But mostly I am very satisfied with what Quake offers me today.

The combination of the enhancements offered by current engines and mods like AD, along with generally really nice, appropriate usage of those features by mappers, executed in a wide variety of maps that still give a good Quakey experience.....I think is great. There's not much I think should be added, except more of the same, and the continuation of a very gradual introduction of minor graphical / design enhancements.

There's a few things I would personally like to see, I'm happy for AD to become a main standard for Quake+++, as long as people remember it's a choice, and vanilla or other mods like Rubicon, Quoth etc are still great to map for. I'd like to see some of the older / less used mod stuff added to AD, specifically Floyds, re-textured Zer Mega Enforcers and Nemesats, the BloodCube, also the Nehahra railgun, all of which I think offer really cool gameplay. Graphically, better fluids would be the next step I think, maybe some subtle surface movement, better textures, even a slight reflectiveness - again the key is subtlety.

Set-up-wise I was going to suggest easier use of the -game malarkey rather than editing shortcuts, but then I realised that works fine changing dir in engine in Quakespasm, so that's fine.

In short, I don't want much more - apart from MOAR MAPS :) 

Not 100% sure if this thread is strictly for user experience ideas, or holistically about Quake, but I have a certain Strong Opinion™ that I was meant to post in the "Quake in 2018" thread but it's probably too late to revive that...

The AI in Quake, and pathfinding specifically, is shit.

I mean, we all know it, but it needs to change from "it's shit, but it's ok" to "it's shit, and it's not ok". It's not completely satisfactory (as per the thread title) that even in 2018, Quake gameplay can be lamely cheesed.

Here's an example from Bal's (otherwise 100% excellent) 1024³ map: it's not immediately visible on that shot but the wall can simply be walked around. In a proper scenario, the Fiends would just find their way around the wall and rip me to shreds, but the Fiends wouldn't, since they just follow the one straight line the QC is telling them to follow at all costs.

This will be an unpopular opinion, but as Quake is slowly re-gaining popularity, we as mappers and modders MUST up our game on this end. I find it slightly embarrassing to recommend all the amazing new maps to newcomers and have them encounter idiotic, prehistoric AI.

It's especially embarrassing since such systems already exist as .qc!!

1. sock implemented an extremely robust pathing system in the In the Shadows mod that was then discontinued in Arcane Dimensions.

2. c0burn has another system, based on FBX waypoints (I think?): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iooijPc7dbY&

3. Numerous older solutions from the inside3d times.

Ten, and even five years ago posts like these would be met with total bollocks like "who cares about smart monsters, I just shoot them :)", maybe it's about time everybody realised that smarter enemies make for a better QUAKE experience.