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Balancingteam, Developers and the community

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wonshot
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Balancingteam, Developers and the community

Post#1 » Wed Oct 24, 2018 10:31 am

Disclaimer: This topic is not made to ster up drama, fingerpointing or create "The movement 2.0" I simply am just curious, and while this post might affect fragile topics of conversation I myself will try to remain as respectful and civil as possible and hide any extreme emotions and ask you to do the same, thanks!

Hello fellow players on RoR, I start this topic as I feel we are left in the dark again about what is going on behind closed doors. While I do fully understand that the community and players should not know every single move, I do however, think we are "owed" (cough cough intitled spoiled shitter here btw :lol: ) to know what is going on with the server, furture content, balancing and the new style of community involvement. But with no results, apart from empty posts and a gost lingering in the shadows (halloween much?)

So lets dive into it shall we?

- New gearsets were teased a while ago and correct me if I am wrong but the #2weeks meme stim from that. While I do understand the the Team is short on manpower, it being a private server and people are not getting payed but instead do this as a hobby, maybe stop teasing that far out when the content is not ready to followup the created hype. I appreciate the time and effort put into this server, but this just further creates a feeling in the community about we cant really trust what is being promised and/or teased.

- Server stability and performance. Thanks for trying to improve the stability, and even give us a headsup in the patchnotes about server might be a little shakey. But what is actually going on, how come we are seeing a way worse performance as of late. Lagging, freezing, lords going on vacation, manual server locks etc. Are we going downhill in regards to performance and stability, because this is for sure not helping retain playerbase where we seem to be bleeding a little :|

- Classbalancing, Veto, Aza's sacrifice and community managers;
ohhh boy. So it has been 6(?) weeks now since the Aza White Lion changes were rapidly removed from the game, based or what seems to be catering towards solo and "less than 6man" playerbase wished. Despite this is directly against the many times we have heard balancing will be based around 6man and warband performance. This raised a little questionmark if it was to remove any sign of Aza, or if his codeing was just so "uniq" that it was too difficult to followup on. Nevertheless the removal was quick and seemed rushed, where as the (empty?) promises of "High priority" changes have taken 2 months now, and we still havnt seen anything in the patchnotes from the priority list.

Correction, we saw a glimse of what Aza spend 90min of our time during a false Q & A that he highjacked, talking about he couldnt do his job towards class balancing because it would get Veto'd by other parts of the Dev team. So from what we saw last weekend with the White Lion pre-implimentation topic getting Veto'd (and I feel like I risk my neck for even mentioning this, but anyone else feel like Torq whispered in the shadows and next thing we know, 5weeks of balancing team, think-tank and alot of good work. Goes down the drain. And that raises my biggest concirn: What was it all for, if nothing has changed? Why even put together a balancing team if they work is simply ignored at the last phase of implimentation. Was it just a mask to make us feel like Aza sacrificed himself for nothing (btw I strongly disagree about Aza method of hijacking and betraying his team's trust, but it continues to seem like it was true and his only move to get us informed)

I dont want to discredit anyone who has put in work towards this server, I respect Torq for his passion, the balancing team for their attempt. But please. Show me and the community that this is not true, that we have moved on and things are better because that Veto move last weekend has not been adressed and I think it is time to let us know how things are going. We have been patient.

So am I the only one thinking along these lines, am I out of touch, or do others feel the same?
Happy halloween and thanks for reading.
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lefze
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Re: Balancingteam, Developers and the community

Post#2 » Wed Oct 24, 2018 10:42 am

There is no "balance team" and there is no balance lead. Wouldn't read too much into last weeks veto as at this stage things come down to people not on the balance "thing" having good and bad days.
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Sulorie
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Re: Balancingteam, Developers and the community

Post#3 » Wed Oct 24, 2018 10:44 am

I notice that the patches come slower but it could just mean, that most likely something bigger is being worked on in the background. I don't need patch X to play the game, so overall I don't care about it or in other words, I am patient about future content and balancing fixes.
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RuffRyder
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Re: Balancingteam, Developers and the community

Post#4 » Wed Oct 24, 2018 10:51 am

I will make it short because OP asked for an opinion: I am a person with usually an impatient nature, but think most of your concerns are coming out of impatience. No offense meant, but don't stick to "2 weeks" all the time.

Furthermore, a lot of communication is going on on official Discord, rather than on the forum, and I appreciate that the team members don't refuse to answer when being asked in a friendly manner.

That said, iirc Vanquisher gear was announced to be released together with fortresses, which weren't close to finished when Vanquisher stats were announced.

I'm looking forward to any change coming, and hope for better performance, too.
Never argue with stupid people, they will drag you down to their level and then beat you with experience. (Mark Twain)

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Danord
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Re: Balancingteam, Developers and the community

Post#5 » Wed Oct 24, 2018 10:55 am

RuffRyder wrote: Wed Oct 24, 2018 10:51 am I will make it short because OP asked for an opinion: I am a person with usually an impatient nature, but think most of your concerns are coming out of impatience. No offense meant, but don't stick to "2 weeks" all the time.

Furthermore, a lot of communication is going on on official Discord, rather than on the forum, and I appreciate that the team members don't refuse to answer when being asked in a friendly manner.

That said, iirc Vanquisher gear was announced to be released together with fortresses, which weren't close to finished when Vanquisher stats were announced.

I'm looking forward to any change coming, and hope for better performance, too.
Wrong forts was supposed to come with Invader.. The Vanquisher was a inbetween thing, wich would be much welcome :)
As i for one and i guess a fair few other lacks a carrot to play for...... Im quite certain it would bring back alot of people, not sure if that is a good idea tho :( with the server being shaky as f... atm..

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Tesq
Posts: 5704

Re: Balancingteam, Developers and the community

Post#6 » Wed Oct 24, 2018 11:11 am

patch moved up and down due restructuration...

updates are there didnt you saw all the teased in news section of the forum? wait halloween event (few days) this thread should had posponed till that.....

they removed both aza and torque changes as those are getting revisited, point 342423 even if yali put a veto you can consider him as part of the balacing team due being owner of the server (in reality why it suppose not to be that way in first place....totally normal...it is strange that ppl think of it as something "new" or lame to me)...

so instead 2 weeks wait 4-5 days some answer should came i assume...

edit: but im curious too.....
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Natherul
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Re: Balancingteam, Developers and the community

Post#7 » Wed Oct 24, 2018 11:48 am

To address this shortly it can be summed up with a few sentences:

Slowing down of things in patch notes are due to working on coming things not yet ready, the restructure, loosing any member of staff means that things slows down and that we have been preoccupied with RL as well (this period of studies for me in particular is stressful).

Performance has been an issue for some time yes but the most recent issues should have been addressed by now (dont get me wrong, its not where we want to be in a long way).

The reversion of the changes to WL was down to 2 things, first being a massive loss of WL players showing their displeasure with the changes done and secondly the rest of the team did not like the butchering of the career that was done (removing the real "mechanic" of the career and slapping on maras mechanic to it).

The gearset is due to the same reason as everything else slowing down.

EDIT:
And just to mention shotly the crashing that happened in the middle of the night 2 days in a row now (EU time) is down to a backup script that we implemented, this is hopefully getting fixed today so it wont crash the server again.

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Ramasee
Posts: 457

Re: Balancingteam, Developers and the community

Post#8 » Wed Oct 24, 2018 12:04 pm

Currently the group put together to make balance proposals consists of three players, 2 balance forum moderators, 1 community manager, and 1 dev.

In truth, we have no power (can be a good thing, see further) and the three players are not considered RoR staff as of this moment. We take information found on the forums, the discord, pms to devs and ourselves, and from in-game chat about issues in the game and work through a process to create a balance proposal.

This balance proposal gets sent to what amounts to an internal forum (for this matter) for devs to comment on, and then we bring it out here for you guys to place feedback on. Based on your feedback, we can push it to devs to be coded, take it back to the drawing board to bring a counter-proposal (such as magus/engi thread, and thats whats going to happen to WL thread), or scrap the proposal entirely. This is where our "power" comes from, is you guys.


After we push it to the dev team, we have to wait for a developer to finish coding it, such a Torque or Max. Natherul being the only coder on the balance group, but he's currently working on a huge content patch.

It has taken us a while to create a good work-flow internally; also the white lion thread took up a ton of our time. (Over 3600 internal messages and several hours of voice communication, and that was AFTER the think tank) We have also had some resistance and confusion within the development team; some fair, others not. Its being worked on, and Yaliskah is the initial reason we are here.

This was our internal workflow:
Spoiler:
1. Initial musings or tossed out ideas.

2. Idea or problem is identified and is ready to be added to our list. Idea should be pinned to the appropiate discord channel and an entry be created on the spreadsheet labeled as "Idea Proposed"

3. When a think tank is made or a document created about the idea/problem, it moves to "Initial Discussion"

4. After think tank discussion comes to a few ideas and a consensus is somewhat created, we poke natherul about its viability to be coded. If yes, label as "Viable".

5. Do some rough draft math to flesh out the idea more. Once complete label as " Rough Draft Math"

6. Dan then works his magic making a understandable post to gitlab. Where dev team members can provide their feedback and *redacted* Label as "Posted to Gitlab"

7. Taking into account dev feedback we should have an optional voice meeting or at least some typed discussion before posting to thread to the forums for community feed back. Label as "posted to forums" and provide the link in spreadsheet.

8. After the post is locked and discussion is over feedback should be collected into our discord channel. Math should be redefined based on viable feedback. Label as "Gather Feedback / Final Math"

9. When that's complete we move to a "mandatory" voice meeting. Label as "Voice Meeting Needed / Final Pass".

10. If the outcome of the meeting is to push the change, label the Gitlab thread as "Confirmed", mark in spreadsheet as "Confirmed on Gitlab", and inform the community in the locked thread. If we do not push the changed, label Gitlab thread as "???", inform the community in the locked thread, and go back to step 3 labeling in spreadsheet as such.

11. Once the devs are finished coding, test the living **** out of our changes within the few day(s) we have. Label as "testing on dev"

12. Once it goes to live continue to monitor the situation actively for at least two weeks. Label as "Push to Live"

13. If we and the community are happy after monitor stage, label as "Solved"
And this has been influenced several times at the request of the you guys. (This is a little basic for obvious reasons in this thread)
Last edited by Ramasee on Wed Oct 24, 2018 9:17 pm, edited 2 times in total.

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wonshot
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Re: Balancingteam, Developers and the community

Post#9 » Wed Oct 24, 2018 12:25 pm

Thanks for the replies.

So how far on that list are the WL changes now, is the Veto in or not? And can we expect all those 3600 + msg plus hours on voice coms to go down a drain again in one of the later stages, simply because someone with power disagrees? I cant imagine how frustrating that must be on anyone.

Brings me back to some of the "evidence" that was shown about balance proposal sub forum was just a trashcan and not priviously taken really serious. With how much energy you guys put into this, and it getting vetod out so far into the process. How does that encourage the community to give feedback.

Hope this doesnt come off as personal attack(s) but I think the concirns I raise are valid, but I thank you for your transparency and time invested!
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Aurandilaz
Posts: 1896

Re: Balancingteam, Developers and the community

Post#10 » Wed Oct 24, 2018 12:33 pm

Natherul wrote: Wed Oct 24, 2018 11:48 am
The reversion of the changes to WL was down to 2 things, first being a massive loss of WL players showing their displeasure with the changes done and secondly the rest of the team did not like the butchering of the career that was done (removing the real "mechanic" of the career and slapping on maras mechanic to it).

The gearset is due to the same reason as everything else slowing down.
Logic being this;
player chooses class to roll -> wants to play smallscale -> rolls WL -> dominates smallscale thanks to pet mechanic and "army of two"
player chooses class to roll -> wants to play largescale -> rolls BW -> plays well in largescale because best AoE dps in game

after 10 years of WL players knowing they have no spot in warbands due to how their class works, just how many pro-AoE spec WL player comments did you expect? The people wanting to play warbands rolled other classes, simply because past decade has proven to everyone which classes work in warbands and which do not.
But hold up; how will an AoE lacking Wl play when Forts and Cities eventually come out? Will an organized warband preparing a coordinate push somehow invite a WL that is specialized in ganking people and doesn't really contribute at all towards the actual campaign push that consists of warbands locking keeps and zones... is the future somehow based on 6mans and 1s and 2mans capturing keeps and bringing down Fortress Lords, or will the process still be on the shoulders of the Warbands?
Will all classes be able to compete on warband level gameplay? Not currently, some classes just lack AoE, or their AoE is so lacklustre no serious warband will want them in their setup.

We have seen the comments from certain devs regarding their opinions of "warbandshitters" - and we know there seems certain bias towards ensuring morales don't scare pugs (only way to justify BW m2 nerf were pug arguments, organized Destro premade warbands had zero issues winning against it) and making them pretty much harmless when it comes to largscale and current lack of "burst" morale bombs (remaining dps classes with burst M2s; Magus, WE, WH, SW, SH... none really "core" wb classes)

Fact is, general oRvR balance is very much BW-centric... and the only way to break this BW-monopoly is if other Order classes can fill their shoes. Sure, nerf BW M2 but meanwhile Order gets AoE WL to compensate for lost burst, yet now the latter doesn't exist. Nerf Flashfire because too many Disrupts, well Disrupts now gone, nerf remains.
Nerfs above would be fine if BW wasn't the only thing holding Order AoE dps output flowing, if Engis, WHs, WLs, Slayers, SWs would be there to step up - currently they don't.
There isn't an Order frontline, there is no row of mdps in medium armour swallowing dmg the same Destro has lines of Maras, Choppas, +5k armored SHs just taking scratches while the Sorcs can hide behind them.
It's BW BW BW BW BW BW.... because for some reason the WL players who rolled WL because it was best class for smallscale surprisingly aren't instantly interested in becoming Warband players... yet many of the warband players (those few remaining who are left) are perfectly willing to hop on their WL alts in case optimizing their organized warband requires them to log from BW to WL for the good of the realm.


The state of largescale balance, its so absurdly biased in favour of Destro it isn't even funny, it's pretty much boring to bring your organized warband with all the utility and watch enemies melt because thanks to balance, they cannot do jackshit about it.

.t Nynaewe, rr78 Sorceress of TUP

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