12 replies to this topic

[Alistair Winter]

It's great that PGI is now a lot more active on the forum, but at the same time, it's kind of easy to lose track of what's been said so far.

Let's say a player council (or just a group of players) come up with a suggestion for how to change the relationship between ECM, radar and missiles. Then Russ and Paul look at it and they decide it would be fairly easy to do the coding, and they wouldn't have to do any major changes to the game.

Then the idea is that we vote for it, right? But would we get to do a public test first, the way we tested IS vs Clans and a bunch of other stuff? Sometimes an idea looks good on paper, but it plays out very different from what you thought. And sometimes an idea looks bad on paper, but it turns out to be a lot of fun.

So have they said anything about this so far? Can we test an idea before voting, if there's going to be a vote?

Edited by Alistair Winter, 23 September 2014 - 02:19 AM.

[Alistair Winter]

Bumping for great justice.

[El Bandito]

I assume there will be a PBE testing period once an idea has gotten the largest community vote.

[Joseph Mallan]

I would hope so. Giving the playerbase the opportunity to break the new mechanics is almost always a good idea.

[Viges]

As I understand community has not decided yet if any changes to ecm needed at all.

[Joseph Mallan]

You'll never get the community to agree that the sky is blue Viges, how do you expect to get a consensus on something like ECM?

[SilentScreamer]

Viges, on 23 September 2014 - 06:14 AM, said:

As I understand community has not decided yet if any changes to ecm needed at all.

The phrase, "The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence" applies here. Some players don't like the way ECM works now and some are okay with it. But unless you have tried both, how can you make an informed decision.

Personally, I find the whole idea of changing the basic mechanics of a game both amazing and somewhat silly. PONG did just fine without patches or tweaks. But PONG wasn't dependent on an online community for continued revenue.

[EgoSlayer]

I doubt it. To play test each change before voting means that PGI actually has to do all the code changes for each option which is at a minimum a two week process per change. Depending on the number of suggestions that could amount to months of work, and then when all is said and done then PGI has to roll back each change, and add the next one. Until a final selection is made, and a final roll back to the winning selection after everyone votes.

It's just not practical. Too much wasted time coding that would be better spent elsewhere, bug fixes, other improvements, etc.

Edited by EgoSlayer, 23 September 2014 - 06:31 AM.

[Viges]

SilentScreamer, on 23 September 2014 - 06:24 AM, said:

The phrase, "The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence" applies here. Some players don't like the way ECM works now and some are okay with it. But unless you have tried both, how can you make an informed decision.

What if I tell you that I played mwo before ecm was in it?

[SilentScreamer]

EgoSlayer, on 23 September 2014 - 06:30 AM, said:

I doubt it. To play test each change before voting means that PGI actually has to do all the code changes for each option which is at a minimum a two week process per change. Depending on the number of suggestions that could amount to months of work, and then when all is said and done then PGI has to roll back each change, and add the next one. Until a final selection is made, and a final roll back to the winning selection after everyone votes.

It's just not practical. Too much wasted time coding that would be better spent elsewhere, bug fixes, other improvements, etc.

To imply that PGI would code and trial release any proposed change is unrealistic. I do agree trying every proposed change would be a waste of time and resources. The Player's Council and PGI management should (and probably do) discuss changes in depth then decide which change(s) make it into Test Center or the actual patch.

Personally I would rather see Community Warfare fully released before more mechs and gametweaks, but that is a different (and probably dead) horse.

[MaddMaxx]

Viges, on 23 September 2014 - 06:30 AM, said:

What if I tell you that I played mwo before ecm was in it?

We used EyeBall 2.0. Same thing still applies.

[Colby Boucher]

Speaking of which, when are these votes supposed to take place? Does anyone know yet? And beyond that, what will the options be? I think it would be productive to start an "Unofficial" ECM discussion thread again, just so PGI can see what we think all in one place.

[Alistair Winter]

Viges, on 23 September 2014 - 06:14 AM, said:

As I understand community has not decided yet if any changes to ecm needed at all.

Yeah, there's a lot of things that need to be decided. But at some point, Russ will possibly be presented with a coherent, working idea. And I'm wondering if we get to do some public tests before he shows thumbs up or down.

EgoSlayer, on 23 September 2014 - 06:30 AM, said:

I doubt it. To play test each change before voting means that PGI actually has to do all the code changes for each option which is at a minimum a two week process per change. Depending on the number of suggestions that could amount to months of work, and then when all is said and done then PGI has to roll back each change, and add the next one. Until a final selection is made, and a final roll back to the winning selection after everyone votes.
It's just not practical. Too much wasted time coding that would be better spent elsewhere, bug fixes, other improvements, etc.

It doesn't mean that at all. It just means that when they have a working alternative, with all the coding done in a single swoop, there's a public test before we get to vote. I mean, if it looks good on paper, there's going to be some testing behind closed doors anyway, before PGI lets us try it. I'm assuming they do a lot of testing we don't know about.

Colby Boucher, on 23 September 2014 - 07:38 AM, said:

Speaking of which, when are these votes supposed to take place? Does anyone know yet? And beyond that, what will the options be? I think it would be productive to start an "Unofficial" ECM discussion thread again, just so PGI can see what we think all in one place.

No information. But I'd like to see an official ECM thread, with all the latest updates.