I don't think map is bad at all. It's a very good map even on the current state. Why remove it?
The map has several things going against it:
- It is a winter map.
- The center is very open. Early game is easy for the enemy to get behind you at the far fuel and get wiped on retreat. Late game is easy to make a few team weapons and hold two VPs (Which I enjoy watching. Saw a game where a player made no tanks and won).
- The cutoffs are too strong and punishing. Winning a fight does not mean you get more resources.
- The VPs are in the corners.
- The fuel cutoffs are on red cover roads.
- Center church is strong.
- The COH2 community. Once a map is vetoed for months at a time, it will usually stay vetoed. Due to the balance patch, we have not been able to update maps for several months.
- There are several new 1v1 maps ready to go that may be better than even the updated version.
This all adds up to it being the least played 1v1 map.
The new version fixes/changes many of these issues and is visually much better looking. But it will at best go from being the least played 1v1 map to the 3rd or 4th least played 1v1 map.
One interesting note is the time of day the map gets played. Pacific rim time sees the largest portion of the play. European time, the least amount of play.
I made the map to test the open movement I like. With sight blockers that let you play cat-and-mouse games with your engagements. But I leaned too much on making it a technical map with harsh cutoffs. And this makes it very not fun to play. Which is the most important component of map.