned hate, Venator just finally got all of its opportunities used up and people got tired of it.  Like a condom! You use it once or twice and realize they're no fun so you cast it aside!

nah the end of this is wild 💀

[Comics]

20 hours ago, Bacta said:

The ability of a GM is limited to a extreme level when we are on a Venator,

genuine request, I would like you to explain out loud how the venator is more limited than the base. Cause I hear it all the time but I don't think I've ever seen anyone explain why so I'd just like to know the issues GMs encounter?
Maybe I am out the loop but main server events seem to also be all extremely similar and stale. I can't imagine this is exactly very tied to the map being a base or venator because every event on titan had droids in MHB and then maybe commandos. It just seems like logic that doesn't exactly follow through.

And you can't include things that are map specific like other planets or a temple (since those can be on either).  just compare a base map and a venator and how one is better for GMs than another

 

Overall I suspect once moving to a base the server has gotten extremely accustom to a base setting with some sort of outdoors, (no matter how shit or tiny) and expanse for BH alone. Jedi temple is just as disconnected and awkward on both current maps. I think people feel a little trapped on the venator, despite being probably around about the same walkable space as the venator, all the ups and downs, hallways and tighter spaces makes it feel more like a cage. Anaxes is pretty spacious and empty so it feels really big and sort of casts this illusion of a lot of walkable space. People like this open air feeling and these cramped spaces venators emulate probably push people to the same place (the few wide open areas) which used to be pretty good for passive RP but I'm not sure people do anything except Bhop and AFK during down time (me included) so it feels sort of pointless. Anaxes at least lets us have an excuse for not talking and it's because everyone is really far away from each other. It also doesn't help this is maybe one of the worst venator maps I've ever had to bear witness to.

Edited April 29, 2022 by Comics

[SquishyFishyy]

35 minutes ago, Comics said:

genuine request, I would like you to explain out loud how the venator is more limited than the base. Cause I hear it all the time but I don't think I've ever seen anyone explain why so I'd just like to know the issues GMs encounter?

If i may answer this I would like to. So, sure on the main server people do the same old same old but thats not because theyre limited to it. Unfortunately, it feels a lot of people just do a basic shoot em up just to fill their quota. That being said the encounter options you have on the venator are very limited simply because it is a military ship in space and it is much harder to actually board the ship without some sort of fail RP. 

On Anaxes it is an actual planet and sure it is also a base that you can not get on without clearance you can still be on the planet with no issues because well the republic cant claim the entirety of a planet which is why there are bounty hunters. You have more space to really open your mind and be creative on how something would happen because its not extremely limiting. Encounters on the base are pretty easy to throw an idea together and it rarely doesn't work but on the venator you can't just throw something together. You have to think of how it would not be considered FAILRP or even possible.

This is my personal beliefs on why the Liberator is more limiting.

[Dono]

The venator can be used a lot more than its being used right now. I've seen some crazy stories and rp filled events conducted before when I only played on shipwalking rp. Ultimately the venator will get stale like any map but it arguably has more potential for creativity then anaxes. The largest reason just being the available space to build in space. For a builder, the venator is a dream. Space stations, docking stations, enemy ships, weird funky asteroids, literally any structure that can be made in space. Ultimately it really just comes down to the amount of creativity that is in the GM team, the venator fails when there isn't enough builders in the team. Also of course performance is a big issue, I know I've been gone for awhile but from what I remember, the venator performance was always ass, especially outside of the ship (which is the most important part of the map for creative GMs). Anaxes or any base map is way easier for GMs since you can entertain ppl still with somewhat variety using the planets with very, very little effort. - If you conduct any low quality / low effort event that is done on anaxes a hundred times, on the venator, i can promise you its going to suck a 100 times more on the venator, then it did on anaxes. I might be coming back this Summer (no promises), if the venator is still around I'll throw down the shit that's needed.


Additionally, the venator is the easiest map in existence to be able to transfer events to the event server. Its harder to spontaneously jump from anaxes to another planet, but a spaceship can fly anywhere to any planet. Event server ultimately becomes the biggest tool on the venator to do the craziest events. The best events I have ever seen on gmod have been on shipwalking rp... events that started on the venator and jumped to the ES with a fantastic story. Although, its not fair to compare since that server was on Venator v1 which is 100 times more optimized

 

Edited April 29, 2022 by Dono

[Comics]

28 minutes ago, SquishyFishyy said:

On Anaxes it is an actual planet and sure it is also a base that you can not get on without clearance you can still be on the planet with no issues because well the republic cant claim the entirety of a planet which is why there are bounty hunters. You have more space to really open your mind and be creative on how something would happen because its not extremely limiting. Encounters on the base are pretty easy to throw an idea together and it rarely doesn't work but on the venator you can't just throw something together. You have to think of how it would not be considered FAILRP or even possible.

Civilians actually have 0 right to enter a Military base, if we really wanted we could always kick them out but we don't because it's fun to have them around it brings more interesting dynamic. The same thing is applied to a ship, sure the procedure is a little more taxing but is requesting docking permission really that much of an ask? I'm not sure naval is willing to kill encounters just to be ATC dickheads so you could probably pretty easily get a market flown into the ship, or have a busted ship need repairs. Maybe have a shanty town in the asteroid field. There are clearly options it seems like the GM team isn't used to venators for encounters, as it probably does require a little more prep.

The idea that bases are not extremely limiting doesn't seem to play out because you agree every event is the same so either both base and venators limit creativity or it's something on the player-side

It seems weird to say this but players are absolutely raring to do some shit, and they're not gonna shoot down some RP because they don't wanna give boarding perms. otherwise they'd kick all non-military off base

Edited April 29, 2022 by Comics

[A-a-ron]

2 minutes ago, Comics said:

Civilians actually have 0 right to enter a Military base, if we really wanted we could always kick them out but we don't because it's fun to have them around it brings more interesting dynamic. The same thing is applied to a ship, sure the procedure is a little more taxing but is requesting docking permission really that much of an ask? I'm not sure naval is willing to kill encounters just to be ATC dickheads so you could probably pretty easily get a market flown into the ship, or have a busted ship need repairs. Maybe have a shanty town in the asteroid field. There are clearly options it seems like the GM team isn't used to venators for encounters, as it probably does require a little more prep.

The idea that bases are not extremely limiting doesn't seem to play out because you agree every event is the same so either both base and venators limit creativity or it's something on the player-side

It seems weird to say this but players are absolutely raring to do some shit, and they're not gonna shoot down some RP because they don't wanna give boarding perms. otherwise they'd kick all non-military off base

Become a GM then? 

[meowthemeower]

Needed break from the server for veteran players

[Pythin]

I think if you had a Venator map that was planet side People would have so much to do, other than that it is a very boring map to be on tbh

[Rohan]

I enjoy the LOA weekends sometimes

[Bane]

Lyonaxis put it best, the Venator has amazing RP potential when it's used for story development and expanding the synergy Canon. The venator would best be used when there is an all weekend event with a story and plan set up around it. I understand the premise of the Venator, a smaller place to help encourage player interaction, but players simply don't rp like they used to. It's a great tool in synergy's proverbial belt, it's just being used wrong. I highly suggest it be kept in reserve as a special event map. However, as it stands, whenever we swap to the Venator it kills my battalion's engagement. Half of my troopers refuse to get on and another quarter swap to naval. Last time we were on the venator my battalion played an entirely different game together instead of being on synergy. The Venator is not a bad map, it's just not an appropriate choice for a main server map we spend 3+ days of the most active period of time of the week on. Therein, I would like to thank Jayarr for editing the map for us and giving us something special. I'm super grateful for the work and the thought! Unfortunately, It's just not something my battalion vibes with. 

[A-Tack]

Honestly, this map really sucks the joy out of waking up and realizing its the weekend. Normally, I would be thrilled to get on, and request a barc patrol. That certainly isn't possible. I love the fact that thought was put in to actually spice things up with Synergy, but just not enough brain power was put into the idea. I sincerely hope that they do NOT go back on the idea, because genuinely it was a good idea, it's a nice change of pace. However, that pace slows down over time, and I genuinely believe it's killing the server. With pilots, recon, bounty hunters, Jedi, any jetpack batt, and almost every other clone batt being affected negatively in some way, it becomes unhealthy for the playerbase. 

Certainly, readjust this idea in some way to a more open map or take this concept and apply it to events.