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Why is every module launch a complete trainwreck and catastrophe?
pandora1x
Member Posts: 725 Arc User
Every.Single.Time.
It takes the whole day (10+ hours) to fix an issue.
The only modules that weren't this HAMSTER were module 1 and 2... This game went downhill from that IceWind dale release.
It takes the whole day (10+ hours) to fix an issue.
The only modules that weren't this HAMSTER were module 1 and 2... This game went downhill from that IceWind dale release.
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Module 1 to 2 was the golden era of this game.
I seriously think we have different higher-ups taking care of the game now, and not the same ones from module 1 and 2. (I know about 12 employees got fired a while ago, not talking about those).
Sekhmet@kvetchus_
Guilds: Greycloaks, Blackcloaks, Whitecloaks, Goldcloaks, Browncloaks, Spiritcloaks, Bluecloaks, Silvercloaks, Black Dawn
Tredecim: The Cloak Alliance
> Nor do I believe that these issues were not caused by the migration itself. The odds of a router or any other piece of hardware bailing on you during 5 consecutive migrations are astronomically small even on a poorly maintained infrastructure. And even then it doesn't take 10h to replace said hardware.
Well, you don't expect the Devs to point the finger of blame upon themselves now do you?
Nice rhyme
There are some serious employee/management issues within this company if you ask me. If I screwed up even 1/10th as much as the people running this game do, I'd be out of a job. And I'm not even in a heavy competition market...
I'm not a Cryptic apologist, but let's not get into unnecessary mud-slinging at the devs here. The underlying computer code that is Neverwinter (or any MMO for that matter) is a massive cesspool of spaghetti code and masking tape holding everything together. It's all intertwined with itself and when something gets change, added, or removed it affects the other end of each noodle that was touched.
So have a little understanding of what's really going on and perhaps a little mercy for the good people who really are working their azzez off to make all this stuff work the way they (and we) expect it to.
Yes: every major update seems a train-wreck. This is avoided as much as possible. The laughable part of this entire thread is how the OP apparently didn't see the (always happening) train-wreck and hence: prepare for what is the inevitable. Whining about will help a total of 0 (zero) percent.
I blame Minsc.
The bold text was my alteration.
Did you seriously just blame all the victims? For the acts of the perpetrators? This line of questioning always fails in any court of law and it fails here. Perhaps a rethink is in order.
they seem to have two sets of "test" servers.. with 1 being private the other public, and the public one only gets a smattering of the "patches" and i think the private one might have 2 dozen people on it
http://blog.nwo-uncensored.com/player-banned-over-ridiculous-fair-use-policy/
1. PWI in China is being taken private. No one knows how successful this will be but anyone who has been keeping up with the news on China knows they are right in the midst of their version of the Great Crash of 1929. It really is that bad over there. 80% of stockmarket investors in China were ordinary individuals (unlike in the West where the vast majority of the market are huge financial institutions). A huge chunk of these people lost everything when China's stockmarket crashed. I'm pretty sure at least some budget cuts were handed down to every single PWI owned dev team and some more than most. Cryptic is one of the ones that took it on the chin. From the evidence it seems they took it heavier than most.
2. D&D is an IP MMO. That means Cryptic and PWI had to sign a contract with Wizards of the Coast (aka Hasbro). Most likely at least part of the contract covered "reasonable" co-ordinated release of products so both companies could synergize their products and marketing off each other. Notice how most every module has been released within weeks (sometimes within days) when Wizards release their latest D&D tabletop product? [Heck, most of the time the Mod and the tabletop product sport the exact same name.] That has the thumbprint of "contractual obligation" all over it. This contract was made when China, PWI and Cryptic were having significantly better times than what they are going through today.
So Cryptic is running on fumes employee-wise to support all their IP games (not just D&D) with a reduced staff. If they're like most companies they will never let on how many employees are left. But they are contractually obligated to produce new content for Neverwinter - otherwise Wizards could rightfully yank the IP from Cryptic for breach of contract.
I really think at least some of this is what is going on. Cryptic is damned if they do and damned if they don't. Slow down to fix bugs to what their much smaller employee team can realistically support and WotC and Hasbro have grounds to yank the IP. Release the content so as to not get it yanked and they end up ticking off their playerbase.
As I see it it's a no-win situation for everyone so they release as best they can and hope that enough players will suffer through the major bugs without leaving for good. Players do suffer. I'm not trying to refute that. But my guess is employee morale at Cryptic is likely not what it once was either.
Again...this is just my theory. I don't have insider information but it doesn't seem unreasonable to me. I can't imagine Cryptic employees are blind to the player anger leveled at them each time a new mod is out. But the fact that it keeps on happening makes me think there's more going on behind the scenes than what players keep seeing.
Anyone who watched the Strongholds dev stream should have some idea.
"Sean made basically everything you see in Strongholds! So... was that hard, Sean?"
Mad props, Sean.
Neverwinter Census 2017
All posts pending disapproval by Cecilia
As for the new mod, it simply dont offer enough. I have to go back to do 3 Icewind dale and Well of dragons mission? For real? I have to tell you, that people mostly hate dailys, i was glad I finished them, and I refuse to even think about getting back to those areas. That's what you call a new mod? Yeah we will be able to build some new boon structures, but for what content? Only playable dundgeons are elol, VT, and ECC, and we all know why people go to the last. You can go to Tos with 3k+ team, even GWD, but for what? Some seal? Tiamat is screwed. Mod 8 pvp will have issues too, maybe it will be good, maybe not, but some or most of the people here dont like pvp. I liked back in mod 2-5, that I could chosse from 10+ dungeons, even get some AD from them.
I have to tell you, Heroic encounters are not fun, they are not really a content. Dragon slaying for the 5557th time is not fun at all. And with all the lag issues, the amateurish bugs it is really annoying right now.
many players out of the game? (Or stuck in Safe Mode) Am worried that
they'll do the math and figure losing X-percentage of players isn't worth
the time to track down the flaws.
While I do empathize with the devs, that does not relieve them of a certain percentage of the responsibility for the game's current state. I work in IT so I know from whence I speak. When our servers have installed a borked Microsoft update, do the users call MS or me? They call me because I'm the face of the services that we provide. MS couldn't care less if I have to stay here for 36 hours straight fixing something they screwed up.
The devs post on here (albeit rarely these days compared to just 6 months ago) so they are the targets of our ire. If we had a representative of upper management in here, that person would draw our anger just as much if not more. Personal note - I'm convinced that if the project managers would give the devs enough time/resources, this game could be "fixed" in short order.
So, moving forward, how do we help Cryptic help us? I honestly have no idea. I have stopped testing stuff on Preview (mostly) because some of the most glaring bugs/exploits on PTS make it to Live anyway. Why bother?
My advice - expect the train wreck; embrace the chaos. Step off the tracks, have a drink or three, spend time with humans. The devs will get it fixed; just not as quickly as we'd like sometimes. It's a game folks, not a vocation.
Final thought - would we still play the game if Cryptic lost the DnD licensing? I probably would.
They've already done that math, and continue to do it every day... instead of staffing up QA, they probably hired an actuarial scientist to do just such an analysis. It really does feel that calculated sometimes.
Sekhmet@kvetchus_
Guilds: Greycloaks, Blackcloaks, Whitecloaks, Goldcloaks, Browncloaks, Spiritcloaks, Bluecloaks, Silvercloaks, Black Dawn
Tredecim: The Cloak Alliance
It is interesting you believe that. Perhaps you are right.
Speaking only for myself I'm not quite so sure that upper management has that much room to increase Cryptic's dev budget for NW if they still want to have a job there. Namely because of what's going on in China right now. Request an increase in budget to the new private owner - especially in the face of declining revenue and playerbase each quarter and he (the new owner) may see that as the reason to sell Cryptic off completely (which would mean at least some likely upper managers would be standing in an unemployment line soon) or shut it down (meaning all upper management would be standing in an unemployment line soon) - to say nothing of rank and file staff. I'm guessing that upper management likely want to avoid giving their new Chinese Overlord a reason to do either.
I suppose they could completely re-assign the percentage each MMO gets with Cryptic's existing budget but if that was the case I'm not sure NW would come out the same and it might end up in an even worse state dev-support-wise than before.
Of course all of this is speculation on my part as I'll readily admit. Maybe a new owner for Cryptic would do them good. Likely though no one will ever know.
I'm having a hard time thinking of a time a new owner has been a good thing. Maybe ddo, but even that had a rough period iirc.
As far as OP question goes.
Not enough testing and QA, and not having enough time due to whatever, lack of employees, deadlines, whatever. (Probably testing is there, but then lack of QA cause of the other things)
Fox Stevenson - Sandblast
Oh Wonder - Without You
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
- Dylan Thomas
As I understand it, City of Heroes did pretty well after it changed hands - except for the whole getting shut down because, 5 years later, the parent company of the new studio decided to shut it down thing. Erm. If you're not familiar with it...... City of Heros was originally a Cryptic game until they sold the IP.
Sekhmet@kvetchus_
Guilds: Greycloaks, Blackcloaks, Whitecloaks, Goldcloaks, Browncloaks, Spiritcloaks, Bluecloaks, Silvercloaks, Black Dawn
Tredecim: The Cloak Alliance