Author Topic: 1.1 Official is out in patch form!  (Read 9675 times)

Offline Cinth

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Re: 1.1 Official is out in patch form!
« Reply #15 on: June 15, 2012, 03:47:35 am »
Nothing wrong with pushing 30. Hell, I'm pushing 30 from the other side myself. How many 30 somethings do you know that have pushed 2 great games out or have logged enough miles to have traveled around the world? 30 something is a great time in life.  8)
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Offline omegajasam

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Re: 1.1 Official is out in patch form!
« Reply #16 on: June 15, 2012, 07:21:47 am »
After reading through the writeup, there was one thing that clearly stood out to me as odd.

That was namely on the Guardian scrolls/City Building and the repeat instance it was a matter of perception and length of time to get them and so on.

This seems half at odds with what I've seen where people /do/ do the city building. I have a lot of friends who built up the city for the sake of building up the city, but even then, the actual scrolls were considered things that were two low in duration to be worth gathering, there being too few situations where they're worth using, or were just uninteresting.

While I /love/ the solution to the city-building problem, even with that solved the scrolls themselves are relitivly uninteresting compared to say hunting after new spells. Their effects are dull, short and they become something people just stack up before a overlord.

Giving them potentially longer durations (with perhaps a smaller buff), having them do more interesting things (applying area enchants perhaps, more varyed effects, randomised combinations) or just well anything might be a good idea to look at in 1.2. They're a cool idea, but I feel they could really use some spice to make them something one would consciously seek out or plan around using.

Offline Misery

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Re: 1.1 Official is out in patch form!
« Reply #17 on: June 15, 2012, 07:43:43 am »
After reading through the writeup, there was one thing that clearly stood out to me as odd.

That was namely on the Guardian scrolls/City Building and the repeat instance it was a matter of perception and length of time to get them and so on.

This seems half at odds with what I've seen where people /do/ do the city building. I have a lot of friends who built up the city for the sake of building up the city, but even then, the actual scrolls were considered things that were two low in duration to be worth gathering, there being too few situations where they're worth using, or were just uninteresting.

While I /love/ the solution to the city-building problem, even with that solved the scrolls themselves are relitivly uninteresting compared to say hunting after new spells. Their effects are dull, short and they become something people just stack up before a overlord.

Giving them potentially longer durations (with perhaps a smaller buff), having them do more interesting things (applying area enchants perhaps, more varyed effects, randomised combinations) or just well anything might be a good idea to look at in 1.2. They're a cool idea, but I feel they could really use some spice to make them something one would consciously seek out or plan around using.

I have to disagree, actually.

I've been using the different scrolls quite alot, and I find that MOST of them are pretty useful.  A "moderate" elemental scroll, for instance;  that's a 40% damage buff to that particular element.  That's really quite a boost, the same as the base level of elemental enchants.  Put the two together and you have one heavy hitting strike.  These are GREAT for boss gang missions.

Stuff like Rushing Wind (I think that's what the running one is called) can make surface area exploration easier;  the jump-increasing one is good both in Outposts, and in many caverns, particularly if you're using slow/heavy characters like the Draconites;  the Draconites are pretty darn strong, but they really are slow as freaking dirt and even a triple jump doesnt help them all that much.  I dont mind gathering some movement scrolls to make them more mobile for a time.    And the defensive scrolls, I forget what they're called, can be good in ANY situation, particularly with low-health characters.

In all honesty the only scroll type I DONT use is Disjunction, and that' simply because I've never run across a situation that needs it; the "area enchant" system currently only applies to outposts, so it's rare that this scroll is needed.

As for the amount of time they last..... 10 minutes is quite alot, particularly in any combat situation or mission.


Now, part of all this might be the difficulty level I'm on; I'm playing on Master Hero currently, so the game can be pretty mean;  the scrolls become that much more useful on higher difficulty levels.  I cant see them being very necessary at all on lower ones, because you simply dont need much extra power in that case.  But on the higher ones, it's often the difference between winning, and getting stomped into the dirt.

I DO though agree with the idea of getting more TYPES of scrolls;  there arent actually very many types right now, and there's all sorts of wacky effects that could be possible with these.  Both scrolls that are used in combat areas, AND scrolls that do things on the world map, I'd really like to see more of both.   

Offline Mánagarmr

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Re: 1.1 Official is out in patch form!
« Reply #18 on: June 15, 2012, 08:25:20 am »
It's really amusing how little I feature in these releases. For the AI:War 4.0 and 5.0 releases I was all over the release notes. But my real life (and Tribes:Ascend) has blown a gigantic hole in my AVWW time xD Ah well, at least I get to enjoy all the changes you lot brought about ;)
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Offline keith.lamothe

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Re: 1.1 Official is out in patch form!
« Reply #19 on: June 15, 2012, 08:41:00 am »
It's really amusing how little I feature in these releases. For the AI:War 4.0 and 5.0 releases I was all over the release notes. But my real life (and Tribes:Ascend) has blown a gigantic hole in my AVWW time xD Ah well, at least I get to enjoy all the changes you lot brought about ;)
One trend I've seen over the past couple years is a distinct "rotation" in player involvement in the community (both bugs/suggestions and general forum interaction).  Players come, get really involved, then go do other things (during which time other players come, get really involved, etc), and often come back later to get more involved.

I think it's largely a matter of only being able to drink from a fire hydrant so long before one needs a rest ;)

It's been really encouraging to see that there's always been been folks to fill in the gaps when others go off-rotation, and I think it's been pretty healthy for the feedback to have the combination of long-time veterans and newer players.

Anyway, many thanks to everyone for helping build this monster we call 1.1 :)
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Offline Misery

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Re: 1.1 Official is out in patch form!
« Reply #20 on: June 15, 2012, 09:15:58 am »
It's really amusing how little I feature in these releases. For the AI:War 4.0 and 5.0 releases I was all over the release notes. But my real life (and Tribes:Ascend) has blown a gigantic hole in my AVWW time xD Ah well, at least I get to enjoy all the changes you lot brought about ;)
One trend I've seen over the past couple years is a distinct "rotation" in player involvement in the community (both bugs/suggestions and general forum interaction).  Players come, get really involved, then go do other things (during which time other players come, get really involved, etc), and often come back later to get more involved.

I think it's largely a matter of only being able to drink from a fire hydrant so long before one needs a rest ;)

It's been really encouraging to see that there's always been been folks to fill in the gaps when others go off-rotation, and I think it's been pretty healthy for the feedback to have the combination of long-time veterans and newer players.

Anyway, many thanks to everyone for helping build this monster we call 1.1 :)


I've noticed this as well at least a little bit even in my short time here.

It really is great to see a community so active and involved as this one.... it really is a rare sight, and something I'd like to see more often.  Stuff like this is yet more reason why I tend to stick to indie titles rather than retail these days.


In my own case, I have absolutely stupid amounts of free time, and gaming is my main hobby, and I put this one right up there with Minecraft and Dwarf Fortress (both of which I'm always playing at least somewhat), so I'm not likely going anywhere anytime soon.

Offline Mánagarmr

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Re: 1.1 Official is out in patch form!
« Reply #21 on: June 15, 2012, 10:45:22 am »
Dwarf Fortress really never goes away, does it? :P
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Offline MouldyK

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Re: 1.1 Official is out in patch form!
« Reply #22 on: June 15, 2012, 11:48:19 am »
I was on and off quite often with contributing because to be honest, while I enjoy the game, I still think something is missing for me in the game, but I don't know what yet. Maybe I aint found a character type I like yet or as Chris wrote in the blog post, a style of play and pace I can live with. :)

Also, looking for a job depresses me and does not help my wanting to game :P


But I will still try to contribute for 1.2 lol. Aiming for more than 15 this time lol.
« Last Edit: June 15, 2012, 11:56:38 am by MouldyK »

Offline BobTheJanitor

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Re: 1.1 Official is out in patch form!
« Reply #23 on: June 15, 2012, 12:42:09 pm »
I could be wrong, but, I think actually that at 33, I'm the old guy of the group.

You've got me beat by a year. I was kind of surprised to hear that Chris was younger than me, although I don't really know why. Just some sort of subconscious assumption that someone who is running their own development studio and pumping out great work must clearly be my elder.

I do sort of assume though that the general age range of the community must be at least in the mid to late 20s. At least it seems more mature than a lot of game communities I've experienced over the years.

One trend I've seen over the past couple years is a distinct "rotation" in player involvement in the community (both bugs/suggestions and general forum interaction).  Players come, get really involved, then go do other things (during which time other players come, get really involved, etc), and often come back later to get more involved.

I'm definitely guilty of that. I was almost top of the list for the last big release, and this one I didn't even make the cut. I sort of thought I'd give it a rest for a bit and wait for an official steam activation, but then that wait turned into a longer and longer wait. And then I got distracted with other games. So it goes. No doubt I'll be back for more soon. I do still try to stir up trouble in the forums whenever I can. :)

Offline tigersfan

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Re: 1.1 Official is out in patch form!
« Reply #24 on: June 15, 2012, 01:15:32 pm »
I could be wrong, but, I think actually that at 33, I'm the old guy of the group.

You've got me beat by a year. I was kind of surprised to hear that Chris was younger than me, although I don't really know why. Just some sort of subconscious assumption that someone who is running their own development studio and pumping out great work must clearly be my elder.

I do sort of assume though that the general age range of the community must be at least in the mid to late 20s. At least it seems more mature than a lot of game communities I've experienced over the years.

Well, by "the group", I meant Arcen staff. I assume there are older folks than me in the community here, I mean, I'm not THAT old! :)

Offline keith.lamothe

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Re: 1.1 Official is out in patch form!
« Reply #25 on: June 15, 2012, 01:28:50 pm »
One trend I've seen over the past couple years is a distinct "rotation" in player involvement in the community (both bugs/suggestions and general forum interaction).  Players come, get really involved, then go do other things (during which time other players come, get really involved, etc), and often come back later to get more involved.

I'm definitely guilty of that. I was almost top of the list for the last big release, and this one I didn't even make the cut. I sort of thought I'd give it a rest for a bit and wait for an official steam activation, but then that wait turned into a longer and longer wait. And then I got distracted with other games. So it goes. No doubt I'll be back for more soon. I do still try to stir up trouble in the forums whenever I can. :)
I certainly wouldn't call it something to be "guilty" of ;)  I think it's a good thing that people go and do other stuff and then (usually) eventually come back with a different set of experiences, etc.

One nice thing about doing AVWW is it gives people who really liked AIW but had their fill (after a few dozen/hundred hours of a specific game some people are just done, nothing wrong with that) a reason to become more involved for a while :)
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Offline x4000

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Re: 1.1 Official is out in patch form!
« Reply #26 on: June 15, 2012, 02:13:09 pm »
There are actually quite a lot of people in the community who have noted that they are in their 50s and 60s, and others in their 40s.  Most of them from earlier in the days of AI War, so that may have changed.  And I won't name any names. ;)  But certainly my alpha test group for AI War consisted half of my dad and uncle, both in their 50s now (early and late, respectively).

Anyhow, I too really appreciate how there is a constant influx of folks and how others return.  It makes me a bit sad when people leave and don't come back (Haagenti, for instance, who was so central in helping to define AI War 2.0; or RCIX who was so instrumental to AI War's development for the better part of 3 years), but these things happen and I'm always glad for the time with everyone who comes and goes.  The more the merrier, and everyone who leaves for one reason or another is always welcome back free of guilt or baggage -- many hands make light work, and nobody is letting the community down by stepping away for a while.

An analogy: I was enormously into tennis as a teenager.  I played, generally, 1-2 hours 6 days a week.  Most of that training with various coaches who had high hopes for me that I was never able to, ultimately, fulfill.  But it was a rather focused training in a variety of styles by some very professional coaches, at any rate.  All that focus can be... bad, past a point.  It is good, to a point, and then it switches to causing tunnel vision.  There were times when I would go on vacation or something and not think about or play tennis for 3 weeks, and then I'd come back and suddenly be noticeably better.  Just from having had some distance.  Some things that had been frustratingly out of reach for months I suddenly could do.

I love that people in the community play other games other than Arcen titles.  I do, too.  I think we're all richer for that, and I would never dream of playing any one game (or company's games) all my life, nor would I hope for anyone else to.  Even if the game is made by Blizzard. ;)

Anyhow, I appreciate all the kinds words of support and solidarity from everyone.  Hopefully we at Arcen will be around for many more decades to come, doing more or less what we've been doing; and to those who inevitably leave during that sort of timespan, hopefully they will feel free to come back every so often and see how things are going, and let us know how they're getting on.  I really like how these forums feel like a community so much of the time, rather than just a... well, a forum for discussion of a topic of common interest.


Anyway, rambling, but that's how I feel. ;)  Today has been so far mainly a day of paperwork and catching up on business-related stuff for me, so no new AVWW stuff.  That, plus getting other things for the distributors ready, and waiting on certain ones to go ahead and release what we sent them.  Etc. :)
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Offline Gemzo

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Re: 1.1 Official is out in patch form!
« Reply #27 on: June 15, 2012, 02:42:46 pm »
I normally don't go through with actually posting this, since I don't feel it adds much to the conversation, but... I really admire this whole system. Developers who are super easy to contact and give feedback to that is actually seriously considered. I've submitted an issue in mantis and seen it resolved 2 minutes later. You guys are seriously crazy awesome and I only wish there were more like you.

On that topic though, I always thought "Why isn't Arcen very well known?" and such. But then I think, "Well if they were, it wouldn't be very reasonable to expect them to read every single thing posted." and thus it would be much harder to get your feedback noticed. Such a situation seems pretty much like what other companies often do. It always makes me sad when I see a forum full of ideas and long overdue balance changes, but the developers don't even so much as respond to discuss making any sort of change. I don't have any doubts that Arcen would still find time to read and respond to most of the feedback somehow, though... Anyway I had to stream my thoughts into a post for this one, just tired of always wondering about this and coming back to the same conclusion every time. Not sure how posting it will help but maybe it could spark discussion.

Offline Cinth

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Re: 1.1 Official is out in patch form!
« Reply #28 on: June 15, 2012, 03:07:40 pm »
...

I love that people in the community play other games other than Arcen titles.  I do, too.  I think we're all richer for that, and I would never dream of playing any one game (or company's games) all my life, nor would I hope for anyone else to.  Even if the game is made by Blizzard. ;)

...

Guilty  ;)

To be fair though, I play a lot of games and have become fans of developers. Blizzard, SquareEnix, MinMax, Kerberos, and Arcen are among the top of my list.
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Offline x4000

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Re: 1.1 Official is out in patch form!
« Reply #29 on: June 15, 2012, 03:29:38 pm »
I normally don't go through with actually posting this, since I don't feel it adds much to the conversation, but... I really admire this whole system. Developers who are super easy to contact and give feedback to that is actually seriously considered. I've submitted an issue in mantis and seen it resolved 2 minutes later. You guys are seriously crazy awesome and I only wish there were more like you.

On that topic though, I always thought "Why isn't Arcen very well known?" and such. But then I think, "Well if they were, it wouldn't be very reasonable to expect them to read every single thing posted." and thus it would be much harder to get your feedback noticed. Such a situation seems pretty much like what other companies often do. It always makes me sad when I see a forum full of ideas and long overdue balance changes, but the developers don't even so much as respond to discuss making any sort of change. I don't have any doubts that Arcen would still find time to read and respond to most of the feedback somehow, though... Anyway I had to stream my thoughts into a post for this one, just tired of always wondering about this and coming back to the same conclusion every time. Not sure how posting it will help but maybe it could spark discussion.

Thanks for that, I really appreciate it.  In terms of the amount of developer interaction, however, I don't think that's a function of community size.  I used to think that was true, but I no longer do.  I think it's two factors and two factors alone:

- People on the Internet are generally harsh, especially at first.
- Most companies seem to build up their workload to the point that they can barely sustain it.

The first factor means that its really damaging to the egos of artistic people to go on forums or similar and read people bashing their stuff.  The more people there are in a community, the more chances there are for someone to disagree with you, and on the Internet that can degenerate very quickly.  So most developers, once they pass a certain point, seem to wall themselves off.  Or the developers were around since before the Internet existed in its current form (aka, before the "blogosphere" happened), and they were inherently used to being walled off to begin with.

On the flipside, some companies that start out really involved with their community really drop out of involvement as they grow, but I don't think that has to do with the community.  The more well-known you get, the more business people randomly start contacting you with these or that opportunities.  The more people want you to hire them for art or music or whatever, out of the blue.  The more paperwork you have to do for staff, and the more overhead in general there is just to get everyone organized.  If you take on several simultaneous projects, then the complexity is almost multiplicative.  Thus all these other activities take the place of the community interaction.

Arcen has seen a lot of growth in the last three years; several notable jumps in community size, in particular.  For the first six or so months of Arcen's life, I responded with a greater than 1:1 ratio to the entire rest of the forum.  In other words, anyone who wrote a post I responded to it, and I also wrote original posts (informing of releases, etc).  This lasted for maybe 8 or 9 thousand posts on my part, I can't remember.  Maybe as high as 12 thousand.

Then we got a lot more well known, and suddenly my response rate dropped to being more like 1:2 or so.  But we also took on some more staff, and they made up for the gap some.  We've had three or four other big bursts of community size growth, and after the most recent one (AVWW 1.0) I think I'm lucky if I'm 1:10 in terms of responses.  If even remotely that.  But Josh and Keith are also here, and Erik is mostly the one focused on twitter and reddit and facebook and such, and between us we're able to keep tabs on things and respond to things as a group as they need to be responded to.  If I miss something that somebody says that is important, that's okay because some other staffer -- or even other community members -- can bring it to my attention.

As part of this whole sort of shift, there is a lot more cross-talk between players themselves, rather than everyone just talking to me in a public-but-individual fashion.  You folks often will have a conversation about one of our games that I'm not involved in at all, and that's as it should be.  Sometimes I'm just, frankly, not needed.  And that's what makes this into more of a community, rather than just a wheel with players at the hub with spokes all leading to a tiny staff in the middle.  Instead it's more of a sea of points, and we float among you, commenting as we can and need to, and reading pretty well everything between the core three of Keith, Josh, and myself.

If the community grew 100x larger, then obviously the three of us wouldn't be able to maintain that level of reading-everything.  But there are always community leaders who step in to fill that void, especially with a community of that size.  And the important interactions and feedback would still rise to the top, even if we could only personally respond to one post in a thousand, or one post in a million.

Think of it this way: could any one of us here on the forum, as an individual, go looking through the feedback on the Call of Duty forums and determine what their feedback constituted?  Of course not.  But if we had mantis set up there, with a system for voting, then we could distill what the most urgent/interesting/popular suggestions and bugs were, and act accordingly.  That's kind of the idea of representative government, just applied to business: and I'm sure it would have all the same challenges of ensuring minority rights in terms of opinions and so forth.  But with good community and company leadership, I think it could be done even on a scale of millions of people.

It wouldn't look or feel remotely like the Arcen forums, but it would accomplish much the same sort of thing.  I dunno; I think there is some naivete in my arguments there, based mainly around the effectiveness of what could easily become a bureaucracy.  Among other ills.  So maybe for Call of Duty it just really couldn't work perfectly, I don't know -- but I do think it could work better than it does now, and I think that on a smaller scale as Arcen grows, we'll be able to keep something along the lines of what we have now.  That's my dear hope. :)
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