Chef Archive
Thread: THIS AIN'T OVER!
SirVimes wrote:THIS AIN'T OVER!
Yes, it is. For me anyway.I still don't here Yarna D'al Gargan doing any singing! Do you?
Well, it might be over for this publish. Except for a few bugs and minor tweaks, what we have no is going to live. But that is not the end of it!
I don't know whether this statement is a testament to your optimism or your patience, but I've run out of both. Coming from anyone but you, I'd have called it naivete.So let me ask you this: which would you prefer? Would you prefer that they send really powerful buffs to the live servers and discover they are too powerful and tweak them down? Or would you prefer that they send us buffs that are weaker to the live servers and tweak them up, making them more powerful?
As has already been pointed out, food is highly consumable. If they had needed to cut 10% off the buff size at some future date, the "overpowered" food would've disappeared and niether game balance nor Chef gameplay would be the worse for wear. This argument boils down to "We're definitely going to hurt you now, in order to reduce the possibility we might hurt you later." That's bull!@#$. The last change we saw on TC wasn't concern that things "might" need toned down "a bit". Characterizing it as "showing caution" is ludicrous. Increasing Brandy filling 5 or 10% would've been "prudent". Doubling it? Nuh-uh. Not buying it.This is the developers' intention. This is what they are planning. And they will be watching. I don't know about you but this gives me a good feeling about the upcoming publish. Again, I would rather they get it right the first time, but that is difficult. If they follow through on their intentions to tweak us soon after we hit live, then I am satisified.
"Getting it right the first time" is particularly difficult when you intentionally get it wrong. I'd buy this line of reasoning if we were dealing with more persistent items like armor, or if the Dev's history gave me any hope that they would actually continue to evaluate the situation. Past performance in this area is not what I would call encouraging.
...but [I] got a chance to talk with somebody higher up the food chain than I normally do today, and he told me it wasn't [a one shot deal]. I believe him.
Do you have any idea how many typos continue to seriously harm gameplay? I currently have a separate +40 and +70 accuracy mods to my HAR. Correcting that to a single +110 should be a matter of editing a single database field. Fixing droid tracking speed is a matter of changing "+70" to "-70". There are dozens of such examples, many have existed since release. Some of these issues were reported in beta and are now pushing thier first birthday. Considering the vast number of issues currently plaguing this game, I find it veryhard to believe the Devs will have the time to re-redesign this system just weeks after finishing it. Besides, if you're going to evaluate it, you gotta wait for the combat redesign, right? There's 2-3 months. Of course, you've got to wait for everything to settle out... give the players a chance to learn and min/max the new system. There's another 2-3 months. After that, you need to identify the problems, redesign and spec solutions, toss em up on test, wait for the next publish... another 2-3 months. All told, the next Chef balancing pass could be a Christmas present. Whomever you spoke to may have been very sincere, but things in this game have a way of getting delayed and moved aside for other priorities (December Chef revamp, anyone?)
Now, I realize this comes off aggressive and argumentative, and I really don't want to attack you personally SirVimes. You're an incredible representative, I've little doubt you're the best correspondent this game has. As a Commando though, I know that having a good correspondent doesn't mean a thing without Developer support (Commandos have already had two Correspondents quit in protest/disgust, and the third is faring no better). You clearly know more than I do, and I honestly hope you're right about the next tweaks coming quickly. Considering that the numbers we see now are little different from those we initially balked at on TC, I'd surmise all your hard work isn't worth much in the end without some cooperation from the Devs, which certainly appears lacking to me, uninformed as I may be (maybe I wouldn't feel so in the dark if I had ever once seen a Dev on this board addressing our concerns).
I'll be turning out several schematics of our most useful new foods (such as they are) on patch day, and then I'm done. The past month's string of disappointments has sucked all enjoyment out of Chef for me.
Thank you for your efforts, and farewell.
Ja-van wrote:
They have not spoken one word to US, thechef community,this entire time (TH courtesy post does not count).
Denoby Master Chef
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fatgit wrote:
I honestly hope you are right SirVimes, and I know you are impartial, which is why I respect you.
However, letting this patch go live with an almost toal dependance on additives that use rare meat is so ridiculous it's almost funny. I actually have more fish than domesticated meat....
I suppose we will have to wait for the publish & see, but any errors will almost certainly not be fixed in hotfixes, unless they decide we're too powerful, so it will be at least 6 weeks for any changes.
(edited because the damned forum decided enter was submit)Message Edited by fatgit on 02-05-2004 11:20 PM
well as a "tweak" before the patch...why can't the devs replace specific meat requirements with quite simply put...meat....carnivore, insect, domestic, whatever...
I think that the numbers would be fine if it didn't require specific kinds of meat...and just required any type of meat you could get your hands on in quantity....particularly carnivore meat...
someone said they could get 10k domestic meat in 1 weekend....and thats from a group of friends...I can get 30k of carnivore meat in 3 hours...HUGE difference there...carnivore meat is 8x as easy to get good quality than pretty much any other type of meat...why? because most of the higher level creatures (and thus they drop more meat) give carnivore meat...
carnivores are also generally more hunted...rancors, voritor lizards, kamuriths...and the best part is...as far as I know at least...no other profession specifically needs lots of carnivore meat.
if the devs are going to low ball the buff sizes...leave the fillings where they were before the increases...but reduce the buff size instead. this will allow people to try out combos more quickly...and any potentially overpowered combinations can quickly be identified...and the fillings on those foods adjusted.
lowering a buff size I don't really have that much of a problem with...since the BE additive for nutrition is the most reasonable...but don't leave the filling that high...its only going to piss off customers, and turn them away from foods/drinks...
a lower buff can be compensated for with the relatively reasonable nutrition additives...making them not quite required...but a reasonable, and mass producable possibility (if what was posted is correct, then the nutritional additives need any kind of meat...much easier to get in bulk if you don't care which kind...just about the stats).
i dunno if i can take being broke profession yet agian
We chefs have been broken longer than we have been working. To release this with crappy buffs and "promise" they will up them later is complete bull**edit**. Its as if the devs know they need upped. They should just up them now and be done with it.
However I have a sad strange feeling i'll be hitting the surrender button 18 times when this patch hits 
I have a question. Did the derv's change anything that SirVimes asked for? It seems they just wanted the test center chefs to check for bugs. As far as I can see, they did not revise anything we asked for. Why can't they at least lower the number of different resources that are now required for us to stock? The stomach time is still an hour right? Even our number one issue was ignored.
I agree that starting low and tweaking up stat numbers is best, but this does not help with the resource issue.
Thank you again SirVimes for all your work even though it seems they didn't listen. 
Kera
New Master Chef
Kera wrote:
I have a question. Did the derv's change anything that SirVimes asked for? It seems they just wanted the test center chefs to check for bugs. As far as I can see, they did not revise anything we asked for. Why can't they at least lower the number of different resources that are now required for us to stock? The stomach time is still an hour right? Even our number one issue was ignored.
I agree that starting low and tweaking up stat numbers is best, but this does not help with the resource issue.
Thank you again SirVimes for all your work even though it seems they didn't listen.
Kera
New Master Chef
- Reduced the time from 1 hour to half an hour.
- All recipes that require domestic milk now takes either kind.
- Doubled the experience we get per resource
- Increased the modifier from casks and barrels (although not as much I asked)
- Lowered the filling on several foods (although I don't think enough).
To be fair, they did everything we asked for...just not as far as we asked for. They did not go as far as I asked them, but they use most of my suggestions.
a) How will it be determined if the food is "balanced" now?
Ok, if it is so out of the way, that people stop buying, it will be clear that it needs an upgrade. But what if people buy it (well at least it's somewhat) but no one gets really happy with it? Serverdata would show normal usage, but still it would need work.
b) What happens to food we produce full of optimism next month on stock, if they raise the numbers? Then those, who believed most in the revamp would suffer most, as they will sit on their 2nd quality stocks.
On another note, what I like - after thinking - most of this patch is the fact, that there is no action or doing in the game, that you can't make better with food. And I like it as well, that it remains voluntary nevertheless to use it. I just hope, the amount of usefulness will be enough, even if it takes a month till then.