Thread: Stable Mounts Issue and Stuttering/Hitching issues

Yet amazingly, most games manage to have a hotfix that works out within the day, or the next day at latest when they manage to screw up the code this badly.

Micropayment grinders mean total lack of quality control. Sad, but true. Coding has never been Turbine's strong suit, even when it was a subscription game. I shudder to think of the state that the code must be in now.

Originally Posted by Chanah

Yet amazingly, most games manage to have a hotfix that works out within the day, or the next day at latest when they manage to screw up the code this badly.

Micropayment grinders mean total lack of quality control. Sad, but true. Coding has never been Turbine's strong suit, even when it was a subscription game. I shudder to think of the state that the code must be in now.

Yes for issues that affect everybody playing, not one that affects a random set of random people at random times, personally I've only ever run into the horse issue twice and despite the doom and gloom sayers in here, it's not game breaking, ooh i close the game and relog in ZOMG! And as of yet I have seen zero issues with lag/skill lag after U6 and 7 but then again I don't raid (and given the tone of some of the responses from some posting in here that do and see the lag I'm glad I don't. I imagine in those cases the voice chat must be a flurry of language more colorful than a dockside bar on a saturday night).

The lag/hitching problem has dramatically improved for me, but alas, the poor stable horses are still balking in their assigned routes.

Server: Arkenstone
Time: 9:32pm MST
Location:
attempt 1: Rivendell to Thorenhad. Horse stopped right before fallen tree bridge
attempt 2: Rivendell to Thorenhad. Horse stopped on long upward incline on the way to the Gates


I appreciate the efforts to fix this problem - progress has been made as the lag/hitching is no longer game-breaking (for me).
Hopefully folks will realize root-cause investigations of this sort of problem are not as simple as they might think. I do know you guys are likely tearing your hair out - thank you for the update with some real information to chew on. Just being kept "in the loop" weill lessen people's irritation at the on-going problem.

Might I suggest more carrots and apples for the horses, and a warm bran mash in the evenings? A little sugar cube here and there should also sweeten their attitudes.

No more significant lag or hitching after the last Update.

Horses, haven't tried slow ones yet.

Originally Posted by Chanah

Yet amazingly, most games manage to have a hotfix that works out within the day, or the next day at latest when they manage to screw up the code this badly.

Micropayment grinders mean total lack of quality control. Sad, but true. Coding has never been Turbine's strong suit, even when it was a subscription game. I shudder to think of the state that the code must be in now.

It is obvious that right now most development effort goes into new stuff. Not into fixing old bugs or preventing new ones.

There is no need to dig for deeper explanations than this.

Originally Posted by Hurin

Nope. Only that this is the nature of troubleshooting complex systems. It doesn't always happen instantly. It doesn't always all get fixed at once. And sometimes, despite what the "duh! It was update 6!" crowd says, it takes a bit of trial and error and sometimes even a bit of luck to finally isolate the root cause and address an issue fully.

Banging our spoons on our highchairs about things we don't fully understand and just asserting that the fix must be easy and obvious doesn't get us anywhere. Because neither are true.

It would help some understand if they would actually get their heads around the fact that there are real people, probably fewer than we'd think, sitting there and dealing with the unpleasant reality that sometimes things go wrong and the fix is neither obvious nor easy (until it is discovered and seems to be both in retrospect). They are of course doing their best and are very motivated to find the cause. But there are only so many of them, and so many hours in a day. Thankfully, if they're lucky, their bosses are more versed in the realities of the situation than the average forum dweller who just wants to rant and wail, facts/reality be damned.

So you suggest to wait a whole year to see this fix?
or you suggest that 2 months is istantly?
This issue must fixed asap and not wait 1 week to put up the last usuless fix cause there is update 7 on monday , we have to wait till next big update to see next turbine's try?

This must be a real bummer for all involved, Turbine and the players alike.

Originally Posted by Hurin

<snip>
Because it's not so freakin' simple as the oh-so-easily infuriated brigade wants to believe.

I will state from the start that this is not a personal attack. You just happened to be the last programmer/developer to post on the forums.

Until the whole industry gets it house in order and starts producing code that actually works from the off, we, the general public, will always be complaining about shoddy coding and programmers of every ilk will come out of the woodwork and tell us how it is in reality.

Is there any other industry out there that would produce a product they know is broken and release it anyway, saying 'we'll patch it up later'?

Until the public start voting with their credit cards, it will never change.

Ok, programming/developing sounds bloody hard to do, but I don't care. If it's too hard, get out and do something else.

I will restate that this is not a personal attack on anyone or any company. It's an industry wide problem. full stop.

Originally Posted by Darmokk

It is obvious that right now most development effort goes into new stuff. Not into fixing old bugs or preventing new ones.

There is no need to dig for deeper explanations than this.

This is yet another oft-repeated bit of silliness. Do you really think it makes sense to divert people who normally write quest dialog, or design quests and instances, or build landscapes and put them to work analyzing network and server issues? Do you have your tax guy do your plumbing? Or vice-versa?

Originally Posted by Iorionael

I will state from the start that this is not a personal attack. You just happened to be the last programmer/developer to post on the forums.

I'm not a programmer or a developer. I just happen to understand how things work a bit more than some. And having worked in several parts of the tech industry, I know how it is to be on the other side of the customer service divide. So before I fly off the handle and bang my spoon on my high-chair, I actually take a moment to think about why things might not be so simple as I assume, why things might be more difficult than I might at first appreciate, and how those whom I wish would get their work done faster might not actually be totally incompetent merely because they aren't meeting my preferred timeframe.

Until the whole industry gets it house in order and starts producing code that actually works from the off. . .

You're asking for an impossibility. Software doesn't work the way you think it works. Here, educate yourself.

Is there any other industry out there that would produce a product they know is broken and release it anyway, saying 'we'll patch it up later'?

This is just cliches. But to answer your question, no. No industry is like this. Because no industry is like the software industry and deals with the same issues that the software industry deals with. . . which is why people who don't understand those issues will always get butt-hurt and hold them to standards that simply don't/can't apply.

Until the public start voting with their credit cards, it will never change.

Ok, programming/developing sounds bloody hard to do, but I don't care. If it's too hard, get out and do something else.

I will restate that this is not a personal attack on anyone or any company. It's an industry wide problem. full stop.

You don't realize it, but you're making an argument for not writing software of any complexity whatsoever. But the good news is that we're already voting with our wallets as you suggest. The fact that all software has bugs has us buying the software anyways. Because the alternative would be to not have games like this at all.

--H

Originally Posted by Hurin

This is just cliches. But to answer your question, no. No industry is like this. Because no industry is like the software industry and deals with the same issues that the software industry deals with. . . which is why people who don't understand those issues will always get butt-hurt and hold them to standards that simply don't/can't apply.

Sorry, but no. I'm in the game and I get incoming versions of new software to test, evaluate etc. Maybe I'm lucky (and simultaneously unlucky cos I'm such a typical IT slacker) that I have a boss and employer with high standards. If the new version breaks more than it fixes I'm expected, and supported, to fight hard to hold back that release until the game-breakers are fixed no matter what desired features are there - pun intended.

Let's forget about all the in-game coin wasted on grumpy horses... I'm no raider, but I do like full fellowship content. This game has been designed well, so that in challenging fights if any one of those six players fails to do their job there's problems. 5-6 second skill lags break an instance. EG. my main is a champ, in Roots the first boss requires me to burn the adds and burn them fast. Once one of those goblin adds starts running there is no margin for error - at this point server lag is the difference between success and potential wipe. I can't even imagine what it's like to be doing well in ToO T2 and have a lag spike that causes a wipe, especially considering the parameters of T2 Saurman challenge mode.

LoTRO does not live in a vacuum, there's at least a score of MMOs of comparible complexity who do not suffer this issue in their netcode. We aren't banging spoons, we're demanding a quality product worthy of the source material - and that's our right as paying customers who singularly fund this project.

Originally Posted by Lainalagos

I work in the financial sector, we handle data files worth more than I'll earn in several lifetimes.

Like I said, you're comparing apples and aircraft carriers.

I don't think you really want to argue that MMOs should be held to the same software quality/bug-free standard as the software powering wall street, do you?

Heck, you might as well make sure all MMOs code is as solid as those in pacemakers or other medical devices.

But, of course, though people who don't think things through might say "why not!?!". . . anyone with a cursory understanding of economics knows why that's a silly position.

--H

+ rep for standing your ground and defending what you believe in.
I love Middle Earth too - I hope you're right, I really do.

I've played many MMO's, currently beta testing two. LOTRO by far has the most lax QC in the industry, its the only gaming company I know that releases a "known issues" disclaimer with every patch notes (if they're known issues then fix them before release or don't release at all ./facepalm).

Of course other games have issues, but they all seem to fix them in a timely manner. They also bring their servers down weekly for a few hours for manitenance, thats were 90% of the problems lie IMO. Doing your server maintenance every 4 months (approx. when each update comes) magnifies the problem.

Software developement is not some voodoo/semi-religious rite, its a science and an industry just like any other and should be held to the same standards as any other consumer product. QC is QC no matter what the industry.

Originally Posted by Gladgilrian

I've played many MMO's, currently beta testing two. LOTRO by far has the most lax QC in the industry, its the only gaming company I know that releases a "known issues" disclaimer with every patch notes (if they're known issues then fix them before release or don't release at all ./facepalm).

Of course other games have issues, but they all seem to fix them in a timely manner. They also bring their servers down weekly for a few hours for manitenance, thats were 90% of the problems lie IMO. Doing your server maintenance every 4 months (approx. when each update comes) magnifies the problem.

Software developement is not some voodoo/semi-religious rite, its a science and an industry just like any other and should be held to the same standards as any other consumer product. QC is QC no matter what the industry.

Where do you get every 4 months? I believe it was done last month.

People complain now over maintenance, I can only imagine the outrage if it was done every week.

Originally Posted by Eartholloth

Where do you get every 4 months? I believe it was done last month.

People complain now over maintenance, I can only imagine the outrage if it was done every week.

U7 was an anomaly, its usually every quarter. People rage, its what they do, I doubt bringing down the servers weekly/bi-weekly at off-peak times for 3 hours would cause that much outrage if game performance improved.

Way to pick out one part of my post to nitpik while ignoring the main point, classic forums move.

Originally Posted by Hurin

Like I said, you're comparing apples and aircraft carriers.

I don't think you really want to argue that MMOs should be held to the same software quality/bug-free standard as the software powering wall street, do you?

Heck, you might as well make sure all MMOs code is as solid as those in pacemakers or other medical devices.

But, of course, though people who don't think things through might say "why not!?!". . . anyone with a cursory understanding of economics knows why that's a silly position.

--H

Why not? I'm sure no one here would mind paying $100/month for a subscription to this game, right?

Originally Posted by Gladgilrian

U7 was an anomaly, its usually every quarter. People rage, its what they do, I doubt bringing down the servers weekly/bi-weekly at off-peak times for 3 hours would cause that much outrage if game performance improved.

No, server maintenance is at least once every month, and EVERY time they announce it, there are a bunch of "people" who complain that it is just RUINING their life. Seriously, EVERY month, at LEAST four threads, with five to ten pages of people complaining about the servers being down for four hours.

Oh, and guess what? Server maintenance has had NO EFFECT on the lag/hitching/stable problems WHATSOEVER.

Hurin pls stop to defend turbine, they're undefendible this time, i played lotro since release and i never missed the old cm day like now .
Nice to ruin your game turbine

Originally Posted by Morons

Hurin pls stop to defend turbine, they're undefendible this time, i played lotro since release and i never missed the old cm day like now .
Nice to ruin your game turbine

You guys misinterpret clarifications and explanations for "defense."

When it is asserted that someone said something that they never actually said, it's not "defending" them to point out that it was never said. It's just stating the truth and not allowing people to make up their own facts.

When it is asserted that the only reason this isn't solved already is because of incompetence and/or malfeasance, it's not "defending" Turbine to to point out other factors that are obviously not being taken into account. It's just stating the truth.

When it is asserted that no other games have ever had issues like this that went on longer than expected, it's not "defending" Turbine to point out that this is demonstrably untrue. It's just stating the truth.

When it is asserted that the fix should be easy (and accomplished already) because customers have vaguely pointed in the general vicinity of where the problem might lie, it is not "defending" Turbine to point out how much more complex (and therefore difficult to pin down and resolve all at once) the issue is. It's just stating the truth.

When people assert and assume that Turbine hasn't really done anything to fix the issue (despite two updates already published and more logging being initiated), and even seem to want to believe that Turbine isn't even interested in fixing it, it is not "defending" Turbine to point out how silly and counter-intuitive such assertions/beliefs are. It's just stating the truth and standing up for common sense.

It speaks volumes that people take such offense when someone strays from the "Turbine is evil/incompetent" orthodoxy. All I have done is make valid/true observations that undermine the "Turbine is evil/incompetent" narrative, and the response has been (both publicly and privately) to "get out of this thread" as though suffering from a bug gives people carte blanche to believe things that aren't true and (more importantly) repeatedly assert such misguided/ill-informed/willfully obtuse beliefs while assailing the competence and integrity of real people. Honestly, this problem can be fixed without all the silly, misguided, ill-founded vitriol. People have said that they find the information Turbine has posted prior "infuriating". . . I merely post the reasons why their "fury" is misguided even if their disappointment that the issue remains is not. That is not the same thing as "defending" Turbine nor is it intended to diminish the severity of this issue or the need for a final fix as soon as possible. So, I'm not "defending Turbine" so much as I am merely pointing out that some people don't know what they're talking about and probably should attempt to restrain their "fury" in light of such.

--H

@Hurin, you should know by now that you can't win an illogical argument with logic, at best you've educated the few here that are actually understanding of what you're saying, at worst you're feeding the trolls. Best to, as you said before, go and enjoy the weekend and let the doomsayers and ragequitters have their little rants and raves.

Originally Posted by Gladgilrian

First off, unless you're a turbine employee then you are just as ignorant as I, cut to the chase, its conjecture on both our parts. I'm sorry, if you have known problems, then effing fix them before release, now you sound like the ignorant one.

You're obfuscating here. You said that a "known issues" list is evidence of Turbine's incompetence and willingness to let bugs make it into a released state. I pointed out that all MMOs have a list of "known issues" whether they post it publicly or not and all MMOs have bugs that make it into a released state. Therefore, the existence of Turbine's public "known issues" document does not make the point you asserted that it made. And I don't need to be a Turbine a employ to arrive at that conclusion.

As for "fixing all bugs before release". . . do I have to pay you to actually read this? Because few people who have read it would still say such things.

Lets compare apples to apples.

Rift had a security breach that was found by a white hat hacker.

LOTRO had a security breach found by a white hacker.

Rift, once it verified the breach, shut down the game until it was fixed and kept the player based informed. They also heaped praise on the white hacker and thanked him.

LOTRO denied everything and kept players in the dark, then after days they brought the servers down. To this day we don't know if our CC info was compromised, most companies side with caution and ask you to be aware that CC info may have been compromised. What became of white hat hacker? Who knows.

Relevance? I thought we were talking about bugs in a game. Not how the corporate office handles security breaches.

Way to move the goalposts.

I didn't say all, don't put words in my mouth, I don't play every single game out so I wouldn't know what every game does. I'm not raging or flipping out, but it seems you are. I barely play this game now for the sole reason that it has become a pale shadow of what it once was.

Way to (again) obfuscate. You asserted that Turbine doesn't do maintenance except when they patch the game. This was just flat-out wrong as I and others pointed out to you. But rather than admit your mistake and the crumbling of the argument/conclusion you built upon it, you're now just trying to change the subject.

You are being an out and out troll when no ones attacked you

If you mean I point out when people say things that aren't true or base their attacks on the competence/integrity of others on bad premises. . . then I'm guilty. But I didn't know doing so is considered "trolling."

Stop being such a troll, it doesn't improve you arguement.

Calling people "troll" for disagreeing with you substantively instead of addressing what they actually said demonstrates that you don't have one.

--H

Then there are those that can't see the forrest for the trees.

You forgot to pick a part this one......I know quality control, I know quality assurance, and I know testing, none of which seems to be a priority at turbine at the present. Do I blame QC and QA? Not neccessarily. You do what your department head tells you do or you lose your job, that I do know. Software is very complex, so is building skyscrapers, airplanes, and nuclear facilities. Thankfully we don't have to worry about loss of life, not real life anyways , with gaming software.

Bottomline is this. LOTRO is a product like any other. Although its F2P, there are still people that pay for this content. Sooner or later they will take their money elsewhere, as I have.

Look, I know what you're doing, others realize what you're doing, soon this thread will disappear like so many others have

All my stable rides since U7 went fine until today, when I bought a ride from Rivendell to Thorenhad. Then i started checking out this thread on the forums, and my ride stopped in Rivendell. Maybe I jinxed myself by reading the forums during a ride?

I find it amusing to read this thread. Lots of people complaining, others spending lots of time telling them not to complain. On and on it goes.

Hurin, you are right in saying that this is not simple to fix - that Turbine just can't snap their fingers and it is fixed.

But you cannot change the history of bugs existing for way to long in this game, and Turbine trying to act as if everything is fine. If they had a better, more honest, more open track record then people would cut them more slack. Instead they let things like the lag and recent bugs go on for very long. They don't say "we are trying - we know this is an important issue" very well. They are very good at being silent or saying "we can't reproduce it" and "we are not seeing it on our machines".

The bottom line is they have not invested enough into QA and staff working on existing bugs. They have plenty of staff time invested in the store and making new mounts, etc. This is a management decision - to not invest enough resources to fix these issues sooner.

And my guess it that, as long as the store is working as intended, and the money is coming in, they will never invest more resources in making the game less buggy. This is their strategic decision - it's good for their bottom line, it's bad for players. What some of us have been pointing out is that no other major MMO seems to care less about these types of bugs/issues - or lets them exist for so long. Sure in the history of other MMOs there have been issues, but the other MMOs clearly care more about player experience and fix things faster. If I am wrong, show me a specific example in another major MMO (Rift, WoW, EVE etc.) within the last 2 years that has had an issue like this in Lotro.

Maybe it's very hard to solve this issue, but obviously Turbine does not have enough staff working on QA and problem resolution for Lotro. They can make the choice to fix this sooner (spend more money on it) or not.

Lastly, Turbine I wish you good luck in solving this one, and know of course that some of you as individual staff are concerned about it and working on it (at least part time).

Originally Posted by Gladgilrian

You forgot to pick a part this one......I know quality control, I know quality assurance, and I know testing, none of which seems to be a priority at turbine at the present. Do I blame QC and QA? Not neccessarily. You do what your department head tells you do or you lose your job, that I do know. Software is very complex, so is building skyscrapers, airplanes, and nuclear facilities. Thankfully we don't have to worry about loss of life, not real life anyways , with gaming software.

Bottomline is this. LOTRO is a product like any other. Although its F2P, there are still people that pay for this content. Sooner or later they will take their money elsewhere, as I have.

Already addressed several times. Need I address it again merely because you repeat it?

Look, I know what you're doing, others realize what you're doing, soon this thread will disappear like so many others have

I think you take solace in that because of how this has turned out for you. Regardless of the ultimate doom of this thread, I take solace in that I saw people saying things that were either untrue or misinformed and I corrected the record and or provided needed context. And at least a couple people (even on that other site) appear to have identified some value in that information. Meanwhile, you can't seem to do anything but attribute the name "troll" to me because your arguments were found to be unsupportable.

--H

LOL, if the shoe fits.........

Originally Posted by Cindir

Hurin, you are right in saying that this is not simple to fix - that Turbine just can't snap their fingers and it is fixed.

But you cannot change the history of bugs existing for way to long in this game, and Turbine trying to act as if everything is fine. If they had a better, more honest, more open track record then people would cut them more slack. Instead they let things like the lag and recent bugs go on for very long. They don't say "we are trying - we know this is an important issue" very well. They are very good at being silent or saying "we can't reproduce it" and "we are not seeing it on our machines".

The bottom line is they have not invested enough into QA and staff working on existing bugs. They have plenty of staff time invested in the store and making new mounts, etc. This is a management decision - to not invest enough resources to fix these issues sooner.

And my guess it that, as long as the store is working as intended, and the money is coming in, they will never invest more resources in making the game less buggy. This is their strategic decision - it's good for their bottom line, it's bad for players. What some of us have been pointing out is that no other major MMO seems to care less about these types of bugs/issues - or lets them exist for so long. Sure in the history of other MMOs there have been issues, but the other MMOs clearly care more about player experience and fix things faster. If I am wrong, show me a specific example in another major MMO (Rift, WoW, EVE etc.) within the last 2 years that has had an issue like this in Lotro.

Maybe it's very hard to solve this issue, but obviously Turbine does not have enough staff working on QA and problem resolution for Lotro. They can make the choice to fix this sooner (spend more money on it) or not.

Lastly, Turbine I wish you good luck in solving this one, and know of course that some of you as individual staff are concerned about it and working on it (at least part time).

Nice post + repped!

Its short term profits over long term gain, and we all know how that will turn out. What some fail to realize is that is the foundation of our angst, that the game that we have grown to love will be no more, or change in such a manner that its unrecognizable.

EDIT: You must spread some reputation around before giving any more.....

Whats the time limit? I rarely +rep anyone and I know it been months since I have.

I am as I sit here on a stuck ride from 21st Hall. Also, last night the Kin on Arkenstone in ToO had several periods of lag experienced by all 12 people. Bottom line is 7.1 was not a fix. Turbine has until the end of my current subscription before I bolt from the game which I played since 2007. I don't think they care because all that is important to this company is if the game is making a profit. You don't want to know what I think about that.

If, as many defending Turbine state, the massive complexity of an MMO code base makes it so difficult to isolate the problem causing this, how is it that many of the same people say it makes no sense to stop adding new updates to the game. Each update adds more complexity, and until they isolate the cause of the current issues, they can't really have any idea whether or not they are creating yet another unexpected issue.

The number of flaws in U7, many of which were bugged in testing (and yes I was on test servers and bugged and know of others that bugged them) meant that it should not have gone live in the state it was in. That it did go live says to me that schedule overides quality these days in no uncertain terms.

When Riders of Rhohan was announced I was looking forward to it. In the last two months I have now come to dread it's impending arrival, wondering how many more things will get broken, rather than looking forward to new content and new mechanics. Given that I currently believe schedule is more important than quality, I'm guessing one of the main reason we're not seeing a resolution of current issues is that almost everybody that is qualified to be working on this is probably working on the new expansion instead. I see from other threads that Turbine is looking to hire a fairly decent chunk of staff, hopefully this may alleviate the problem, but at the same time I hope its older hands that are more familiar with the code that are switched to looking for the issue(s) causing problems.

I continue to have skill lags, continue to have odd lags occasionally when looting (both on mobs and nodes), crossing zone boundaries causes lags which never used to occur, trying to fire almost any skill immediatly after crossing a zone boundary or exiting from one area to another almost always experiences a delay of 1-3 seconds (playing off a SSD and the drive is NOT active loading data while these are waiting to go off), experience a slide of approximately a metre every time I approach about 80% of the crafting facilities in game. All since update 6, and no (or so little as to be not noticable) improvement with either of the last 2 updates.

I wll note that I seem to have cleared up a lot of my landscape hitching issues by setting my refresh rate (in game) and desktop rate to 60hz and turning vsync on. Prior to this I had it set to auto and vsync off, generaly ran at around 120fps dropping lower in busy areas, but very rare to see it dip under 60fps. Why fluctuating fps that is not dipping particularly low affects movement is beyond me, but this seems to be the case for me, don't know how others may fare.

Originally Posted by Hurin

I'm not a programmer or a developer. I just happen to understand how things work a bit more than some. And having worked in several parts of the tech industry, I know how it is to be on the other side of the customer service divide. So before I fly off the handle and bang my spoon on my high-chair, I actually take a moment to think about why things might not be so simple as I assume, why things might be more difficult than I might at first appreciate, and how those whom I wish would get their work done faster might not actually be totally incompetent merely because they aren't meeting my preferred timeframe.


You're asking for an impossibility. Software doesn't work the way you think it works. Here, educate yourself.


This is just cliches. But to answer your question, no. No industry is like this. Because no industry is like the software industry and deals with the same issues that the software industry deals with. . . which is why people who don't understand those issues will always get butt-hurt and hold them to standards that simply don't/can't apply.


You don't realize it, but you're making an argument for not writing software of any complexity whatsoever. But the good news is that we're already voting with our wallets as you suggest. The fact that all software has bugs has us buying the software anyways. Because the alternative would be to not have games like this at all.

--H

The bottom line is this.

1)The industry has a monopoly.
2)They know it and profit from it as much as they can.
3)The same old excuses have been used since the industry inception.
4)The industry set their own standards and your average Joe has just bent over and taken it.
5)It's waaaay too late to change how the industry works. So the end user will still shell out the readies for the next dodgy release.

That link just reinforced how the industry doesn't care and is obviously full of shysters and incompetents.

Originally Posted by Gladgilrian

EDIT: You must spread some reputation around before giving any more.....

Whats the time limit? I rarely +rep anyone and I know it been months since I have.

Time limit applies to how much rep overall you can give out in a given amount of time (24 hrs I believe, but I don't know for sure). I don't think there is a time limit when applying rep to one individual poster multiple times, even if you're attempting to rep them for different topics entirely. What the system is telling you is that you can't give rep to the same poster until you've given some amount of rep out (of which I have no idea how much that is) to other posters. In their words, until you've "spread some around".

Originally Posted by Iorionael

The bottom line is this.

1)The industry has a monopoly.
2)They know it and profit from it as much as they can.
3)The same old excuses have been used since the industry inception.
4)The industry set their own standards and your average Joe has just bent over and taken it.
5)It's waaaay too late to change how the industry works. So the end user will still shell out the readies for the next dodgy release.

That link just reinforced how the industry doesn't care and is obviously full of shysters and incompetents.

This is actually a perfect example of the type of mindset that pervades discussions like this. The basic realities, logic, and human limitations that dictate why things are the way they are can be spelled out until I'm blue in the face. . . but if people want to believe there are villains to be hated and evil forces out to hose them, they're going to believe that because it's more emotionally satisfying and a conclusion more readily determined. So, Turbine is evil/incompetent in the case of this bug and no further factors need to be considered (so we should all therefore just feel free to be "infuriated" and insult them publicly and personally now). And a very well-written (and well received elsewhere) explanation of why software has bugs and why it's not economical to release "perfect code", by a guy at a small, independent software company, is dismissed as being representative of an industry run by "shysters and incompetents" out to protect a (non-existent, btw) "monopoly" and "bend over" their customers. It's the same "find the villain and hate them" mindset applied to every situation.

People love to hate. When something unfortunate happens, some people go looking for causes, while other people go looking for villains to blame and hate.

Granted, sometimes the two coincide, and the cause is a villain with bad intentions. But sometimes, it's just basic reality, human frailty, economics, and. . . well. . . just the way the universe operates. And there's no point in spewing anger and hate at real people or blaming them for, well. . . reality.

As someone tried to remind me above, you can't beat an illogical/emotion-driven argument with logic. I fully agree.

Take care all. . .

H

the "game" is unplayable for me at the moment, please revert back to a less crashable state.

Not sure if Turbine is still watching this thread since it no longer seems to be used to report stable mount incidents, but just in case it's useful to continue reporting these issues:

I just took a stable horse from Michel Delving to Hobbiton, and just before reaching the stable master, my horse climbed up on top of a nearby house and got stuck. Not a huge deal since I could dismount a short distance from my intended destination, but thought the error might be worth mentioning.

Originally Posted by Hurin

People love to hate. When something unfortunate happens, some people go looking for causes, while other people go looking for villains to blame and hate.

People love to excuse too. This isn't just one 'unfortunate' incidence, it's a clear case of another brick in the wall of Turbines incompetence and lack of proper QA of late. If this were an isolated incidence I'm sure they would be getting cut some slack. A lot of people's slack ran out a while ago. What goes around comes around, if you treat your customers with respect, when the time comes that you need it back, you'll get it. If you treat your customers like idiots there to be milked, when the time comes that you need understanding from your customers, you aren't going to get it. Remember Draigoch? Turbine do, they took the money for it, and have since ignored just about everything about it being broken for many people. This isn't an isolated incidence.

Originally Posted by Hurin

But sometimes, it's just basic reality, human frailty, economics, and. . . well. . . just the way the universe operates. And there's no point in spewing anger and hate at real people or blaming them for, well. . . reality.

You could excuse just about every bad decision ever made in business with that nonsense. I wonder how many people would still have a job if everytime they screwed up royally at work said, oh well 'it was just human fraility and that's just the way the universe operates'. People do make mistakes, but there's a difference between a genuine mistake, and putting out a shoddy product because you know your customers will tolerate it.

But you're right about one thing, Turbine didn't do this to be evil, it's just a result of greed. A result of chasing profits at the expense of the customer, either that or a result of their best employees / resources being moved to their new console MMO. Combined with a 'they'll put up with it as usual' mindset which sees more and more bugs which should have been caught making it into live buids to be fixed at a later date, or not fixed at all which seems to be the case with the major ones lately.

If people keep excusing their shoddy practises as 'human fraility', of course they are going to continue to rush buggy content to live, and sell broken raids, and then not fix them. After all, why shouldn't they when people will just put it down to 'the way the universe works'.

Originally Posted by Whart

Not sure if Turbine is still watching this thread since it no longer seems to be used to report stable mount incidents, but just in case it's useful to continue reporting these issues:

I just took a stable horse from Michel Delving to Hobbiton, and just before reaching the stable master, my horse climbed up on top of a nearby house and got stuck. Not a huge deal since I could dismount a short distance from my intended destination, but thought the error might be worth mentioning.

I had several problems today too.

I took the stable mount from Hobbiton to Needlehole - Needlehole to Hobbiton - Hobbiton to Needlehole.

On the first Hobboton to Needlehole run I got almost to Waymeet and the horse stopped. I logged off and back on and it ran the rest of the way.

On the ride back from Needlehole to Hobbiton the horse almost got to Waymeet and again stopped just north of Waymeet, I logged off and back on... Now the first funny thing... When I logged back in the horse turned around and started to run back towards Needlehole, ran for a few feet and then turned around and ran to Hobbiton.

On the last trip to Needlehole, the horse made it all the way to just before Needlehole (Just before the last bridge) and stopped. After a few seconds it turned and ran to the water then ran back to the road and stopped. (Must have been thirsty) I dismounted and ran the rest of the way to Needle hole.

Wonder how long this will continue...

Originally Posted by RiceandPea

You could excuse just about every bad decision ever made in business with that nonsense. I wonder how many people would still have a job if everytime they screwed up royally at work said, oh well 'it was just human fraility and that's just the way the universe operates'. People do make mistakes, but there's a difference between a genuine mistake, and putting out a shoddy product because you know your customers will tolerate it.

You miss the point. Human frailty wasn't mentioned as an excuse for making a mistake on an individual basis. It was mentioned as one of the many reasons why it's impossible to write perfect code beyond a few thousand lines. Because the human mind just isn't capable of knowing exactly how an added bit of code will interact with the other thousands upon thousands of lines of code (indeed, usually written by others). So I'm not saying: "They're human, so we have to forgive them."

What I am saying is that when you write code with hundreds of thousands of lines, you're going to have a certain error rate. But it's not really fair to call them "errors" since sometimes the code you've written is fine, but interacts unexpectedly with other code written perhaps years prior by someone who left the company long ago. And, since it's intermittent in its effect or very quirky in what catalyst exposes the issue, it slips by internal testing, private beta testing, and even the public beta test. . . and makes it onto the live servers. At which point, you've got to find the problem without disrupting the game for the other (substantial) percentage of players who aren't appreciably affected by the issue (no reverts/rollbacks). And, guess what, since the offending code isn't obvious, and is the proverbial "needle in a haystack" but worse because it's not a needle but an actual piece of hay itself hidden within several haystacks that needs to be compared against every other piece of hay in those stacks to see if it freaks out and behaves oddly. . . you've got yourself a long haul ahead of you. And if you're smart, you'll stay off the forums and not listen to the folks who have no idea about such realities but just want to call you greedy and/or evil because you aren't pulling the landscape design guy and the guy who works reception into the effort to track down the issue.

So, no, I did not bring up "human frailty" or human limitations (the word I should have used) as an excuse for people making mistakes. I brought it up as one of many realities that makes software development and the concept of code economy what it is.

But hey, you guys are just going to pretend that Turbine's unwillingness to throw more money at this issue is the problem. It's easiest just to think that Turbine is "greedy," and that somehow these things can always be avoided at reasonable expense or loss of efficiency and only incompetence/greed could possibly be to blame. If that makes you feel better, I'm done trying to stop you. Enjoy your misdirected rage.

--H

Originally Posted by Hurin

.....interacts unexpectedly with other code written perhaps years prior by someone who left the company long ago. And, since it's intermittent in its effect or very quirky in what catalyst exposes the issue, it slips by internal testing, private beta testing, and even the public beta test. . .

--H

Is that like all the bugs that went live anyway, despite being reported by numerous people during testing on Bullroarer?
Some bugs are inevitable, regardless of investment in QA, and some bugs will always have to make it from beta to live. But that has an acceptable limit, and for most people that limit has been crossed by a large margin. Like I said, if this was an isolated incidence, you might have some credibility, but on top of all the other 'issues' recently that have made it live despite being reported by many in testing, you don't. It's obvious that seriously buggy beta builds have been given the green light to go live, and that they expect us to live with them. Like we're expected to find workarounds amongst ourselves for Draigoch as we've had zero reponse.

The only rage I've seen recently here has been from you. You keep saying you aren't coming back, then you do. I don't think most here are angry, just disappointed that it's come to this.

Originally Posted by RiceandPea

Is that like all the bugs that went live anyway, despite being reported by numerous people during testing on Bullroarer?

Yes. Exactly like those. But this isn't one of those.

Some bugs are inevitable, regardless of investment in QA, and some bugs will always have to make it from beta to live.

We agree.

But that has an acceptable limit, and for most people that limit has been crossed by a large margin.

I'd say that's only the case for "most" people who for some reason conflate this type of problem with the type of bug that any company looks at and says: "it's not ideal, but we can --and should-- ship with x still being a problem." The floors in the pit of iron is a good example of the latter kind. You can either leave them in and release the other 98% of the content. Or you can delay a while, fix the floors and pray that you didn't just break something else (perhaps something much worse like this issue!). Or you can fix the floors, delays three weeks, and do regressions tests to make sure the "fix" didn't break something else. At some point, all things being considered (which likely won't be by those reading this), it just makes sense to release it with the broken floors and fix it later.

Like I said, if this was an isolated incidence, you might have some credibility, but on top of all the other 'issues' recently that have made it live despite being reported by many in testing, you don't.

And there's that conflation again. The posts were deleted yesterday, but throughout this thread, people love rationalize their hostility here via completely unrelated issues prior. You yourself have stated that there are different kinds of bugs. And that some are unavoidable. Well, I posit that this is one of those unavoidable ones (one that good-faith testing did not catch). So despite how good it might feel, it does no good basing your feelings about an unavoidable bug on the bad taste left in your mouth from the avoidable ones.

It's obvious that seriously buggy beta builds have been given the green light to go live, and that they expect us to live with them.

You could say the same about Windows, Mac OS, every MMO out there, and most apps on your phone. And not because of "greed". . . though I'm sure that'll be the dismissive answer (perhaps from others).

The only rage I've seen recently here has been from you.

I was not the person to openly admit to being "infuriated" merely because Turbine stated that they continue to work on the issue.

You keep saying you aren't coming back, then you do.

Lucky you. I had a few more minutes of free time.

--H

Originally Posted by Hurin

Well, I posit that this is one of those unavoidable ones (one that good-faith testing did not catch). So despite how good it might feel, it does no good basing your feelings about an unavoidable bug on the bad taste left in your mouth from the avoidable ones.

But I'll point out again that the reason they are getting serious flak about this issue, is because of the way others have been handled, or not handled as the case may be. If people had seen progress about for example the Draigoch bug they would be more inclined to say 'well, they clearly do care' so why should this be any different. Instead, it's become a case of 'they don't care' so why should this be any different. They are reaping what they've sown.

You could say the same about Windows, Mac OS, every MMO out there, and most apps on your phone. And not because of "greed". . . though I'm sure that'll be the dismissive answer (perhaps from others).

Sure, bugs are unavoidable in all software. But again let's take Draigoch, for those that paid and it didn't work - no refunds, no fix, nothing. Many people paid for that raid specifically and can't run it. Almost all respectable software houses will offer you a refund if a purchased product doesn't work ( or even if you don't like the product - http://i.imgur.com/LP7ko.jpg ). Not so for Turbine. Once they have your money, you aint getting it back. Tough luck if what you paid for doesn't work due to no fault of your own.

They cut the customer no slack - even when the issue is at their end, and when situations arise like this, that 'generosity' is returned to them, and rightly so. If they had offered refunds regarding Draigoch, it would have showed goodwill. They have showed none, not even the courtesy of updates about what is happening. Why should people show goodwill to them now?

Now I'm sure you'll say that doesn't relate to this issue, and it doesn't directly, but it does show how little Turbine value the customers. Which is why this for many is just the final straw in a long line. For many it seems this isn't about this particular issue, but a cumulative effect.

Would this issue have occured if Turbine had spent more on QA? No-one can say for sure. Personally I think that Turbine have been cutting corners on all fronts for too long, and it was inevitable that things like this would eventually start to happen. I suspect many of their best programmers have either left, or been moved to their new console title, and Lotro is running on new and more inexperienced staff. Whatever the reason I do think if Lotro was being showed the care it once received, this wouldn't have arisen. There are a whole raft of things that point to it being demoted to second fiddle at Turbine.
Ultimately, if Turbine as you say can't avoid these issues no matter what they do, it's about time their refunds policy reflected it.

Fair enough, R&P. I won't dispute any of that latest post as it's well-argued and reasoned while showing an appreciation of basic realities.