Elfa Posted April 19, 2012 Author Share Posted April 19, 2012 They have 2 options at that point. If they can't fix the bug before it goes live, then they can 1. pull it at the last minute, and we've all seen how the community reacts when that happens, or 2. send it to live and continue to work on the bug fix. It's easy to sit in your armchair and say that things need to be tested better and bugs shouldn't make it to live, but that's not how things work. No amount of testing in the world will keep bugs from popping up when it hits the live server. It just isn't possible, hence why every single MMO ever has new bugs with every major patch. So you see a problem with asking for Bioware to address their customers about bug fixing time tables? Is it too much to ask them to give us a ballpark on where these bugs stand and how hard they're going to be to fix? Alleviating your customer's concerns is just good business. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Raximillian Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 (edited) They have 2 options at that point. If they can't fix the bug before it goes live, then they can 1. pull it at the last minute, and we've all seen how the community reacts when that happens, or 2. send it to live and continue to work on the bug fix. It's easy to sit in your armchair and say that things need to be tested better and bugs shouldn't make it to live, but that's not how things work. No amount of testing in the world will keep bugs from popping up when it hits the live server. It just isn't possible, hence why every single MMO ever has new bugs with every major patch. Then they can fix the fall-out with a little communication in the patch notes: "Color matching went live in this patch, but there was a last minute bug that caused the color not to match the helmet. We apologize for the inconvenience, this will be fixed in a future patch". Putting that on the patch notes would make all the difference in the world, don't you think? All problems can be fixed, I appreciate a company that fixes them, or at least lets us know that they are aware of it. Not just release it broken, and them pretend they did not know about it... All it would take is a single line in the patch notes... Edited April 19, 2012 by Raximillian Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GnatB Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 Not a single one of those is serious or game breaking. Nice troll. Neither are any of the issues they HAVE been fixing. I don't mind losing gametime outside of scheduled maintenance to fix actual important "Need to fix now" issues. But these issues they've been taking them down for can easily wait until the next scheduled maintenance. A fix to a horribly designed world event? Can wait... or heck, get rid of the event. Sound issues? Please. If it bothers you so much turn off your speakers. Troopers doing extra damage? Bully for them. PvP losers don't get enough rewards? More incentive to win next time. I can only hope there was some actually serious issue they fixed that they didn't mention in the notes, (with any luck, the issue of good stuff in your crafting queue being tranformed into worse stuff...) And the rest of the stuff is "may as well since it's coming down anyways". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pipda Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 I can't quite get my head wrapped around the BW bug fixing scheme either. I think they have a very laggy development cycle. As in what they are working on lags very far behind the live version. "Fixing the problems of today...next month" A lot of pretty large bugs go unfixed for a long time in this game while you see patch notes fixing really minor things. Look at the Operative/Scoundrel Patch notes for 1.2, how many talents do you see fixed so that they actually have an effect when you put points into them? An how many nerfs did that class get in previous patches? That is just one example of many in this respect. Tons of AC nerfing and buffing before the broken talents in the trees were ever working. How can you decide a class needs to be reworked when it wasn't working right in the first place. Implementation of the legacy system when a lot of people are abandoning their original characters and servers to go to more active servers. Did SOA ever start working? How long did it take to fix the WZ daily wins not counting? The damn cover bugs are back for Smugs and IAs. That is my biggest axe to grind with this game. The huge amount of bugs and what is getting fixed. Do you think I care if I got a more different animation when an ability procs when I have a 50/50 chance to fight a boss that is going to bug out? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elfa Posted April 19, 2012 Author Share Posted April 19, 2012 Well, it just reminds me of post launch when instead of fixing the horrendous bugs that really were game breaking, they were repairing minor holes in the economy. It was infuriating. Sure, I get low hanging fruit. Fix what you can as soon as you can. I'm sure they are working very hard on the unify color issue and the companion issue AND the mailbox issue. I just want them to tell us about how it's going and how much longer it will be. What's going on? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LrdScorpio Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 So you see a problem with asking for Bioware to address their customers about bug fixing time tables? Is it too much to ask them to give us a ballpark on where these bugs stand and how hard they're going to be to fix? Alleviating your customer's concerns is just good business. The issue is that your premise is wrong. Coming out with tentative timetables and a bunch of maybe's is not good business and does more harm to the customer than good. This has been proven in every single instance where a development company tries to parley their internal predictions to the customer. You don't pay for any entitlement to get answers to these questions and even if they were to qualify every date they give as a maybe, they will get more heat for missing the date then if they had never said anything at all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LrdScorpio Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 I can't quite get my head wrapped around the BW bug fixing scheme either. I think they have a very laggy development cycle. As in what they are working on lags very far behind the live version. "Fixing the problems of today...next month" A lot of pretty large bugs go unfixed for a long time in this game while you see patch notes fixing really minor things. Look at the Operative/Scoundrel Patch notes for 1.2, how many talents do you see fixed so that they actually have an effect when you put points into them? An how many nerfs did that class get in previous patches? That is just one example of many in this respect. Tons of AC nerfing and buffing before the broken talents in the trees were ever working. How can you decide a class needs to be reworked when it wasn't working right in the first place. Implementation of the legacy system when a lot of people are abandoning their original characters and servers to go to more active servers. Did SOA ever start working? How long did it take to fix the WZ daily wins not counting? The damn cover bugs are back for Smugs and IAs. That is my biggest axe to grind with this game. The huge amount of bugs and what is getting fixed. Do you think I care if I got a more different animation when an ability procs when I have a 50/50 chance to fight a boss that is going to bug out? Its not like fixing the bugs they have already is taking away from the bigger fixes in the works.... They roll them out as they are finished, as they should be doing Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elfa Posted April 19, 2012 Author Share Posted April 19, 2012 The issue is that your premise is wrong. Coming out with tentative timetables and a bunch of maybe's is not good business and does more harm to the customer than good. This has been proven in every single instance where a development company tries to parley their internal predictions to the customer. You don't pay for any entitlement to get answers to these questions and even if they were to qualify every date they give as a maybe, they will get more heat for missing the date then if they had never said anything at all. I agree with some of what you said, but I strongly disagree about not being entitled to answers. I'm aware that giving dates is a bad idea, but there is nothing wrong with reassuring the players that it's being worked on and it may take a certain amount of time to do so. As long as I'm giving them money, I DO expect them to tell us what is happening. I do understand that if I don't get what I want I can vote with my wallet and hit the door. I don't want to do that. I love this game, I'm just not happy with the communication and I personally blame EA for that side of things. Bioware is a great game developer, but EA needs to let them handle their business the way that made them great to begin with. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DarthAnaethil Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 Then they can fix the fall-out with a little communication in the patch notes: "Color matching went live in this patch, but there was a last minute bug that caused the color not to match the helmet. We apologize for the inconvenience, this will be fixed in a future patch". Putting that on the patch notes would make all the difference in the world, don't you think? All problems can be fixed, I appreciate a company that fixes them, or at least lets us know that they are aware of it. Not just release it broken, and them pretend they did not know about it... All it would take is a single line in the patch notes... this is common sense.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KrittaB Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 (edited) Dealing with a business isn't like dealing with a person. This patch has been playable for about a week now. In that time, lots of people have found bugs, but they have to collect data to see what circumstances causes the bugs and whether it is game wide or largely isolated to a few individuals. Then they have to figure out how to fix it. Then there are a huge number of variables that go into when and if the devs comment on a known bug. Does it essentially make the game unplayable to a large percentage of the population? Does it prevent people from progressing their story line? Is it largely cosmetic? Is it just a minor annoyance? How many bug tickets have been submitted (which really tells them how many people care about it enough to mention it)? These things take time and more often than not you won't get any communication about bugs at all. If you've submitted a bug ticket in game, they know about it and are working on a fix, or it is at least on their list of things to fix. They don't need to come in here and reply to every single thread complaining about one bug or another. That would be completely inefficient and wouldn't be effective anyway considering how many people already don't know what the devs have commented on previously despite there being a link right in their face. Edited April 19, 2012 by KrittaB Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GnatB Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 I'm actually unclear on the "mailbox" bug. I get stuff with attachments all the time, (expired auctions, successful auctions, stuff mailed to alts) and the "pending mail" message in the social center bar seems to have an accurate count of unopened messages, including ones with items/credits. (though IIRC it's always been a tad slow to update when I send items to alts) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SpazCats Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 We want to know what's up with these and how long is this going to take. I love this game and this every week these things go unfixed is another kick to my and many other player's moral. This. I completely agree with you OP. I was excited when I heard about the downtime, and now that I've seen what they fixed, I am pretty disappointed. Will I cancel? No, not yet. After all I do genuinely like the game. That's why these things being left broken for so long really irk me. If I didn't care, I would have quit by now with how unpolished this game has STAYED. But as you say, every week is a kick to my moral. At some point (probably sooner rather than later), I will likely decide to cancel for awhile and come back after 6 months or so to a, hopefully, more polished game. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elfa Posted April 19, 2012 Author Share Posted April 19, 2012 This. I completely agree with you OP. I was excited when I heard about the downtime, and now that I've seen what they fixed, I am pretty disappointed. Will I cancel? No, not yet. After all I do genuinely like the game. That's why these things being left broken for so long really irk me. If I didn't care, I would have quit by now with how unpolished this game has STAYED. But as you say, every week is a kick to my moral. At some point (probably sooner rather than later), I will likely decide to cancel for awhile and come back after 6 months or so to a, hopefully, more polished game. I love your style SpazCats. There are some that need to realize that just because we're unhappy doesn't mean we are going to rage quit. You can want change and still want to be here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holden_Dissent Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 I love your style SpazCats. There are some that need to realize that just because we're unhappy doesn't mean we are going to rage quit. You can want change and still want to be here. just make sure you fill out your bug reports. That's really all we can do. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
uziforyou Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 So you see a problem with asking for Bioware to address their customers about bug fixing time tables? Is it too much to ask them to give us a ballpark on where these bugs stand and how hard they're going to be to fix? Alleviating your customer's concerns is just good business. So, you go to Disneyland. They're working on the ride Space Mountain. You feel as a customer using their rides entitles you to have Disney INC. pass information about the status of Space Mountain to you? You've never owned a business obviously. Disney INC. is obligated to keep you informed of nothing and neither is Bioware with regards to SWTOR. They may as a courtesy but that is entirely their call. The fact that you use their services does not infer a responsibility on their part to keep you informed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Screaming_Ziva Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 they can't just flip a switch to fix bugs. it takes time. these bugs are probably all related to other systems, and attempting to fix them is a complicated matter. In all fairness, it seems they're flipping switches to create these bugs. Seriously, how does this bug (companion gear) even get created in the first place? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crimson_Spider Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 Regarding ball park date figures for when something might be done, it's impossible, a programmer says it might take 2 days, we get that info, the programmer finds out the rabbit hole is a lot deeper, it will take a month to fix, the community starts calling BW liars and "lose respect" for their stupidity at saying 2 days only to change that to a month... People make mistakes and have judgment errors, calm down. I agree with some of what you said, but I strongly disagree about not being entitled to answers. I'm aware that giving dates is a bad idea, but there is nothing wrong with reassuring the players that it's being worked on and it may take a certain amount of time to do so. As long as I'm giving them money, I DO expect them to tell us what is happening. I do understand that if I don't get what I want I can vote with my wallet and hit the door. I don't want to do that. I love this game, I'm just not happy with the communication and I personally blame EA for that side of things. Bioware is a great game developer, but EA needs to let them handle their business the way that made them great to begin with. Well it's not as easy as it sounds, I don't see much difference between "we are looking into it" and silence (which are realistically the best ones we can hope to get before "this has been fixed"), each of those answers generates bad answers, from "you said that 10 days ago" to "give me info now!"... sometimes there's just no info. And as I said before, we must keep complaining and filing bug reports, just not rage over every issue... we really don't know what's happening and sometimes we really don't want to know. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DragoAskani Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 (edited) It's been 3 patches and two weeks and you haven't fixed any of the serious issues or major breaks with the main patch. Its been ONE WEEK. I don't know what time paradox you live in that you think its been two weeks. But you're sorely mistaken. Cool your jets there turbo. Edited April 19, 2012 by DragoAskani Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dejoule Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 They fixed the medal issue for when you lose a warzone. That was pretty crippling and I'm happy that was fixed. The codex thing may not seem that important, but considering the world even is only available temporarily, the outrage caused by not being awarded the codex and then never having the oppurtunity to get it again would have been catastrophic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kanshan Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 The companion thing is the most important issue. That, and the fact tanks lose aggro when knocked back or stunned, that's pretty important to. This, other stuff is meh, but companion gifts I need for legacy haha Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elfa Posted April 19, 2012 Author Share Posted April 19, 2012 Its been ONE WEEK. I don't know what time paradox you live in that you think its been two weeks. But you're sorely mistaken. Cool your jets there turbo. You're right, it has been one week. Sorry, I was on the test server for a week, kinda of threw off my timeline. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kiddeth Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 Um lets see. Games runs 10x better. Game looks 5X better, even on the lowest setting. If that was all the patch did I would have been happy as hell but it did much more no ZERO complaints from me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rakuenCallisto Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 They fixed the medal issue for when you lose a warzone. That was pretty crippling and I'm happy that was fixed. The codex thing may not seem that important, but considering the world even is only available temporarily, the outrage caused by not being awarded the codex and then never having the oppurtunity to get it again would have been catastrophic. Wait - when did they fix this? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HectorCasan Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 for me the real issue is that im playing and then bam, maintenance, its getting extremely annoying Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kthx Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 (edited) In all fairness, it seems they're flipping switches to create these bugs. Seriously, how does this bug (companion gear) even get created in the first place? Have you ever written a computer program? It is quite common for an error to exist that doesn't manifest itself until a certain condition triggers it. In fact, this is a major reason why bugs appear in live releases even after having gone through both extensive internal and beta testing. Edited April 19, 2012 by Kthx Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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