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robiwan
Moderator
1035 Posts |
 Posted - 26/05/2007 : 08:22:24
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Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?topic_id=340344
We are very pleased that we have finally have Chapter 6 in the hands of all of the players. We are monitoring the cranking up of the incubator component trading economy, the collection of enzymes, and the beginning of incubation with great interest. Like on the test centers, it will take awhile before you start seeing a lot of the new pets around. Remember, they start off as babies (well toddlers really), so you will see a lot of tiny creatures at first, aside from those that are converted to mounts. Be sure and check out the Beast Mastery forums for some fantastic guides and advice on how to best use the systems. I must admit that I am constantly impressed with the quality of the player generated material and the speed at which it is produced. There are a lot of folks out there helping the playerbase on this. A big thankyou to everyone who has contributed to these guides and discussions.
As with every chapter there has been some controversy, and rest assured that we do hear the feedback. As Blix has already stated, there are some wandering elites that we are cleaning up, and we are re-auditing a number of areas to make sure they are not too challenging. We will continue to tweak and refine combat as we move forward. I know that combat is more challenging now, but rest assured that both SOE and LucasArts QA ran through all of the game content before the chapter went live, running the major quests lines and professions, and we are generally comfortable with the level of difficulty that exists. We know it is tough sometimes when things change, and we know that we can never please everyone. There are a lot of different playing styles in SWG, and it is difficult for each chapter to please all of those styles. We know that there are some cases and scenarios that are presenting extra challenges and have problems. As these are identified, we will address them through the hotfix process.
I know that passions run high in this community, and I think it is great that folks care so much for the game and its future. I would ask that folks keep the discussion constructive and the flame wars to a minimum. It does not help the dialog, it divides the community, and it becomes difficult to really glean any useful information. This is a great time for the game. The servers are quite busy and a lot of folks are coming back to the game or trying it for the first time, with the numbers for the last few days being fantastic.
Have a great memorial day weekend, and I look forward to meeting some of you out in LA for the SW Celebration summit.
DM
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I have waited and planned and built my strength for fifteen thousand years. I have evolved. It is time.
(Omnius Evermind)
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Feyd'Rautha Saresh (Medic, Rebel Alliance, Europe-Chimaera), Robe Saresh (Force Sensitive, Rebel Alliance, Europe-Chimaera)
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robiwan
Moderator
1035 Posts |
Posted - 26/05/2007 : 08:25:51
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Otázky a odpovede:
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=15&topic_id=340344#3795755
Q: me likey Ch 6 so far as it seems to be solid and good but..
cant you really blow the auto-store away? Its just not fun to see mounts that are nothing but lifeless transports.
ah well keep it up though, it seems SWG is not completely lost yet SMILEY:P
A: Yep. We know that the auto-store is unpopular. There are simply too many exploits involved with being able to have mounts/vehicles, pets, familiars, and droids all out at the same time. We will look for ways we can mitigate the exploits so we can do away with auto-store, but we have not come up with anything yet that really solves the problems.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=15&topic_id=340344#3795735
Q: So you hear the feedback from all the people that are saying forced grouping isnt the right way to go and just ignore it. What of profession revamp to make them more inline with the now more difficult combat. Have you seen the posts from the people that play Smugglers and Bounty Hunters and Jedi saying that you have made the game far too difficult for these professions. Are you planing to do anything about it cause from that note it looks like you are happy with the way things are going and dont have any intention of responding to feed back that isnt possative to this chapter. Could it be said that you only read what you want to and ignore what you dont like? Cause you appear to take anything negative as 'controversy' and then carry on reguardless.
Are we going to see anything about BH and Smuggler missions, for the casual gamer who cant always just log on and find people to adventure with, for Cl 1-89 to help with grinding, for cl 90's the elite of their professions not to get killed in 3 shots from some mobs, fixes for stealth where as soon as we break agro the mobs gain full health, for Jedi who have to engage their opponents within 5 meters causing them to draw agro from all hostiles. For ranged professions having to exploit the poor AI in the game where they can shoot an NPC and even though his mates are close by and easily within field of vission dont back him up and as they lure one NPC off at a time. Kill it and then move on to the next one i.e. 'pulling' which is hardly tactics and rather just taking advantage of the AI. Or that Jedi robes need a serious increase in protection and everyone is now an elite mob drop taking a group to get a jedi some robes. And that is just the tip of the ice burg of what this chapter has done. Harder isnt a problem but you havent brought in any real tactics, where are the bleeds, knockdowns, stuns, blinds, dizzies etc etc of the Pre NGE days that allowed tactics to be used in fighting tougher mobs. At the moment stealth and snares dont work which for some professions only leaves damge specials and healing to take these mobs on with.
A: As I said, there are a few specific instances that need to be tweaked. Casual game play is fine and the majority of the content does not really require groups. I do not think it is possible to have all content be both casual and challenging. The elite problem in non high-end areas has been addressed by Blix and will be fixed in the next hotfix.
I think everyone is a little guilty of only seeing what the want to see in terms of the forums. We have lots of folks here, besides myself, who read and analyze the forums. I think I get a pretty balanced view. There are a lot of negative things being said, there is a lot of positive things being said. Who do you want me to listen to? I try and listen to everyone, but I cannot please everyone unfortunately.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=0&topic_id=340344#3795397
Q: There are other issues that need looked at besides difficulty also. Including issues such as the Reb themepark armor being loaded as 'unique'. This does not allow us to use the armor as decoration and forces us to keep it in our inventory. Can we please get 'unique' removed.
A: This is addressed in the next hotfix. Keep it in your inventory until then.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=30&topic_id=340344#3795850
Q: I did the themepark and was quite dissapointed DeadMeat. It was good content but being a Jedi the only thing I got was a Rebel Banner. I cant even wear the armor or place it in my house! Some stuff needs to be addressed too, for example...you can enter a some of the dungeons on leave bypassing all the NPC's getting to a boss to kill.
A: Not sure I have heard that one. Which dungeons?
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=30&topic_id=340344#3795882
Q: Nothing on Pharples? SMILEY:-(
A: Heh...Nothing yet at least. I am not sure at this point, and do not want to give a uninformed answer.
Odkaz: Thank you for getting rid of the auto-store!
btw don't you think it's about time to clean up the announcements on the launchpad it's getting kinda long and a few of them are for an expired contest
A: Heh...I did not say that. I said why we have it now. I do not know if it will be removed in the future. Don't start some "DM says auto-store going away" rumor.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=30&topic_id=340344#3795929
Q: Any chance you could look into fixing the looping sound bug, it's been bugged since chapter 5 and is really getting annoying.
A: I have actually looked at this a number of times personally. PM me with your system specs, as we cannot find a problem nor reproduce it in-house.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=105&topic_id=340344#3797192
Q: Better question: Why continue to ask this hashed question when it has been clearly stated over a dozen times on the forums that this is a universal issue? I find it disgusting that the first reply I got was that I had "primitive onboard sound that was no longer compatable with SWG." What changed so drastically that it made motherboard sound obsolete? So I go to get a soundblaster Audigy, and I still have the problem - in some cases even worse. I tried my neighbor's HD card and I STILL have the problem.
This isn't any one specific card, it's all of them. One way or another, even the best card is going to experience this issue. I did mod my music to see if that had any effect on it and the sound still skipped, so there is a chance this could be a client side bug.
A: I am not sure stating something a dozen times counts as Universal...the change in chapter 5 to sound was a switch to using MPG files, which was now supported by Miles (our sound package) as a looping sound. Many of the Entertainer songs would not have worked otherwise. We have run compat tests and cannot reproduce the problem. I have examined some of the dump logs to see what is going on. If the system is under heavy load then there could be issues with streaming the sound off the disk. If you have low system memory, buffer allocation can fail, etc. As I said, I am not ignoring (infact I was investigating again earlier this week). But it is hard to fix a problem that you cannot identify.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=120&topic_id=340344#3798229
Q: My Windows Vista machine does it all the time...
DELL E6700
Intel 2 Duo Processor E6700 (2.66GHz,1066FSB) with 4MB cache
4GB DDR2 SDRAM at 667MHz
256MB NVIDIA GeForce 7900 GS
250GB SATA II Hard Drive (7200RPM)
(Intergrated Audio)
My Windows XP machine does not...
A: Nice machine! Since we are not a Games for Vista SKU we do not do a lot of compat testing against it. It indeed could be a problem with Vista...There are a number of things in that OS that are not game friendly. We honestly do not support Vista yet officially.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=135&topic_id=340344#3798400
Q: Alright, DM, I have a theory here. Someone already brought up a good point here. You said you guys couldn't duplicate this "at the office" but have you tried this problem at home? Everyone whom I know and each of those who continue to play this game have this sound bug regardless of what sound cards they are using.
There was something that was bothering me, however. One of my friends insisted that we were nuts and that we needed to update our drivers or something to that effect. Then I put 2 and 2 together. You guys are now using specific Miles Sound Studio files with the emulation of sound in SWG. My friend has the same program for his music mixing and MIDI generation, and he does not have this bug.
I just finished downloading the very modest program myself and notice that there are numerous layered CODECS featured in the Sound Studio program that often times take over Windows' default CODECS for sound. It appears that SWG runs in compatibility for Miles Sound Studio and not Windows default sound CODECS. This in itself presents a problem for those who do not have Miles Sound Studio. As a temporary fix, some people may find that installing this program and setting all defaults to Miles Sound Studio may alleviate this issue as it has with my friend, but I am yet to test this theory myself.
I believe this "issue" lies therein with software compatability, not hardware.
A: That actually sounds pretty good. I will check it out. Thanks!
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=30&topic_id=340344#3795965
Q: I am very happy with Chp 6. I think a great job was done.
I am wondering if there is a fix in the pipeline for the following items:
- Carbine animations
- Animations in general
- The ugly faux silver finishing used in the UI - I know this is a minor item, but I and a lot of other people do prefer the old style over this new one. Which is why some people are using the UI mods.
A: We would definitely like to fix the carbines. Animations in general is a little vague. UI changes are possible, but are not scheduled as yet.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=60&topic_id=340344#3796588
Q: great job Dm, blix, and the rest of the crew. have you gys thought abotu these things?
1. auto spawn/raid system
2. will heroic mobs have storylines and be starwarsy?
3. FRS?
A: The heroic mobs will definitely be Star Warsy and will have a storyline. I do not see FRS coming back anytime soon. We like the auto spawn/raiding discussion we have been seeing, but that is certainly not on the current schedule.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=60&topic_id=340344#3796649
Q: The UI is also a big one in my book. Is there anyway to go to an XML type UI(If it's not already) like many other MMO's and allow people to mod the UI's. This creates a whole new aspect for the community. Create a base UI that isn't as gaudy as the current one, and let out the programming so people can mod their UI, or load up community ones.
A: Modding the UI (in the sense of skinning) is somewhat problematic. Star Wars is a major IP, and Lucas, rightfully so, cares deeply about how it is presented. We simply cannot allow unfettered ability to skin the game. There are other mods we can allow UI wise, but I do not think we will ever have skinning.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=90&topic_id=340344#3797053
Q: I know we are not to speak of such taboo things as modded UI, but I noticed that the modded UI now shows the "check mark" from the CU, where you could set a repeating attack (however it will not move). Is this going to mark a return of the automatic auto-attack via a clickable command icon for the default attack?
I believe the pet toolbar has this feature now, and such would like to see it return to the main toolbar as a standard feature again.
A: That is really a Blix question. Obviously with pets, having to manage it's specials as well as yours was too cumbersome, hence the auto-attack for pets.
I have a deal with Blix...I don't talk too specifically about undiscussed design choices and he does not date my daughters.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=60&topic_id=340344#3796686
Q: Is there any word on why the party at Nym's Stronghold and the badge for attending the party do not seem to be working right now?
A: Pex had a couple of issues. I believe they have been addressed, but I am not sure when he is planning to do the kickoff. I would assume it will be soon.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=75&topic_id=340344#3796744
Q: The Dodge animation is so annoying with this increased game speed we stuck with atm. Any chance to see game speed reduced back to orginal levels so the dodge animations does look like a screen flicker and other animations being able to return and look good as well? Nice being able to move from point A to B faster but at the cost of animations (ingame and removed) and distorted speeder turning, the faster speed is simply not worth it.
A: I'm afraid the animation will have to be redone, as we will definitely be sticking with the current play speed. I definitely know what people mean when they talk about some of the current animations. I will try and schedule a number for examination with each cycle.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=120&topic_id=340344#3798187
Q: "Guild Management tools in SWG aren't up to snuff - I went ballistic when I heard you can only manage your guild through the terminal. We need to fix this." -Smed
Smed said this needed to be fixed back in Feb. What updates can you give us?
A: Should be released in the next couple of weeks.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=165&topic_id=340344#3798902
Q: So that just means that we'll be able to manage the guild from anywhere as if we're at the terminal. Your probably not going to add any cool guild features like guild militia, a ranking system, etc.
A: Correct. This update will only allow accessing the current guildhall functionality from anywhere.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=120&topic_id=340344#3798304
Q: Do you guys ever try this stuff at your houses and not in the office? Thats not a diss, im being serious?
A: Sure...All of us play the game. But that is really nothing compared to a compatibility lab run.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=135&topic_id=340344#3798355
Q: Curious what position the team has as far as the gap between the end of the Legacy/RotW quests and the Mustafar quest lines? Many of us feel that the gap is too great, and it seems like a bit of a punishment having to grind from early to mid 60's up to 80's to finish your character up to 90. (moreso now that mob's have armor/specials)
At least it is not compelling and entertaining (IMHO).
So what's the word?
A: I agree. These is a gap from a quest perspective, although there are a number that are good in that range. I don't have a quick answer about what we may be able to add in that range.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=150&topic_id=340344#3798770
Q: When can we guess to expect some more profession fixes down the road...ie spy, though not the only profession is drowning in broken/grosely underpowered expertise abilities...several threads have been made consolidating the issues in the spy forum...
A: We will continue to look at each profession. I can give no specific date on any one of them, but we are tweaking all the time.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=165&topic_id=340344#3798870
Q: The decision NOT to slow down combat speed is not a good one.
Slowing it down would greatly reduce lag and other issues (such as heal misfires).
DeadMeat, you and your staff seem to lack basic knowledge of how systems and networks work. The old combat system was capped at 1 attack per second. This meant that only one combat packet at most a second was travelling from the client to the server, to other affected clients.
The current system is 4-5 times faster than this. This means that the number of packets the server and network (variable internet) is having to pass per second has increased fivefold.
That means that your server's capability to accommodate players has DECREASED fivefold. Pre NGE I remember fights with 150 people around an area and we didn't go into slideshow mode. These days 25-30 will do that.
Simply put, until you guys replace ALL your hardware with vastly better and faster machines (very VERY expensive) or you figure out a way to surpass the speed of light via copper, this combat system simply is never going to work right. Maybe you can figure out cold fusion at the same time.
Simply put, your combat system exceeds greatly what your servers and the internet can handle.
A: Gee Jack...I guess my 14 years as an MMO engineer, my expertise in multiplayer server architecture, and the fact that I work on this code and with this system everyday, don't mean much compared to what you have learned by observing the client software. I will turn in my badge at the desk and head home in shame.
Oh...And I know a thing or two about fusion.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=195&topic_id=340344#3799410
Q: With all due respect, I've worked as a network and systems engineer for 13 years.
You can't increase the amount of traffic you are sending fivefold without increasing your systems capacity (your servers are 2002 vintage) and your network capacity (internet is variable, you can't) and not have SEVERE degradation of performance (LAG).
Software engineers don't know crap (in my experience) about the limitations of systems and networks.
A: Quite simply, combat traffic represents a small percentage of net traffic in SWG. It is a discreet event that usually is *not* happening. Increasing combat speed did not come anywhere close to even increasing by 20% the amount of network traffic. I am sure you know networks and I apologize for my snappy reply. I just happen to know how this software works.
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=180&topic_id=340344#3799315
Q:why are things so much laggier then pre cu? If you know all about this stuff and all why is it like it is? This last chapter has made it horrible for me , since the cu it just gets worse and worse. But yet pre cu I had no lag at all unless it was an epic event.
A: Lag can be caused by a number of things. And it depends on what you are describing. Some people use lag when referring to slow rendering of the scene. This has nothing to do with network performance and may be caused by a number of factors. The difference after NGE in some cases could be the increased particle effects. I am only guessing there.
Network lag is different. Now the actual movement speed before the NGE and after is the same (or at least close). It is usually movement that suffers most from lag (rubberbanding, etc). Combat lag can be caused by increased combat speed, but because the client shows most of the more obvious combat effects (the particles, anims, etc.) without waiting for host confirmation, I do not think this would be noticeable (beyond the syncing of state from the host).
There is nothing I can think of in the last chapter specifically that should cause noticeable increases in lag. Your machine may be getting a little crufty. When is the last time you have really cleaned it up?
Odkaz: http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/posts/list.m?start=165&topic_id=340344#3798880
Q: I personally have no problem wth the difficulty, it was needed. Seriously though, what I have in bold made me spit out drink I laughed so hard.
1. Based on the condition every patch goes live in, you guys don't even have a QA department.
2. Even if you did, there is no way that person did all that.
It just wouldn't be Sony without gigantic, baldface lies. lol. SMILEY:-D
A: Snap!
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I have waited and planned and built my strength for fifteen thousand years. I have evolved. It is time.
(Omnius Evermind)
---------------------------
Feyd'Rautha Saresh (Medic, Rebel Alliance, Europe-Chimaera), Robe Saresh (Force Sensitive, Rebel Alliance, Europe-Chimaera)
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