Smuggler Archive
Thread: This is not a please read post.
Tiggs wrote:
teh_n00b123 wrote:
JFreeman wrote:
The new slicing system is done.
Keep in mind, once a dev finishes a project like that, he checks it in. It goes into our version control software ... and we have little control over when it will get to you. Sometimes the developer isn't even 100% sure which publish his change will be in: the next one, or the one after that?
At that point, it's in for an upcoming publish with a lot of other stuff. Any of that "other stuff" could delay the publish. Or we could hear back from QA, "We don't have time to test that properly, so let's hold it for the next publish and give ourselves time to test all this other stuff." Or this could delay the publish itself. Or we could discover other issues with it in testing that cause us to sit on it for another publish, and so on. Really, anything could happen.
Most of the time, nothing bad happens, we haven't scheduled anything that requires more QA time than QA can accommodate, and what we check-in arrives on Live servers when it's supposed to. But this is just not something we can promise, so we try not to do that.
This particular torpedo has left the tube, but we can't say when precisely it will make contact with the USS Smuggler.
"Soon".
Nice post, you know....an excellent friday feature would be to have a QA on how SOE acts. Pictures of your offices, how bugs get fixed. An example of the game in code... The processes for pushing features in a game, like the example above. Those would really do wonders for us....
FYI - It might be best to put the smuggler fixes on high priority
This is really a great suggestion (not the included of the game code part) and would wind up being a few Friday features. I can check on Monday to see what we can do for this.
thanks for responding, and I look forward to a friday feature like that.
I can understand why you wouldn't want to give us a small example of ingame coding, but nevertheless..for someone who knows (on a scale of 1-10, 10 being an expert....1) about that, it would be intresting.
1010111010101011010101001010101101010101010101010101010101 --> okay, so you prob don't use binary 
Atleast I know what that is.
Still....
Personally I love seeing information, any information... even if it's not what I would like to hear. Especially with the current state of some very large and annoying bugs in the game.
Heck this information doesn't need to come directly from a red name if that'll help lower the playerbase's expectations a bit... give the info to the corrospondents for them to share with the given sub-groups that are interested in the information.
Stuff like
"Elemental damage is on the plate for late june or early july"
"Slicing is getting a corrective pass in July or August"
"Creature handles are indeed getting some love in month or month"
"Broken mission bugs are being looked at but currently have not ETA"
Once we get past all of the super-visable and super noted bugs, then that state of the game post can begin to hint at future upgrades and content enhancements. Something like
"Look for capital ships in October or November"
Now that I know "soon" means sometime in the next 3 to 4 months worst case, I'm going to log in my smuggler alt, and start some factory runs of Clamps and Knives. And untill I read the release notes for Pub 18, 19, or 20 wherever it really hits, I'm just gonna sit back, and have some pie and beer.
Thank you Tiggs for throwing us this bone and sharing this information, I for one truely appreciate the info.
I don't suppose you would like to stop by the Ranger cabin sometime and pull up a seat at the campfire and share some stories with use blokes over there too would you?
/target Tiggs
/offerpie
/offerpepsi *seems appropriate*
/salute
Look Tiggs, slicing is all well and fine but please take a look at our profession name; SMUGGLER.
If the slicing changes are out to Publish 19, and assuming 3 weeks per publish and we're maybe a week away from publish 18 then we're looking at mid-July for Publish 19 and slicing changes. You also never said slicing would be complete in that publish.
But, what concerns me and may end up being the end of SWG for me, is that the actually SMUGGLING content you have not mentioned since the In Concept post. Even if that comes out in Publish 20 it is well after July 31.
Something tells me though that it's lack of attention means it is well out past July.
Could you please address the following questions;
What publish is actual smuggling scheduled for?
Has it been scheduled for a specific publish yet at all?
Tiggs wrote:
FYI - It might be best to put the smuggler fixes on high priority
This is really a great suggestion (not the included of the game code part) and would wind up being a few Friday features. I can check on Monday to see what we can do for this.
I think something like this would go a long way to putting a "human face" on not only the devs, but showing that there is a working environment where things are being "worked on".
Many of us did not have the opportunity for one reason or another to go to Fan Fest, and thus you people at SOE are just "words" to us. Seeing where you guys work, and what you do would go a long way to humanizing you and letting us know there are real living, breathing, thinking folks behind those words.
Also I think it'd bring less grief that way for ya! 
Tiggs, I've read almost every word you've posted since you started at SOE, and you are obviously an intelligent woman, and I have faith based on that your decisions to not share timetables, etc are for the best; However, when you have a situation as exacerbated as this one with the smuggler community, it can be extremely difficult to say the least. I think seeing a Friday Feature in this vein would go along way to "bridging the gap" between the players here on the forums and the dev team working for making our game even better.
Just my two credits worth,
J.
Tiggs wrote:
I look at posts like this and realize it is a catch-22. When information was communicated in the past (before my time) everyone went wild. If that information missed the target or was removed then everyone was upset and the community felt the team was lying. This is why when I first started posting not only to this profession but to all, I stood firmly with if it is not 100% solid, I wouldn't post. Players were across the board on my posting that but for the most part many agreed that this would be a better route to take.
Our communication has been down lately with the following events hitting us from all sides: Celebration, Combat Upgrade, Rage of the Wookiee, E3 and Fan Fest. While these are not excuses the actuality of it all is releasing Combat Upgrade and RoW was like releasing two expansions at once. Something that no game has ever done.
We all learned some valuable lessons from doing two simultaneous releases and in the future our goal is to improve the communication flow so we don't run into that situation again.
Tiggs wrote:
I brokemy rule and gave you tentative information, lets see how it goes.
/scold* You should know better by now Tiggs.[%^)=)
this isn't supposed to be the 11th kind of ripping everything you say Tiggs (I know its tough, and you are in a very unthankfull position to get most of the returnfire, from a very,very serious problem with the game. And there is no denying that you DEVs tend to do things poorly oftentimes although i dont doubt you do things with good intentions)
BUT
here it goes:
I hear slicing everywhere!! Slicing so what, thats not content, thats a kind of crafting and moneymaking for us.
What happened to Missions, Smuggling, Content?
Isn't that the major part revamp.
Fixing spice and slicing is okay, but thats not what's really important, is it? I want to be a smuggler.
Is there any way we can entice you to comment on that, as well?
Thanks
Magnum
tiggs i just wanna say this
for you, my dear, and for the other devs, it is NICE to hear about this kind information once in a while.Sometimes the professions just wanna hear something,so theydont have 2 months of nothing, then hope thier revamp is getting done.... Sure it may look bad if it doesnt go through, but if you tell us, we would understand "LA crushed the idea" would be good enough.. but if you said "It went through, changes will be coming publish xx, we hope" that gives us ...some sort of... well hope... its like, "it might be coming, and we hope it is"
just my 2 credits
Second, someone brought up forced in-game testing for the developers/Comm. Relations folks. I actually recall this being enacted shortly after SWG went live. Is the practice still in place?
I've gone from being a hardcore SWG player to an EXTREMELY casual player... and even for the short amount of time I play I can quickly find bugs with my professions/new features.
Finally, are there plans to provide official feedback on each profession's "Top 5 issues" lists that the correspondents worked on so long ago?
I understand that you don't want to say things are coming to the game until they're 100% solid. I also understand that you don't want to talk about some "known issues" because it can encourage people to uncover new exploits (from another thread). However, without feedback on non-exploit issues that that the community presents to you (at SOE's asking, btw), it feels like our work goes into a black hole.
We have official mouthpieces for each profession prioritizing for you, so you don't need to go digging to find problems. With many issues being listed for more than a year (thinking beyond smuggler, here), it's easy to get demoralized. I'm guessing you're actually well aware of issues, but with no mention that they've at least been read, we don't KNOW that you know.
Some personalized, simple acknowledgements back to the community (all professions) would probably go a long way toward diffusing the anger and frustration that is often felt across these board. I'm not saying dev's should get on the forums instead of doing their coding--just some official acknowledgement from you or TH so that we are confident that the communities' "known problems" actually are also the dev's known problems.
Goes from we are fixing smugglers, nope now we are doing new content, no wait its now for jedi, no bugs... nope smugglers, nope Cu nope rotw, no crap city fixes?... no hold we got it fix guild's,damn back to smugglers, over to pistoleer, no wait...hold on... what are we doing now? Do you all not have a schedule to go by up there?
I simply do not get, how you cannot know what is coming down the pipe, it always looks like people are running around in circles at best of times. and seem to be on thorozine at worst of times.
The thing i dont get is, how can you all not know what is schedule to go to publish. Be it now, or a year from now.
The lack of communicatin has always struck me as, no one really is clued in on what to do next, organizationis sorely lacking up top in the management area.
Seems to me if you had good schedules lined up and stuck to them, then, letting us all know what is coming wouldnt be such a chore.
Even if it means it wont be ready for 3 months, 6 months, year, least we know it is coming eventually and not gonna be pushed off for something else that makes zero sense to us.
I know for example in that other game i keep bringing up, that in about 1.5 years a new graphical engine is coming down. why so long?
because they have a new cd coming out ,this is an mmo mind you not a doom3 like game its just like yours huge honking sore spot at times, they are changing direction of the game drastically to make it more realistic. is anyone crying about the massive change? Nope , why? they knew a year and change in advance it was coming, and they point to the transistion of it as they move along, a server dedicated to helping have artillery fire in this game keeps getting shoved off, they dont hide it, they explain why, do they get their gripes, sure, but the griping really cant move much since it was explained why its turning out to be a real thorn in their collective sides. For the most part their butts are covered. Now granted the devs and community there almost go to blows at times.
But that usually does revolved around a sudden lack of communcation, once realised what they are up to or something new suddenly pops out which is cool as all get out things simmer down. and mainly its the customers who feel like idiots.
That can be done here as well, sure you still gonna have your cry babies, there are always a massive pack of them searching out games
to disrupt, but least if you all knew what was going on and let us in turn know in turn your battles wouldnt be so rough as you would have more than brown nosers on your side, there by letting the community eat itself. lol
Anyways, form watching this for going on three years now, matching this with one other mmo that has a dev to client ratio of 1 versus 50k no CSR's to help other than dedicated players, actually they went up to two people in house to help with CSR related issuses one was a player that got hired to help, verus megacorp with all their collective money an manpower, working on a game 1/4th the size of the other.
The one glaring thing that keeps popping up is the organization.
Until that gets straighten out, i cannot honestly see how communcation will straighten itself out between the devs and the community.
If the left hand,management, doesnt know what the right hand, devs, are doing, an vice versa, how are we supposed to not be confused at the best of times?
Set the schedule up, put it up so we can see take our good ideas, use them, stomp on the bad idea to relive stress, find out who the good bug reporters are use them to your advantage, hell cant beat free labor with a stick, and move it along, This way we all know months in advance when things are about to crash around our collective ears. Then we all feel, see, and react on the same page, for the most part, bad when things go south, and can all jump for joy when it all goes right.
Least it be nice to hop in game then without thinking... Hmm I wonder what was screwed up today, or if my profession will ever see a friggen fix in my life time.
I personally would like to know, good or bad, least what is coming so i can plan accordingly.
Right now the mini-game for me is trying to keep my characters protected from some new surprise from SOE themselves.
Now be a great time to start that using the smugglers/rangers as your test bed. You might be surprised how well it would work out for
all of you there.