Balance/Live Team

fowlero

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Jan 2007

England, UK

We Are The One And Only [rR]

Just posting here to see if anyone knows what's happening with the new balancing and directly to any Anet cr that may see this, to start:

Quote:
Originally Posted by Linsey Murdock
The switch to a bimonthly schedule allows us to maintain the quality of our work, and—this is important—it allows us to gather community feedback about the skill balance updates before they go Live.

To do this, we’ll try to post the update notes/dev update for each skill balance about a month before the update actually goes Live and ask you for your feedback.
Last balance was September 17th, but then since we've had the implementation of the Live Krewe and various other things in halloween and the hero removal etc.

So i'm just wondering with the stuff you've done whether there's still likely to be a balance this month? Since somewhere it says you've switched to bimonthly, so hoping this month is target.

As the dev notes said to be a month before has yet to appear, would also wonder if this is still a plan in action as it says it was only a possibility?

(Just to make sure, this isn't a QQ i'm just wondering how this is gonna work/how the schedule is.)

Shayne Hawke

Shayne Hawke

Departed from Tyria

Join Date: May 2007

Clan Dethryche [dth]

R/

I think I can make a safe bet in saying that the Test Krewe is not yet in place.

If they're truly on a bimonthly skill balance schedule, the next balance will come soon. Looking back, it doesn't seem to be consistent with what day that may be, whether it's the first or second Thursday of the month, or a Wednesday, or whatever.

Eragon Zarroc

Eragon Zarroc

Atra estern?? ono thelduin

Join Date: Jan 2008

Madness Incarnate

[Duo]

W/P

it is highly possible that skill balance may be a little late with all the holiday stuff going on. if it is late, i would say that's understandable.

lemming

lemming

The Hotshot

Join Date: May 2006

Honolulu

International District [id???]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Eragon Zarroc View Post
if it is late, i would say that's understandable.
It would also be awful.

Chocobo1

Chocobo1

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Sep 2007

New Zealand

CoA

N/

I really do expect great changes this month. They have had 2 months + a test krewe for suggestions + playtesting. They really don't have an excuse to be late, Halloween was the same as last year except a meh quest chain.

Eliz Genevieve

Eliz Genevieve

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Jul 2009

Portugal

The Archivists' Sanctum [Lore]

D/

They do.. henchmen bars; gvg henchies, HA henchies..

The meh quest chain ..

hell, I won't say the did a lot, but they did something.

And for god's sake, the test krewe isn't yet in place , <<.

englitdaudelin

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Jul 2006

East Coast

Soldier's Union [SU]

N/Me

I'm not going to hold my breath for "great" changes, but I'm looking forward for the next little steps. Linsey's posted before about the effort in designing areas, and I'm sure then that this chain of quests for Halloween takes more effort than I know about. The programmers out there know better than I do--so, any takers on that question?
Given the suggestion that Dhuum (or his skellies) get stronger as some are killed--was there some kind of dynamic instance, where other skeletons gained health, energy, or armor based on the death of others? Or was the Steward blowing smoke that we shouldn't have inhaled?

And testing for XTH, and Henchies in PvP? I'd love to see the update...but I think we've seen it.

Ownage Ritual Lord

Ownage Ritual Lord

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Aug 2009

Almighty Kurzicks of Cantha

Rt/

Yay new balance!

Anon-e-mouse

Anon-e-mouse

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Apr 2006

@ Home

League Of Friends [LOF]

R/Mo

It's been mentioned by Linsey, that any skill updates would happen AFTER halloween.. so hold onto your horses for feck sake.. Blardy hell the festival auto-update (NPC removal) has only just kicked in and already people are spitting their dummies for a skill update.

Meridon

Meridon

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Dec 2008

Funny Business Inc [FBI]

I remember Linsey's or Regina's late October Journal post say that at that moment, they hadn't started any development on the skill update, regardless of the fact that last update was already a month old.

Also, when they stated they would be switching to bimonthly updates, they stated that they did this in order to make the skill updates more meaningful.

Assuming that the above statement wasn't a lousy excuse to produce one update less per two months, and meant that they wanted to do bigger skill updates (and equally fewer, so not cutting back on skill update development), you can expect the skill update to get delayed. If the next skill update is as big as they promised, it should take some serious development time (maybe like a month or so), and therefore not appear before late November.

If they do deliver soon however, it would mean that the skill update will either be very small, very bugged and untested, or that they do have the potential to pump out a large skill update in less than 2-3 weeks, which would indicate we're not recieving enough of them.

Fril Estelin

Fril Estelin

So Serious...

Join Date: Jan 2007

London

Nerfs Are [WHAK]

E/

Linsey also said in her August 28 mega-post (bold highlighting is from me:

Quote:
Originally Posted by Linsey
A New Approach

I know this is a lot of information to take in, and it comes in a package that is sort of unusual in the game industry. At the beginning of the year, we spoke about wanting to be more open about what we’re working on and set this as a high priority in the months that followed. We had a lot of plans for how to accomplish this, but as they say, "The best laid plans of mice and men often go astray.”

We’ve decided to try a slightly different approach, starting with this post. As you can see, we are relaxing our stance on talking about projects that are in progress and projects that are just getting going. We’ve launched Facebook and Twitter pages to give you quick updates on what we are up to. Taking a less formal approach like this will work easier with our fast-paced schedule and will hopefully increase the flow of information to you.

This degree of transparency is unusual for large game companies, being more common to smaller studios and indie projects. We’ll be sharing information and offering insights into the development process that the public normally doesn’t have access to for AAA games. This kind of stuff goes on behind the scenes anyway; we’re just pulling the curtain back to show you the process. To make this new approach successful, our community needs to meet us halfway. We all have to be on the same side here.

So, in return for this openness, we expect you, our community, to be understanding when projects that we have discussed may be canceled or changed, or a project or build is delayed. We want you to have ambitious expectations for us, but to understand that there are always limitations. Everyone has to deal with finite resources, competing priorities, and unexpected complications, and we’re no different. By embracing this reality, we can work together to bridge the gap between development and community for the betterment of the game.

I’m looking forward to chatting about my work openly, but as always please keep in mind that there will be lulls in activity from time to time.

Meridon

Meridon

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Dec 2008

Funny Business Inc [FBI]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Fril Estelin View Post
Linsey also said in her August 28 mega-post (bold highlighting is from me:
[insert journal post here]
Uhm, cool story bro?

Nothing personal, but it seems you are implying that I'm not aware of the bolded parts and not acting accordingly. I actually only pointed out that we can expect a delay based on what the Anet has said so far, and seeing the update too soon would probably be bad actually.

I didn't grief about any supposed lack of updates. Frankly, I'm pleased that they announced late october they didn't start work on the skill update, because it prevented me from being disappointed later on at around this time, because like I said, it made me expect that it would be delayed, and you should too.

fowlero

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Jan 2007

England, UK

We Are The One And Only [rR]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Anon-e-mouse View Post
It's been mentioned by Linsey, that any skill updates would happen AFTER halloween.. so hold onto your horses for feck sake.. Blardy hell the festival auto-update (NPC removal) has only just kicked in and already people are spitting their dummies for a skill update.
Why so mad? If you read my original post i am in no way "spitting my dummies for a skill update". I also stated that i was not expecting an update til after halloween, so i have no idea what you're on about.

My posts intention was to find out if anyone knew any update (or at hope an anet cr) on when this is to happen and when we can expect the next set, due to the number of things they've done lately. My reasoning being they said they would probably release dev notes a month before the balance (though not for certain).

With Fril's part, i'd be understanding if they told us it was delayed. But as since we've heard nothing other than that balances will now be bimonthly since the last update in september. I'd just like to know if that's still on time kinda thing.