Developer Feedback

Perenti · 02-29-2008, 12:21 AM

From my Guilds website:<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p>
<o:p></o:p>
"Here is the location for the IIRC chat the other nite.

http://eq2.allakhazam.com/wiki/Dev_Chat_Feb_28_2008

Lazaretto asks: Regarding VP - Is Druushk working as intended and did you mean to put the hardest mobs in the zone on the first floor? Many people consider the Druushk fight in its current form to be almost impossible without exploited mythical weapons.

What are your plans for this encounter specifically and for later encounters in the zone. Many raiders are frustrated with what they consider broken raid design

Lyndro: Druusk is a little harder than he was intended, and the fight has some "unfun" elements ffffffffffffffor sure (*cough*). That being said, it was intentional that Druushk and Nexona serve as gatekeepers for the epics. We’ve got some balance changes coming to Druushk that should make the fight a little more accessible. <o:p></o:p>

Maverick: The paladin forums are awash with complaints about the 'perceived' design flaws in the paladin epic, and the disparity between it and the other fighter epics. The response to this has been locking of topic that are critical in nature. Do the devs ever plan to actually address this concern held by many of the class?

Lyndro: We are looking at all of the epics as a whole. We don't plan on doing spot checks (Aside from bug fixes) with hotfixes or the regular game updates. In an upcoming update we plan on evaluating all the epics (Feedback and all) and making changes to them all at once. Some may change, some may not, some may get better, some may not. We don't have an ETA now, but EQ II is a live game and epics are high profile. We want to do them justice. <o:p></o:p>

Runaf: Are there any scheduled changes planned for the swashbuckler VP armor set bonuses and epic effects, and if so is there any sort of timeline scheduled?

Archonix: We're currently the set bonus changes for all of the Kunark raid armor sets (Swashbucklers VP set included). No details as of yet, but I'm hoping they'll be out on the test server sooner rather then later."

Looks hopeful but I will judge them on results and how long it takes...

Oizen · 02-29-2008, 04:01 AM

QFE

Quote:

Originally Posted by Maverick

The paladin forums are awash with complaints about the 'perceived' design flaws in the paladin epic, and the disparity between it and the other fighter epics. The response to this has been locking of topic that are critical in nature. Do the devs ever plan to actually address this concern held by many of the class?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lyndro

We are looking at all of the epics as a whole. We don't plan on doing spot checks (Aside from bug fixes) with hotfixes or the regular game updates. In an upcoming update we plan on evaluating all the epics (Feedback and all) and making changes to them all at once. Some may change, some may not, some may get better, some may not. We don't have an ETA now, but EQ II is a live game and epics are high profile. We want to do them justice.

Nice job Mav.

Maveric_LOL · 02-29-2008, 07:00 AM

Bloo! your just all over the place man!

I was surprised that they actually passed my question to the devs, with my poor typing and all lol.

What was telling though was the long lag time between when the mods posted the question and the devs first response, it took them according to the look back at my logs just now, a full 7 miniutes to generate a response, longest response time by far of any question.

This was noticed by many and was commented on in the free for all channel at the time.

Posted here below, is the excerpt from the #eq2-ffa (free for all channel) of the applicable period from my chat logs.

[20:59] <kaalenarc> long time for an answer to the pally question...
[20:59] <Matak> why are they taking so long to answer?
[20:59] <Laeadil> lol Boy, those are some huge crickets on that question.
[20:59] <Tenamdar> It's kind of a pointed question
[20:59] <Skandragon> They're deleting all paladin, give them time.
[20:59] <Riftone> they have to make something up
[20:59] <Felishanna> there does appear a long lag, yes hehe.
[20:59] <Bozidar> ROFL SKAN!
[20:59] <Vortextank> they are either writing an essay, or wondering what to say
[20:59] <@Tamat> poor Pallys
[20:59] <Neiloch> loks liek a question got through they didnt want to answer lol
[21:00] <@kiara> they're nerfing the rangers right now... hold on
[21:00] <Neiloch> lol
[21:00] <Edavi> haha
[21:00] <EQdragowulf> It's because they didn't have it pre-written
[21:00] <Vortextank> haha
[21:00] <@kiara> they can only type code so fast
[21:00] <kaalenarc> haha
[21:00] <sabershadowkat> lol
[21:00] <Skandragon> UPDATE characters SET class='Shadowknight' where class='Paladin';
[21:00] <@kiara> well what fun would it be if we let them prewrite their answers :p
[21:00] <@Bludwyng> OMG, Rothgar has the Nerf-bat(tm)!
[21:00] <Matak> skan, lol
06[21:00] * Telkon watches nobody answer that question on the q and a tab
[21:00] <EQdragowulf> Rothgar is a programmer
[21:00] <RULlawyer> This dev chat started well, but like all stories in EQ2 they go unfinished.
[21:01] <@Bludwyng> she is working on it
[21:01] <eq2luv> Am I LD? oh no ig uess the devs are still there
[21:01] <Edavi> yea give her a minute haha shes typing
[21:01] <kelaEQ2> don't forget that many devs type with a Broomstick handle from across the room
[21:01] <DarkShadow> wow really taking there time with paladin ?
[21:01] <sabershadowkat> I'm suprised it was a Pally epic, as I hadn't heard that complaint before; mostly I heard Illus, Inq, and 'locks. For the Fabled version.
[21:01] <Skandragon> We have like... 8 devs. Can't we answer say, 2 questions at a time?

[21:01] <Edavi> its hard to PVP for fun when the Exiles kill you everywhere you go
[21:01] <@Bludwyng> not everyone chats at raid speed
[21:01] <Matak> how many devs are there on the team total?
[21:01] <kett> the devs went ld
[21:01] <Bozidar> skan ; yeah.. let's pop another while she answers that
[21:02] <kaalenarc> yeah - ALL their keyboards spontaneously stopped? ROFL
[21:02] <Bozidar> lol kiara
[21:02] <Vortextank> haha
[21:02] <cheddars_> all devs are idle
[21:02] <Riftone> plug pulled
[21:02] <Skandragon> The dev's epic weapon mob spawned another placeholder, and they went to kill it.
[21:02] <RULlawyer> LoL Kiara
[21:02] <Bozidar> HAX!
[21:02] <@Tamat> Owned
[21:02] <Muligan> Well I just want them to say no that's not going to happen or we are working on this...
[21:02] <EQdragowulf> lol kiara
[21:02] <Bozidar> the SK dev pulled the ethernet cable to the router
[21:02] <kaalenarc> lol
[21:02] <Tenamdar> DUDE! Lyndro type's SLOW LOL
[21:02] <cheddars_> k this dev chat sucks
[21:02] <RULlawyer> WHat a lame answer with no substance!!!
[21:02] <Tenamdar> ALL that time FOR THAT hehe
[21:02] <Tenamdar>

[21:02] <Tenamdar> j/k
[21:02] <ShandrisNZ> that wasnt really an answer

They came back a few miniutes later and said they knew a lot of people had questions about their various classes epics. It seems they are taking a lot of flack for the design of many of the epics.

Perenti · 02-29-2008, 11:29 AM

Well done Mav

So how long until we heard anything on this if they hadnt been ambushed with this question?

No timeframe? GU44, GU 45, GU46? How many months off might that be?

Well at least we know they are looking at class VP gear and Epic changes, hmm maybe they are boosting our healing?

Maveric_LOL · 02-29-2008, 01:37 PM

Well the content for the next GU (44 i think it is) is already on test and the devs said would be patched live next week.

The devs also stated that the art for the guild halls had just been completed at the SOGA studios, or was ready for hand over, something to that effect so i assume that will get pushed through in house testing and then to test for the subsequent GU since that is something they have been speaking on since November or so.

I imagine that along with what ever bug fixes come up between now and then will take up most of their time. Of course i dunno how long the guild halls coding stuff will take, maybe they can squeeze in the updates to epic....even if they only do a few at a time starting with the ones of most concern.

Pinski · 02-29-2008, 01:48 PM

The next GU is 43.

GU 44 will be in late march/early april.

Vainamoinen · 02-29-2008, 02:10 PM

I like how you got the "topic locking" in there /thumbsup

Diplomatically veiled answer, but an insufferable optimist like me sees it as a positive answer.

Oizen · 02-29-2008, 03:16 PM

...and you should Vain. In this case it stands to reason that we might expect positive results with a positive attitude.

Chin up, Perenti. There is wisdom in silence sometimes. Rest assured that SoE is genuinely concerned with our feedback and is most definitely keeping tabs.

The god of Norrath can't come right out and say whoopsie or the entire religion will be brought into question and SoE can't react to negativity or the sadpandas will all jump on that as the way to get things done.

Our positive, constructive, factual feedback is the best approach at this point. It's much easier for them to make changes and respond if the community isn't negative. Like I said, if they respond to crying, then crying will be the standard for change in the entire player community... this game will quickly devolve into sucksville.

The more unified, clearly and constructively we speak as a community, the more likely we will be heard.

Perenti · 03-01-2008, 09:52 AM

Good points Oisin and you will note I havent been saying we should all betray or cancel our accounts (as have some).

Yes they do need facts and analysis.

However SOE have been notorious in their poor CS and in particular with commmunication about gameplay issues. You basically have to set youself on fire to get a response on anything. You cant sit back and say "well they are dealing with it" if you have no indication that thats happening.

Often all it needs is a short message "Hi I am Dev Blogs, we are looking at this please post any constructive suggestions and we will consider them, do not expect frequent posts from us on this but we are addressing it."

Many Oz players will remember the bloody fight we had over the 4am PST patch business (middle of our prime time) and know that we had to point out the bleeding obvious ad nauseum, to get them to understand what our problem was, or indeed to understand that they had customers in the Southern Hemisphere and that Off Peak players werent solely Rocky Mountain playing time.

We had messages from SOE people (eventually) that indicated they couldnt find the Pacific Ocean if it was nailed to their ass.

Anyway, yes I am pleased that there has been a positive response, no I am not pleased there was no comment in a main stream SOE forum, no I am not pleased that someone had to lever this info out of them on a public live forum for us to hear it at all.

There is no estimate of when the changes will be in either.

What they have trained me to do in past situations is to be bloody minded and persistent, to keep threads active, and to be bloody cynical about any feel good announcements with no (at least rough) timelines.

There is a wider issue on how these itemisation and Epic problems occured in the first place, not just for Paladins but for others also.

Onra · 03-02-2008, 09:35 PM

At least they are looking into it