Very Disappointed on Many levels (Tanker Post)

[Tellis Stormchaser]

From the front page of this website

April 13, 2005 - Low Level Skilling Up Bugged Post-Patch

The SOE developer Tanker has posted in the forums to explain that skilling up at lower levels (up to 150) has been unintentionally made much harder than than it should be. This was a byproduct of the intended changes to skilling up at higher levels of skill, where progression from 200-250 was to get a bit easier, and 250-300 was to get a bit harder. This actually affects all skills including melee skills, swimming, and the like. There's no ETA on a fix. For now, avoid skilling up in anything under 150 if at all possible.

Nothing Tanker said or that folks have posted indicates that success rates are affected. Getting skillups should be the only problem.


Created By: Verdandi Board Goddess
Last Modified on: 2005-04-13 08:42:59

I read this and was very disappointed on so many levels. I was running a twink thru to do some tradeskills, troll race smithing. I was running his tradeskill quests in hopes of seeing if it is possible for him to actually make armor he could use for his level. Basically SOE has taken away all newbie trade skillers ability to progress in the game. This might be part of the reason you are losing players and having to consolitate servers. You can't afford to keep things running this way.

The most disappointing thing in this is this little quote.....

There's no ETA on a fix.

I can't for the life of me understand how this can't be merely remedied by rolling back the patch? Someone who programs please explain it too me. It seems to me you all should be falling all over yourselves right now to fix this. Instead I suspect it will be a problem in 6 months still like most things you break.

Sometimes I truly wonder if SOE ever tests anything. How can you adjust equations and not test them at all levels? I'm an engineer. I know you have to make sure that the parts you add that are new are compatible with the whole system. In all honesty it doesn't take an engineer to figure this out. Think outside that little box you call your cubicle.

Do you all have any trouble shooting teams working on this stuff?

They have once again done a great dis-service to their customers. Thanks again guys for the "help".

I read once that if you leave a monkey alone with a typewriter and alot of paper it will eventually write a great novel. Nuff said.

[KyrosKrane]

Um. Since that initial post on the front page, there have been a few updates between here and the EQ boards. The fix for this is already on Test, and it will be pushed out with the next patch. One of the devs has mentioned that it may be as soon as this coming Wednesday.

[Kakg]

One of the devs has mentioned that it may be as soon as this coming Wednesday.

Thank goodness as my mid level mage is having a terrible time with research. It's bad enough having to do all those practice runes anyway but having a reduced skillup chance on top of that is maknig my progress in levelling much much harder.

[sorourke]

I have to agree with the original poster. I have been very disappointed with this myself. Skilling up is a part of the game that is absolutely essential to a young character. And this just doesn't affect tradeskilling.....it's everything (offensive, defensive, special attacks, etc.) What would someone who just started this game think? I know I'd probably get frustrated and quit.

I am an engineer also, and I program PLCs and industrial controllers, so I can relate to the many variables that may be present....but it just seems like this would have been more of a priority.

[Ngreth Thergn]

I myself am not concerned with the bug itself happening. Stuff like this happens. The code is awfully complex, and ORIGINALLY had many problems that will probably NEVER be fixed because of the mass complexity. And because of that, bugs sneak in.

As for why the test server? Test server does not mean 0 bugs when a patch comes out. I am sorry, there has not been a SINGLE MMO that has come out with a major patch with absolutely zero bugs in it. And I doubt there ever will be. MMO's are just too complex, with way way way too many variables. *BUT* the test server DOES help find bugs, and many bugs ARE caught before they make it over. Without it, there would be 100-200 bugs each patch instead of 10-20. The Test server DOES do its job, it reduces the amount of bugs with patches, the test server just does not guarantee 100% bug free patches.

I can also see how this could have been missed. The priority was on testing TRADESKILLS after 150... and I am sure that was well tested... There was probably only minimal testing on bellow 150, and the little testing probably chalked up to the RNG evil runs of bad luck.

Despite this though, I am also concerned (not "disapointed") that they did not asign this bug higher priority. It does have a fairly large impact on the game. But then again, I can also see the other side of this. It was caused by a change to DIFFERENT code... that makes finding it a mess.

As for a reversal of the patch... I think their system, has a big problem with doing so, and is something they may want to invest some time in also. Last time they reversed a patch there were other widespread problems. And the final problem with reversing the patch... reversing the patch would likely have required a character rollback also... and well, since it took a while to confirm this bug, the rollback would have had a VERY adverse effect.

[Trellium]

More about Test Server:

* It's not always in sync with code going out to production. We might also have code being tested that isn't ready for release, so only a subset of the changes we see might be put live.

* Sometimes there are errors in the migration of code to production itself. A bug doesn't exist on Test but does on production, or oerhaps even some production servers have a bug and others don't. There have also been times when we see a bug on Test, bug report it, find it gets fixed, and the bugged code is released to live. It shouldn't happen but it isn't an issue with the workings of Test Server but rather in code migration.

* Some code bypasses Test Server altogether, especially "surprise!" code such as the Fabled mobs. We get them activated at about the same time as produciton servers, and in the case of expansions often not until several days after production servers get the expansion.

[Nolrog]

Um. Since that initial post on the front page, there have been a few updates between here and the EQ boards. The fix for this is already on Test, and it will be pushed out with the next patch. One of the devs has mentioned that it may be as soon as this coming Wednesday.

I can confirm that there will be a patch early tomorrow morning. It's got a 6 hour down time, so it seemst hat more than just the correct formula will be put in.

[Tellis Stormchaser]

Thank you for your prompt handling of this matter.

I can confirm that there will be a patch early tomorrow morning. It's got a 6 hour down time, so it seemst hat more than just the correct formula will be put in.

As I said in heading, Thank you for your prompt handling of this matter. According to the patch message you all 'fixed' this with today's patch. I'll try to run a quicky test tonight when I get online. But I'm sure some other people will beat me to it. Regardless, thank you.

[Ghismonda]

Today's patch message only makes reference to fixing tradeskills at lower levels. Does that mean that the enormous increase in combines required per skillup at the higher levels was not a result of this mistake, and is not a mistake at all? Certainly doesn't appear to be 20% increase at all...

[Tellis Stormchaser]

reread what I said to begin with

Today's patch message only makes reference to fixing tradeskills at lower levels. Does that mean that the enormous increase in combines required per skillup at the higher levels was not a result of this mistake, and is not a mistake at all? Certainly doesn't appear to be 20% increase at all...

a. My original post was about how they broke the lower levels while fixing the higher levels. Again thank SOE for getting on that.

b. If I understand how they fixed upper levels is they too the difficulty that once existed at the 170-200 ranger and moved it to the 200 (250?) to 300 range in addition to spreading the difficulty out. Now, I think read somewhere that we are looking at a 1 skill up per 36 combine from 250 to 300 on average. It was supposedly worse that that during the 180 to 200 levels.