A short question about development

[Drfirewater79]

You've seen Quarion's new signature, right?

no i havent really havent seen many devs reply to near anything that i would consider a serious thread about development disturbia over all. but i will look up quarion on dev tracker in a moment but first.

I hadn't seen either of those, thanks MT, but listen and please hear me out back in march she said x,y,z right then on 10/8/07 7 months later she said something totally different, now in march she said fall for many of those things...for most of us fall is Sept - Nov , then in oct she says umm not yet later....so where what was going in the 7 months in between the 2 dates?, why didn;t they say in may, or june or august guys we aint going to make it this fall, they wait till they are already late


I assume most of us has a job

okay when do you call your boss to say "hey boss I'm going to be late" if you have to be at work at 11:00 am do you call at 10:30 and say "hey I'm running behind" or do you just tell your boss "sorry " as you walk through the door 30 min after you were supposed to be there....you do that a couple of times you lose your job.....that's my point....get where I'm coming from ????MT you knwo your going tobe late before your late, say something, that's is all I ask

yes i agree totally in this case being an mmo unlike all other games this kind of comunication is crutial especially in a game like ddo where all of its advertising is based on word of mouth. if ya want people to spend there off game time speaking of how good the game is and what a bright future it has (like i did blindly for the first year) then maybe posting something about its future and making a big deal about the future instead of hiding it on websites that most if not all dont go to. I know ign.com and gamespy and most poeple go to those sites when they are looking for a new game not when they are looking for information about the game they play. Why give dates if you dont see it as a possiblility.

here is a little advice from a engenieer Mr. Laforge from STNG "if the job is gonna take 1 hour say you need 3 that way if your late you still look like you went faster then expected."

I'd also love to hear stuff like that. I think avoiding making posts like the op would go a long way to opening up that kind of communication.

And while there are points to gain from it, I don't think a boss worker relationship is the best comparison to make here. How much communication does the public get from a company every time they know a project is hitting a speed bump? For most industries, little. Because of the nature of MMO businesses though, I think it is something they would do better to be more open about that stuff, but it's a new (relatively speaking) industry that many companies are still figuring out.

i dont know where you invest money in the market but let me tell you this, companies do post that kind of information daily, not weekly, daily.

I think the forums would go along way if people avoid making posts like you who dont really care about the topic at hand just like to hear yourself talk ....

and watch there points go down when they dont say something and then it happens NRON remind anyone of that or how about nortel and where could that information be found ON THERE WEB SITE.

mmo's have been around for quite some time now its not a new gaming business multii player online games have been around since Zorg and other such text only multiplayer online games they started becoming popular with games like diablo when you could only get a set number of people on one game at a time (much like current mmo's that only allow for so many in a mission at a time) the only thing that has changed since diablo is graphic cababilities of personal computers due to the rise and popularity of online computer gaming vs console gaming. another thing that has changed is the way games are made they are no longer made 2d or top down only people want a more real experience so everything is simulated 3d (which is actually still 2d) and from the first or third person back view as a general basis of computer games.

Because of the large customer base computer games have got since diablo II hundereds of multi player platforms where invented looking at games like final fantasy SWG Anarcy online and several others that set milestones in the MMO world by listening to there customer base and doing there best to keep them as informed as possible while putting forth the best product possible.

This is what opened the door for other mmos like wow whos popularity has only risen so high because of the popular stratagy games that it gets its namesake from.

DnD is possibly the biggest name sake for a video game since SWG and FF ... wow shouldnt even have been a contender should the game have been lauched with the content and classes of NWN.

Ignoarnce is one thing and let me be the first to say there are times that yes even i am wrong ... rare as they maybe. but if you dont think we are intitled to that information be it that we are the people who attempt to intelligently argue the DEVELOPMENT through DISCUSSION as the forum name dictates then why are you even wasting our time to type in this forum ... .go bother people in general discussion if you dont have a relivant topic of discussion.

for instance MT is probably the best person to have an online arguement with

i love ya buddy even though we rarely get along in forum chats

cause he doesnt talk out his ares and from time to time even posts links to prove his point ... hard to not take someone seriously if they take the time to make an intelligent reply.

I look forward to MT's replys even if they put me down cause they are usually (cant give ya credit all the time) informative

if you are gonna just poke at people and not address any issues then please dont waste the space on the page as it is more of an annoyance then a help.

i have been in and around video games and there development since i was 5 so its not like i am always talking out my arse.

MMO's are a bread of game that goes beyond and if DDO doesnt start going beyond someone else is gonna keep stealing our player base.

[PhoenixRajoNight]

I should walk away, everything is telling me to do so, but I gotta say something.

I'm sick and tired of this "If you don't like the game leave" mentality. Listen If we didn't like the game we would leave. I'm going to make a little analogy to get some of you with this mentality to understand. Let's say you like apples, theres only 1 orchard in town and you go to it frequently because you like apples. The problem with this orchard you go to, is that it is not kept properly and about 1 out of every 5 apples is spoiled. You keep going tho because you love apples, if you didnt then you'd just stop going. So you take this chance everytime you go to the orchard that 20% of the time your gonna bite into a rotten apple. Hopefully this little analogy makes you understand a little bit better, There is 1 DDO, and we love it, but we have some real issues with it, because when you like something you have issues with it when things arent done right in your opinion. If you dont like it, you just walk away because it is not enjoyable for you at all.

It's not just 1 thing wrong with the game its many small/medium/large things that dont make the game unplayable, but they do make the game frustrating. Major known bugs going unadressed til a content patch comes out? This is a serious issue, if you know a bug and you have it fixed you release the fix for it, this is called a HOTFIX and is done by most of the other companies out there. Leaving a known bug that causes a game crash is just plain and simple laziness. I don't want this excuse well turbine is a small company and the game is underfunded, thats outright bs. How many mmo's they got going now, how many games have they co-dev'd, small company, pfff. Bottom line is, that they aren't getting their jobs done, now what is the reason for that, they need a dedicated team for ddo only, not working on diff games. From that team they need divisions for seperate things 1 team for content 1 for fixes 1 for game enhancements etc. If they are smart they have this, and so if you are a person who believes they are smart, and I think their smart even if I dont agree with the way they do things then we can end this argument right now that well if you want new content then dont *** bout having bugs all over because they can only do so many things, seperate devs work on different things so fixing the bugs in the game should not effect the rate of new content, so stop with this straw-man argument because its bs.

I want new content, but I'd rather they fixed the game, but they should be able to do both. Another issue, stop changing the game in crappy ways, id rather have xp penalty like it is than stupid item damage. TY to the people that cant play their characters and complaining they cant get their lvls cuz of xp penalties, now when I die on the higher lvl misions which I will and so will you, Im gonna go broke on repairs.

[Ghoste]

Publicly traded companies, not privately owned ones. What's the key difference there? They both have customers, but for one the customers are also the boss, not the other. So it still comes down to giving that information to the boss, in some cases, the customer, but that is a side affect, not the goal.

[Ghoste]

Phoenix,

I may have missed the post you're referring to, but I haven't seen anyone tell anyone else to leave. This has primarily been a discussion on the best way to handle customer service, both from the customer's as well as the business' end. The closest anyone has come to telling anyone to leave has been those telling others they should have stayed out of this discussion to begin with, and that was said by someone expressing dissatisfaction with the game, not the other way around as you have spun it.

[rpasell]

Customers are not always right.... that is a myth from an era of C.S. that is looooong gone.

Nowadays it is more like the customer is always able to find a different product/service provider.

The belief that each and every customer CAN matter to any company is manifest absurdity. If it were possible we would live in a much different and extremely less effecient world

That is not to say they shouldn't complain when they feel that the product they were promised was not delivered. However, pardon me for being reasonable, "new content" is not the product we are paying for. It is a service in addition to the product that we are paying for.

I may or may not be satisfied with the quality of the services ADDED to the product that I pay for but, I try not to confuse one for the other. Apples make poor orange juice

And to the OP - long time no see

i.e. Service is a commodity.

and to be clear, so are customers.

[Eladiun]

Drfirewater79, I agree 100%. Imagine what a good marketing tool a new class, crafting, or housing would have made for the anniversary. It could have been covered by the major online outlets. They could have had a free return weekend. A bunch of peeps would have re-uped. Missing and opportunity like this is bad mojo. Thus my post similar to yours when you run a business you just don't miss big opportunities to boost you brand and gain momentum like they could have if they delivered on any of what was alluded to (is that better than promised fanboi's). You don't waste opportunities. Thus the question why, rings in my head...none of the answers I come up with are anything but doom.

Just pretend you run DDO, would you have let this opportunity pass? (Be honest with yourself at least) If it doesn't concern you then...

[rpasell]

Imagine what a good marketing tool a new class, crafting, or housing would have made for the anniversary.

We know something is coming on the anniversary.... we just don't know what. DDOCast has speculated housing, but I'm sure it will be cool whatever it is.

Also, I have grouped with more returning players in the last 2 weeks than ever. So it would seem at least *some* of the viral marketing has been working.

[Ghoste]

And Mr Firewater,

You say I should stop posting because I don't care about this topic. You are wrong. Nothing else I can really say about that, you are simply wrong. I am interested in the topic.

There are a lot of points of customer service that become blurry when they are moved to forums. In a store, they help the customer quickly because they don't want other customers to see that kind of frustration in that store. On the forums, if you truly succeed in creating something they don't want other customers to see, they close the thread and possibly close the account as well. It's really like traveling back in time to witness the rebirth of customer service. A lot of the rules of customer service that we assume, don't apply. That leaves voids though that forum moderators worldwide are trying to figure out how to fill in regards to dealing with customers.

[Missing_Minds]

here is a little advice from a engenieer Mr. Laforge from STNG "if the job is gonna take 1 hour say you need 3 that way if your late you still look like you went faster then expected."

Uh, a little more advice. If you are going to quote, pay attention to who is speaking and what is actually said. Scotty was the one telling (then) Lt. Cmdr. Laforge how to look like a miracle worker, and the ep was Relics. It was not Laforge speaking the line.

And I'll throw a quote right back at you concerning those two.

[Scotty tells Geordi to boost one of the impulse engine systems]
Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: The engine won't take that kind of pressure.
Scotty: [laughs] Where'd you get an idea like that?
Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: What do you mean, where'd I get an idea like that? It's in the impulse engine design specifications.
Scotty: [grinning] Regulation 42-slash-A-15?
Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: Yeah.
Scotty: Forget it. I wrote it. A good engineer is always a wee bit conservative, at least on paper.


In other words, just because something is written down, doesn't mean that is is the end all answer.

[Drfirewater79]

Do you know anything about artificers or are you just talking out of your ***?

Metamagic feats applied to wands and scrolls. Taking 10 on UMD checks (along with a slew of UMD bonuses). And infusions.

Armor Enhancement and Weapon Augmentation: Who doesn't want the ability to just add enchantments to their weapons and armor on the fly?

Spell Storing Item: Stick pretty much any spell in the game into a makeshift one-charge wand.

Item Alteration: Ever wish those +6 strength bracers gave a competence bonus instead of an enhancement bonus so they'd stack with Bull's Strength?

Disrupting Weapon: Yep, they have a spell that makes any weapon into one of the "Power 5." (Not that they can't do any of the other four with Greater Weapon Augmentation, but Disrupting Weapon is lower level.)

Not to mention all the infusions that work with Warforged. A warforged artificer is a sight to behold.

And that's all without even talking about crafting.

obviously you are not sitting with the book open let me help you a bit.

crafting is comming to the game anyway its already talked about its already being implamented in the raid in the up comming mod.
so saying you want to play a class whos primary fuction is crafting is silly ... the reason i say this is i have seen it ruin many a mmo like swg which became all about crafting and less about playing the game. crafting is important yes make people take the feats yes creating a class whos main purpose is to craft means only one thing less people playing and more people sitting around crafting and spaming in emotes and general about the stuff they have for sale ... we already get sales posts in the mission LFM's soon the LFM's will have more people selling there junk then setting up missions meaning less people playing and more people dropping.

let me help out thouse who dont know what an artificer is with a quick list of there level to level bonuses.

1d6 hp/level
base attack starts at 0 and 4 times in its level progression from 1-20 it doesnt raise making it less able to hit targets the standard classes including rouges and bards.

base saves are 0 0 2 at first and 6 6 12 at 20th

there skill lists is similar to a rouges so with the right build you could possibly disable and open lock or umd
as issues of forgery have been made i must augment the page slightly for more information the book and pages are listed at bottom of the page ... lvl's will be removed.


artificer knowledge (no roll playing so usless), artisan bonus (+2 umd when you have the same item creation feat),
disable trap(basically usless in this game because most mobs are immune to the traps with little exception to tangleroot and a few other instances), item creation, scribe scroll

brew potion

craft wondrous item

craft homunculus bonus feat (completly useless summoned monster hence the reason it is common as a familiar)

craft magic arms and armor, retain essence(useless since kate has already mentioned that they are not useing player exp to craft items as they do in pnp)

metamagic spell trigger (the only good thing i have seen thus far because it allows you to use metamagic on wands unfortunatly the more meta magic you have on the less your charges are worth meaning you will spend 3 for empower 3 for maximize so each spell cast from wand with these will be at a 7 charges per attack and still only at the base damage of the wand)

craft wand

bonus feat

craft rod

metamagic spell completion (allows you to put "A" metamagic feat he knows on a spell item so maybe an extended haste clicky but then again its still based on the level of the spell)

craft staff, bonus feat

skill mastery (unusable because you cannot take 10 or take 20 in ddo hence the reason we dont have coupe de graz rules)

forge ring

bonus feats

anyone wanting to learn more about this ddo usless class can check out Eberron campain setting pgs 30- 33 and see for them selves how this wont translate well for an MMO

especially since crafting is part of a currently ready to launch raid so crafting feats are pointless
with the one exception of crafting wands unless the new crafting system wont let you do it unless you have the pre req feats which kate says in that wonder full ten tone hammer article isnt the way they are going with crafting as they are using special shrines to allow you to add features to current items.


but dont get me wrong its nice to know they are working on some classes

but as i said Druid is more important first because it like monk was promised shortly after launch and because it opens up possiblilites for casters and polymorph possibly the one major spell that has been completly left out of this game but has been a part of DnD video games since ravenloft II, as well as being a huge part of NWN.


and all talks of druid stopped after last years mention that monks would be first so the attention was drawn away from druids

there are alot of much more benificial classes that would be easier to implament like warmages or swashbucklers all basic classes from the complete books and from ebberon which i think would be more of a draw for new customers then artificer would be.

You've seen Quarion's new signature, right?

now i have and it doesnt say anything other then in development not links to dev posts on the specific development of that mod or anything so i dont see its relivance even though it is a step forward.

[PhoenixRajoNight]

Phoenix,

I may have missed the post you're referring to, but I haven't seen anyone tell anyone else to leave. This has primarily been a discussion on the best way to handle customer service, both from the customer's as well as the business' end. The closest anyone has come to telling anyone to leave has been those telling others they should have stayed out of this discussion to begin with, and that was said by someone expressing dissatisfaction with the game, not the other way around as you have spun it.

Oh its their, its just not outright said in this post. In many posts its out right said and maybe i posted this a little to quickly but I saw it coming and saw it in the underlyingtext of some of the replies, so I posted what I did, in my post along with what I was working up too, it was a complete thought all together and I have a tendancy to overthink things as well so yeah :-/

[Drfirewater79]

Uh, a little more advice. If you are going to quote, pay attention to who is speaking and what is actually said. Scotty was the one telling (then) Lt. Cmdr. Laforge how to look like a miracle worker, and the ep was Relics. It was not Laforge speaking the line.

And I'll throw a quote right back at you concerning those two.

[Scotty tells Geordi to boost one of the impulse engine systems]
Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: The engine won't take that kind of pressure.
Scotty: [laughs] Where'd you get an idea like that?
Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: What do you mean, where'd I get an idea like that? It's in the impulse engine design specifications.
Scotty: [grinning] Regulation 42-slash-A-15?
Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: Yeah.
Scotty: Forget it. I wrote it. A good engineer is always a wee bit conservative, at least on paper.


In other words, just because something is written down, doesn't mean that is is the end all answer.

well done it had been a while since i saw the episode lol but i remember it better now that you sent another quote at me ... i have never been a trekie but i appreaciated STNG as quality programing lol .

as for the so it is written comment

your right in that aspect too but all i am saying is there is no reason to set a date and not make it better to not set a date why say fall if its not gonna be ready by summer is the point i am making if you launch something right after its finished you have to fight through two weeks of errors and problems that cause more people to leave out of fustration monks should have been on risia already so that when next mod comes out with monks all the bugs are fixed. but if the graphic of one pre-completion jump kick is all the clips they can produce during an interview with gamespy then that means they havent even gotten through the basic movements yet now nearing 2 years from when it should have been out, LAUNCH.

I should walk away, everything is telling me to do so, but I gotta say something.

I'm sick and tired of this "If you don't like the game leave" mentality. Listen If we didn't like the game we would leave. I'm going to make a little analogy to get some of you with this mentality to understand. Let's say you like apples, theres only 1 orchard in town and you go to it frequently because you like apples. The problem with this orchard you go to, is that it is not kept properly and about 1 out of every 5 apples is spoiled. You keep going tho because you love apples, if you didnt then you'd just stop going. So you take this chance everytime you go to the orchard that 20% of the time your gonna bite into a rotten apple. Hopefully this little analogy makes you understand a little bit better, There is 1 DDO, and we love it, but we have some real issues with it, because when you like something you have issues with it when things arent done right in your opinion. If you dont like it, you just walk away because it is not enjoyable for you at all.

It's not just 1 thing wrong with the game its many small/medium/large things that dont make the game unplayable, but they do make the game frustrating. Major known bugs going unadressed til a content patch comes out? This is a serious issue, if you know a bug and you have it fixed you release the fix for it, this is called a HOTFIX and is done by most of the other companies out there. Leaving a known bug that causes a game crash is just plain and simple laziness. I don't want this excuse well turbine is a small company and the game is underfunded, thats outright bs. How many mmo's they got going now, how many games have they co-dev'd, small company, pfff. Bottom line is, that they aren't getting their jobs done, now what is the reason for that, they need a dedicated team for ddo only, not working on diff games. From that team they need divisions for seperate things 1 team for content 1 for fixes 1 for game enhancements etc. If they are smart they have this, and so if you are a person who believes they are smart, and I think their smart even if I dont agree with the way they do things then we can end this argument right now that well if you want new content then dont *** bout having bugs all over because they can only do so many things, seperate devs work on different things so fixing the bugs in the game should not effect the rate of new content, so stop with this straw-man argument because its bs.

I want new content, but I'd rather they fixed the game, but they should be able to do both. Another issue, stop changing the game in crappy ways, id rather have xp penalty like it is than stupid item damage. TY to the people that cant play their characters and complaining they cant get their lvls cuz of xp penalties, now when I die on the higher lvl misions which I will and so will you, Im gonna go broke on repairs.

thank you phoenix for pointing that out in the most basic way cause it seems as though many dont understand that concept when dealing with development discussion in the forums

the whole point of this forum is to talk about what you dont like what you do like and what you would like to see if your comments are about anything other then the game why are you not making them in general discussion

it should be obvious and it saddens me that phoneix had to do it (very happy you did cause i wasnt sure i could go another post without doing it myself) cause most of us should know that much about forum chat.

you dont have to love everyone who participates but everyones points are valid so long as they deal with the topic and not the people posting them

Phoenix,

I may have missed the post you're referring to, but I haven't seen anyone tell anyone else to leave. This has primarily been a discussion on the best way to handle customer service, both from the customer's as well as the business' end. The closest anyone has come to telling anyone to leave has been those telling others they should have stayed out of this discussion to begin with, and that was said by someone expressing dissatisfaction with the game, not the other way around as you have spun it.

everyone has at some point made a comment that was leading in that direction even though no one has said the words in a direct way because everyone is still trying to be as PC as possible

Drfirewater79, I agree 100%. Imagine what a good marketing tool a new class, crafting, or housing would have made for the anniversary. It could have been covered by the major online outlets. They could have had a free return weekend. A bunch of peeps would have re-uped. Missing and opportunity like this is bad mojo. Thus my post similar to yours when you run a business you just don't miss big opportunities to boost you brand and gain momentum like they could have if they delivered on any of what was alluded to (is that better than promised fanboi's). You don't waste opportunities. Thus the question why, rings in my head...none of the answers I come up with are anything but doom.

Just pretend you run DDO, would you have let this opportunity pass? (Be honest with yourself at least) If it doesn't concern you then...

you hit the hammer on the nail in one shot

should have been mass advertising for a update that had a special dev team working on it all year.

would have blown the socks off of the mmo world and brought in thousands of new players leaving no need to merg servers or deal with the amount of complaints that they have been since cheaping out on the expence of an aniversary ... what did we get for our continued support of DDO ... a loot weekend.

We know something is coming on the anniversary.... we just don't know what. DDOCast has speculated housing, but I'm sure it will be cool whatever it is.

Also, I have grouped with more returning players in the last 2 weeks than ever. So it would seem at least *some* of the viral marketing has been working.

housing is a long way off believe in it all you want we are more likely to see guild hosuing before we see player housing and its not gonna be this year cause there is no way they can implament that kind of change while still working on monks

they did mention a new system adding and that is the crafting system we already know that much at least they are trying to learn from last years aniversary flop ... hope its gonna be as good as we all think cause i still have a feeling if its not done right its gonna cause alot of problems auction house and other wise. I have faith that they will make it work before they launch it which also means i have faith it wont be comming out any time soon. prolly 7 months after they said it would that seems to be there MO on this MMO.

So I don't have your permission to join this discussion unless I share your opinion? Well that's just too bad, sugar.

I'm sorry you lost your temper. You're feeling calmer now and want people to take you more seriously now?

Someone throwing a tantrum in a store is very different in nature than similar behavior on forums. Notice how nobody has rushed over to meet your every concern? A big part of that is because you're not just asking for a toaster, you're asking for something they can't give you: monks right now! As far as the communication part, you could be right. I'm not an MMO veteran. DDO is the first one I've played for more than a month. I don't know, do players get more attention and open communication when they rant and moan in the forums of other MMOs? Could be. I'd think not, but you're the first to get me really thinking about that.

and here you go doing it again

i have seen more of your comments aimed at me and not the topic

you say you are an mmo veteran and ddo is the first one you played for more the a month

you are no vet then are you. your a bouncing noob never staying long enough to understand how things work or the differences between the games you played because you never took the time.

I am a MMO veteran i have held accounts on Zorg text game at the beginning of mmos i have had accounts for at least 6 months to a year on SWG COH COV 9dragons Lost Chaos guildwars FF11 (actually that one was only two months cause it sucks) I frequent IGN looking for up and comming mmo news and development as well as playing DDO since days after launch (cause it was hard to find a store carrying it at launch to show how much advertising it had) the only reason i have a credit card is so i dont have to buy game cards.

I would go so far as to say i am a true gamming geek have owned every system since intellivision (skiped out on C64) and have only missing out on current next gen systems cause MMO's are more interesting for the time being. I only started playing DnD with launch of 3.0 and own 90% of the books published by WOTC dealing with core and other rule books for DnD as well as ravenloft campain, ebberron campains, forgotten relms, dragon lance, and kingdoms of kalamar.

i have invested alot of money in the DnD brand cause i think it has the most potential out of any other brand out there .... its only the lack of people taking the game development seriously, and fighting for the DnD matterial that really care about the company that is why people like me and a few others pick the topics that make people go off there rocker ..... but keep it in the topic and not personal.

i have a hard time doing it myself cause i have a short temper ..... but if i can keep the topic i am sure the pot shot people can start focusing on topic and not the people involved.

Development Discussion not personal slander.

be it that i said that i am sorry if i have made anyone feel singled out in anything i have said cause really everything i have said goes for everyone lol.

Oh its their, its just not outright said in this post. In many posts its out right said and maybe i posted this a little to quickly but I saw it coming and saw it in the underlyingtext of some of the replies, so I posted what I did, in my post along with what I was working up too, it was a complete thought all together and I have a tendancy to overthink things as well so yeah :-/

and i appreachiated it cause i saw it happening myself couldnt have done it PC without ya ty

[lasra]

Lots of different topics being thrown around in this one. OH, where to begin?

1) Customer service - Anyone who has worked in customer service will tell you, almost to a man/woman, that the customer is rarely right, especially the really irate ones. However, they will also tell you that fixing the problem (or perceived problem) becomes the most important thing at that point. Once the issue is resolved, the customer's actions/behaviour/attiude become stories for future generations of customer service personnel to laugh about.

2) Communication - Turbine is in a lose/lose spot on this one. They can't say anything regarding releases or projects in the planning stages, because they get ripped by people re-defining what they said to fit their personal ideas of how things should/could be done. But, alas, they can't NOT say anything either or people will rip them for not communicating. Sorry devs, but you are like the poor customer service rep on the receiving end of a ranting customer.

3) Communication history - There is a lot of info out there about projected release dates, ideas in development, etc. you just have to look for it. And, yes, things stated in previous months have changed in later months. It's called the R&D cycle.

4) The R&D cycle (for those who haven't ever done it) - Code, test, implement, bug test, re-code, re-implement, bug test, etc. etc. etc. until you get it right, and even then, sometimes you miss stuff and have to pull it back down and fix it. Lets assume a coding/development team of 20 and a player base of 1000. 50 players to 1 developer means that it is very likely that the players will find an exploit that was missed, just by sheer law of averages, and that small percentage of players who actively look for an edge.

5) Release delays communication - There actually was release delay communication. It came in the form of a splash screen that changed from "Coming in January" to "Coming Soon," which actually is not a confirmation of a delay unless the release date goes into February.

6) Beware - all the players in Korea, Australia, and New Zealand will be starting threads accusing Turbine of lying if they release the Mod on Jan 31st, because if they timing is wrong, it will already be February 1st across the IDL.

[Missing_Minds]

your right in that aspect too but all i am saying is there is no reason to set a date and not make it better to not set a date why say fall if its not gonna be ready by summer is the point i am making if you launch something right after its finished you have to fight through two weeks of errors and problems that cause more people to leave out of fustration monks should have been on risia already so that when next mod comes out with monks all the bugs are fixed. but if the graphic of one pre-completion jump kick is all the clips they can produce during an interview with gamespy then that means they havent even gotten through the basic movements yet now nearing 2 years from when it should have been out, LAUNCH.

You know... Why is it every single doom and gloomer keeps pointing to that clip as fact of "we only have monks done this far."???

Have you ever stopped to think that maybe... just maybe... they are a lot further along, that the have animations for all races, that they have skins for all races, and that they are now doing up skins for armor and weapons?

That maybe they are in the dev play testing right now?

That maybe there is a lot more to it than a simple "clip"?

That maybe they still need to work on timings as that spin kick was rather slow for the combat we are used to.

That maybe they don't want to give away much of anything for how it looks so they can have great fan fare about how cool it looks and here they are AND get it right the first time?

That maybe gamespy did indeed see more than what they showed in the clip and that due to either time constraints or non disclosure agreements they couldn't show more?

Why not take the clip for what it is. Proof they are actually doing monks and we will get them.

Yes, there are a whole lot of maybe's there, however, these maybe's have a lot more going for them than your OPINION of when things "should" be out. We will get monks when we get them. (and like you, I want them now, darnit. ) Whining and complaining will slow down the process. Begging and pleading while equally annoying in their own manner works better.

[Mercules]

"Kate: We have three main focuses. One is to continue to develop the D&D experience. We’re looking at prestige classes. We’re looking at epic levels. Even other classes from the Eberron setting are fair game, like the Artificer perhaps for the ’09 release year. "


ok here is the only relivant thing in that last post aside from the fact that the monk is comming and that fall is the date for half orcs

ARTIFICER? who the hell wants to play an artificer in a mmo where roll playing has no part in anything the game has produced so far and now you are wasting time building a class completly surounded with crafting? are you nuts?

this is just another case of what happened to the more important issues ..... personally if artificer comes out before the "we will have druids and lvl 20 cap in 2008" which was mentioned at last years aniversary i dont think we are gonna have much of a player base to save.

please tell me that artificers arent your next class of choice we dont need a class that is completly craft only we need more classes that benifit the players in mission not out of it.

WHAT!?! Have you seen what an Artificer can do? They are like UMD Rogues and Arcane casters all rolled up in one with tons of abilities that make items BETTER. You know the enhancements that make wands do more damage or have a higher DC? Well, imagine throwing Maximized Fireballs or Extended Hastes from WANDS!

They are a fantastic class and very Eberron in a game that distinctly lacks Eberron flavor despite it's Eberron setting.

[Drfirewater79]

You know... Why is it every single doom and gloomer keeps pointing to that clip as fact of "we only have monks done this far."???

Have you ever stopped to think that maybe... just maybe... they are a lot further along, that the have animations for all races, that they have skins for all races, and that they are now doing up skins for armor and weapons?
That maybe they are in the dev play testing right now?
That maybe there is a lot more to it than a simple "clip"?
That maybe they still need to work on timings as that spin kick was rather slow for the combat we are used to.
That maybe they don't want to give away much of anything for how it looks so they can have great fan fare about how cool it looks and here they are AND get it right the first time?
That maybe gamespy did indeed see more than what they showed in the clip and that due to either time constraints or non disclosure agreements they couldn't show more?

Why not take the clip for what it is. Proof they are actually doing monks and we will get them.

Yes, there are a whole lot of maybe's there, however, these maybe's have a lot more going for them than your OPINION of when things "should" be out. We will get monks when we get them. (and like you, I want them now, darnit. ) Whining and complaining will slow down the process. Begging and pleading while equally annoying in their own manner works better.

i hate to say it again but whining and complaining is what development discussion is all about really if all we did was pat the devs on the ass and say good job then nothing would get done ever .

I frequent sites like gamespy and Ign.com who do these kinds of promos for all games not just mmos and one thing i can tell you is no one ever posts videos of chalk line animations even years before game launch if they have the ability to post footage of live action and movement.

you can believe it all you want but that is a fact.

if they had devs play testing it already the video clip would have shown that same jump kick hitting a troll

i am a video junkie, and as one i can tell you that the videos that demo new games and new additions to games are what sell it so if they didnt have a image to sell then that means they dont have the product to sell which means they are further behind then expected not ahead of the game. dont believe me that is cool go to ign.com look up how man games are not due to come out for the next even two seasons and i bet you there is video of game lanscapes character details and live game play at E3 or in live interview like the one done on gamespy i can also garuntee you find no more then two that have a dev at there desk showing one move in a 2 second pass by when that is the major feature of the update or game ... and even then when you do see it its done in a fade out to the actual move being done in game.

i think you have to much blind faith

and that is a dangerous thing ... not a helpful one.

sad to say.

WHAT!?! Have you seen what an Artificer can do? They are like UMD Rogues and Arcane casters all rolled up in one with tons of abilities that make items BETTER. You know the enhancements that make wands do more damage or have a higher DC? Well, imagine throwing Maximized Fireballs or Extended Hastes from WANDS!

They are a fantastic class and very Eberron in a game that distinctly lacks Eberron flavor despite it's Eberron setting.

If ya want a umd rouge caster there is a hundred people including me who can tell you how to make one right now

you are also putting to into the class without reading the down sides and i am not saying never launch it what i am saying is there are much better classes that require more attention cause they have already been talked about like druid.

my rouge caster currently sitting with 34 int and 10 cha has a umd 36 with one level of rouge a DD that hits 60's if buffed right and search spot and open lock all in the 37-50 range and it wasnt even really all that hard to do.

as for wands unless you are crafting lvl 20 wands all the maximize and empower (which if you read the class states its 3 charges for an empower and 3 charges for a maximize) means you will get more out of one greater mana pot then you will out of a whole wand when it comes to damage delt over time and its gonna cost you a fortune to play these games with wands an artificer gets at lvl 19 4 of each spell level so you wont have many that you can actually cast and the ones you do will practically be with wands .... i dont know about you but when i am setting up a party for a difficult mission i dont expect people to be playing wands only even if i could max and empower them.

the class is basically for PnP as a crafter because players are always wanting to craft there own items based on the fact that DMs so rarely want to give the players the items they want to have. figure out damage numbers

righ tnow you can purchase lvl 6 wands which means unless you find them that is the best your gonna get

lets say this spell is 1d6/lvl and you are a lvl 14 caster means your damage is 14d6 x2 max x2 emp = 48d6
a level 6 wand would be 6d6 x2 x2 which is 24d6 which is half the damage plus you have to use 7 charges per cast which means a 50 charge wand maxed and emp'd will give you only what 6 attacks for 1,250 gold a wand how about this take a greater mana pot or two get back 300-600 sp and cast for double the damage at no gold cost .....

the advantages of an artificer in pnp are huge dont get me wrong i can see that myself but in an MMO where crafting is already going to be open to all classes and races in a way that is not feat dependant like kate said in her interview so all the crafting feats are pointless too ....

my major problem with it isnt how useless i think it is cause there are alot of builds i find usless

my problem is there are better more needed classes for the purpose of keeping current base and getting new and old players to pick up a copy of the game .... and i dont feel that artificer a little played class even in pnp one that you will almost never see at any DnD con game (which is where a good number of the players they should be targeting are based on the name sake alone).

druids where talked about back in beta just like monks
warmages and swashbucklers are easy to implament cause you dont need a whole new graphic set like monks and druids do
and i think they are classes you will see used more often then not in any dnd game.

if the object is to get more people playing and less people leaving then focusing your efforts on classes and races that people actually play in PnP would make a better business choice for the sake of getting more customers.

artificers much like my prefered class Dread Necromancers (herrors of horror) dont make a good transition class for the game

i understand that wish more could ...

general population of non DnD players know what a druid is so hype is already there Warmages and Swashbucklers have that same sell ability to people who dont know the classes and great sell ability to thouse who do ... that makes it a profitable and intelligent addition to the game

adding another rouge class when everyone whines about rouges not being needed in missions is really dumb.

i mean really think about it there isnt at least two other classes in all of dnd that you would rather see then artificers with the way this game is layed out?

be honest with yourself and maybe the devs will wake up too.

[HumanJHawkins]

My god, how much time have you all wasted on this? It took me about 10 minutes and I just scrolled and skimmed through the whole thing hoping to find something worth reading. Other than the post by lasra, this was not a successful effort. :-)

Having wasted 10 minutes already, I think I'll just go.

Cheers!

[PhoenixRajoNight]

My god, how much time have you all wasted on this? It took me about 10 minutes and I just scrolled and skimmed through the whole thing hoping to find something worth reading. Other than the post by lasra, this was not a successful effort. :-)

Having wasted 10 minutes already, I think I'll just go.

Cheers!

Waiting for cube, :-p.

[lasra]

Awww, I don't think that was cube-worthy. Besides, I have to stick up for HumanJ as he complimented something I wrote

[Drfirewater79]

lol yeah it was about 2 3 hours straight though i had fun lol