Way to go Testies, you really dropped the ball this time!

[Boza]

Just kidding...It would be nice if they gave the test server community a little longer to hammer away at major content updates before pushing them live, though. I understand that SOE is pushing this whole "look at all the new content we've put in and WoW hasn't!" agenda pretty strongly, but the whole thing seems pretty silly when a big patch falls flat on its face like this. From my own experience, I know plenty of folks on Test that would rather have more time between patches to adequately check out content, and you'd think that most of the playerbase would rather wait an extra week or two for new stuff to go live than wait for several hours to play at all due to bug oversights and overall poor quality assurance. What does everyone else think? Is it worth waiting a little longer for the Test population, or would you rather have it tested en masse as early as possible?

[kjam]

<DIV>hehe hehe hehe you said Testies, cool.</DIV>

[JarredDarque]

<DIV>what ever happenedto SOE saying they where gonna wait to put mentoring in for a few patches,  i.e.  not this one but the next patch?  oh well.....I am lookin foward to it, but would prefer that they give y'all on test adequate time to work everything out first.</DIV>

[Fairburne Molo]

<DIV>Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.   I can't say this enough.  IMO it is Sony's BIGGEST by far downfall.  In EQ and now EQ2 they are infamous for pushing out content and expansions before it is ready.  The release of EQ2 was too soon.  The released of patches come to soon and I am sure the first real expansion will be released too soon.  This was the same as in EQ and is the #! complain I here from all ex-eq players.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Rushed content is buggy exploitable and makes people dissapointed at the least.   Then once its fixed people cry nerf and get upset and quit.  If they would just take their time and release content that is more polished the player base woudl be much larger and the game would be better.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I thought for sure Sony had leanred their lessons form EQ when making EQ2.  They said all the right things.  But now I relaise that they have not and I fell for it.  I no longer have any hope of Sony fixing this issue.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Luckliy for them I still play.  Somehow I always find away around any nerfs or changes and still enjoy both crafting and adventuring.  The game is very fun to me and I love to play it.  Its not all bad.  </DIV>

[Fle]

<DIV>The problems seem to happen when the live servers get updated. The bugs don't show on test but suddenly appear when code is updated on the live servers. I have no idea why and it's not something thats just unique to eq2.</DIV>

[Cast]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Fleet wrote:<BR> <DIV>The problems seem to happen when the live servers get updated. The bugs don't show on test but suddenly appear when code is updated on the live servers. I have no idea why and it's not something thats just unique to eq2.</DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P>It doesnt just "show up". The problems theyre having now have been there. Its SOE's [Removed for Content] poor way of testing things that is the problem. The people on the test server arent testers, I doubt half of them know how to test patches or are given the right tools to work with. SOE makes what? Around $15mill a month off of 350K subscribers? You'd think they could pay 10 monkies to sit in a room and check this stuff. </P> <P> </P> <P>BTW no offense to the monkies most of us know theyre smarter than the people in charge of the testing that goes on here.<BR></P>

[Samnas]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Castor wrote:<BR><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Fleet wrote:<BR> <DIV>The problems seem to happen when the live servers get updated. The bugs don't show on test but suddenly appear when code is updated on the live servers. I have no idea why and it's not something thats just unique to eq2.</DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P>It doesnt just "show up". The problems theyre having now have been there. Its SOE's [Removed for Content] poor way of testing things that is the problem. The people on the test server arent testers, I doubt half of them know how to test patches or are given the right tools to work with. SOE makes what? Around $15mill a month off of 350K subscribers? You'd think they could pay 10 monkies to sit in a room and check this stuff. </P> <P> </P> <P>BTW no offense to the monkies most of us know theyre smarter than the people in charge of the testing that goes on here.<BR></P> <BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <P>SOE does have an internal test team that tests changes in addition to the test server.  Like with any software bugs get missed. </P> <P> By the way the 350k number is not actual paying subscribers it contains a lot of people who are not paying $15 a month they inflated the figure pretty well.</P>

[Cast]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Samnas wrote:<BR><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Castor wrote:<BR><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Fleet wrote:<BR> <DIV>The problems seem to happen when the live servers get updated. The bugs don't show on test but suddenly appear when code is updated on the live servers. I have no idea why and it's not something thats just unique to eq2.</DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P>It doesnt just "show up". The problems theyre having now have been there. Its SOE's [Removed for Content] poor way of testing things that is the problem. The people on the test server arent testers, I doubt half of them know how to test patches or are given the right tools to work with. SOE makes what? Around $15mill a month off of 350K subscribers? You'd think they could pay 10 monkies to sit in a room and check this stuff. </P> <P> </P> <P>BTW no offense to the monkies most of us know theyre smarter than the people in charge of the testing that goes on here.<BR></P> <BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <P>SOE does have an internal test team that tests changes in addition to the test server.  Like with any software bugs get missed. </P> <P> By the way the 350k number is not actual paying subscribers it contains a lot of people who are not paying $15 a month they inflated the figure pretty well.</P><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P>Well lets see show me something where theyve inflated the numbers. Next find me this "test" team that tests patches before they come out or hit the test server. The only test team I know of are the ones working on expansions. </P> <P></FONT> </P> <P>Why would they hire testers when they can feel good about free labor?</FONT></P> <P><BR></P>

[Fle]

<DIV> <P>It doesnt just "show up". The problems theyre having now have been there. Its SOE's [Removed for Content] poor way of testing things that is the problem. The people on the test server arent testers, I doubt half of them know how to test patches or are given the right tools to work with. SOE makes what? Around $15mill a month off of 350K subscribers? You'd think they could pay 10 monkies to sit in a room and check this stuff. </P> <P>-------------</P> <P>Sorry i just don't buy that. You really think they implement bugged code on purpose !, that would just cause more problems for them than waiting. This plat bug im hearing about...i don't know the in's and outs of it but no way if that was on test would it just get ignored and implemented onto the live servers for them to then have to take em down and fix it.</P> <P> </P></DIV>

[Neneth]

<DIV>I agree with the wait part. The test sever base is so small how do they know how  a patch is going to affect the live servers...( IE; crafting patch, we all saw what that one did...&nbsp<img src="/smilies/8a80c6485cd926be453217d59a84a888.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>My question is if it's the same patch why didn't it crash the TEST sever like it did the live servers?  </DIV>

[Cast]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Fleet wrote:<BR> <DIV> <P>It doesnt just "show up". The problems theyre having now have been there. Its SOE's [Removed for Content] poor way of testing things that is the problem. The people on the test server arent testers, I doubt half of them know how to test patches or are given the right tools to work with. SOE makes what? Around $15mill a month off of 350K subscribers? You'd think they could pay 10 monkies to sit in a room and check this stuff. </P> <P>-------------</P> <P>Sorry i just don't buy that. You really think they implement bugged code on purpose !, that would just cause more problems for them than waiting. This plat bug im hearing about...i don't know the in's and outs of it but no way if that was on test would it just get ignored and implemented onto the live servers for them to then have to take em down and fix it.</P> <P> </P></DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P>You dont have to buy it. This is where theyre expecting people to test something that they arent equiped to test. The heritage item that was sold was a crafted one and blah blah it wasnt tested right. When they got swarming reports of this issue they should have tested every single one from start to finish. Did they? Nope not even close. </P> <P>They then pushed this code out without putting in the AP and what went wrong there? People lost everything they got from going in there. </P> <P> </P> <P>This is just plain lazy. Odds are good were in for another 2 day rush patch because the numbnuts punching buttons while theyre stuffing thier faces dont have the first clue as to what theyre doing. <BR></P>

[waswas-f]

<blockquote><hr>Castor wrote:<BR><BLOCKQUOTE><HR>Samnas wrote:<BR><BR><BLOCKQUOTE><HR>Castor wrote:<BR><BR><BLOCKQUOTE><HR>Fleet wrote:<BR><DIV>The problems seem to happen when the live servers get updated. The bugs don't show on test but suddenly appear when code is updated on the live servers. I have no idea why and it's not something thats just unique to eq2.</DIV><BR><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>It doesnt just "show up". The problems theyre having now have been there. Its SOE's [Removed for Content] poor way of testing things that is the problem. The people on the test server arent testers, I doubt half of them know how to test patches or are given the right tools to work with. SOE makes what? Around $15mill a month off of 350K subscribers? You'd think they could pay 10 monkies to sit in a room and check this stuff. </P><P> </P><P>BTW no offense to the monkies most of us know theyre smarter than the people in charge of the testing that goes on here.<BR></P><BR><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><BR><P>SOE does have an internal test team that tests changes in addition to the test server.  Like with any software bugs get missed. </P><P> By the way the 350k number is not actual paying subscribers it contains a lot of people who are not paying $15 a month they inflated the figure pretty well.</P><BR><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>Well lets see show me something where theyve inflated the numbers. Next find me this "test" team that tests patches before they come out or hit the test server. The only test team I know of are the ones working on expansions. </P><P></FONT> </P><P>Why would they hire testers when they can feel good about free labor?</FONT></P><P><BR></P><hr></blockquote>lol or make code changes and pass right over the free labor test server to live. You may be a SOE coder if... you think 20000000 in copper is 20 gold pieces in eq2.You may be a SOE coder if... if (1) { never_ever_do_this_function() } looks "ok" to you.-Waswas

[The_Witchfind]

<BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> waswas-fng wrote:<BR>You may be a SOE coder if... if (1) { never_ever_do_this_function() } looks "ok" to you.<BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <DIV>Compile error.  Expected semicolon.  :smileywink:</DIV>

[Cro]

<DIV>Am I the only one who thinks pushing stuff live after a short test period is a good thing?</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Well some times stuff goes KABOOM! ! !  But the majority of times it seems to go off smoothly.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>They released EQ2 too soon? I don't think so. I think release went off very well. I would have prefered to have been playing a few months earlier even with more down time and bugs.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I think that alot of the changes they are making and the fine tuning is awsome. It is showing that they are listening to us ALOT more then I expected. </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>They can't make everyone happy, but it seems like they are trying to make the majority of players happy.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>"What does everyone else think? Is it worth waiting a little longer for the Test population, or would you rather have it tested en masse as early as possible? "</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I choose as early as possible.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I just don't see why all of you are expecting that keeping new ideas in test longer will help fix most of these problems. I dont think that the stien in test sold for 2100p, or that t5 ores were foraging rares and normals in the backwards reverse ratios. I think that must have been an error when applying it to live servers more then a lack of testing.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I am ver pleased with 99% of eq2.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>One easy change I see is for them to make a 10 second delay when in the chat rooms while waiting for servers to come up. Would almost stop all of the spamming.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>And for them to ban the spammers from chat for 1 week.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>And for them to open a few more chat channels, I am forced into French every time that I go there because general is always full. F the french.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>And....</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV>

[waswas-f]

<blockquote><hr>Croff wrote:<DIV>Am I the only one who thinks pushing stuff live after a short test period is a good thing?</DIV><DIV> </DIV><DIV>Well some times stuff goes KABOOM! ! !  But the majority of times it seems to go off smoothly.</DIV><DIV> </DIV><DIV>They released EQ2 too soon? I don't think so. I think release went off very well. I would have prefered to have been playing a few months earlier even with more down time and bugs.</DIV><DIV> </DIV><DIV>I think that alot of the changes they are making and the fine tuning is awsome. It is showing that they are listening to us ALOT more then I expected. </DIV><DIV> </DIV><DIV>They can't make everyone happy, but it seems like they are trying to make the majority of players happy.</DIV><DIV> </DIV><DIV>"What does everyone else think? Is it worth waiting a little longer for the Test population, or would you rather have it tested en masse as early as possible? "</DIV><DIV> </DIV><DIV>I choose as early as possible.</DIV><DIV> </DIV><DIV>I just don't see why all of you are expecting that keeping new ideas in test longer will help fix most of these problems. I dont think that the stien in test sold for 2100p, or that t5 ores were foraging rares and normals in the backwards reverse ratios. I think that must have been an error when applying it to live servers more then a lack of testing.</DIV><DIV> </DIV><DIV>I am ver pleased with 99% of eq2.</DIV><DIV> </DIV><DIV>One easy change I see is for them to make a 10 second delay when in the chat rooms while waiting for servers to come up. Would almost stop all of the spamming.</DIV><DIV> </DIV><DIV>And for them to ban the spammers from chat for 1 week.</DIV><DIV> </DIV><DIV>And for them to open a few more chat channels, I am forced into French every time that I go there because general is always full. F the french.</DIV><DIV> </DIV><DIV>And....</DIV><DIV> </DIV><DIV> </DIV><hr></blockquote>I would go for sooner, but tested. Come on, they push out a change to test that has heroic items (what 10 in game?) changed to sell to npc only for x cost. People notice a typo on the sellback rate for a few of them on test. How much common sense does it take to verify all gasp 10 db entries for these items that state their sell back rate. Make those changes and push back out to test with other changes and fixes from feedback for more testing _before_ you push them live? You push code changes live with _no_ test and you get possible errors that ruin the entire economy or lose items -- and need to revert or down _ALL_ of the servers for 8 hours vs and extra day on test with no code changes before live. Don't break the game to push out new changes that are untested.

[Samnas]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Castor wrote:<BR><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Samnas wrote:<BR><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Castor wrote:<BR><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Fleet wrote:<BR> <DIV>The problems seem to happen when the live servers get updated. The bugs don't show on test but suddenly appear when code is updated on the live servers. I have no idea why and it's not something thats just unique to eq2.</DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P>It doesnt just "show up". The problems theyre having now have been there. Its SOE's [Removed for Content] poor way of testing things that is the problem. The people on the test server arent testers, I doubt half of them know how to test patches or are given the right tools to work with. SOE makes what? Around $15mill a month off of 350K subscribers? You'd think they could pay 10 monkies to sit in a room and check this stuff. </P> <P> </P> <P>BTW no offense to the monkies most of us know theyre smarter than the people in charge of the testing that goes on here.<BR></P> <BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <P>SOE does have an internal test team that tests changes in addition to the test server.  Like with any software bugs get missed. </P> <P> By the way the 350k number is not actual paying subscribers it contains a lot of people who are not paying $15 a month they inflated the figure pretty well.</P><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P>Well lets see show me something where theyve inflated the numbers. Next find me this "test" team that tests patches before they come out or hit the test server. The only test team I know of are the ones working on expansions. </P> <P></FONT></P> <P>Why would they hire testers when they can feel good about free labor?</FONT></P> <P><BR></P> <BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <DIV>Wow do you always act like you know everything until you see proof?  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>A post from Moorguard that makes it clear they have an interal testing team.  <A href="http://eqiiforums.station.sony.com/eq2/board/message?board.id=news_announcements&message.id=30&highlight=internal+testing#M30" target=_blank>http://eqiiforums.station.sony.com/eq2/board/message?board.id=news_announcements&message.id=30&highlight=internal+testing#M30</A></DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>A post that makes it clear the # of PAYING subscribers is not 350k.  <A href="http://eqiiforums.station.sony.com/eq2/board/message?board.id=Non-Gameplay&message.id=66186&highlight=350%2C000#M66186" target=_blank>http://eqiiforums.station.sony.com/eq2/board/message?board.id=Non-Gameplay&message.id=66186&highlight=350%2C000#M66186</A></DIV> <DIV>Notice in that one they say something about 80% of registered users <STRONG>become</STRONG> subscribers.  I take from that that at best they expect the current registered users to translate to 280k paying subscribers, but that they are not to that point yet even.</DIV>

[Amise]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Fleet wrote:<BR> <DIV>The problems seem to happen when the live servers get updated. The bugs don't show on test but suddenly appear when code is updated on the live servers. I have no idea why and it's not something thats just unique to eq2.</DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <P>The biggest issue is probably the vast difference in population size between test server and live servers.  There's only a few hundred people on test at the very most  (EQLive test server never went over 400 people IIRC).  Put some code on test server and you have a couple of hundred people checking it out.  If it's zone-specific chances are most people are too high or too low level to go there.  Keep it on test for a week or two it might seem fine.  Then once it goes live it crashes zones and servers, or it becomes exploitable.  Why?  Because on live servers you have up to several thousand people interacting with that code.  Many times more people interacting with it than you will ever see on test server.  The higher populations make obscure exploits come to the surface much quicker and exacerbate instability in ways that you simply won't see happening on test.</P> <P>The bigger the test server population, the more likely it is that bugs and exploits and instability is going to be found and fixed before it ever makes it onto live servers. Soooo, play on test.  Cause a test server population that more closely approximates a live server population is going to be a lot more effective at testing.</P><p>Message Edited by Amise on <span class=date_text>03-08-2005</span> <span class=time_text>04:25 PM</span>

[RoseWhi]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Fleet wrote:<BR> <DIV>The problems seem to happen when the live servers get updated. The bugs don't show on test but suddenly appear when code is updated on the live servers. I have no idea why and it's not something thats just unique to eq2.<BR> <HR> </DIV></BLOCKQUOTE> <DIV>I'll grant you that. The problem is, though, that SOE seem intent on raised buggy releases to an art form, or maybe a trademark :smileyvery-happy:</DIV>

[Shazzbott_Feldercarb]

You all seem to think that SOE has some monopoly(tm) on releasing code that has bugs. Lets see, ever heard of Microsoft, they release far far buggier code then SOE and I don't see you up in arms over it. How about Linux? The have one of the largest betatesting groups out there, but still they release code that has bugs in it. System Engineers Creedo: I will attempt to build a fool-proof system.Universe's Creedo: I will attempt to build a better fool.The Universe is winning.Shazz

[RoseWhi]

<DIV>Sweetie, I am a software developer in RL. I am forced to write in Visual Basic, VBScript for ASP and MS SQL-Server. I am also responsible for maintaining my company's Exchange Server and, heaven help, SNA Server. Not to mention having to deal with eight server machines running Windows 2000 and 24 workstations with either Win 2K or Win XP Pro.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Don't get me started in on Microsoft and their buggy products. I guarantee, as surely as MS will release an emergency patch tomorrow to fix a glaring security fault they hoped the virus writers would be polite enough to ignore, it will not be pretty.</DIV>

[PhourZwanZig]

<DIV>One thing ppl forget about is the test server isnt only for testing the codes its to make sure nothing else happens when applyin the patch..   </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I work in a company that has to deal w/ patching code and I work for a freaking cable co..   We see it too.. We have 2.. thats right 2 test groups made up of employees that test the code..  So we apply the patch 2wice at 2 different times to 2 different batches of clients..   We did this because of the way patches sometimes go..  A patch can go great w/ the first group and sometimes do something weird to the 2nd group..  But theres nothing different between the patches..</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>(btw the patches im talking about are for our DVR box)   What we were seeing was that the patch can go fine when only being applied to our small group but when it hits the masses it doesnt respond the same as the test group..  We were having DVR boxes re-formating themselves for no reason..  It didnt happen to our test group but did on our customers, cuz of this we now have the 2 test groups...</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>But anyways what im saying from this is many worse things could happen, think us Testies have to worry when we loggin after our updates if our chars are reset or not..  Now what if that happend and still made it to the live servers, then I think theres a valid point to testers not testin right..  But that normally is caught even b4 it gets to us..   </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Again.. Patchin is playin a number game..   K..   Lets do some math..   Just for the ease lets say there is bout 500 ppl on the test server and 10 Live servers containing 5000 each..  Now if the patch only negativly effects 1% of the players, that is a whole 5 ppl for the test server..  Live = 50 x (# of servers) 10 = 500...</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>So on the test server if we dont notice the problem or just dont bug it cuz someone thinks someone else will, a problem can easily be missed until live where itll effect more ppl..  Hence the reason for some of the Odd lil bugs not showing till Live servers..  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Oh and then we didnt mention how the numbers could be effected if it was a class or race related bug..  And then the factors can be played w/ more if its a bug in the code that if you have x and y it happens..  well if nobody on the test server is using the combination of X and Y, again itll will be missed..</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>So in the end I guess all IM saying is things could be worse..   Yeah that lvl 50 you had is lvl 1 again..  Oh and SoE doesnt have a record of your char being 50 cuz all the info was bugged too.. So your stuck re-lvlin your char all over again..   Yeah thats worse..</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I just hope some of you can get a better understanding on how its not SoEs fault or the Testers fault that things are missed, cuz in the end not always are they missed..   Just never seen..   </DIV>

[Aegori]

<DIV>Game is down for a day and requires some hotfixes and that makes this patch a flop? Little overdramatic at all? </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>This patch is full of great fixes, changes and additions. Mentoring, soloing improvements, new high end raid zones, fixes for abilities/spells/quests/, etc. After the dust of the bad day settles, this patch looks like it's going to have a pretty good impact on the community. It's even a patch that doesn't so dramatically change any aspect of the game that we may not have to hear the raucous forum whining for the next two weeks. Drop the ball, bad testing, whatever... This isn't a day to day game and shouldn't be judged as such. If one day of downtime is the tradeoff for what they offered in this patch, i'd be willing to sacrifice.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>-Aeg</DIV><p>Message Edited by Aegorian on <span class=date_text>03-09-2005</span> <span class=time_text>12:53 AM</span>

[Boza]

Good to hear peoples' opinions. While I'll agree that a day of downtime is a small price to pay for the extra content added in this patch, the whole situation was handled poorly--and this is not the first time, obviously. There seems to be a systemic breakdown in the communication team somewhere. There's no compelling reason that this patch needed to be pushed out so fast. Mentoring is a pretty significant change to the game; I can't see any logic behind testing it for a little over a week. Many of the other changes were clearly not tested properly either--a friend of mine plays a level 32 Berserker. Upon finally logging in last night, he found that one of his most commonly used taunts was red and he could no longer use it. How many other classes experienced similar problems? I'm guessing they're probably not going to be waving the flag for all of the "fixes and improvements" to people's abilities. I'm not saying there's anything inherently wrong with extended downtime, and I certainly don't want to criticize adding content--I've done development work, and I'm aware of the pitfalls. What I'm saying is that it's fairly obvious that the content needs to be tested more. As I said above, there's no legitimate reason for pushing this content out before it's been properly tested, EXCEPT to please the marketing types who want to be able to drop banner ads all over the place that say OH BOY OH BOY OH BOY 400 NEW SPELLS TONS OF NEW ZONES AND NO WAITING!!!!! It's a bit of a misnomer. It's also fairly common courtesy to warn your usergroup if you're going to make a significant change to the software that may affect their productivity. Now, certainly EQ2 isn't anything peoples' lives depend on, but that doesn't mean that the playerbase should be denied the common courtesies inherent in software development. An announcement that this huge content patch was going in even 24 hours ahead of time would have been incredibly easy to do, and would have saved them tons of grief (if nothing else, it would have given the SOE weenie suckers license to say "they told you the big patch was going in today, you should have expected lots of downtime"). If a team developing software for a private corporation treated their clients like this, they'd get a poor reputation and likely find it hard to attract new business--with good reason. I don't mean to come off as overly negative. I really do like this game, and I think overall the stability has been pretty good. Things like yesterday can be avoided, though, and it can be done pretty easily with a little communication and, more importantly, proper time for content to be tested. I know most of us would have been willing to wait another week or two for mentoring if it meant that all of the other stuff was going to work properly and we wouldn't have 12 hours of downtime.

[Lolthinae]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Aegorian wrote:<BR> <DIV>Game is down for a day and requires some hotfixes and that makes this patch a flop? Little overdramatic at all? </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <DIV>Well, for me it's 2 days now and counting. 2 hours scheduled yesterday, starting at 9pm my timezone, extended to 8+ hours from what I've heard (I was sound asleep or when the servers finally got back on line, if not off to work already). 2 hours today, starting at 7pm my timezone, so far extended to 3.5 hours and no ETA. Oh well, I did get to log on for 30 mins before the servers went down tonight, but frankly this is getting annoying. You would think Soe could attune the new content bit more before releasing it and causing such extended downtime to the live servers.</DIV>

[Fairburne Molo]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Croff wrote:<BR> <DIV>Am I the only one who thinks pushing stuff live after a short test period is a good thing?</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Well some times stuff goes KABOOM! ! !  But the majority of times it seems to go off smoothly.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>They released EQ2 too soon? I don't think so. I think release went off very well. I would have prefered to have been playing a few months earlier even with more down time and bugs.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I think that alot of the changes they are making and the fine tuning is awsome. It is showing that they are listening to us ALOT more then I expected. </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>They can't make everyone happy, but it seems like they are trying to make the majority of players happy.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>"What does everyone else think? Is it worth waiting a little longer for the Test population, or would you rather have it tested en masse as early as possible? "</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I choose as early as possible.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I just don't see why all of you are expecting that keeping new ideas in test longer will help fix most of these problems. I dont think that the stien in test sold for 2100p, or that t5 ores were foraging rares and normals in the backwards reverse ratios. I think that must have been an error when applying it to live servers more then a lack of testing.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I am ver pleased with 99% of eq2.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>One easy change I see is for them to make a 10 second delay when in the chat rooms while waiting for servers to come up. Would almost stop all of the spamming.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>And for them to ban the spammers from chat for 1 week.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>And for them to open a few more chat channels, I am forced into French every time that I go there because general is always full. F the french.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>And....</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> Most of the people that I know that played EQ2 at the beginning and no longer play EQ2 are not playing because EQ2 when released was very veyr buggy.  Mayube you didn't run into them as often as I did.  I had 1 friend who no longer plays would would do at least 3 bug reports every single day for the first month all on  different issues.  He got tired of trying to play only to be blocked by bugged content.  I know at least 30 people personally who are sick and tired of this dance.

[Ayum]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Aegorian wrote:<BR> <DIV>If one day of downtime is the tradeoff for what they offered in this patch, i'd be willing to sacrifice. <HR> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>LOL. As a Developer too, my company WILL NOT torlerant any down time longer than 1 hour on the LIVE Servers. And the LIVE servers only need to be taken down 1-3 times per year.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Everything should be tested in the testing server, and every Developer should test his own code even before putting to the test server.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>What is the point to have a TEST server (not to count there should have a develop server) ?</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>if SoE develop team just tolerant one day of downtime on LIVE server, no wonder how GREAT is your patch.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><STRONG><EM>Patching the patch, Endless LOOP</EM></STRONG>. :smileyvery-happy:</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <P> </P></BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <p>Message Edited by Ayumie on <span class=date_text>03-09-2005</span> <span class=time_text>07:38 AM</span>

[Petrovinas]

I realy can't understand this type of thinking. In the first place, the price I pay for this so called 'extra content', [IS] the price I pay every month! Period. That would be like buying a car and walking outside every morning wondering if it will start or not, then telling yourself, 'heh it's ok, just look at the neat stereo they put in it." If my credit card cannot be billed by SOE's monthly automated billing system I'm sure the Accounts Receivable Dept. does not sit around and say '...well he's such a good player..let's give him a break." It's mentality like this that, in affect, give corporations the green-light to treat its customers like doormats. This downtime, not to mention daily (SINCE GAME WENT LIVE), downtimes. It is very dissapointing that with the background in MMORPGS, SOE's testing methodology is still trivial, and is unacceptable. There realy isn't a valid excuse for flawed software being distrubuted to production except: flawed testing methodology; which is in itself inexcusable. It is not in anyones interest (except SOE), to make excuses, apologize for, or tolerate this kind of bunk.

[waswas-f]

<blockquote><hr>Petrovinas wrote:I realy can't understand this type of thinking. In the first place, the price I pay for this so called 'extra content', [IS] the price I pay every month! Period. That would be like buying a car and walking outside every morning wondering if it will start or not, then telling yourself, 'heh it's ok, just look at the neat stereo they put in it." If my credit card cannot be billed by SOE's monthly automated billing system I'm sure the Accounts Receivable Dept. does not sit around and say '...well he's such a good player..let's give him a break." It's mentality like this that, in affect, give corporations the green-light to treat its customers like doormats. This downtime, not to mention daily (SINCE GAME WENT LIVE), downtimes. It is very dissapointing that with the background in MMORPGS, SOE's testing methodology is still trivial, and is unacceptable. There realy isn't a valid excuse for flawed software being distrubuted to production except: flawed testing methodology; which is in itself inexcusable. It is not in anyones interest (except SOE), to make excuses, apologize for, or tolerate this kind of bunk.<hr></blockquote>I totally agree, it is one thing to be supportive when you have software that is released with a known issue and you can see from a high level overview externally that the software _did_ get tested and sent through QA. What we are experiencing as SOE customers are blatant testing and QA issues. They have a test server in the loop so things can be player base tested. This is a visible testing and QA step to all players. When they jump the gun and push out code and DB changes that obviously have not been tested _at all_ on the test server -- as external clients we see that as bad testing. That in and of itself is enough to get us grumpy. Multiply that many times when we see this happening over and over again and multiply those feelings even more when it causes downtime and huge issues on the live servers.Things that are not excusable in this latest patch:** That heritage items were tested on the test server and players noted sell back price issues. There are like 10 heritage items in the dang game, it does not take a huge leap in logic to go back and verify all 12 items sellback rate when at least 2 were typo'ed in your database. Then push it back to test server and ask people to verify. Heck even revert players back 2 days so they can test selling them again!** The obvious code changes were made to the code level that was on the test server and pushed live before that code was updated and tested on the test server. What the heck kind of QA and testing is this? Code Locks? Revision Control? Gold Versions? Testing Cycle? ack. Because of this big issue there are multiple issues that are happening on live now that would have been caught on test. HO's are borked, SK and other classes have spells and abilities that were redded out, etc... Please just take a day or two and come up with a real testing strategy that we as customers can see and feel comfortable with. We all understand that this is software and there are always bugs in software. We will understand if a bug slips through the process and the servers need an emergency patch or fix. We will not be understanding if you don't even follow some kind of minimum testing procedure before pushing out broken patches though.here is a book that you may want to read:<a href=http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0201794292/ref=pd_null_recs_b_t/103-3751019-5113409?v=glance&s=books target=_blank>Amazon:Effective Software Testing: 50 Specific Ways to Improve Your Testing </a><p>Message Edited by waswas-fng on <span class=date_text>03-09-2005</span> <span class=time_text>08:08 AM</span>

[JarredDarque]

<DIV>Something for yall to look at, sometimes, bugs show up on a live server that did not exist on test servers,  there is slightly differant coding on the live servers in order to to allow them to handle heavy player loads, it happens, and has happened in any game that ever existed.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>So you know, on test, they had the problem of heritages selling back for too much, and they did fix them.  All of them, every single one.  The fact taht the Stein reverted back  to selling for so much was most likely a problem that the patch coding had with the server coding for the Live servers.  As for all the rares being harvested, I dont even recall that being an issue on test, and I can guarantee that in the time that patch was on test that there where a few players who did some harvesting, so again seems an issue that the patch coding has with the Live server coding.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>As for the so called "developer" for antoehr game earlier in the thread tlak inga bout one hour of down time ever and servers only down 2-3 times a year...I call Bull[expletive ninja'd by Faarbot] , if it is true,  what do you have?  a 5 person player base?  and even then I am sure yall bring the servers down more than that <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />  You are a lying sack of [expletive ninja'd by Faarbot], and you know it <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></DIV>

[Boza]

Actually the Stein problem cropped up because of something related to the crafting element of that quest. One of the devs (Gallenite I think, but I'm not sure) acknowledged that it was missed during the testing because they never tested the sellback price AFTER the crafting step or something to that effect. It was a fairly simple oversight...it's in Dev Tracker somewhere, I read it on Tuesday. That's kind of a perfect example of why the testing/QA model needs to be a little less rushed. They need to stop making 11th-hour changes and pushing them live before the version has had even 24 hours on test. Certainly there will be coding issues on the Live servers that don't exist on the Test bed, but not to the extent that we've dealt with this week. I fully expect 2-3 days of downtime when the Blodlines pack goes live, just based on the problems they've had so far with the D'Morte equipment wonkiness.

[Naughtesn]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Bozack wrote:<BR>Actually the Stein problem cropped up because of something related to the crafting element of that quest. One of the devs (Gallenite I think, but I'm not sure) acknowledged that it was missed during the testing because they never tested the sellback price AFTER the crafting step or something to that effect. It was a fairly simple oversight...it's in Dev Tracker somewhere, I read it on Tuesday. <BR><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE>I don't care what the excuse was...you have 22-24 heritage items that exist in a finished state.  Test each one's sellback price - could take all of 3 and a half minutes.  Instead we get an additional 6 hours of downtime.  Pretty decent investment don't you think 3.5 min for 6 hours.....<BR>

[Daffid011]

3.5 minutes huh? I wish testing was that easy...

[Naughtesn]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Daffid011 wrote:<BR>3.5 minutes huh? I wish testing was that easy...<BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <P>Hmm - lets see go to a vendor and hit sell x 20 or so...very time consuming, you're right....</P> <P>So time consuming that on live, it was done immediately by 14 people....very time intensive....</P> <P>/sarcasm off</P>

[Naughtesn]

<DIV>Maybe the problem is no one on Test had even completed the stein quest - because certainly if they had completed it - being test server community members they would have tested the sellback...O.o</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Oh wait - in the copy existing toon idea - perhaps people with Steins might have tested this...</DIV>

[Mindgamer]

<DIV><EM><FONT face="Courier New" color=#66ff66 size=3>A one man lobbying campaign for toon copying isn't the answer either. Who really wins their Stein and then runs immediately to their nearest vendor with a heritage item just to see how much they can sell it for?</FONT></EM></DIV> <DIV><EM><FONT face="Courier New" color=#66ff66 size=3></FONT></EM> </DIV> <DIV><EM><FONT face="Courier New" color=#66ff66 size=3>Strategies to increase the Test server population to provide a more realistic testing environment, both in terms of player level distribution, crafter levels, economy, etc., would go a long way towards helping with debugging. </FONT></EM></DIV> <DIV><EM><FONT face="Courier New" color=#66ff66 size=3></FONT></EM> </DIV> <DIV><EM><FONT face="Courier New" color=#66ff66 size=3>Agedone, 38th Mystic, Test</FONT></EM></DIV>