Creature Handler Archive

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KzinKiller wrote:
On a more serious note, what 'should' they do?

CH has been on the receiving end of some of the worst dev foul-ups, absolutely ... but let's face it, it's nothing personal, they've done just as bad to most of the professions in the game. They have just never prioritized good quality in their code, and they have always been terribly understaffed for the number of professions they have. Obviously this problem must be worse today than ever, because every publish seriously and negatively impacts multiple professions now .... the quality has really never been worse.

So what should they do?

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(1) Shake up their management team, problems start at the top.

(2) Hire a new QA (Quality Assurance) manager in their software engineering team.

(3) Hire three to five employees whose only responsibility is playing every profession in the game, one month per profession to start. This team must brief the PM's (product managers) and dev managers weekly, Monday and Friday, on the major issues in each profession and the preferred community solutions.

(4) Once the new QA manager is hired, he adds 2 more people to his staff.

(5) Once the new QA manager is hired, the #1 priority in the project for the next quarter (3 months) is Quality. Yes, the teams work on different things at SOE -- but not for this three months. The only thing anybody works on is quality of existing code. You were working on an expansion last week? Great ... here's a list of 100 known bugs, start at #1 on the list and work to #100, testing fixes as they come out of the responsible dev team. We get more fixes and every team in the game learns a better understanding of the overall game, an understanding that is clearly lacking today or changes would not have such negative unintended consequences.

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That's what they should do. Fixing this stuff isn't rocket science, it takes good management and intelligent priorities. But ..... I'm not betting on it in this case.

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An excellent business plan. Whoever runs SOE has the business sense of a rock though. They seem to think the name Star Wars is going to keep them going forever. Just listen to their commercials. The reason this game is failing isn't Star Wars, indeed it could have been the greatest MMORPG of all time, but instead it has been hit by major mistake after major mistake by the devs and their managers.

Here's the dev's response:

Publish 20 notes -August 29, 2005

• Fixed Creature level 1(0) bug - natural pets once again have normal health stats


• Reduced female Narglatch health poolto balance with it's CL


• Renamed all tamed creatures in everyone's datapads to Bob


• Introduced new artisan crafted Pet Leash - all CH's will now be required to keep every pet on a leash in accordance to the Empire's new Leash law. Any player owned pet not on a leash can be destroyed from the radial menu by any Jedi at his or her convenience


• Reduced all mount speeds by 50%


• Introduced Master Profession health boost command /hboost - anyone engaged in battle against a player owned pet now will have the ability to boost their ham by 200% for the duration of the battle at at 50% faster regen rate then normal


• Removed Master Creature Handler title and replaced with Master Baiter

thanks guys

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KzinKiller wrote:
On a more serious note, what 'should' they do?

... edited for space...

That's what they should do. Fixing this stuff isn't rocket science, it takes good management and intelligent priorities. But ..... I'm not betting on it in this case.

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Best post/response I have seen.

Unfortunately, SOE will likely never read it, or if they do, they won't give it a second thought.

As long as people keep paying, and they do not loose more accounts than they gain, then they will maintain the current status quo.

Time for each of us to decide if the bugs and frustration is worth what we pay, and speak with our money, and not with words.

SOE understands money, words are just... words.