Low priority to fix but still annoying

Discussion in 'Time Locked Progression Servers' started by Runes, Aug 24, 2020.

  1. modsiw Augur


    Ngreth was purposefully trolled. Being completely unfamiliar with one of EQ's most iconic zones and not taking the time to GM warp to Chardok to look around still says a lot about company culture.

    He got exactly what he requested on Aug 26th, with no noise, but ignored it. This isn't the first time Ngreth has stated he needed information, received it, and crickets. Don't blame the users for misleading him.

    The devs need less hand holding and more Netflix culture.
    Wyre Wintermute, jeskola and Runes like this.
  2. yerm Augur

    Chardok is not one of eq's most iconic zones; seb is. He correctly identified how seb works. Chardok was a ghost town until they revamped it, I believe around epics launch? Even then it never became as popular. Fippy and Vulak were the first time the zone overtook Seb in popularity. For a non tlp nerd, it's similar to not remembering dalnir or kedge etc. Even after the mistake the spot he said he's looking at on the bad map IS the right spot even if the reasoning is off. Meanwhile it's only been 3 weeks.
    Duder likes this.
  3. Ngreth Thergn Developer

    I figure people want to hear from devs, not have a perfect dev.
    I don't always have time to do the research. I just don't. Even the 5 or 10 minutes.
    So. I will make mistakes.
    minimind, Skuz, Duder and 1 other person like this.
  4. Ngreth Thergn Developer

    I do consider spending time reading these forums and making some responses important, even though I really don't have time for this as well. So I temper that with just responding with what I can, even if there may be errors I need to correct because, since I don't even have time for this I don't spend time researching.
    minimind, Skuz, Fanra and 3 others like this.
  5. Stix Man Elder

    I don't think people are mad at you, moreso the "let me google that for you" type of thing.

    It probably just takes more time to try to gather the information from a forum, versus logging on and looking.

    You most likely have to verify the location either way. I doubt you will just take a location given and add it into the database. You'll probably go to chardok, teleport to that location and make sure it's okay.

    We do appreciate the work you put in. It's just people are tired of having so many of these "10 minute fixes" go completely ignored and then they have to "hold hands" or "google it for you" type of thing.

    Maybe if you had some highly knowledgeable people to ask to do research for you instead of trying to gather locs from a public forum. But, really, I think it just comes down to it's just an easy thing for someone with GM powers to do. It 100% took way more time out of your work schedule to try to gather the information from us.

    If you had just logged on and looked, you could of simply replied to everyone "I warped over to Chardok and the location I picked is xxx, yyy, zzz (zone in)... any objections with good reasoning? And, that is literally the end of the conversation.

    Less stress on you, and we get the information without having to feed locations to someone who can warp to the zone in 2 minutes, which again, you'd have to do to verify the location is correct anyways.
  6. modsiw Augur


    I won't venture to speak for anyone else, but I'm not mad at Ngreth. I am, however, 'mad' at DBG. DBG created the situation where this sort of thing happens. Stix has is it right, imho. There should be time built into Ngreth's schedule, by management, where he has a block of time to do the right thing. The right thing for the consumers, and the right thing for DBG. It's absolutely insane that a developer doesn't have the autonomy to use his own judgement to allocate a small portion DBG's resources (some of his own time) in what is clearly in DBG's best interest.

    DBG,
    Quit with the micromanaging. FAANG / top tier companies have pretty well proven this is the wrong way to behave. Seeing as DBG is ran by venture capitalists, perhaps have a look at how Y Combinator runs things. Failing that, go grab a few random staff engineers from top tech companies and talk to them.

    Objectively, DBG is doing this wrong. It's inefficient and irritating.
  7. jeskola pheerie

    Chardok is the one with the Sarnaks
  8. Febb Augur


    Right now, the company has put the next expansion as the top priority and everything else probably only gets worked only if management gives the green light. They have a ticket system that probably is controlled by management and only if their current task is done are they assigned to work on the next ticket. Working on things in between tickets is usually a no no unless it's approved by management. At least this is how development happens with my company.

    If I start working on a non prioritized ticket and spend time coding up something and it's not my assigned current task and management finds out, I get asked 20 questions and scolded and told to stay on task until it's done and tested.
  9. modsiw Augur

    Yea. A lot of places are process heavy.

    Do you think this is the best way to operate?
  10. Bigstomp Augur

    I don't always agree with you, but the fact you take time to read and post is very appreciated.
  11. Runes Augur

    I have next to no coding experience so my outlook on expectations for fixes are probably too simplistic.

    My question is if there is something really complicated in changing the current succor and pick point coordinates inside the Chardok zone to match the zone in coordinates from the 1st entrance as you run into the fort on your right? I mean, is it as simple as changing a few global values for the coordinates when a succor type spell or item is activated from inside the zone or when picking , or does a coder have to manually go in and change individual values for every single spell or item to use those specific coordinates, making it a very time intensive process?

    I also seem to remember that Chardok used to only have one zone in, zone out, succor and pick location, which was the current zone in that is a dead end?
  12. Ngreth Thergn Developer

    depends on the game.
    For EQ, this particular change is "simple".

    That said, the title also says it "Low Priority" I have things of higher priority. I even consider forums conversations higher priority. Doesn't mean it will never get done. Just. Not high.
    Rolaque and Skuz like this.
  13. modsiw Augur

    “Low priority” doesn’t show the entire picture. The severity is low, but the ROI is high. Sure, there are a lot of worse things ‘broken’ on TLPs, but even if you’re actively fixing one those, which I doubt, it’s still justifiable to pick some low hanging fruit from time to time.
  14. Accipiter Old Timer


    Yes. Otherwise you end up with fixes that break other things, new/refactored code in place that no one tested because they didn't know about it, etc. I have a couple of pet peeves that make me nuts as a dev exec:
    • Developers refactoring other people's code because they saw something they didn't like while working on an unrelated issue.
    • Developers picking up whatever task they feel like doing today.
    I have a bunch more but those are closest to the discussion at hand.
  15. Runes Augur


    Thanks Ngreth, response is fair enough, it really is not a priority item when time and resources are limited and can be put towards better uses, especially when there is only a few months left and majority of people will be moving on to Velious. Just wanted to bring it up for attention and maybe it will get lumped into a batch of other QOL small fixes in time for the next server.
  16. modsiw Augur

    The process that determines which work is performed is independent of how that work is done. As you pointed out, having regressions is almost always due to either insufficient test coverage or monolithic code bases. Neither of which is what we're talking about and are equally likely to occur regardless of how whether to fix / don't fix was decided or who decided it.

    "Refactoring someone else's code" is a problematic mentality right from the start. Teams own code, not individuals. If the refactoring is justified for the objective, then it's correct. If not, then it's a developer expending resources in a way that's not in the company's best interest, and should be counseled. Whether or not refactoring is correct has nothing to do with if the person doing the refactoring is the original author or not. That's just ego, both in the original author being offended that someone else changed their code, based on no other criteria, and on the person performing the refactoring if its done because "they didn't like" it.

    Developers picking up "whatever task they feel like" isn't what I'm describing. That's simple immaturity. A professional should be aware of the immediate objectives being worked toward and able to make daily operational decisions toward that end. A developer should be free to make tactical decisions that are in the best interest of the company, not what's in the best interest of his individual psyche. Strategic guidance should come from higher levels. If you can't objectively defend why you chose to do something (not how you did it), then that developer needs counseled and ultimately terminated if the behavior continues. If a dev is making poor choices in this regard even after being talked to about it, it's almost a certainly that he's making additional poor choices in less obvious ways. Slowing everything and everyone down to match pace with the least disciplined man on the team isn't the best plan, but there's plenty of Fortune 500s that can demonstrate it gets things done, eventually.
    bardybard likes this.
  17. Tweakfour17 Augur


    How is the ROI on this high? Just from a PR perspective of "hey look! we listened and fixed this annoying thing"? because otherwise the Return on Investment is low, across how many servers and how many players is changing the succor point in 1 Kunark era zone going to be helpful for? For how long? Maybe this issue effects live servers (is Chardok in EoK era expacs?) but otherwise the only people benefitting are:

    A) On Aradune or Rizlona
    B) Needing to evac somewhere safe

    If you're picking over you are likely full health and should be prepared to fight a couple low level mobs at the exit before making your way back down into the zone. Also in 3 months or less the number of players in column A will drop drastically which will cause the numbers in column B to be almost 0.

    Should it still be done? Sure, but I don't think any part of this is "high" priority.
  18. modsiw Augur


    ROI is the ratio of effort to reward, not an absolute measure. Effort is low, as ngreth stated, thus the required reward to have a high ROI is low in absolute terms. Yes, PR has value, but in this case not because of fluff, but because it removes an annoyance that is highly visible (relative to most PR where the recipient has no direct interaction).

    This delivers value for 3 months out of each TLP cycle.

    PS: You said PR, so I'm going with it. This isn't PR though. PR is purely information / image management. If the company actually does something relevant to their product or industry, it's not PR.