Development Cycle Archive
Thread: A sort of state of the game
I didn't read all the replies but this one struck me as odd.
On the 6 servers that I play on, I am only allowed to have ONE ticket created at any given point in time.
Has anyone taken the max allowable tickets created into consideration when calculating the decline in ticket submissions?
I still WANT to submit as many tickets as I submitted a month ago but I am now unable to do so. That would most certainly account for why my account has had less submissions...
Other than that, I appreciate the efforts you are taking in making the game and the community better for everyone involved. I only wish you would hurry up.
Holocron wrote:
The top issues that tend to get reported these days, and which are therefore our top priorities for fixes include missing items (mostly seem to be related to crossing server boundaries); ghosted items on vendors and the bazaar; skills going missing (still no luck on this one!); people getting stuck in certain places; things warping to 0 0 0; and mission NPCs not spawning at waypoints.
Nothing whatsoever about warping mobs and prone warping. There are continual complaints about these in the Forums, so why aren't they mentioned here? Also, what about all the broken missions? Mission rewards never showing up in your inventory? And what about Lt. Lance?
Also, no surprise whatsoever on Creature Handlers. These days it's easier to ask who isn't a Creature Handler. I've been one for several weeks now, and am getting close to dumping it because there are just too many animals running around.
As in the name "state of the game" these communications should represent the general direction of SWG. Many of us would rather see a broad report of conceptual advances rather than details of bugs people encounter.
Holocron wrote:
I'm happy to report that our response time on CS tickets has fallen by a factor of twenty from a month ago
*tongue in cheek* Wow, your CS response times must have been at least 20 weeks!
/*tongue in cheek*
I have a CS ticket that I have been getting emails on every time I log in for a week. Emails say the ticket hasn't been read. I am expecting any day now to get the message "Sorry, we can't prove that happened to you so we can't help you with that" that will so tidily resolve my issue anyway =P
Holocron wrote:One to call out is houses vanishing--every case we have investigated closely has turned out to be a legitimate deletion. So we're planning on providing CS with a way to get the houses back, and we're looking to change how house deletion from unpaid maintenance works so that we don't have this problem coming up as much.
I have to question this one... the PA I'm in recently had a PA Hall disappear. I had an open call with a CSR at the time I found about about it so I brought it up to that CSR. Though I wasn't a building admin, I'm told the maintenance was paid up. The CSR was nice enough to look into this issue for me (thank Janice) and confirmed that there was no reason the PA hall should be gone. She told me that she wasn't capable of restoring the item, however, and passed it up the chain. The PA hall did reappear, but it was missing a large cache of resources that were stored in it in anticipation of the upcoming player cities. Truth be told, those resources were much more important to our PA than the PA hall was, but apparently when the fact that they were missing was brought up the responce (either from a CSR or dev, I'm not sure) was "oh well."
1) Its one of the few professions that actually pays off at Master (now). The CH is not particularly strong until they reach the higher tiers. Dabblers can't do a whole lot with CH except to maybe handle a Grand Wrix or Sludge Panther, both of which can be fairly easily knocked out of commission by most skilled combat professions and mid-level creatures in the wild. Believe me, non-CH greatly, greatly, greatly overestimate the damage these creatures can inflict and absorb.
2) The exploit. You know, "THE" exploit. The one they discovered too late and never attempted to roll back, the one that allowed any dabbler or player with enough scouting XP stored up to go from novice to master CH in a single day. Shortly after this was shut down, Holo himself mentioned it in passing with a bit of a chuckle in the Pistoleer forum. To paraphrase, "CH has recently become the most popular profession, but I think we all know why that is...."
3) Timeframe. CH takes about a month or two to master with casual play. The early boxes are almost as slow as combat skill, though the latter half of the tree moves more rapidly. This means that common players in the first month or two who decided to master CH are now reaching their goal. It also matches up well with the gunfighter professions. Notice Pistoleer is second place as the most sought after, but not yet mastered. I fall into this category. CH has been mastered, and I now intend to finish off Pistoleer. Most people choose these as a supplimental profession. Now that our primary has been mastered, we will see a growth in combat professions mastery in the near future as players like myself redirect our efforts into their combat skills.
sigh :/
why dont speack of mind ham ?
the fight in game is totaly broken ....and no one say what u want make for mind healing .
mind dmg + tef time after death is CREAZY.
pvp is totaly broken , if i kill a bh ,rifle or cm ...i have my mind hitted my killtarget come back full healed from cloning adn attack me again on mind ...and again gain ......one bh can kill a full group no one can help mate on mind ham bh die come back kill one die again come back and kill another , and no one can make anything.
mastergunfighter/masterdoctor
bloodfine
I have some ideas I have been reading and such...but just somethings that maybe the DEVs can think about adding and I know..."Oh another Bafoon putting his two bananas in our pile of S%^*. But just saying...
1. Someone said something about fences...security fences...different levels to be able to repel certain creatures...and then higher levels to be able to repel strong creatures...maybe have like chain link to brick..and then have them only being available with an existing structure...just so that...as someone stated...players aren't building massive fences and cordoning off territory for themselves and calling it candyland...that was a quote...well sorta...but I think this is an idea and maybe it wouldn't be to difficult.
2. Food...I know a guy that left the game b/c he couldn't expand his Health or action or mind at all...it was set and that aint like other games. That wasn't his only excuse but it was in his big three. I was thinking that maybe it would be cool to have a bonus for eating right and taking care of your body. Say...certain food affect certain attributes (vitamins in RL). You eat this item once every four hours of game play...for a week of game play...and you get a boost in overall HAM...nothing huge...but maybe like 100 pts or 150 pts...and like the bodies of individuals if you use spices, continually, (CONTINUALLY IS THE KEY TERM) over a period of time you get a decrease...now if people eat randomly then oh well no change and the same with spice use...but I think you will have the Chef being more crucial and people still using spices on a regular basis...but both together maybe...just take breaks from the spices for a lil while or at least...they would use them in moderation b/c they are needed...
Look I know that not everyone is going to agree with these...OH WELL...(you can do it better? ........... riiiiiiighhhhhhhhhhttttttttttttttt!!!!!!!!) These are just a few small things I think could make the game more fun and enjoyable. For a lot of people...
I have a couple more...but I am too tired to think and need to go to sleep..
mo~
Well, glad to hear that Holo did address the same question that was posed in the dev forums, answer below:
"Yes, you are being somewhat cynical... I am not here to pretend everything is happy and pretty. I'm here to give you the straight facts. Limiting tickets has indeed helped reduce the numbers, but it's fairly clear from the graphs that bugfixing has had a far bigger impact.
We're not claiming everything is hunky-dory, we're telilng you "Hey, CS is 20 times faster, this is good news."
Now, I don't think anyone is saying CS being faster isn't good news, we are all glad to hear it. And while we, or at least I, might be reading too much between the lines, your first post seemed to indicate that the response times and overall ticket creation were down due to increased CSR ability, performance, etc. which I think most people would disagree with.
I think if you had just originally said that bug fixes and game improvements have reduced ticket load, which has allowed CS to respond to tickets faster, it would have been much less of a political spin. I think we all know that limiting tickets per player was a significant impact to overall tickets, if it wasn't you wouldn't have done it. I think we can also agree that correction bugs will likewise decrease tickets as well.
I guess I just take offense to the manner in which the original post was written as if some great quality increase in CS (which many of us have yet to see due to i.e., canned responses, inability to resolve issues, flat-out rudeness - remember Boourns?, etc.) when in it is more a combination of limiting player options and game corrections.
Lastly, thanks for editing your original post to clarify the situation. At least now we have some basic idea of the metrics involved, and while they do not reflect the whole picture (you guys should really do a poll on CS satisfaction based on response time and issues resolved, not canned responses) we do have a clearer idea of what you were talking about.
BTW, do you all have the same metrics for tracking ticket drop after the 'one ticket limit'? I think a lot of us would like to see how it compares to the ticket drop you are seeing now. Yo ushould likewise be interested in this as it would give a basis for judging the actual merits of the original post rather then based on lose conjecture and partial fact.
Holocron wrote:
Why not take the manpower focused on new features, and put them on fixing existing professions.
It's one person, and we DID commit to having cities, vehicles, and mounts for you soon after launch. We intend to keep that commitment.
OK, I probably won't be back to reply to this thread (just setting expectations here)... just wanted to address the top things I saw mentioned.
Why do i bother responding if i know he wont read.. anyways..
If its only 1 person doing new features, do you think maybe thats why its taking so long? Is there only 1 person fixing bugs, and only 1 person adding content, etc? Maybe you all need some more Devs working on SWG.
Holocron wrote:...A big thank you goes out to the hardworking CS staff who have exhibited a lot of grace under enormous pressure--they want your experience to be as good as possible, and they are not the bad guys...
Ahmen to that. Those poor people do a lot of frigin work. Thanks girls and guys.
I had a thought for ageneral PvP concept... and I wasn't sure where to post it... so I'm posting it here...
I think this forum needs a general ides thread... 
I'd like to see something like a /groupduel and /endgroupduel which would allow for teams of players to participate in PvP without having to be involved in the GCW.
Much like the duel feature but not just one on one.... it would make some RP situations much easier to play out with this.
Thanks!
Holo, Q, Vass,could you please give us some insight into what your time table is for address the worthlessness of this profession. I understand that it may be some time before the coding is done and the changes are implemeted, but we haven't even received a response to our correspondents report. I would like to know:
1. When we can expect a response (that can be released by our correspondent to SL forum) to our correspondents intial report?
2. What is the status of the changes you proposed on August 22, 2003 to the Squad Leader profession. These are the changes that the vast majority of squad leadersare against being implemented, as reported to the Devsby our correspondent. (Those changeswerenot a response to ourcorrespondent's report,but rathercompletely new proposals that made no reference to the issues raised by our correspondent).
3. In general, what types of improvements (passivebonus, bug fixes, xp formula changes, for example)do youplanfor the Squad Leader profession.
4. Are we likely to see helpfulchanges (i.e. not what you proposed on 8-22-03) implementedin the live serversto the squad leader profession within2 months?3 months? 6 months?
5. Do you plan to ever fix the sqaud leader profession so that it will provide as much of a benefit to a group as Doctors, Combat Medics, BHs, Commandos, TKA, etc?
The morale among the Squad Leaders, at least the ones that post on the forums,is very low and is dropping. With each new postthe DEVs make about changes, particulary tocombat and other professions, withoutmentioning Squad Leaders, a new round ofnegative post is intiated, includedthoseplanning todrop the professionor the game. Whatdoes your hard data tell you about the state ofthe SLprofession?Are our ranks increasing or decreasing? What percentage of players drop SL after a month or 2?
I understand you are busy and that this post will likley never be read by a Dev, but please let us know as much as you canthat is going on with this profession. Even if you are say that we are working on this and have no plan to do so in the near future, that would at least let me quit the profession and do some else so I canstart enjoying the game again.