I have to say that this update is quite scary. I haven't upgraded anything since the upgrade system went live, so every piece of equipment I own will be replaced with a new version that hopefully won't be bugged. I even own items that you can no longer get in the game, such as the old anti-Borg guns from before the Omega rep.
Flyingtarg, out of curiosity, how are the TP values for items stored? Two items with exactly the same mark, rarity, and modifiers could have different TP values, depending on how much was spent upgrading the items. For example, Alice's Phaser Sniper Rifle Mk XII could have a different TP value than Bob's Phaser Sniper Rifle Mk XII. It seems to me that every instance of an item (not just every permutation) would need separate storage. You can use programming technobabble in your explanation if you wish; I'll probably understand it.
P.S. Why isn't this thread stickied?
The TP values are stored in the same place on the Dynamic Items that we store Mark Level, Quality, and the mods of your item. It's just a number in our database attached to your individual item.
Daniel "FlyingTarg" Razza
Star Trek Online Lead Programmer
It will change to match the "latest" appearance. So all Mark 11 Wide Beam Plasma pistols will look the same, but will all look different from the Mark 2 version.
The TP values are stored in the same place on the Dynamic Items that we store Mark Level, Quality, and the mods of your item. It's just a number in our database attached to your individual item.
Let me see if I understand you correctly. There is a database table with the columns Mark, Quality, Modifier1,...,Modifier5, and TP. The table has a separate row for every item in the game. Different items owned by different players, or even different items owned by the same player, would have separate rows. Does it work something like that?
I've seen this "change to a dynamic item" in person already.
In fact, in order to change any item from the old standard to the new standard, all one needs to do is open the upgrade tab and place the item in the box, it'll convert instantly (with no upgrade stuff spent).
Often this is changing "8" (turn that sideways) into Mk XII
What this means for us is that development will be faster and easier, and we can that much more rapidly and efficiently bring you more content.
First of all, I want to say I'm appreciable of the wall-of-text. I know people think I'm weird for saying so, but I prefer extremely detailed exposition from developers to marketing buzzwords. That being said, this quote of yours seemed (at least to me) out of character, since it seemed more like something marketing would say.
Could you give us an example of this "rapid and efficient development of content" with the present system, as compared to the old?
However, there is the chance that we missed something important in our item conversion process. If we did miss something, it would manifest in one of two ways: Either the item will appear as a black box in your inventory that cannot be moved or deleted, or the item will either be incorrect as a whole, or will have incorrect quality, mark level or mods. If you see any of those problems on Tribble, please let us know immediately in this thread.
I have not stepped foot in Tribble for months (if not a year or more), but due to your exceptional efforts, I'll start it back up and see if any of these problems exist. If I have any of these issues, I will let you know.
If any of these issues I reported show up on the holodeck build for Season 10, I am not going to be happy.
Let me see if I understand you correctly. There is a database table with the columns Mark, Quality, Modifier1,...,Modifier5, and TP. The table has a separate row for every item in the game. Different items owned by different players, or even different items owned by the same player, would have separate rows. Does it work something like that?
It works sort of like that. The only thing that's really incorrect there is that it's not really a table. Because it's not a table, it's not Modifier1,...,Modifier5, it's actually a true array of modifiers that can be infinitely long if we so choose.
Daniel "FlyingTarg" Razza
Star Trek Online Lead Programmer
You guys need to do this for your 'ship's interior system' too because in reading Dev posts of that past, you made/copied single interior maps for EACH Bridge - and with Small/Medium/Large layouts that's a lot in individual maps.
I'mm never understand why you guys just didn't make three internal map layouts (Small/Medium/Large); and have the Bridge connect dynamically to the layout a player had chosen when he 'visits' his/her Bridge (and internal ship) Like with the items it would make upgrading internal ship layouts easier as you're only dealing with 3 instance of an internal map and not and individual map for EVERY Bridge made in the game.
With how it is now, no wonder we'll never see internal ship layouts altered to the new tutorial style internal layout.
Formerly known as Armsman from June 2008 to June 20, 2012 PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."
First of all, I want to say I'm appreciable of the wall-of-text. I know people think I'm weird for saying so, but I prefer extremely detailed exposition from developers to marketing buzzwords. That being said, this quote of yours seemed (at least to me) out of character, since it seemed more like something marketing would say.
Could you give us an example of this "rapid and efficient development of content" with the present system, as compared to the old?
Sure, I'll lay it out plainly. When we need to start up a server locally, it nearly takes half the time it used to. Considering that every single developer is starting up a server probably multiple times a day, that alone is giving back 15-30 minutes of developer time a day. Add in that we regularly work with tools that need to access the item list, and we might be talking more than half an hour of developer time we get back.
So it's not that we're changing how we develop, we're literally just getting more time for development every day by reducing a lot of the waiting time we've had to deal with.
Some parts of the team, such as the Systems Team, will likely see more gains than others. Artists, for example, don't have to delve into the item database as often.
Daniel "FlyingTarg" Razza
Star Trek Online Lead Programmer
It works sort of like that. The only thing that's really incorrect there is that it's not really a table. Because it's not a table, it's not Modifier1,...,Modifier5, it's actually a true array of modifiers that can be infinitely long if we so choose.
Like... loot roll tables for magical items in the DM guide for tabletop D&D?
So it's not that we're changing how we develop, we're literally just getting more time for development every day by reducing a lot of the waiting time we've had to deal with.
Ugh, I do remember how long it took to open up module files in the editor for the older Neverwinter Nights games. I can relate (at least a little bit, on a much smaller scale).
I wonder if this will help with the lag from using ground powers. Since its not always been fluid most of time I can hit the 1 key about 10 times before it ever fires lol. It isn't something new but one reason a lot of players aren't very good at ground/away team combat is due to the fact that they don't understand you have to plan ahead even though you always lose time on those skills and especially the ones that have been broken forever like the anesthezine gas.
Some may call it flaming or trolling but its not when it comes to one of the biggest turn offs is when something doesn't work right. Then it its even more frustrating when its been 4+ years stuff like this goes unchecked and devalues the content if its just swept under the rug and eventually considered as is by a developer.
Sure, I'll lay it out plainly. When we need to start up a server locally, it nearly takes half the time it used to. Considering that every single developer is starting up a server probably multiple times a day, that alone is giving back 15-30 minutes of developer time a day. Add in that we regularly work with tools that need to access the item list, and we might be talking more than half an hour of developer time we get back.
So it's not that we're changing how we develop, we're literally just getting more time for development every day by reducing a lot of the waiting time we've had to deal with.
Some parts of the team, such as the Systems Team, will likely see more gains than others. Artists, for example, don't have to delve into the item database as often.
It works sort of like that. The only thing that's really incorrect there is that it's not really a table. Because it's not a table, it's not Modifier1,...,Modifier5, it's actually a true array of modifiers that can be infinitely long if we so choose.
That's interesting. So the back end for this isn't an RDBMS.
If this cuts down on our file size on the disk and it cuts down the amount of "downtime" the server has to make for when we're playing. Great.
All I can say is that I feel like the server will be clogged up when you activate the upgrade scripts, or will the having the new system already running make the transition quicker?
No promises on that front. For the most part, the items that were deleted were all fairly consistent in how they worked. But there might be a few things that were inconsistent or not working correctly before that were changed to work correctly after.
Guess that could have gotten more into the interaction of abilities and items with where the two met, and whether it was in the item or in the ability. Like things in the past where Tet didn't receive the same boost from FAW that other energy types did. Just made it look like the FAW modifiers were part of the item sort of thing.
BTW, thanks for taking the time to answer folks here.
If this cuts down on our file size on the disk and it cuts down the amount of "downtime" the server has to make for when we're playing. Great.
All I can say is that I feel like the server will be clogged up when you activate the upgrade scripts, or will the having the new system already running make the transition quicker?
There will be some slowdown when the upgrade happens. There's a very strong chance that we will lower Holodeck's player capacity temporarily at the launch of Season 10 to accomodate the upgrade script. This is pretty standard operating procedure for these sorts of changes. Usually the first few hours of the release have aggressive caps (Which means login queues, sorry guys), but we relax them as the day goes by. Typically after the first day the login queues are no longer necessary.
Daniel "FlyingTarg" Razza
Star Trek Online Lead Programmer
It will change to match the "latest" appearance. So all Mark 11 Wide Beam Plasma pistols will look the same, but will all look different from the Mark 2 version.
Ugh, can we please reconsider this? I would much rather have weapons with MK 1-4 graphics (even if I have to put in the work using the annoying upgrade system), then the super ugly versions at the higher levels. I would like to be able to have weapons that look like they were on the shows/films, then forced to use the versions with the pointless blue disco lights on them...
Thumbs up to the Dev team for the excellent communications in their upcoming changes in the game and there responses to player questions
I have a good feeling about this change just from their responses
Jellico....Engineer ground.....Da'val Romulan space Sci
Saphire.. Science ground......Ko'el Romulan space Tac
Leva........Tactical ground.....Koj Romulan space Eng
JJ-Verse will never be Canon or considered Lore...It will always be JJ-Verse
There will be some slowdown when the upgrade happens. There's a very strong chance that we will lower Holodeck's player capacity temporarily at the launch of Season 10 to accomodate the upgrade script. This is pretty standard operating procedure for these sorts of changes. Usually the first few hours of the release have aggressive caps (Which means login queues, sorry guys), but we relax them as the day goes by. Typically after the first day the login queues are no longer necessary.
Thanks for the heads up. I might recommend including this information in big letters wherever you can advertise it to the players so that nobody can say they are surprised at the queues and that they were not adequately informed as to why. What you've written here should suffice, if you guys can get that in everybody's face before this goes live.
Christian Gaming Community Fleets--Faith, Fun, and Fellowship! See the website and PM for more. :-) Proudly F2P.Signature image by gulberat. Avatar image by balsavor.deviantart.com.
Okay i dont get hopefull but this got me even kinda happy .......I just hope they can work out all the bugs if it was a wall of test to explian omg imgine the work.......good work devs on a good ideal......
interesting idea , give players a change modifiers on things , the idea quite fresh and original . and that if the players to give more opportunity to change the type of weapon damage by (for example) . how to say it would be interesting to look at Faeht shooting antiproton lance , or you can specify a 360 -degree beams elachi type of damage and vizual effect.
These "Black Boxes" Where an old Broken Item should be, Would it have the Tooltip or "Hover"info of the old item so we knew which item it was that is broken and should be there?
I sincerely doubt this would have any impact on any server lag you're experiencing. For the most part, the servers are running at the full speed we expect them to run. Any sources of lag you're experiencing are likely not related directly to the server processes themselves, but are more likely due to network issues unrelated to the actual server hardware or processes.
Could it fix the Exchange lag? Lol, that one is beyond horrible.
There are a lot of items out there especially the pure mules I have some of them I forgot their login info but there is one per say where this thread talks about all those items. This one I have it has like 5 characters that each have a maxed fleet tabs of stuff like large hypos and stuff because used to be long long ago KDF had no vendors for that stuff so to avoid exchange lag and TRIBBLE since its always existed in this game had a reserve stockpile of stuff like that... most likely contributes to the 18% of us at one point that all had setups like that so you are prolly looking at hundreds of thousands of TRIBBLE in the game no one is ever going to use.
Make no mistake, this will probably break quite a few items when it goes live.
But damn, I'm impressed by flyingtarg's presence in this thread and his helpful answers. Overall, we now know to expect changes and have time to prepare (check items, possibly screenshot them) and we're upront informed of things that may not be pretty, but are needed (limited admission on servers temporarily after Season 10 hits).
For all that, big thumbs up from me.
Another set of 'special' items I can think of is the non-lobi and non-reputation version of the Nukara ground set. That one has been obtainable from reward boxes when Nukara adventure zone was released.
TOIVA, Toi Vaxx, Toia Vix, Toveg, T'vritha, To Vrax: Bring in the Allegiance class. Toi'Va, Ti'vath, Toivia, Ty'Vris, Tia Vex, Toi'Virth: Add Tier 6 KDF Carrier and Raider. Tae'Va, T'Vaya, To'Var, Tevra, T'Vira, To'Vrak: Give us Asylums for Romulans.
These "Black Boxes" Where an old Broken Item should be, Would it have the Tooltip or "Hover"info of the old item so we knew which item it was that is broken and should be there?
Otherwise this feels like a snipe hunt...
I also have that same question. I checked Tribble and thoroughly scanned my bank and personal inventory and saw that everything appeared to WAI.
Unless this black box is extremely obvious, I don't think I can find it.
These "Black Boxes" Where an old Broken Item should be, Would it have the Tooltip or "Hover"info of the old item so we knew which item it was that is broken and should be there?
Otherwise this feels like a snipe hunt...
It appears to be a slightly blue/navy background vs the normal black/shaded background.
You can right-click the item and get a context menu as well. However, all information is completely blank.
The only instance of missing items I've found so far appears to be due to a "phantom" equipped item on a ship.
My Romulan "Console - Science - Particle Generators Mk XII [-Th] [Pla]" are showing on ship B as equipped on ship A on Holodeck. These items no longer exist, however, as they have been converted to the new system. Yet the phantom item is of the old version and is still showing on the ship B while the new version is on ship A.
On Tribble, this shows up as a deleted item on ship B.
That certainly explains some of the bumps in the road with the upgrade system, as well as some of its stranger quirks. Good to hear the system is being upgraded though. Would love to see more posts like this, it very clearly explained a current issue, why it is an issue, what is being done to fix it, what we can expect to see happen and why.
I'm starting to think the reason we can't craft or upgrade kits or kit modules is that they haven't been updated to this new "dynamic item" system yet. It's a good bet that the old kits from before the kit revamp have not been updated. I'm less sure about kit frames and kit modules. What will happen to the old kits, kit frames, and kit modules once this change goes live?
Comments
The TP values are stored in the same place on the Dynamic Items that we store Mark Level, Quality, and the mods of your item. It's just a number in our database attached to your individual item.
Star Trek Online Lead Programmer
All I have to say to this is... "Yay!
thank you for answering my question.
Let me see if I understand you correctly. There is a database table with the columns Mark, Quality, Modifier1,...,Modifier5, and TP. The table has a separate row for every item in the game. Different items owned by different players, or even different items owned by the same player, would have separate rows. Does it work something like that?
In fact, in order to change any item from the old standard to the new standard, all one needs to do is open the upgrade tab and place the item in the box, it'll convert instantly (with no upgrade stuff spent).
Often this is changing "8" (turn that sideways) into Mk XII
First of all, I want to say I'm appreciable of the wall-of-text. I know people think I'm weird for saying so, but I prefer extremely detailed exposition from developers to marketing buzzwords. That being said, this quote of yours seemed (at least to me) out of character, since it seemed more like something marketing would say.
Could you give us an example of this "rapid and efficient development of content" with the present system, as compared to the old?
I have not stepped foot in Tribble for months (if not a year or more), but due to your exceptional efforts, I'll start it back up and see if any of these problems exist. If I have any of these issues, I will let you know.
If any of these issues I reported show up on the holodeck build for Season 10, I am not going to be happy.
I'm pretty sure that sideways '8' is meant to be an infinity sign.
It works sort of like that. The only thing that's really incorrect there is that it's not really a table. Because it's not a table, it's not Modifier1,...,Modifier5, it's actually a true array of modifiers that can be infinitely long if we so choose.
Star Trek Online Lead Programmer
I'mm never understand why you guys just didn't make three internal map layouts (Small/Medium/Large); and have the Bridge connect dynamically to the layout a player had chosen when he 'visits' his/her Bridge (and internal ship) Like with the items it would make upgrading internal ship layouts easier as you're only dealing with 3 instance of an internal map and not and individual map for EVERY Bridge made in the game.
With how it is now, no wonder we'll never see internal ship layouts altered to the new tutorial style internal layout.
PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."
Sure, I'll lay it out plainly. When we need to start up a server locally, it nearly takes half the time it used to. Considering that every single developer is starting up a server probably multiple times a day, that alone is giving back 15-30 minutes of developer time a day. Add in that we regularly work with tools that need to access the item list, and we might be talking more than half an hour of developer time we get back.
So it's not that we're changing how we develop, we're literally just getting more time for development every day by reducing a lot of the waiting time we've had to deal with.
Some parts of the team, such as the Systems Team, will likely see more gains than others. Artists, for example, don't have to delve into the item database as often.
Star Trek Online Lead Programmer
Like... loot roll tables for magical items in the DM guide for tabletop D&D?
Ugh, I do remember how long it took to open up module files in the editor for the older Neverwinter Nights games. I can relate (at least a little bit, on a much smaller scale).
Some may call it flaming or trolling but its not when it comes to one of the biggest turn offs is when something doesn't work right. Then it its even more frustrating when its been 4+ years stuff like this goes unchecked and devalues the content if its just swept under the rug and eventually considered as is by a developer.
That makes perfect sense. Thanks!
That's interesting. So the back end for this isn't an RDBMS.
All I can say is that I feel like the server will be clogged up when you activate the upgrade scripts, or will the having the new system already running make the transition quicker?
Guess that could have gotten more into the interaction of abilities and items with where the two met, and whether it was in the item or in the ability. Like things in the past where Tet didn't receive the same boost from FAW that other energy types did. Just made it look like the FAW modifiers were part of the item sort of thing.
BTW, thanks for taking the time to answer folks here.
There will be some slowdown when the upgrade happens. There's a very strong chance that we will lower Holodeck's player capacity temporarily at the launch of Season 10 to accomodate the upgrade script. This is pretty standard operating procedure for these sorts of changes. Usually the first few hours of the release have aggressive caps (Which means login queues, sorry guys), but we relax them as the day goes by. Typically after the first day the login queues are no longer necessary.
Star Trek Online Lead Programmer
Ugh, can we please reconsider this? I would much rather have weapons with MK 1-4 graphics (even if I have to put in the work using the annoying upgrade system), then the super ugly versions at the higher levels. I would like to be able to have weapons that look like they were on the shows/films, then forced to use the versions with the pointless blue disco lights on them...
I have a good feeling about this change just from their responses
Saphire.. Science ground......Ko'el Romulan space Tac
Leva........Tactical ground.....Koj Romulan space Eng
JJ-Verse will never be Canon or considered Lore...It will always be JJ-Verse
Thanks for the heads up. I might recommend including this information in big letters wherever you can advertise it to the players so that nobody can say they are surprised at the queues and that they were not adequately informed as to why. What you've written here should suffice, if you guys can get that in everybody's face before this goes live.
Christian Gaming Community Fleets--Faith, Fun, and Fellowship! See the website and PM for more. :-)
Proudly F2P. Signature image by gulberat. Avatar image by balsavor.deviantart.com.
These "Black Boxes" Where an old Broken Item should be, Would it have the Tooltip or "Hover"info of the old item so we knew which item it was that is broken and should be there?
Otherwise this feels like a snipe hunt...
Could it fix the Exchange lag? Lol, that one is beyond horrible.
Actually that makes sense... will it?
Well they could maybe fix the whole game lol.
There are a lot of items out there especially the pure mules I have some of them I forgot their login info but there is one per say where this thread talks about all those items. This one I have it has like 5 characters that each have a maxed fleet tabs of stuff like large hypos and stuff because used to be long long ago KDF had no vendors for that stuff so to avoid exchange lag and TRIBBLE since its always existed in this game had a reserve stockpile of stuff like that... most likely contributes to the 18% of us at one point that all had setups like that so you are prolly looking at hundreds of thousands of TRIBBLE in the game no one is ever going to use.
But damn, I'm impressed by flyingtarg's presence in this thread and his helpful answers. Overall, we now know to expect changes and have time to prepare (check items, possibly screenshot them) and we're upront informed of things that may not be pretty, but are needed (limited admission on servers temporarily after Season 10 hits).
For all that, big thumbs up from me.
Another set of 'special' items I can think of is the non-lobi and non-reputation version of the Nukara ground set. That one has been obtainable from reward boxes when Nukara adventure zone was released.
Toi'Va, Ti'vath, Toivia, Ty'Vris, Tia Vex, Toi'Virth: Add Tier 6 KDF Carrier and Raider.
Tae'Va, T'Vaya, To'Var, Tevra, T'Vira, To'Vrak: Give us Asylums for Romulans.
Don't make ARC mandatory! Keep it optional only!
I also have that same question. I checked Tribble and thoroughly scanned my bank and personal inventory and saw that everything appeared to WAI.
Unless this black box is extremely obvious, I don't think I can find it.
It appears to be a slightly blue/navy background vs the normal black/shaded background.
You can right-click the item and get a context menu as well. However, all information is completely blank.
The only instance of missing items I've found so far appears to be due to a "phantom" equipped item on a ship.
My Romulan "Console - Science - Particle Generators Mk XII [-Th] [Pla]" are showing on ship B as equipped on ship A on Holodeck. These items no longer exist, however, as they have been converted to the new system. Yet the phantom item is of the old version and is still showing on the ship B while the new version is on ship A.
On Tribble, this shows up as a deleted item on ship B.
Man that's confusing.