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[Syllph]

Am posting this in hoping that no more people will fall victim to FRED.

Incident Goes like this:

I've GRed my Ranger and in the process took 2 Toughness Feat. After Leveling her to 20 i decided to Swap 1 Toughness Feat in Exchange for Mental Toughness. So i Paid Fred a Visit.

This is where things go wrong. The Swap was successful BUT Fred is too hardworking and took out my 2 Toughness feat in exchange for that mental toughness. Resulting in a loss of 1 Feat.

Sent a ticket but the GM says this bug is not recorded or seen so they cant do anything about it.

As a warning, don't run the Harbringer of Madness set. It eats items, as I found out today when it ate the gauntlets from the Sora Kell set out of my inventory. They were locked, and I have used the set off and on since level 13 a few months ago. So don't run this series until Turbine fixes this issue, and if you don't have it, DON'T buy it. It is ridiculous that this goes on, and they refuse to deal with it.

It only took 9 runs to get the **** things, and now I have to refarm them.

and the list continues

[Hambo]

my experience with C64 emulators is that I have to use CPUkill to slow the games down enough to play them...I dont like doing that because it cooks my ****.

does this emulator not have that prob?

Sorry for being so off topic.

edit...hey I went to that page and think I have used this one and in older versions it does need cpukill.

Alternate Reality: the dungeon will just have to wait another 30 years.

I've not actually run C64 emulators... I'm more the older C/PM and Unix Emulator fan. Sometimes it 's hilarious to run a program that emulates a 2Mhz system at current speed... My current system emulates a PDP/11 with Unix system V nearly 1000 times faster than the original hardware.

Just shows how far we've come in 40 years

[KKDragonLord]

I have an idea...

How about, adding a "bug token" for 500 TPs to the DDO store, and make all funds acquired through the purchase of that token grant 1 "Special Bug Form". The funds achieved by the sale of that token would be used to hire Extra hands for the current Bug Hunting DDO Team, and those Special Bug Forms would be priorized by those Extra helpers hired.

i wonder if that would help the issue somewhat, i would really like to pay exlclusively for the certainty that my bug reports were getting Any guaranteed attention, and for the certainty that Turbine would increase their efforts to eliminate the multitude of bugs that make my beloved mmo be the laughing stock of other mmos out there.

just a random thought...

[Elixxer]

I disagree with many of you. I am a programmer.
In almost all situations where I am called in to fix someone's application I ask for the list of bugs.
In 99% of the cases these bugs are very simple changes that affect little and make the program much better.

Many items have been fixed recently...like the toolbars always moving even after locking, or the items still being able to be pulled off when locked. This was looked at and the dev found it easily and fixed it probably in seconds. It was added the next update/hotfix.

Many times bugs are added when someone adds new lines of code that conflict (such as crafting suddenly not working right on GS or the really mixed up DM voice overs right now.)

In 99% of the cases these are simple fixes. One programmer could just spend time going through all this and making fixes or recommendations. As a programmer I would say this is essential to this program.

This is an old program that is continually being stitched together by people who were not the original builders. There is a point when it is just band aids and splints when you add stuff. That makes it unstable.

With more advanced engines and newer programming techniques, it is sometimes worth a rewrite. Even Operating systems start looking at full rewrites at times. Definitely major upgrades every few years. Apple, MS, and linux provide new kernels and try to get out old bugs with each update (and include many more).

DDO was probably being built in 2004, beta in 2005, live in 2006, and we are now in 2011. 7 years is a long time to be running a legacy program that has been continually modified without redoing its guts.

As it gets more modified a program's original foundation is not designed or planned to have all this new stuff. That is why an addition of the new crafting screwed up the old crafting...the old crafting having just been added on top of the old program that did not have anything like it built into it....thus 'bugs' happen.

You have to deal with bugs...security and bugs. Those two things can kill your business. "hey, come play ddo", "um, this is broken, this is not working, etc" is not good for the business.


I imagine somewhere there is a very long list of bugs, much longer than any of us realize.


Programming is a chore. A hard one. Most programmers work in bursts....they get involved and go to town on something, mostly finish it, then peter out and get some pizza and soda..... then lose interest in the finishing. Why? Because that is the hard part.

More bugs = too much pizza and soda = programmers to overwhelmed too finish.

They need some 'finishers'... closers.
These type of people are the most important in most any business. You got to close the deal. Most employees cannot do that.

I agree, Turbines old code is effecting Turbines new codes. I personally doubt many of these coders really care for DDO, and I do enjoy the pizza breaks! I make my own games and man, bug's get annoying. I am not that smart of a programmer and my codes are limited but I do understand you CAN make bug free games.

As I have said before, do you think the coders get paid by the hour? . I know I'd work a bit slower if I got paid by the hour.... Would you?


Coding isn't easy, but it is fun in it's own way. I wish I could +1 rep to you. Anyone do that for me? .

[Canopenner]

I agree, Turbines old code is effecting Turbines new codes. I personally doubt many of these coders really care for DDO, and I do enjoy the pizza breaks! I make my own games and man, bug's get annoying. I am not that smart of a programmer and my codes are limited but I do understand you CAN make bug free games.

As I have said before, do you think the coders get paid by the hour? . I know I'd work a bit slower if I got paid by the hour.... Would you?


Coding isn't easy, but it is fun in it's own way. I wish I could +1 rep to you. Anyone do that for me? .

Unless contracted by a temp agency programmers are salaried employees. 99% of the time anyway.

[Elixxer]

Unless contracted by a temp agency programmers are salaried employees. 99% of the time anyway.

Okay thanks for the info. That's good to know!

[Canopenner]

Okay thanks for the info. That's good to know!

NP. I am Helpdesk rep by trade. You pick this stuff up being a corporate wageslave.

[Adarro]

Since 'programmers' are sounding out, I might as well toss my geek XP into it.

There's a good chance that somewhere, is a bug list for Notepad.exe, and I bet its not going to get any serious consideration any time soon.

Most of these bugs not being fixed have little to do with Love / Hate or Caring on Turbines part.
It's simple cost analysis.
The first thing most companies do is a preliminary estimate on how much it will cost to fix (time / resources / availability).

If the answer involves too much downtime, unacceptable delays, discontenting shareholders or anything else that is essentially 100% guaranteed to lose profit, then there's a good chance it's not getting fixed in spite of 3 or even 10 people posting their discontent on a forum. In this case, you keep everyone doing what they're doing, and try for some PR. This is especially true when the impact is relatively minor with well-known workarounds.

It is extremely difficult to say 'This is an easy bug fix' with any accuracy if you've never seen the codebase.
Do they unit test? Regression Test? White box? Black Box? How much bouncing between Managed (DotNet) and Unmanaged (C/C++) code?

Sometimes even when you as a developer have a fix, it can get vetoed by management or many other reasons.

Imagine walking into a board meeting and saying, "Well, I know you have already prioritized our goals for the fiscal year, but I just thought I'd point out that I can probably fix the invisible torch thingy in Treasure Cove... um... yes sir.. um.. well, yes, I know we're not bringing the event back this month.. but..., yes, we did unintentionally break something we were sure wouldn't be affected by that change last month... but.. yes sir... I'll be sure to write up some documentation and save the diff patch... good day to you as well sir..."

There are bugs in this game, but most of them tend to be about as insurmountable as jumping on the ladder instead of climbing from the bottom. The major ones get attention and generally get at least addressed if not always fixed on our timeline.

My virt would love an Enthrall that works with suggest, but enjoys that new parasitic breastplate in the mean time.

TL;DR - My screen door doesn't shut all the way. I could probably fix it in 10 minutes with just a screwdriver... Its on the same list with some of those 6 year old bugs.

[Canopenner]

oh yah...is no reason for turbine to fix bugs...

you dont stop the bus to get new tires when there are people waiting to ride it. Money in hand.

Bug list grows.

Customer base grows.

Im happy as long as I can play DDO for free. LOL.

[Adarro]

Unless contracted by a temp agency programmers are salaried employees. 99% of the time anyway.

Okay thanks for the info. That's good to know!

Hourly Contractors are making up a significant portion of the programming pool now a days.
Probably about 3:5 in my department.
While there's no physical time-clock, there are claim numbers and estimated times to complete a task, so taking 8 hours to fix a bug listed / estimated at 3 hours will net you 3 hours pay and some explaining to do.

Also, there are 'exempt, non-exempt employees', which are salaried, but still punch a time clock to determine overtime compensation (which is some sliding-scale formula that makes DDO crafting seem like a one stop shop)

[Canopenner]

Hourly Contractors are making up a significant portion of the programming pool now a days.
Probably about 3:5 in my department.
While there's no physical time-clock, there are claim numbers and estimated times to complete a task, so taking 8 hours to fix a bug listed / estimated at 3 hours will net you 3 hours pay and some explaining to do.

Also, there are 'exempt, non-exempt employees', which are salaried, but still punch a time clock to determine overtime compensation (which is some sliding-scale formula that makes DDO crafting seem like a one stop shop)

oh yah...

theres deadlines for all programmers...

they are all fast talkers tho...either that or out of work...

My experience is that a salaried employee gets boned on OT.

Thats why Im paid by the hour actually.

[MrWizard]

well, having been 'temp' hired by companies to come in and consult/fix things I know that a large number of programmers do get stuck in a rut very often and spend a lot of time doing nothing during their 'time on the clock'. And I see this when I come in to fix things.

This is a management issue for the most part.
If the code is that sloppy that shows it was thrown together at the beginning (as most projects aggravatingly seem to be) and more slop is patchworked on it every update.

A single bug is not that important you say....but hundreds of them start a momentum. Eventually you get crashing problems (and ddo has experienced those from time to time). Program, server, even client can go down. Last year there was massive failures...and the year before that. Remember when the servers were going down a lot?

this is because of those bugs that seemed 'unimportant'. Most bugs are simple to someone who actually knows the code. One person should be sent as bug hunter.
Best time for bug hunting is right after an update since the programmers are still hot (and remember the code)...send them right away on everything. Waiting means more pizza and soda...and forgotten code...and too much time trying to remember...and nothing getting done.

Actually going through code and logic is hard for 90% or more of hired programmers. Addition and subtraction is easy, code logic and alteration at a deep level is very hard for most.

Its like a lot (if not all) of the open source community programs for the web. Some are quite ingenious and complex. None really deal with security very well at all. It is too hard. It is unrewarding since nothing is 'showing', making it even harder.

I say turbine needs three people right now

1) Someone who plays the game an awful lot to make a real manual to teach new players about the game and its mechanics.

2) A bug hunter, big time.

3) Someone to develop a real customer service policy and implement it.


As for content.....they have more than enough pre made textures, monsters, and existing mechanics to throw together some quest lines for high level content every month. Throw 'giant caves' kind of quests in all the wilderness areas one month even.

It has been a while since update 8...then update 9 came and it had 4 quests. 4. They are spending time on crafting and upgrades to the system mechanics like spells.... kind of like spending time on upgrading code for bugs.

I personally could never understand ignoring bugs.


Bugs are the reason sony just got hacked, forums get hacked, games get hacked, and mostly the reason sites go down, games crash, etc....

They do not get hacked or crash because no content was released that month. They get hacked and crash because of bugs. Bugs that cause customers to leave or get very aggravated and not spend money. Bugs that lead to lawsuits (bye sony).

How do you feel leaving all your credit card or bank information with a company that ignores bugs? Feel safe having that info sitting in their database? Ask the people who use that playstation thing about that.

[Khanyth]

I skipped a lot, mainly because I didn't understand or didn't care to understand it.

New stuff is never bad. Never. Striking the right balance between new stuff and fixing old stuff is paramount, however.

[Syllph]

New stuff is never bad. Never. Striking the right balance between new stuff and fixing old stuff is paramount, however.

Yeah this

[Phidius]

...
New stuff is never bad. Never...

Tell that the the people who lost gear after running some of the new content.

[leadhead]

This game runs pretty smooth imo... I have certainly played far more buggy games.

Also, didnt they just take the servers down the other day for bug fixes?

[Canopenner]

This game runs pretty smooth imo... I have certainly played far more buggy games.

Also, didnt they just take the servers down the other day for bug fixes?

they sure took them down for something.


Prolly had to do with redfens being blown up.

[Cyr]

Considering how small the new content is I'm not sure what people are so worried about missing out on...

For a six month update we got a buggy incomplete crafting system and 4 rather small adventures in the mid levels. I certainly could have lived without those and maybe even would not notice they were gone if they got yanked for a few weeks/months.

[Adarro]

I skipped a lot, mainly because I didn't understand or didn't care to understand it.

New stuff is never bad. Never. Striking the right balance between new stuff and fixing old stuff is paramount, however.

This is also a part of the problem. (I'm not bashing btw), people [non-programmer types] don't know and don't care why certain things don't work... and generally speaking, they shouldn't. (Many programmers who might know may not really care either for that matter. I really don't feel like fixing someone's printer when I drop by) In the same way I don't expect a technical forum link when I see the local ATM's down and I don't expect the bank to go into a detailed explanation about it, I just wanna grab some cash and buy a coke. Now, if those technical issues occur when I was trying to close on a house, I'd probably be changing banks pretty quick.

Most of these issues seem to be closer to the grab a coke inconvenience than the 'closing on a house' one to me. (Just my personal opinion) The GS bug and other major issues are certainly more important, but they are also being addressed (just never as quickly as the client would like)

Balance is 100% the key to success. Hopefully they will get it right.

[Lerincho]

V E T O.