General

I completely agree with this. There is a complete lack of communication between the deve team and the player base. I truly belve there would be less people rage quitting and quitting there subs if there was more communication.

Thank you for the update. It's greatly appreciated.

Well unfortunately we did get updates, basically telling us that our concerns were not relevant..

Letting us know that the timer is connected to a global formula and would require more study, to see if it could even be changed, is much more helpful.

@Ulukyn - Thank you for addressing our concerns and letting us know we were heard. That means a lot!

* * * * *

@Luminatrix - It's not the fame or dappers or cooldowns so much as the imbalance and feeling forced to behave a certain way. I already go to multiple cities/tribes on multiple continents for overseer missions anyways, but that was by choice. Now it's no longer a choice; the decision is made for us all. And when you add in the Ranger-specific fame issues and the unique hassles of traveling Aeden Aqueous for camp tours/prospector mission (Greenvale is a looong swim from FH compared to the short jog Matis get, not that I'd do that for 40% of the rewards others get for the same thing), it's a bit hard to not feel punished for choices I feel are valid, like being a Trykette Ranger who enjoys her homeland more than the other regions. I've felt pressured to be Kara/Matis to match my guild/friends for most of the time I've played (which is a restriction I also dislike immensely, but that's a separate discussion), and now it feels far less optional.

Now more than ever, the mechanics are forcing me in ways I don't feel are right. Hopefully there will be tweaks that will lessen that feeling....

Don't take this game too serious. If you think about it more like a hobby everything will be fine. I'm here for jena knows how many years, I saw many homins come and leave, devs come and leave, csr come and leave, but the game is still functional. It might not be the game I used to play and love, but I'm curious where it is headed.

arc

(To both)

Another aspect of these patch stories and Ryzom that you guys don't seem to realize.
The team is really lacking of testers.

As a result, big change (that impact the whole server) cannot be tested entirely, or not at all.
And players want content update and big change :P
So well.. what to do?

You can still try to help with testing, asking Tamarea on RC.
Or serve as guinea pig for each patch.. or?

Excuse?
This is no excuse but reality here, and feel free to help instead.
Ofc time need to be taken, that not the point of my comment (but you don't seem to understand it).

Have a look at the Ranged weapons project now.

How long are you willing to wait?

Seriously, some changes are in test for a month or two. And after that time it is normal that Tamarea _begs_ to have at least one test report for each platform. While, by me, the reasonable minimum should be 15 (3 platforms x 5 languages). I see 51 names in the Testing team. Yes, not everyone is a tester, there are members of other teams who want or need to observe. But don't tell me it is 90%.

Testing is not much fun. It is long and repetitive work, even with testing tools (that DEVs develop along the way). It requires active attitude, it requires you to think in wide context. And it requires good knowledge of the game. Testing is not "do and forget". You need to come back to see if issues you have found were solved. And then you re-test it again, every single issue fix. While you look for any new regressions. And once someone decide it is good enough, it must all be tested again. And after it is released, you test it again. You must keep track of player issues and when those issues are solved somehow, the process starts again. Testing, re-testing, final testing and post-patch testing. And don't forget unofficial testing/helping aside the process, because all development time non-DEV can save, DEVs can use to work on something else.

And now, think about the fact that the Testing team is, as it looks to me, an usual start point for new volunteers. A volunteer comes to the team, learns basics, complete some testing in one or two patch cycles. And then simply leave, because it is as described above. Or find another place for himself/herself in another team. Or another team pull that volunteer for own projects - the lack of members is a problem for most of teams. And that volunteer has no or just a little time or will for any more future testing.

Yes you are right, testing is not the only problem and I personally do not understand why there is so rush with (some) changes when, by me, it is not ready to release yet. But it always ends with the testing. And we need much more testers than 2.5 or whats the average per change :/

Okay, I must be in an alternate universe now; I'm actually (at least mostly) agreeing with both Moniq and Revvy!

Testing takes a ton of dev-hours to do right, and often does not account for all of the ingenuously creative ways the end user (in this case, players) can and will use whatever is released. It's not fun, and it sucks up resources that could be used elsewhere. That's rough for a small team.

That said, there are times where something that is seen as "good enough" and sent prematurely can cause far more problems than waiting. And with Ryzom in particular, I think most of us who have been around a while are used to change happening slowly. We know the team is pretty small, and we have the math skills to know that for a given amount of dev-hours, less devs means more hours. I think that much of the recent kerfluffle may have been a rush to ship, which lead to not testing certain aspects (i.e. - like how equally this patch would treat all four factions, or how equally dynamic events treat each time zone) due to time constraints.

One thing that may help in the future is a combination of communication and patience. I suspect I'm not the only one that would rather hear, "This is a thing we're working on, but it's still not working as intended.", than have a repeat of this fiasco. Sure there will still be some mistakes made, but I think that at least a little more transparency would dampen unrest.

Preface: I know that there are lots of good hearted volunteers involved. Please do not take this personally. I love all of you who have good intentions.

RE: Not enough testers. Not the full picture:

Guys... if ANYONE had told us that new horizons was 100% going to be removed (let's be honest... that's what it is)

NO ONE would be jumping up and down for that , save the most masochistic "give it to me harder, oh yeah" group. I don't need to name names here.

I understand this argument about testing, but there was no transparency.
We just need some more conversation.

If someone told me 2-4 days, plus no buff, on craft misisons... guys.. I could caclulate for you the outrage here. It's obvious that people who are doing 3/4 lands + even tribes can still be stuck with tons of extra mats, if the timer is increased by that much.

Telling me to go do something else is just dictatorship.

The point is, theoertical discussions can bear lots of fruit, not just actual testing. In fact, depending on WHO your testers are, they may think this is JUST FINE (no sap crytals, punitive florist nerf, useless dappers on nh, no free nh transport for neutral +50s, huge buffs to combat missions and no buff to crafting missions, "just go dig" for sap crystals)

It's not just about how many testers. It's about the diversity of testers, and people who aren't pushing a "make it harder, I love it" agenda.

There are specific posts by someone who literally said (paraphrasing):
Sucks for you, that you didn't see this nerf coming. Haha , I made 30 alts, farmed the events, farmed crystals, and now I have stuff, and you don't . Haha, now you have to suffer, and I don't. But OH I really support this change, it's a necessary change, people had too many dappers and crystal anyway (nevermind that I'm laughing at you because I "planned" for this)

With people like this in the community, I'm not sure testers can even be trusted.

-Theoretical discussion is effective.
-Make your changes MORE transparent.
-Don't tell me I need to join the team or email Tamarea to get involved

The patch notes were written in a way, that I feel, hid the reality that this was a blatent nerf. I don't have to defend my statement. It's plain to see. And it needs to stop.

PS. Since the effects of the patch have hit so much pushback, a rush fix-patch would have been advisable, or even a rollback on the patch (or parts of the patch) Some things should be rushed, some should not.

I'm just playing my part. I don't mean to be as abbrasive as I sound. It's just worth saying. Thanks. I have suggested my 2 cents on how to help fix this. More testers, FINE. More theoertical discussion, more transparency, YES.

Testers have no power to change anything directly. We can object and point out what we think is wrong with a specific change, however the goal of testing is to make sure it works as expected by rules we do not make. We are not making decisions and we are unable to delay or stop the release.

To be specific about New Horizons 2.0: We did warn that the change will not make players happy and suggested at least to wait for planned mission changes. The matter of mission adjustment was not known to the Testing team by that time. The answer was it will be release separately, with mission changes following shortly after JY 2603 patch.

I am not sure who you should rather address your text, maybe Level Design team?