cRPG

cRPG => General Discussion => Topic started by: Ujin on February 25, 2013, 03:28:23 pm

Title: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Ujin on February 25, 2013, 03:28:23 pm
I'm only gonna express MY thoughts here, but if anyone else feels the same or wants to add his 2 cents, go ahead.



Dear chadz and the Item team,
Stop treating us like shit, please.


Now that you have another thing going for you (wink wink), i think it'd be nice if you could spend a couple of minutes , read this , and possibly even reply.

We all are your loyal supporters. Pretty much everyone who still plays this mod is your loyal supporter. That's the playerbase you'll have to rely on many times in the days to come and i'm sure you know it. I could point this out more frequently and explicitly in this topic but certain agreements restrict me from it, so i only do this once.

Some of us are more vocal than others, some may support you more actively, but we still are one group of people who share similar interests and admire your work. We all are interested in seeing your Projects get better and expand in various ways.


I'm getting to the point, don't worry.


You have extremely talented and active coders on your team, including yourself. You have enthusiastic people with great (most of the time at least) ideas. You aren't afraid to experiment and try out new things. You as a team also have your own unique way of communicating with your players and i personally can respect that too, after all we haven't paid a cent for this game, except for some individuals who donated.

Crpg has many unique things that made it such a popular mod , including this one - ITEM VARIETY . Eventually it went from just quantity to quantity AND quality, but it took quite some time.

Why ? Well let's figure it out together shall we ?


You don't have any modellers or texturers on your cRPG team. In order to add new items to your mod's arsenal , you had to rely on either OSP packs from independent artists or  enthusiasts from your own community to make them. And BY GOD this is a long history of treating your most loyal fans, the ones that actually moved a finger to help you get your mod better, like crap.

I remember back in the days when the Shogunate still existed, we still had the native pink strange armors in the mod. Holy hell that looked horrible didn't it ? And guess what, if not for the community, we'd still have a gazillion of crappy items in the game with a few exceptions here and there that came out of OSP packs.

Every time the community creates something for you, getting it in the game is like driving a shopping cart through a Russian swamp. Now i wouldn't feel i had the right to make these kind of statements if the issue was some random obnoxious crap that players randomly make and than demand being put in the game. I don't in any way support this kind of way of working with the CRPG team.

In the last couple of years i've personally dealt with and watched others communicate with the CRPG Team. Without a doubt, most of the times it looked more like human torture than  two civilized  groups discussing things.

For those of you not in the know , the process of adding your new items in the game that has the most chances to succeed usually looks like this (spoilered to save some space) :

(click to show/hide)

Now, seems alright on paper, doesn't it ?  It's ok , except for the fact that every single time there are numerous obstacles . In short, i'd name it the Dev Apathy Syndrome.

I could start pointing fingers at certain dev team members , but i don't  want to . First , i'm done trying to figure out how your damn item adding system works, you tell us. Second, it's called a team for a reason, i don't think one person should take all the blame.

So to conclude - dear Crpg Dev Team, here are  a couple of questions i'd really like to see you answer :


- Why does it take you months to add items brought to you on a silver plate, tested, polished, formatted AND , most importantly - approved by your item team ?

- Why is it almost every time these new items get added you manage to mess something up and than it takes you another couple of months to fix it (latest e.g. zitta bascinet, the horrible glitch on the chinese armor) ? All this while your coders do a tremendous job of making the game better, doing small upgrades almost every day.

- Why are you so apathetic about adding new QUALITY armors to the game, even when they are made by or for your most loyal supporters - your playerbase ?

- Why do you refuse to state at least an approximate date when the items get in the game , even though your item team representative clearly said they WILL get to the game? Do you realize that the process of making these new items can not only cost money for your players, but also a lot of energy and time. No offense, but possibly more energy and time your entire item team can spend on the mod in a couple of months.


- Do you even want your players to help you and bring new items for the mod ?


These are my questions. I believe they are simple enough and many people who have previously approached you on similar matters can relate to these questions.  The frustration is growing. 
It's pointless to hide it now, i personally paid for the last item commission , but it's not even about that. Me and Zimke literally worked day and night on some of those items , with both enthusiasm and joy. When Zimke was finally done with the commission i think he had like a 2 day nap.
 And i'm sure it was the same for the many other times players were working on new items for the mod. It's just every single time their enthusiasm hits this brick wall of dev Apathy and, if you ask me, it's disrespectful. One of the most disrespectful things you can do to a person is ignore his hard work, especially when it's made FOR you.




To conclude - i don't want a 24/7 community manager to lick our asses. I don't want every stupid new item suggestion to be approved so we get a billion retarded low quality items in the game. I just want good work that is brought to you to be appreciated. If 3 months ago when me and Zimke started making the new items i approached the devs and asked when the items get in and they would've replied "in 3-5 months", would we still make the items ? It's a long wait , but yes, we would. 
 But if back then i knew that  we'd have to rush it cause Shik said "it'd possibly get in in the nearest December patch " ( thanks for that btw, i felt like a retard on the day of that "patch") and than we'd be in the dark for the next 3 months  ..... nah, probably not. I hope you can get the difference. It's all in the attitude.
I can't imagine what other players who's got their projects that are still not in done earlier feel..

All i'm asking you to do is read this and just think about it. This is not a rage post, rather a frustration post. I just want you to understand this frustration that possibly many other players may feel too.



Regards,

Ujin.



P.S. deja vu tells me i've made a similar long post a while ago... the irony.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Corsair831 on February 25, 2013, 03:51:14 pm
I'd like to, for the sake of everyone without 20 mins to read this, summarise --

"chadz BAD. I WANT NEW ITEMS. ITEMS SENT TO chadz. chadz NOT PUT IN GAME YET. PUT THE ITEMS IN THE GAME chadz."

obviously it's not quite as eloquent, however, the message is there :P
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: rufio on February 25, 2013, 03:59:22 pm
''attitude''
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Blueberry Muffin on February 25, 2013, 04:16:47 pm
You're asking for a guy to do all the boring little detailed jobs, it is indeed very important because its the little details in life that have the greatest impact in my experience. Problem with boring little details is that they are incredibly.... well.. boring and tedious.. Why bother updating armours and making changelogs when you have bigger things to look it.

Its a long standing problem I have had with the devs also, they dont actively play the game they have created, so you can imagine how the little details seem insignificant compared to the bigger picture.

So yeah, you need an active crpg player who knows all classes, and can do small things to smooth the rough edges of the mod.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: BADPLAYER_old2 on February 25, 2013, 04:18:50 pm
From what I know, the items have already been "accepted" and the stats made up for a long time now, it's just up to chadz to implement them in the next patch though since he is the only person who can release full patches.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Umbra on February 25, 2013, 04:45:02 pm
Fuck, read it fully now. Agree
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Latvian on February 25, 2013, 04:45:49 pm
Ujin made excellent point +1 his post to support idea!
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: CrazyCracka420 on February 25, 2013, 04:47:42 pm
Why is pixel crack so important to you?

The game is over 2 years old, and people are still requesting to add items to the game.  I'd say that should be their last priority right now.  There's still problems with strategus, and they're working on their new project.  Both more important than getting more pixel crack into the game.

There's what, 100 pieces of body armor, you really going to complain about them not adding more?
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Zimke Zlovoljni on February 25, 2013, 06:08:02 pm
Quote from: Ujin on February 25, 2013, 03:28:23 pm

 i think he had like a 2 day nap.

That was quite a nap, lol, haven't been sleeping properly that month at all.


EDIT, my 2 cents:
Almost forgot, I re-checked the Textures folder for wrong format textures,people do tend to save textures in dxt3 or dxt5 instead of dxt1, on places where no other format is needed, because of lack of additional software or propper settings, in order to reduce pixelation and....bunch of other technical terms, anyways, did found some textures that slipped away, or I was too tired to convert them last time, it saves some space for textures, so here they are (just put them in cRPG->Textures folder):
https://www.dropbox.com/s/lxpm7bdcsbq6klw/reformated%20textures.rar (https://www.dropbox.com/s/lxpm7bdcsbq6klw/reformated%20textures.rar)

and the original textures backup:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/a6zu0dmwlqp5h58/original%20textures.rar (https://www.dropbox.com/s/a6zu0dmwlqp5h58/original%20textures.rar)





Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: BlueKnight on February 25, 2013, 06:51:40 pm
Patience and trust guys, seriously. Keep calm and carry on. Crpg dev team - best team. Be patient. It's a long time to december so you have to relax and let it be as it is. They haven't killed the mod yet and for sure they aren't going to do it.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Alexander_TheGreat_ on February 25, 2013, 06:59:02 pm
Wauw...i really read the whole thread...and it was so long...the reason must be because im banned from cRPG :c (god damit - FU GRUMPHY)
Beside +1 :D
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Aethelwolf on February 25, 2013, 07:00:15 pm
Indeed. I have to say that crpg devs have made a lot of things for us players since the start of crpg. And they are not even payed for it (only by donations). But on the other hand the devs shouldn't rest on one's laurels. By this I'm not saying that they do nothing,  I know they are working on crpg...It would be just awesome if they communicated with the player base more and do some things that can be realised to give the game a new cape, which would maybe lure new players to play crpg :) Keep up the good work anyway, I know you didn't give up on this mod  :wink:
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Count_Curtis on February 25, 2013, 07:03:05 pm
But its a case of a tonne of free content, and just saying "nah, we'l pass"

its pretty much "Here, we made armors for you to add, for free, we even payed to have them made" and they just say "Nah, its k thanks"
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Uther Pendragon on February 25, 2013, 07:03:59 pm
The entire item-adding butthurt would be resolved if only someone could tell us how adding items works/what needs to be done, how much time it usually takes etc., so we won't sound "ignorant" when talking about it :)

But still, I have a feeling they will take their time before anwsering in this thread :lol:
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: karasu on February 25, 2013, 07:04:38 pm
Why did they need 12 whole months to simply add a couple of new admins to the most played mode in the mod?

It's sekrit.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Ujin on February 25, 2013, 07:10:53 pm
Quote from: BlueKnight on February 25, 2013, 06:51:40 pm
Patience and trust guys, seriously. Keep calm and carry on. Crpg dev team - best team. Be patient. It's a long time to december so you have to relax and let it be as it is. They haven't killed the mod yet and for sure they aren't going to do it.
What they are gradually killing is the community's willingness to support them in any other way aside from verbal (like you just did).
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Tears of Destiny on February 25, 2013, 07:18:14 pm
Those would be my top three reasons.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Teeth on February 25, 2013, 07:20:04 pm
It is really mindboggling how a team of developers without any in house modellers or textures manage to assume such an elitist attitude when addressing community members which deliver them high quality and unique items for free, we all know how important these items are for this mod in particular. The correct attitude should be to humbly thank them for their amazing contribution to the mod. Shamefur dispray, honestly indecent.

Can at least a developer give a final answer whether the item commissions of Ujin and Fallen are going to be implemented or not. A simple yes or no should be doable. Here's hoping that dev-community interaction will be a lot better in future projects, because this is not working.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Tears of Destiny on February 25, 2013, 07:22:05 pm
Quote from: Teeth on February 25, 2013, 07:20:04 pm
It is really mindboggling how a team of devlopers without any in house modellers or textures manage to assume such an elitist attitude when addressing community members which deliver them high quality and unique items for free, we all know how important these items are for this mod in particular. The correct attitude should be to humbly thank them for their amazing contribution to the mod. Shamefur dispray, honestly indecent.

Can at least a developer give a final answer whether the item commissions of Ujin and Fallen are going to be implemented or not. A simple yes or no should be doable.


The problem is that the devs we have come from an indi background and not a corporate one, so you are not going to have the same training when dealing with the public, and multiple other problems that arise from the same lack of training. Case in point, we have a lot of great people for coding, but not a single one of the devs is worth a damn when it comes to PR and Technical Communication skills.


Look at all the incidents that arise, the public acts like rabble, and that is normal, but the Management (Our dear devs) due to lacking the expertise and background for dealing with such occasions grow publicly irritated, impatient, and handle things poorly from a PR point of view to an extent that no actual established company would do... But you can't really ask for more from a brand new indie company who is still getting things together, this kind of thing takes time. Random people wanting to make a project won't magically understand overnight how to handle things in all aspects of a company.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Ujin on February 25, 2013, 07:24:43 pm
Quote from: Tears of Destiny on February 25, 2013, 07:22:05 pm

The problem is that the devs we have come from an indi background and not a corporate one, so you are not going to have the same training when dealing with the public, and multiple other problems that arise from the same lack of training. Case in point, we have a lot of great people for coding, but not a single one of the devs is worth a damn when it comes to PR and Technical Communication skills.
This has nothing to do with public relations or corporations. This is basic level human relations, politeness and decency. This is a small community where everyone knows each other pretty much.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Oberyn on February 25, 2013, 07:28:49 pm
Quote from: Ujin on February 25, 2013, 07:24:43 pm
This has nothing to do with public relations or corporations. This is basic level human relations, politeness and decency. This is a small community where everyone knows each other pretty much.

He has a point, there is usually a layer between devs/programmers and the general public. Having potential personal access to the devs is both a blessing and a curse, really.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Tears of Destiny on February 25, 2013, 07:29:51 pm
Quote from: Ujin on February 25, 2013, 07:24:43 pm
This has nothing to do with public relations or corporations. This is basic level human relations, politeness and decency. This is a small community where everyone knows each other pretty much.


Public relations has everything to do with this, if they present a perceived lack of "basic human level relations" then that is a PR problem. Some of our devs obviously display competence in coding, but a complete lack of training for talking to the public, and to be perfectly honest some brilliant people will always be rubbish when talking to people if they lack people skills to begin with.


Then we have the problem of Culture Shock, which is when one thing that passes normal in one culture is a complete mess for another, which again points to proper company training for such international arenas which the devs, naturally, lack.


An example is cmp, who knows his shit when it comes to Coding and is a great asset to the team, but has no business making any public announcements due to his personality (which is great for explaining problems to an internal team but rubbish for "making the public happy").


This is not some easy subject, from personal real world experience this is a very delicate subject that has dedicated professional personnel just for it. As this is an Indie company, you will have no such dedicated personnel and thus run the risk of some of your "brilliant in house talent" pissing off the public.

It does not matter if you are "right" it matters entirely on how you present yourself, which is an art that requires both natural talent and training.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Sandersson Jankins on February 25, 2013, 07:36:47 pm
In my opinion, the solution to this problem is to simply add new staff.

It's obvious that chadz n' company are working primarily on M:BG. I mean, why wouldn't they? Of course they're going to focus almost entirely on that project, and I'm grateful for that.

However, cRPG is beginning to feel neglected. I'm sure that the developers still care about cRPG. After all, it's their creation. Still, the rather small dev team can only do so much.

Since cRPG is on the way out, with the playerbase/community putting ten tons of effort into keeping the game alive, why not put on some more developers? Esteemed members of the community that are unlikely to abuse their power (an issue that's come up quite a lot recently). Of course there's always potential for catastrophe, but I'm not asking to put someone else in charge of cRPG. In fact, these new developers needn't even have admin powers, really.

I understand that it's quite a bit of effort to screen and choose your candidates. However, the difference between this effort and the effort required to add new content to cRPG is this effort required to add new developers really only needs to be expended a single time.

Seriously, I'm positive that cmp, chadz and the rest are absolutely sick of people acting like entitled babbies over a free mod. I'm quite guilty of acting like that as well. The only solutions to this problem seem to be adding new developers or officially withdrawing dev support of cRPG. The second option would more than likely make the largest consumer-base of M:BG supremely pissed off, so why not add some new developers?

Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Ujin on February 25, 2013, 07:42:38 pm
Quote from: Oberyn on February 25, 2013, 07:28:49 pm
He has a point, there is usually a layer between devs/programmers and the general public. Having potential personal access to the devs is both a blessing and a curse, really.
I guess you two do have a point after all. It's kind of ironic now that they're trying to work on that , but tbh i doubt they'll ever bother with cRPG.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Ujin on February 25, 2013, 07:49:25 pm
Quote from: Sandersson Jankins on February 25, 2013, 07:36:47 pm
In my opinion, the solution to this problem is to simply add new staff.

It's obvious that chadz n' company are working primarily on M:BG. I mean, why wouldn't they? Of course they're going to focus almost entirely on that project, and I'm grateful for that.

However, cRPG is beginning to feel neglected. I'm sure that the developers still care about cRPG. After all, it's their creation. Still, the rather small dev team can only do so much.

Since cRPG is on the way out, with the playerbase/community putting ten tons of effort into keeping the game alive, why not put on some more developers? Esteemed members of the community that are unlikely to abuse their power (an issue that's come up quite a lot recently). Of course there's always potential for catastrophe, but I'm not asking to put someone else in charge of cRPG. In fact, these new developers needn't even have admin powers, really.

I understand that it's quite a bit of effort to screen and choose your candidates. However, the difference between this effort and the effort required to add new content to cRPG is this effort required to add new developers really only needs to be expended a single time.

Seriously, I'm positive that cmp, chadz and the rest are absolutely sick of people acting like entitled babbies over a free mod. I'm quite guilty of acting like that as well. The only solutions to this problem seem to be adding new developers or officially withdrawing dev support of cRPG. The second option would more than likely make the largest consumer-base of M:BG supremely pissed off, so why not add some new developers?
Now that i remember it , in my previous topic that was very related to these same issues that i created roughly over a year ago , i offered them our help and to hire some staff for the item team if the current one was too tied with their hands full .   Lol ? =)
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Joseph Porta on February 25, 2013, 07:51:37 pm
Well put, i'm also dying for the new items, and I am, like most of us, annoyed on how long it takes to add them. Allthough I doubt this will speed it up.  :mrgreen:
You have my "support" though, for whatever its worth, here! Have a +1!
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Smoothrich on February 25, 2013, 07:58:30 pm
The items will be added with the next patch, with all the content presumably queued up ready to go.

Aka, lol.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Ubereem on February 25, 2013, 08:16:32 pm
imo they want this mod to die and soon. they know once MnB2 hits the player base will dwindle and now that they are working on their new top secret project I fear CRPG is on its last legs.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: kinngrimm on February 25, 2013, 08:19:15 pm
i just loved Shikes response on my request for custom made armor (http://forum.meleegaming.com/faction-halls/(wolves)-wolf-pack-mercenaries/msg291156/#msg291156)

i would even pay for this and prices are negotiable, but what i got was a troll feed back from a dev and i lost track of this afterwards for obvious reasons not even including the jungle people need to walk through when they already have quality stuff ready.

Back then i even would have considered to pay reallife money, but atm i am out of that so cRPG money or looms.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Ujin on February 25, 2013, 08:27:14 pm
Quote from: Zimke Zlovoljni on February 25, 2013, 06:08:02 pm
That was quite a nap, lol, haven't been sleeping properly that month at all.


EDIT, my 2 cents:
Almost forgot, I re-checked the Textures folder for wrong format textures,people do tend to save textures in dxt3 or dxt5 instead of dxt1, on places where no other format is needed, because of lack of additional software or propper settings, in order to reduce pixelation and....bunch of other technical terms, anyways, did found some textures that slipped away, or I was too tired to convert them last time, it saves some space for textures, so here they are (just put them in cRPG->Textures folder):
https://www.dropbox.com/s/lxpm7bdcsbq6klw/reformated%20textures.rar (https://www.dropbox.com/s/lxpm7bdcsbq6klw/reformated%20textures.rar)

and the original textures backup:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/a6zu0dmwlqp5h58/original%20textures.rar (https://www.dropbox.com/s/a6zu0dmwlqp5h58/original%20textures.rar)
50 mb of difference , thx mate 0_0.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Meow on February 25, 2013, 08:28:13 pm
Not Shik's fault, not really anyone's fault.
As far as I know there is a technical issue right now which needs some hours of work before a patch can be deployed and it's kinda hard to get hours of freetime right now to fix it for the people who could.

Bear with us we still care about the community and we are aware how important content patches are for you guys.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Pentecost on February 25, 2013, 08:29:44 pm
Wait, wait--ALL of the items in the game that weren't in native were modeled by Warband enthusiasts/players of the mod and not the devs? Seriously?

That just makes the distant, regal, and indifferent attitude that some of the dev team seem to have towards their players even more unacceptable to me than it already is. I mean, I enjoy this mod, but I don't enjoy it blindly and unequivocally like some people do.

After being told at length about how some the dev team acts (or doesn't act) by other players who have actually had a lot of contact with them and, more importantly, after having read their posts and seen some of their actions firsthand, I decided I wasn't going to give them any money for their new project until I saw that it wasn't vaporware and they stopped acting like the community was somehow beneath them.

Hearing yet again that they, for the most part, don't really care and don't even play their own mod anymore only confirms that I made the right decision back then.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Joseph Porta on February 25, 2013, 08:33:11 pm
Quote from: Zimke Zlovoljni on February 25, 2013, 06:08:02 pm
That was quite a nap, lol, haven't been sleeping properly that month at all.


EDIT, my 2 cents:
Almost forgot, I re-checked the Textures folder for wrong format textures,people do tend to save textures in dxt3 or dxt5 instead of dxt1, on places where no other format is needed, because of lack of additional software or propper settings, in order to reduce pixelation and....bunch of other technical terms, anyways, did found some textures that slipped away, or I was too tired to convert them last time, it saves some space for textures, so here they are (just put them in cRPG->Textures folder):
https://www.dropbox.com/s/lxpm7bdcsbq6klw/reformated%20textures.rar (https://www.dropbox.com/s/lxpm7bdcsbq6klw/reformated%20textures.rar)

and the original textures backup:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/a6zu0dmwlqp5h58/original%20textures.rar (https://www.dropbox.com/s/a6zu0dmwlqp5h58/original%20textures.rar)

Thats excellent, thanks!
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Fringe on February 25, 2013, 08:34:43 pm
Tears has a point, and so does sandy, because we know that the dev team isn't going to be donating any free time to cRPG anytime soon. Also the lack of skill with technical communications and public relations presents this problem of not even knowing when.

Quote
If 3 months ago when me and Zimke started making the new items i approached the devs and asked when the items get in and they would've replied "in 3-5 months", would we still make the items ? It's a long wait , but yes, we would. 

So to me it seems like communication is sorely lacking, and a problem that needs solving, which no solution has yet been presented.

Quote
and than we'd be in the dark for the next 3 months

Also noticeably lack of staff has been a known complication, but one does not just hire a whole barrage of people when needed. But also because of lack of communication the dev team has not noted us of this dilemma or have not sought out the right people for the job.

I do not have the patience to post a fully supportive comment for Tears who is too intelligent for me to keep up with. :| So I'll just leave it summarized as such and hopefully it's comprehensible to the public.

Quote from: Meow on February 25, 2013, 08:28:13 pm
Not Shik's fault, not really anyone's fault.
As far as I know there is a technical issue right now which needs some hours of work before a patch can be deployed and it's kinda hard to get hours of freetime right now to fix it for the people who could.

Bear with us we still care about the community and we are aware how important content patches are for you guys.

Also, the dev team has had to deal with some unruly and ignorant people of the community, and it takes an educated person who knows what the hell their talking about to present the problem so it can be settled.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Tydeus on February 25, 2013, 08:43:29 pm
Quote from: Meow on February 25, 2013, 08:28:13 pm
Not Shik's fault, not really anyone's fault.
As far as I know there is a technical issue right now which needs some hours of work before a patch can be deployed and it's kinda hard to get hours of freetime right now to fix it for the people who could.

Bear with us we still care about the community and we are aware how important content patches are for you guys.
The return of Chairman Meow! He has returned, we are saved!
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: zagibu on February 25, 2013, 08:52:56 pm
This problem has nothing to do with dev <-> public disconnect or PR. Like Ujin said, if you put hours and hours into something, and don't even get any reaction at all, that's just quite impossible to misunderstand, really.

That said it's still a most impressive modding project, and I really look up to the devs for keeping it going so long.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Zimke Zlovoljni on February 25, 2013, 08:59:11 pm
Quote from: Ujin on February 25, 2013, 08:27:14 pm
50 mb of difference , thx mate 0_0.
Not a problem, it was a quicky job for me. Not sure for some textures if game reads them at all, but every little bit helps, so give it a try and test them out. Oh and I updated the rar file with couple more textures I forgot to add (just like last time I did this)  :oops:

download link:https://www.dropbox.com/s/lxpm7bdcsbq6klw/reformated%20textures.rar (https://www.dropbox.com/s/lxpm7bdcsbq6klw/reformated%20textures.rar)

original textures backup: https://www.dropbox.com/s/a6zu0dmwlqp5h58/original%20textures.rar (https://www.dropbox.com/s/a6zu0dmwlqp5h58/original%20textures.rar)
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: BlameMeForTheNoise on February 25, 2013, 09:13:25 pm
If you know that you have bigger things on your hands now and know that you don't have the time (or "will") anymore, be a man realist and give it over to the people who still care.

Take an example from Dean Hall and his DayZ, who if not in the same-, is at least in a somewhat similar position:


This way both "projects" still get the attention they deserve.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Christo on February 25, 2013, 09:15:25 pm
Because Melee: Battlegrounds.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Teeth on February 25, 2013, 09:16:35 pm
Quote from: Christo on February 25, 2013, 09:15:25 pm
Because Melee: Battlegrounds.
Getting items into this mod has been problematic for a little longer than that project has been going on.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Smoothrich on February 25, 2013, 09:24:03 pm
Quote from: BlameMeForTheNoise on February 25, 2013, 09:13:25 pm
If you know that you have bigger things on your hands now and know that you don't have the time (or "will") anymore, be a man realist and
  • Gave dev-work of the mod over to the community who develops still further.

Knowing just about every member of this community, their good sense of balance, taste in items, and complete lack of bias towards factions, Strat politics, and internet honor..

I can see nothing wrong with "community" managed development of all future patches.

Patch 2.02 notes:  Fallen armors rejected
Patch 2.03 notes:  Kuyaks removed, Russia continent IP banned
Patch 2.04 notes:  Polish sleeper cell loads in worm into patch harvesting credit cards info of all Fallen members, greatsword damage buffed
Patch 2.05:  Delayed because Fallen clan officers have been arrested for ordering child pornography online
Patch 2.05:  2hand stab buffed
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Meow on February 25, 2013, 09:30:00 pm
Quote from: BlameMeForTheNoise on February 25, 2013, 09:13:25 pm
If you know that you have bigger things on your hands now and know that you don't have the time (or "will") anymore, be a man realist and give it over to the people who still care.

Take an example from Dean Hall and his DayZ, who if not in the same-, is at least in a somewhat similar position:

  • Made an awesome mod.
  • Went professional.
  • Realized that both mod and professional work do not go too well together.
  • Gave dev-work of the mod over to the community who develops still further.

This way both "projects" still get the attention they deserve.

Kinda different since he is actually developing the same game on the same engine with a studio of long time professionals behind it who build that engine.

I see why you guys are getting impatient or even slightly mad (not meant in a trollish way) but as said so many times before, it's a mod, it's a hobby and it's a lot of free time that went into this.
Freetime is a rare commodity right now and not everyone on the team can spare any of it right now.

Give us some more time, I'll try to keep you guys updated.

Quote from: Teeth on February 25, 2013, 09:16:35 pm
Getting items into this mod has been problematic for a little longer than that project has been going on.

What's your assumption on the timeframe since when the project has been going on?
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Ujin on February 25, 2013, 09:34:05 pm
Quote from: Meow on February 25, 2013, 09:30:00 pm

What's your assumption on the timeframe since when the project has been going on?

We dunno, you tell us ? It's been like this all the time pretty much, 2 years back  , 1 year back , all the same.

In any case , thanks for showing up and posting Meow, appreciate it.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: BlameMeForTheNoise on February 25, 2013, 09:55:32 pm
Quote from: Ujin on February 25, 2013, 09:34:05 pm
In any case , thanks for showing up and posting Meow, appreciate it.

Same here. Appreciate your concern with the community as always.

Quote from: Meow on February 25, 2013, 09:30:00 pm
Kinda different since he is actually developing the same game on the same engine with a studio of long time professionals behind it who build that engine.

... it's a mod, it's a hobby and it's a lot of free time that went into this.
Freetime is a rare commodity right now and not everyone on the team can spare any of it right now...

Same difference. Try to follow my thoughts here:

M:BG is not a mod anymore. It has people paying which basically means chadz/the team now actually have an obligation to come through.
Which on the other hand naturally means he should invest more if not all time into M:BG. That again means less time for cRPG.

I think this would put even more weight in my above mentioned argument.
Don't get me wrong. I love cRPG and I'm the first to appreciate what you guys have done with it (and some still do on a very regular basis) and how much effort and time it took to get here...

I'm just trying to see the whole situation on a logical level.
I know its a big cRPG-cliché: But I would hate to see the mod actually dying because of neglect.


I'm not saying let go of it completely. I'm just saying maybe give a little bit of responsibility over to some supervised people who still have the time.

Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Meow on February 25, 2013, 10:10:24 pm
Quote from: Ujin on February 25, 2013, 09:34:05 pm
We dunno, you tell us ? It's been like this all the time pretty much, 2 years back  , 1 year back , all the same.

In any case , thanks for showing up and posting Meow, appreciate it.

I wouldn't know, I'm just the cat.
Just interested if people think this started with the timer or something.

As I said, I'll try to keep you updated it's just kinda hard to give an ETA right now since it's not a cba issue.

Quote from: BlameMeForTheNoise on February 25, 2013, 09:55:32 pm
Same here. Appreciate your concern with the community as always.

Same difference. Try to follow my thoughts here:

M:BG is not a mod anymore. It has people paying which basically means chadz/the team now actually have an obligation to come through.
Which on the other hand naturally means he should invest more if not all time into M:BG. That again means less time for cRPG.

I think this would put even more weight in my above mentioned argument.
Don't get me wrong. I love cRPG and I'm the first to appreciate what you guys have done with it (and some still do on a very regular basis) and how much effort and time it took to get here...

I'm just trying to see the whole situation on a logical level.
I know its a big cRPG-cliché: But I would hate to see the mod actually dying because of neglect.

I would agree if there were people in the community who got an idea how cRPG works, got the capability to manage it as in enough knowledge about the Module system and if it wouldn't need cmp to specifically patch WSE and the beta client for it.
Trust me, Arma2 modding is different, so is the DayZ persistence system.

Don't get your hopes up on this project being passed to other people.

As said before, item patch will happen just can't tell for sure when.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Joseph Porta on February 25, 2013, 10:15:20 pm
Quote from: Ujin on February 25, 2013, 09:34:05 pm
We dunno, you tell us ? It's been like this all the time pretty much, 2 years back  , 1 year back , all the same.

In any case , thanks for showing up and posting Meow, appreciate it.

At the release, or announcement w/e didnt chadz state that he and the team where already working on the engine for the past year or so? Or maybe it was one of the Q/A.. Idk.. Im sure it was mentioned somewhere.  :)
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Teeth on February 25, 2013, 10:28:19 pm
Quote from: Meow on February 25, 2013, 09:30:00 pm
What's your assumption on the timeframe since when the project has been going on?
My assumption is that concrete development started after the date this topic was made (June 24, 2012), when big plans were announced for cRPG.

http://forum.meleegaming.com/announcements/crpg-status-and-plans/

If they had been working on the project before that, making this topic was honestly stupid and deceptive, as none of the promised things have been realised to the slightest extent in 8 months. Whereas getting items into the mod has been an incredibly difficult and slow process since the first time my clan tried to replace the ugly native strange armor, at least that is what I got from Ujin on the subject as I wasn't there.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Moncho on February 25, 2013, 10:42:49 pm
Quote from: Meow on February 25, 2013, 10:10:24 pm
As said before, item patch will happen just can't tell for sure when.

I guess that is the clearer answer we are going to get for now. Not that I dislike it, I understand the circumstances.
Nice to know that they will be included, that they are not being ignored.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Meow on February 25, 2013, 10:48:51 pm
Quote from: Teeth on February 25, 2013, 10:28:19 pm
My assumption is that concrete development started after the date this topic was made (June 24, 2012), when big plans were announced for cRPG.

http://forum.meleegaming.com/announcements/crpg-status-and-plans/

If they had been working on the project before that, making this topic was honestly stupid and deceptive, as none of the promised things have been realised to the slightest extent in 8 months. Whereas getting items into the mod has been an incredibly difficult and slow process since the first time my clan tried to replace the ugly native strange armor, at least that is what I got from Ujin on the subject as I wasn't there.
I think I remember those, needed fixing because the spec maps were bugged so they were glowing and one was completely white?
I see your point it's just that not everything submitted can/will be added without adjustments and no matter what caused delays before, right now it's not something where it is about pressing a button to get the stuff in.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Arathian on February 25, 2013, 11:01:48 pm
Thank you for your honest answers Meow
(click to show/hide)

I fully understand that there are more important things to do, but surely you will agree, this playerbase will be the foundation of the new game.

A treat here and there would help keep the playerbase that will kickstart the wider playerbase....here. You have the rare opportunity to start a game with many people playing it. Don't waste it!
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: CrazyCracka420 on February 25, 2013, 11:18:36 pm
So why all the downvotes?  What was so groundbreaking with Meow's posts that you guys didn't already know?  Was my reality check a little too harsh, was it the language that offended you?

Even before M:BG the devs had a lot better things to do than add more content (sorry if "pixel crack" offends you), and worry about balancing out the stats and cost.  I'm happy with the amount of equipment we have, it's actually quite a lot.  I don't see where all these complaints are coming from, if you're really that upset couldn't you create your own mod?

List of issues more important than new equipment:

Strategus issues (there's plenty)
New game modes for cRPG (strategus type siege mode to replace current siege mode, conquest to replace battle mode)
Removing and adding maps based on up/down votes
Releasing their equipment tweaks (especially in regards to the weapons and having different hit boxes and damage type based on where you hit with the weapon)
Getting the EU game play over to NA servers
Getting M:BG into an early alpha test phase for investors
?
More cRPG equipment, balancing those items stats and cost, retweaking after game play testing
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Teeth on February 26, 2013, 01:05:37 am
You definitely are a massive shitposter.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Christo on February 26, 2013, 01:33:46 am
Quote from: Teeth on February 25, 2013, 09:16:35 pm
Getting items into this mod has been problematic for a little longer than that project has been going on.

I know.

But it's the final nail in the coffin in this case.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Kafein on February 26, 2013, 01:42:26 am
Laziness, impatience and hubris.

(click to show/hide)
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: cmp on February 26, 2013, 02:10:40 am
Quote from: Teeth on February 26, 2013, 01:05:37 am
You definitely are a massive shitposter.

He's also right.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Idzo on February 26, 2013, 02:26:07 am
Quote from: cmpxchg8b on February 26, 2013, 02:10:40 am
He's also right.

I just don't get it why would someone give so much cash to ppl who couldn't balance mod is all these years...  :P
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: cmp on February 26, 2013, 02:32:38 am
Quote from: Idzo on February 26, 2013, 02:26:07 am
I just don't get it why would someone give so much cash to ppl who couldn't balance mod is all these years...  :P

Who's giving cash to balancers? First time I hear of that.

Also, why are you still here if balance is so bad? I'll take it as a compliment.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Korgoth on February 26, 2013, 02:34:56 am
Quote from: CrazyCracka420 on February 25, 2013, 11:18:36 pm
...conquest to replace battle mode)

Replace? I hope you got this terribly wrong.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Havoco on February 26, 2013, 03:00:46 am
I dont think they'd actually replace battle mode if conquest mode was implemented. They would probably replace DTV or rageball if they're pressed for money.

Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: chadz on February 26, 2013, 03:24:31 am
The biggest issue is the legacy problem of cRPG. Both technical and organisational. It was never planned. Never ever. cRPG happened, was hit with success by surprise and has been always one step behind this from a planning point of view.

(click to show/hide)

For example the team, it was never properly organised. People moved themselves into a position by showing dedication, but those positions were  never defined, clear areas of work are completely missing. People just did. And sometimes people stopped doing. Stuff like that was never foreseen and accounted for.

It's the same for the technical aspect as well. Items in particular are especially problematic to put into a patch, because they have to be synched on the website and the game simultaneously. Sounds easy, but it isn't. If it would be a normal singleplayer/multiplayer mod, you'd just patch that shit, test it, release it. Simple as that.

In cRPG we can't even test patches properly because it all has to be in sync. This is why we (I in particular) are so reluctant of item patches - if something goes wrong, it could mean several hours downtime in best case, and a multiple day revert worst case.

Yes, this is far from optimal, and something I take full responsibility for. That's things we have changed for our future projects, because it really is horrible to work like that. Add a lack of spare time, and the chaos is complete.

As for items: we are grateful, the problem is no one is really responsible for them. Definitely PR problem. I've always wanted to streamline the way community models make it into the game, but I've never gotten to it. Again, I'm really sorry for that, and I know it's my fault. When I hear that someone is mad that his items are still not in the game, it's usually the first time I ever hear that they are there in the first place. My fault.

That all sounds overly bad, but there's also some good news: I do have a lot more spare time in the future, mostly dedicated for the new project, but I do intend to clean up some of the mess in cRPG as well - both technical and organisational.

(click to show/hide)
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Idzo on February 26, 2013, 03:37:03 am
Quote from: cmpxchg8b on February 26, 2013, 02:32:38 am
Who's giving cash to balancers? First time I hear of that.

Also, why are you still here if balance is so bad? I'll take it as a compliment.

Omg...

Why would you take that as compliment if you didn't balanced it?
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Korgoth on February 26, 2013, 03:41:13 am
Quote from: chadz on February 26, 2013, 03:24:31 am
.....

Nice to see you reply chadz. I would like to help with a donation, but you'll have to wait for me to get a job first, hopefully that will happen soon!
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Havoco on February 26, 2013, 03:50:35 am
Nothing against the new items, they look great, but id rather see zagibus armor texture mod implemented before these new items. I mean that's probably the closest well ever see to a heraldic tabard in this game, and heraldic Tabards have been wanted long before any of these new items.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Butan on February 26, 2013, 04:37:00 am
Woooooow, chadz your message is like a blessing, now I can believe you're just overworked a bit, and not a mean guy  :P

I hope you have no job & no family, because M:BG + cRPG vets are going to be hard on you...

I hope you find a way to organize stuff in no time!
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Ujin on February 26, 2013, 08:02:14 am
Quote from: Havoco on February 26, 2013, 03:50:35 am
Nothing against the new items, they look great, but id rather see zagibus armor texture mod implemented before these new items. I mean that's probably the closest well ever see to a heraldic tabard in this game, and heraldic Tabards have been wanted long before any of these new items.

You really don't get my post if  you think i was plugging the items from my commission exclusively.



@ Crazycracka - i'd agree with you if not the existence of something called the "item team" which we always thought was there exactly for that... items. And balancing. So theoretically it wouldn't derail the CODERS who work on game modes and strat. Get it ?  Also, you really don't realize that first the items got approved by devs and than DAYS of OUR time are spent on making them, not dev time.  If we approached devs with our ideas of new items and they said " sorry ,can't do it anymore", this topic would've never existed.

@ chadz     Thank you for your honest answer, it's a huge step forward and we all appreciate it. Looking forward to the future =).



@ CMP  Believe it or not, but as much as we love the colossal amount of coding work you have done with Warband And WSE and really DO appreciate it, many of us also like this game (M&B in general) for "pixel crack". It's a pseudo -historical medieval fighting game, we have a bunch of clans with some sort of historical themes going on and most of them would love to run around in cool looking armors. That's just the type of crowd we are. I hope you'd acknowledge  this in your future projects.  Progression, immersion, connection to your character are all important parts of a successful rpg (ish) game. And "rpg" is what made your mod so different in the first place.  Again, don't get me wrong, gameplay>everything .
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Vibe on February 26, 2013, 09:12:42 am
visitors can't see pics , please register or login


visitors can't see pics , please register or login
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: The_Bloody_Nine on February 26, 2013, 09:58:17 am
ahhh, reading one of chadz' love-story posts makes me feel all warm and cosy everytime.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Largg on February 26, 2013, 10:19:20 am
It's nice to see a well mannered discussion without rage about this topic. Having feedback from the devs means a lot.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: owens on February 26, 2013, 12:11:27 pm
This is the biggest worry for me in cRPG. We have Ideas soem get 50+ and yet no dev even reads/replies to the fucking forum post! They don't even bother typing yeah good idea but we cant at the moment or yeah great we will do it or no this is stupid.


Every time a suggestion corner essay is written someones time and mind has gone into it. Sometimes they are great ideas that just wont work or are too much work. This is fair enough but when your idea is used or modified then used and you get no recognition! this is bullshit.

Someone made the new Eastern armours!

Someone made the short broad sword and the Pilum!

I suggested ashwood pike with shield!

I suggested turnspeed by weight and length!

^So many suggestions go through and are ignored, but even worse is the lack of community mention. Every new armour and code change should have the thinker/catalyst or creator mentioned. This is common knowledge for any development team. I know the creators of the armour are mentioned somewhere but I think a link to their mod should be a minimum or even a thanks for the help forum post mentioning the original creator of an OSP.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: BASNAK on February 26, 2013, 12:15:43 pm
Quote from: chadz on February 26, 2013, 03:24:31 am
The biggest issue is the legacy problem of cRPG. Both technical and organisational. It was never planned. Never ever. cRPG happened, was hit with success by surprise and has been always one step behind this from a planning point of view.

(click to show/hide)

Announce that all servers will be down for a day, and take your time to add the items. If servers are down for the sake of Items I dont think anyone would object :D
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: tizzango on February 26, 2013, 12:37:30 pm
Quote from: BASNAK on February 26, 2013, 12:15:43 pm

Announce that all servers will be down for a day, and take your time to add the items. If servers are down for the sake of Items I dont think anyone would object :D

+1.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: chadz on February 26, 2013, 12:55:37 pm
Quote from: owens on February 26, 2013, 12:11:27 pm
This is the biggest worry for me in cRPG. We have Ideas soem get 50+ and yet no dev even reads/replies to the fucking forum post! They don't even bother typing yeah good idea but we cant at the moment or yeah great we will do it or no this is stupid.

We already commented that many times - we don't do that because people just get their hopes up and think we'll implement it asap when in reality we never have the time to implement it.

Also, every contributor is listed here: http://forum.meleegaming.com/general-discussion/credits/msg627526/#new
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: pepejul on February 26, 2013, 12:59:15 pm
god has spoken....  :mrgreen:
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Vibe on February 26, 2013, 01:19:09 pm
Quote from: pepejul on February 26, 2013, 12:59:15 pm
god has spoken....  :mrgreen:

visitors can't see pics , please register or login
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Paul on February 26, 2013, 01:28:50 pm
Quote from: owens on February 26, 2013, 12:11:27 pm
I suggested turnspeed by weight and length!

ok
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: kinngrimm on February 26, 2013, 02:24:36 pm
Quote from: Meow on February 25, 2013, 10:10:24 pm
...
I would agree if there were people in the community who got an idea how cRPG works, got the capability to manage it as in enough knowledge about the Module system and if it wouldn't need cmp to specifically patch WSE and the beta client for it.
...
I may be able to help.


Quote from: chadz on February 26, 2013, 03:24:31 am
The biggest issue is the legacy problem of cRPG. Both technical and organisational. It was never planned.
...
For example the team, it was never properly organised.
...
Items in particular are especially problematic to put into a patch, because they have to be synched on the website and the game simultaneously.
...
In cRPG we can't even test patches properly because it all has to be in sync.
...
I've always wanted to streamline the way community models make it into the game, but I've never gotten to it.
...
but I do intend to clean up some of the mess in cRPG as well - both technical and organisational.

1) i would like you to state if you intend to keep cRPG/Strategus alife in context of M&B2?

If you don't want a competitor to your own new game, i can understand that, but then you need to make this public and yes then cRPG will die, but you then can fully concentrate on your new baby and noone will later think they wasted time into something you didn't intend to keep alife anyhow. It was stated to me from diverent sides that this would be a possibility and before i or people i am close to would invest into keeping cRPG alife this i need to know.

2) Sebastian a member of Wolves is bugging me for a long time to get something done into the direction of RPG elements for his own mod, he may be someone who would be able to help keeping things alife. Have a look at his mod "Battle of Europe (http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php/topic,239917.msg5739758.html#msg5739758)", i would think here in terms of a merger, that but with the clear goal to have a M&B2 mod later on too and castles and towns really existing in Europe. Overall how it would look like is open for discussion i guess, Sebastian has some graphical artists but is lacking coders so you both may benefit.

3) 2) depends storngly on the answer in 1) if you would let die of cRPG/strategus there will be the intent then to implemented in BoE, elements of an RPG and of a Strategy game, then still with your influence as you made the groundwork for so many amazing concepts. I personally would prefer that cRPG/Strategus stays alife, as i just invested too much of my lifetime in this game and this community and aslong i don't see the new game i am not sure that i would then just switch to that one or BoE. Nolifers also have structures they can't just let go ;) .

4) Testing environment, back in the day before my burnout, i was quite involvend in programming, from what you tol me here and what i saw in the dev chat, i take it you haven't got all of the following

a) programming engine(sure)
b) test system which simulates the reallife environment
c) life system(which basicly is your test environment
d)  scheduled, organized and structured test cases for certain releases
e) functinability tests
f) stress tests
g) an organized test crew with access to b), which after testing document their findings

i guess it is more like, you & cmp do stuff, you may look at each others code or just test it yourself, when no error comes out at the end you put it into a release and sometimes you put stuff onto a test drive and ask testers like me to ahve a look at it( seen it 3-4 times in 2 years, but may have missed out on several occasions as i am not always in irc)
Also within your studies you came to know that testing is a science for itself, some which shouldn't be neglected when you go for your own software. If in your studdies you neglected this subject because it can be fucking boring ^^, at one time you really need to get proficent with it! I know of few guys in your team which should have the needed stuff and knowledge to prepare documentations(f.e. Nessaj?).

Everyone knows better ^^, and i have surly not full insight into your routine nor how you set your systems, so my advice may again be mute, test environment also may seem as a huge overhead and depending on the size of a project not really nessarry to the full extent. It is upto you to judge, if but implemented and the processes streamlined for your purposes, you will have less hustle with things you afterwards like here explain to us or appologize for. That is apprecciated when you do it, but doesn't solve the problems.
F.e. the sync, yes a problem, still with some effort you can get a test environment set also for that issue.
Atm we are all your beta testers, so when we see problems we do post them anyhow, but at some point you need a defined test crew, which documents after each step of a test, but alos prepares test documentation in for front befor the tests are started, only then you get controll over testing, the outcomes and by that higher stability and less negativ feedback.

My personal offer is that i can bring people together have a look out for suitable additions for your team and help finding common ground. This is basicly what i do in this comminity in terms of Strategus and Clan Leading anyhow. In addition i still would like to be part of a test crew when you choose to organizee that a bit more professionally.
If you think that would be something you want or need send me pm with requests and we could talk more private also on teamspeak "cotgs.de" or in steam(kinngrimm).
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: zagibu on February 26, 2013, 03:09:57 pm
Actually, the issue about not having enough people to help with the items is bullshit. Many capable guys have offered their help in IRC, and the answer was always "no thanks, we don't need any help".

Also, what speaks against a second database and using one of the official servers during release with this database to test stuff? It's called staging, and it's done in every commercial development project. Sure, this would take some time to set up, but it would have been worth it many times over now.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: chadz on February 26, 2013, 03:16:09 pm
Quote from: zagibu on February 26, 2013, 03:09:57 pm
Actually, the issue about not having enough people to help with the items is bullshit.

Who said that? It's not a matter of not having enough people.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Micah on February 26, 2013, 03:57:02 pm
Quote from: owens on February 26, 2013, 12:11:27 pm
^So many suggestions go through and are ignored, but even worse is the lack of community mention. Every new armour and code change should have the thinker/catalyst or creator mentioned. This is common knowledge for any development team. I know the creators of the armour are mentioned somewhere but I think a link to their mod should be a minimum or even a thanks for the help forum post mentioning the original creator of an OSP.
If your suggestioin is used , cant you just be happy that you helped the mod envolve ? i mean , its just a suggestion that could have also come from any other player .. is it important that you was first to mention ? are you even 100% sure about it ? AND does it even matter ? you didnt code it and you didnt live with the consequences it would cause .. why  should i care if it was your idea when in the end i would blame the donkeys for including it in the mod ?
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Count_Curtis on February 26, 2013, 04:13:41 pm
What, you mean no new content? i am so shocked
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Tears of Destiny on February 26, 2013, 04:26:38 pm
Quote from: owens on February 26, 2013, 12:11:27 pm
^So many suggestions go through and are ignored, but even worse is the lack of community mention. Every new armour and code change should have the thinker/catalyst or creator mentioned. This is common knowledge for any development team. I know the creators of the armour are mentioned somewhere but I think a link to their mod should be a minimum or even a thanks for the help forum post mentioning the original creator of an OSP.


 :arrow: :arrow: :arrow:  http://forum.meleegaming.com/general-discussion/credits/ (http://forum.meleegaming.com/general-discussion/credits/)

Stickied in the most often-used board, or are you talking about something else?
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Butan on February 26, 2013, 04:53:40 pm
Quote from: Tears of Destiny on February 26, 2013, 04:26:38 pm

 :arrow: :arrow: :arrow:  http://forum.meleegaming.com/general-discussion/credits/ (http://forum.meleegaming.com/general-discussion/credits/)

Stickied in the most often-used board, or are you talking about something else?


Sometimes its the playerbase that "hear about something for the first time" a bit late  :P dont chastise them for it !
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: FrugFrug on February 26, 2013, 07:32:17 pm
Since the devs seem to be visiting this topic frequently I'll just drop this here: NERF 2H STAB...Please?
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Joseph Porta on February 26, 2013, 07:34:30 pm
Quote from: Butan on February 26, 2013, 04:37:00 am
Woooooow, chadz your message is like a blessing, now I can believe you're just overworked a bit, and not Just a mean guy  :P

I hope you have no job & no family, because M:BG + cRPG vets are going to be hard on you...

I hope you find a way to organize stuff in no time!

Fixed  8-)
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: DaveUKR on February 26, 2013, 10:56:30 pm
The real issue of the most problems is that crpg dev team is open from one side and completely closed from the other side. I bet the best balancing team would be a team of excellent players.

P.S. Like 50% of my fixes have never been added to crpg (fixed maps, fixed collision meshes etc). And I just cba to beg to add them.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: zottlmarsch on February 27, 2013, 12:50:34 am
1 year on, 170 + votes later, still no lederhosen....  :cry:
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: zagibu on February 27, 2013, 01:10:10 am
Quote from: chadz on February 26, 2013, 03:16:09 pm
Who said that? It's not a matter of not having enough people.

I am confused. Who said what? You quoted something I said and ask who said it? Is that some kind of insult? Or did you mean the next sentence maybe? I can remember two occasions where I asked how progress on new item patch was and whether I or anyone else could help accelerating it, and at least cmp and Shik said no, there is no help the community could provide to accelerate it.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: The_Bloody_Nine on February 27, 2013, 01:56:56 am
Quote from: zagibu on February 27, 2013, 01:10:10 am
I am confused. Who said what? You quoted something I said and ask who said it? Is that some kind of insult? Or did you mean the next sentence maybe?

Well, you adressed the given issue that they have not enough people and chadz asked you who claimed that the debate in this thread has anything to do with an issue having to less people in the first place. crystal clear, no?
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Belatu on February 27, 2013, 02:52:53 am
Quote from: chadz on February 26, 2013, 03:16:09 pm
Who said that? It's not a matter of not having enough people.

enough people who actually plays?
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Carthan on February 27, 2013, 04:58:11 am
Quote from: chadz on February 26, 2013, 03:24:31 am
(click to show/hide)
Upon reading this I could not stop myself from shedding manly tears
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Joker86 on February 27, 2013, 07:14:47 am
Quote from: DaveUKR on February 26, 2013, 10:56:30 pm
The real issue of the most problems is that crpg dev team is open from one side and completely closed from the other side. I bet the best balancing team would be a team of excellent players.

Could be right, but could also be wrong. Being an excellent player in cRPG (and many other class and character based games with player skill) always means being a minmaxer, and trying to "exploit" a certain build as good as possible. Or a certain mechanic. I don't think that this would put them into an objective point of view. Sometimes it could be better to just stay the spectator, see the results of the latest changes, compare them to the aimed goal, and tweak accordingly.

Although, on the other hand, some practical knowledge is definitely needed. That's why I generally refrain from making any suggestions concerning fighting mechanics like animations, stuns, chambering, etc., because I suck at fighting.  :mrgreen:
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: zagibu on February 27, 2013, 08:57:20 am
Quote from: The_Bloody_Nine on February 27, 2013, 01:56:56 am
Well, you adressed the given issue that they have not enough people and chadz asked you who claimed that the debate in this thread has anything to do with an issue having to less people in the first place. crystal clear, no?

Ah, thanks for clarification. Noone stated it openly like this, but Badplayer and Tears and others hinted at it in their posts. It's also the logical assumption, when work doesn't get done.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: chadz on February 27, 2013, 09:00:03 am
Quote from: zagibu on February 27, 2013, 01:10:10 am
I am confused. Who said what? You quoted something I said and ask who said it? Is that some kind of insult? Or did you mean the next sentence maybe? I can remember two occasions where I asked how progress on new item patch was and whether I or anyone else could help accelerating it, and at least cmp and Shik said no, there is no help the community could provide to accelerate it.

Quote from: zagibu on February 26, 2013, 03:09:57 pm
Actually, the issue about not having enough people to help with the items is bullshit.

Quote from: http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=bullshit
1.    bullshit   
A blatant lie, a fragrant untruth, an obvious falicy.

So what you are implying is that the dev team somewhere said that they need more people, and that you believe this is a blatant lie, a fragrant untruth, or an obvious falicy. Unless you did that statement yourself and immediately claim what you said is a lie, which would be even more confusing :).

A page before I stated the reason for things not getting done in time, and nowhere did I say it has something to do with the amount of devs.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: KingBread on February 27, 2013, 10:35:59 am
Finally we got chadz word on stuff. Good i prefer to know they know and can't do stuff than think they don't care or don't know.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Count_Curtis on February 27, 2013, 01:23:31 pm
yeah but instead of arguing with turkish people all the time, he should make real statements about the game, the mod, and the development. i mean this entire community threw thousands of euros at him, he could at least tell us how shit works in the dev team. nobody has any idea how the mod is developed
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Joker86 on February 27, 2013, 02:00:34 pm
Quote from: Count_Curtis on February 27, 2013, 01:23:31 pm
yeah but instead of arguing with turkish people all the time, he should make real statements about the game, the mod, and the development. i mean this entire community threw thousands of euros at him, he could at least tell us how shit works in the dev team. nobody has any idea how the mod is developed

Quote from: chadz on February 26, 2013, 03:24:31 am
The biggest issue is the legacy problem of cRPG. Both technical and organisational. It was never planned. Never ever. cRPG happened, was hit with success by surprise and has been always one step behind this from a planning point of view.

(click to show/hide)

For example the team, it was never properly organised. People moved themselves into a position by showing dedication, but those positions were  never defined, clear areas of work are completely missing. People just did. And sometimes people stopped doing. Stuff like that was never foreseen and accounted for.

It's developed very chaotically, I would say.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: chadz on February 27, 2013, 02:12:03 pm
Quote from: Count_Curtis on February 27, 2013, 01:23:31 pm
yeah but instead of arguing with turkish people all the time, he should make real statements about the game, the mod, and the development. i mean this entire community threw thousands of euros at him, he could at least tell us how shit works in the dev team. nobody has any idea how the mod is developed

You're completely mixing up the mod and the new project here - they are two separate things. Those that invested have of course access to different information.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Joker86 on February 27, 2013, 02:30:56 pm
Might we ask for an HONEST answer about the future development of cRPG? And with honest I mean even honest to yourself. Because as I see it now, you are developing a game which you have been actually paid for, you are trying to make a name in the gaming sector, and you have possible profit at the end of the process. So why should you bother wasting your time with cRPG any more, time which was spare enough even before you started M:BG.

Some kind of weird responsibility towards the community? Does this outweight the fact that M:BG can directly affect your life by being a first step towards your new job?

As I see it now, cRPG this time is REALLY dying. It will persist for a long time until it will finally die and Leshma, Teeth, ToD and Vibe leave for good (!!!), but from now on the decline will become more and more obvious. First signs could be that the battle server is sometimes astonishingly empty, or that I see perhaps one or two developer posts in the cRPG-game-forum section in a week.

In my eyes cRPG has fullfilled its role as testing object for your new game, although it was not started as such in the beginning. You have to move on (especially since M&B II would have killed cRPG most likely, anyways).

Perhaps it's time to release an agenda for cRPG 1.0, and to finally declare development as stopped as soon as the finaly version is released?

Edit: you = the team, not only you, chadz.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: chadz on February 27, 2013, 02:36:20 pm
That's not really a secret - we still work on cRPG, still add stuff every here and then, but most of the work goes towards the new project.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: matt2507 on February 27, 2013, 02:51:52 pm
Quote from: chadz on February 26, 2013, 03:24:31 am
It's the same for the technical aspect as well. Items in particular are especially problematic to put into a patch, because they have to be synched on the website and the game simultaneously. Sounds easy, but it isn't. If it would be a normal singleplayer/multiplayer mod, you'd just patch that shit, test it, release it. Simple as that.

In cRPG we can't even test patches properly because it all has to be in sync. This is why we (I in particular) are so reluctant of item patches - if something goes wrong, it could mean several hours downtime in best case, and a multiple day revert worst case.

Whys do not use a system like many mmorpg ?
   
once in a month, turn off the server for indeterminate time.
This will let an hour or two to synchronize new items and test them with a dev launcher.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: kinngrimm on February 27, 2013, 03:25:20 pm
@Joker
exactly my point i had too.

@ chadz
Will cRPG/strategus be upgraded for M&B2 yes or no?
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Joker86 on February 27, 2013, 03:37:14 pm
Quote from: chadz on February 27, 2013, 02:36:20 pm
That's not really a secret - we still work on cRPG, still add stuff every here and then, but most of the work goes towards the new project.

So if people were 100% devoted to cRPG before M:BG, and patches were released in a roster of several months, what kind of development can we expect now, with 10-30% devotion? Once a year a bugfix?
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: cmp on February 27, 2013, 03:45:18 pm
Quote from: kinngrimm on February 27, 2013, 03:25:20 pm
@ chadz
Will cRPG/strategus be upgraded for M&B2 yes or no?

Very unlikely. It's a weird question though, M&B2 doesn't even exist yet.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: chadz on February 27, 2013, 03:54:25 pm
Quote from: Joker86 on February 27, 2013, 03:37:14 pm
So if people were 100% devoted to cRPG before M:BG, and patches were released in a roster of several months, what kind of development can we expect now, with 10-30% devotion? Once a year a bugfix?

We were never devoted 100% to cRPG (dayjob, other responsibilities etc), so you cant calculate it that way. You'll have to wait and see, anything else is pure speculation, from everyones side.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Molly on February 27, 2013, 04:39:25 pm
Wonder why everyone seems so... I dunno... even a bit aggressive...

Announcing "you know what" was in itself a clear statement that cRPG won't be a priority anymore. And rightly so since it's just a mod. Except for a very small number of mods, they all died out at some point. cRPG has a very loyal playerbase and that's probably the only reason we all stick with it... and that there isn't any comparable alternative to it.

Sure, I would like to see new stuff added like everyone else but right now I am more or less pretty happy with the state. Overall it's working.
I don't think there is a lot wrong with the mod but with the expectations of some players tbh.

My advice, sit back and play the game... or don't. Quit the melodramatic questions and blame.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Micah on February 27, 2013, 04:43:41 pm
one thing i wonder about is , why we do openly discuss Melee:* here  :shock:?
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Macropus on February 27, 2013, 04:45:22 pm
What kinda annoys me is that some people seem to think devs should lick their asses since they invested some money to the new game and speculate like "I gave you money, so now you have to..."   :?

Quote from: Micah on February 27, 2013, 04:43:41 pm
one thing i wonder about is , why we do openly discuss M: here  :shock:?
Well... because we're all crpg players which are allowed to discuss it here? I don't think somebody reads this forum except crpg players.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Oberyn on February 27, 2013, 04:54:03 pm
When the money was going towards donations feeling any sense of entitlement was a shitty and retarded thing to do, I agree. With the self-funded kickstarter game development thing though they begin to have the inkling of a point. Of course a few people are outright rude and assholish about it, but some people are just rude assholes.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Joker86 on February 27, 2013, 05:03:01 pm
Quote from: chadz on February 27, 2013, 03:54:25 pm
We were never devoted 100% to cRPG (dayjob, other responsibilities etc), so you cant calculate it that way. You'll have to wait and see, anything else is pure speculation, from everyones side.

No, I meant 100% of free time meant for game development. This time has now to be shared with M:BG (are we not allowed to say it or what? Or are we only not allowed to talk about contents of the game and its development? I guess it's pointless to deny the existance of the project  :? ), and latter will most likely receive the biggest part of the attention. That's how I meant those percentage values, I didn't mean 100% of your time besides eating and sleeping.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: cmp on February 27, 2013, 05:07:26 pm
Quote from: Oberyn on February 27, 2013, 04:54:03 pm
With the self-funded kickstarter game development thing though they begin to have the inkling of a point.

They have a point if they want to be listened to after investing, but only if it's about what they invested for. Want us to do cRPG stuff because you invested in something else? Dream on.

Quote from: Joker86 on February 27, 2013, 05:03:01 pm
No, I meant 100% of free time meant for game development. This time has now to be shared

Money = more time.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Joker86 on February 27, 2013, 05:10:38 pm
Quote from: cmpxchg8b on February 27, 2013, 05:07:26 pm
Money = more time.

Got a point there.

I just hope that a few things get finally fixed for cRPG, so that it can spend its last days in a good, finished shape until it dies a natural death of a fading playerbase. Things like turn speed, multiplier system or even upkeep. And perhaps a new game mode. It's really close to perfection.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: chadz on February 27, 2013, 05:22:37 pm
Quote from: Oberyn on February 27, 2013, 04:54:03 pm
With the self-funded kickstarter game development thing though they begin to have the inkling of a point.

We take our responsibility to the investors very seriously, but as cmp said - we are responsible for delivering a different thing, and we have a dedicated place to talk to those (and so far I have a feeling that those are so far happy with the way we handle things).

cRPG is what it was before - a hobby project. The investment thing doesn't change that. We work on it whenever we have the time and will to do so.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: kinngrimm on February 27, 2013, 06:23:54 pm
Quote from: cmpxchg8b on February 27, 2013, 03:45:18 pm
Very unlikely. It's a weird question though, M&B2 doesn't even exist yet.
Is it weird? It is to see what perspectives cRPG/Strategus has for the future.
If it is unlikely to also make the step to M&B2, the "dieing out"-factor so to speak is a bit more likely.
People tend to join new game versions and if this mod ain't upgraded for the new game version of M&B2,
you would loose people. Sure some may join the new game, but keep in mind M&B is an existing game and it is from the chances to be rated higher there will be a M&B2 however long it will take to be released. As you are building from scratch a new game, its release date is likely to be after that of M&B2. If you show us tommorrow a working alpha of BG, then my estimates are mute, till then i think i have a point.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: chadz on February 27, 2013, 06:32:08 pm
The whole reason we move away from Warband&successors is because
a) it's far away,
b) the engine doesn't suit us in what we want to do

You are suggesting to do just that again.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Vibe on February 27, 2013, 06:37:17 pm
Quote from: kinngrimm on February 27, 2013, 06:23:54 pm
Is it weird? It is to see what perspectives cRPG/Strategus has for the future.
If it is unlikely to also make the step to M&B2, the "dieing out"-factor so to speak is a bit more likely.
People tend to join new game versions and if this mod ain't upgraded for the new game version of M&B2,
you would loose people. Sure some may join the new game, but keep in mind M&B is an existing game and it is from the chances to be rated higher there will be a M&B2 however long it will take to be released. As you are building from scratch a new game, its release date is likely to be after that of M&B2. If you show us tommorrow a working alpha of BG, then my estimates are mute, till then i think i have a point.

Dude yes, cRPG/Strategus is dying/will die out eventually, development is focused on the new game that allows 100% freedom for the devs and where all the money is at. It's beyond obvious.

Now

fucking

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Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: pepejul on February 27, 2013, 06:56:59 pm
Someone though to say "THANK YOU chadz AND CMP and others" for many hours playins cRPG ? I will shout it loud :
THANK YOU FOR ALL YOUR AMAZING WORK !!!
And do what you want you are the master !!!
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Micah on February 27, 2013, 07:02:31 pm
There is nothing at all community can demand from the donkey crew in cRPG , not even a better PR. Eventhough ujin has a vital point that things MIGHT be better and im seriously feeling with him in that matter, since he did put so much work into his improvements (for the best of the community, including myself), it can only be a suggestion and hope in a sense of a user of a free mod would make to its developer... and its free choice from the lather one if,when and how he does.
I even fear that donkeys did lean a bit to far out of the window (like we germans say) with some of their statements and agreements - out of best intention surely - but against  their own best. Installing a propper organisation, logistics and timelines, admin applications .. all of this has not very much to do with the fun of free time modding. Very soon it became a player/developer relation like almost between a user/company... which never was the case. See what happens if some dev too early states: yeah it will get added some time ? And you wonder why they so rarely comment ? They fear the demands and certain disappointment that would follow in the community that would make them eat up theirselfes,
I am glad with what there is in cRPG its a beautiful game, and its more about the community that got spoiled by the goodwill of the devs and now come and demand too much. Sorry, but i feel it is wrong, and we have to step back a bit ... i even dont mind to give them way more of a slack than they currently use up ... You ever asked what would be if chadz suddenly decides to ditch the whole thing ?
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Butan on February 27, 2013, 08:06:28 pm
One answer : community patching.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: _Sebastian_ on February 27, 2013, 08:12:52 pm
Quote from: kinngrimm on February 26, 2013, 02:24:36 pm
2) Sebastian a member of Wolves is bugging me for a long time to get something done into the direction of RPG elements for his own mod, he may be someone who would be able to help keeping things alife. Have a look at his mod "Battle of Europe (http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php/topic,239917.msg5739758.html#msg5739758)", i would think here in terms of a merger, that but with the clear goal to have a M&B2 mod later on too and castles and towns really existing in Europe. Overall how it would look like is open for discussion i guess, Sebastian has some graphical artists but is lacking coders so you both may benefit.

3) 2) depends storngly on the answer in 1) if you would let die of cRPG/strategus there will be the intent then to implemented in BoE, elements of an RPG and of a Strategy game, then still with your influence as you made the groundwork for so many amazing concepts. I personally would prefer that cRPG/Strategus stays alife, as i just invested too much of my lifetime in this game and this community and aslong i don't see the new game i am not sure that i would then just switch to that one or BoE. Nolifers also have structures they can't just let go ;) .

...
...
My personal offer is that i can bring people together have a look out for suitable additions for your team and help finding common ground. This is basicly what i do in this comminity in terms of Strategus and Clan Leading anyhow. In addition i still would like to be part of a test crew when you choose to organizee that a bit more professionally.
If you think that would be something you want or need send me pm with requests and we could talk more private also on teamspeak "cotgs.de" or in steam(kinngrimm).

I remember the time around february/march 2012 when I had endless discussions with Kinngrimm, about making a new mod similar to crpg but with a huge amount of new features and realistic gameplay.

Kinngrimm was very interested in developing sophisticated RPG mechanics while I was more interested in making the mod very realistic and historically accurate.

We would like to port the "good" things of Strategus over to BoE and enhance them, if the development of it really stops or already has stopped.
This is in no way a type of propaganda against crpg, we are just interrested in continuing the great work of strategus if it's development really stops.

We definently will develope our mod also for M&B 2,  so the future is safe :wink:

As kinngrimm said, we only have a few programers (Sebastian, kinngrimm and another guy), but more 2d/3d artists and historical consultants...
This seems to be a common problem of the modding scene... you will find alot of guys with good knowledge about modeling and texturing,
but getting a capable programer is a difficult and long task.

This is the big difference of modders and indie game devs. The most modders are 2d/3d artists and the most of the indie game developers are programers.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: kinngrimm on February 27, 2013, 08:35:04 pm
Quote from: chadz on February 27, 2013, 06:32:08 pm
The whole reason we move away from Warband&successors is because
a) it's far away,
b) the engine doesn't suit us in what we want to do
i understood and agree on all of that

Quote from: chadz on February 27, 2013, 06:32:08 pm
You are suggesting to do just that again.
not really as my hopes are that with M&B2 there would be implemented the missing factors, but yes there is an uncertainty to it.

What i really suggest is, that cRPG would be developed further also upgraded for M&B2, so that nolifers like myself can keep on grinding XP not fearing that the mod would finnally die because there is no intention to get it upgraded onto the next M&B2 for whatever reason.

If that is done only by the dudes doing it now or new guys or in a different mod ... as long i can keep on playing the way more or less i do it now and don't loose the community i build my life around i don't care what of those options then make it in the end.

@vibe dealing with it, is exactly what i am doing here
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Belatu on February 27, 2013, 09:10:12 pm
You could look for a secondary team to keep going with the crpg thing
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: DaveUKR on February 27, 2013, 09:16:32 pm
Quote from: Belatu on February 27, 2013, 09:10:12 pm
You could look for a secondary team to keep going with the crpg thing

That is true. Why not expanding dev team of crpg and have a new wave in there? chadz, I suggest you to involve more people in development as fresh blood always has a little bit more ambitions.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Micah on February 27, 2013, 09:28:11 pm
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Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: enigmatic_stranger on February 27, 2013, 09:28:39 pm
Quote from: pepejul on February 27, 2013, 06:56:59 pm
Someone though to say "THANK YOU chadz AND CMP and others" for many hours playins cRPG ? I will shout it loud :
THANK YOU FOR ALL YOUR AMAZING WORK !!!
And do what you want you are the master !!!
No admin powers for you! Hahaha! :P
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Prpavi on February 27, 2013, 09:30:15 pm
I have no problem with the mod dying in the future, just hope it will be in an week long orgy of no upkeep, plated chargers and heavy armored knights!
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: dynamike on February 27, 2013, 09:58:58 pm
Quote from: chadz on February 27, 2013, 05:22:37 pm
We take our responsibility to the investors very seriously, but as cmp said - we are responsible for delivering a different thing, and we have a dedicated place to talk to those (and so far I have a feeling that those are so far happy with the way we handle things).

cRPG is what it was before - a hobby project. The investment thing doesn't change that. We work on it whenever we have the time and will to do so.

Suggestion:

Offer crowd funding options for a continued dedicated development of CRPG

OR

Offer positions in an extended CRPG development team to some of our talented community members who are interested in keeping the mod alive and kicking
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: cmp on February 27, 2013, 10:12:15 pm
Quote from: DaveUKR on February 27, 2013, 09:16:32 pm
That is true. Why not expanding dev team of crpg and have a new wave in there? chadz, I suggest you to involve more people in development as fresh blood always has a little bit more ambitions.

There's very few Warband scripters at our level, and they're already working on other mods.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Jarold on February 27, 2013, 10:19:20 pm
Quote from: cmpxchg8b on February 27, 2013, 10:12:15 pm
There's very few Warband scripters at our level, and they're already working on other mods.

Very true.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Ujin on February 27, 2013, 10:56:08 pm
Quote from: Micah on February 27, 2013, 07:02:31 pm
There is nothing at all community can demand from the donkey crew in cRPG , not even a better PR. Eventhough ujin has a vital point that things MIGHT be better and im seriously feeling with him in that matter, since he did put so much work into his improvements (for the best of the community, including myself), it can only be a suggestion and hope in a sense of a user of a free mod would make to its developer... and its free choice from the lather one if,when and how he does.
I even fear that donkeys did lean a bit to far out of the window (like we germans say) with some of their statements and agreements - out of best intention surely - but against  their own best. Installing a propper organisation, logistics and timelines, admin applications .. all of this has not very much to do with the fun of free time modding. Very soon it became a player/developer relation like almost between a user/company... which never was the case. See what happens if some dev too early states: yeah it will get added some time ? And you wonder why they so rarely comment ? They fear the demands and certain disappointment that would follow in the community that would make them eat up theirselfes,
I am glad with what there is in cRPG its a beautiful game, and its more about the community that got spoiled by the goodwill of the devs and now come and demand too much. Sorry, but i feel it is wrong, and we have to step back a bit ... i even dont mind to give them way more of a slack than they currently use up ... You ever asked what would be if chadz suddenly decides to ditch the whole thing ?
I am significantly drunk right now but i'd like to just point out one thing, maybe dsnot so carefully and quite blatantly so, apologies in advance :



This small community gave chadz and his new project over 30k euros in less than 2 days. I don't want to come out as an asshole , but money DOES talk. It's obvious that we are most grateful to chadz & Co and that we have our most honest trust in his bright future and he has our everlasting loyalty as supporters.


This is a win-win relationship where 99.9 % of success depends on the brilliancy of chadz , Cmp and the othr Devs, and the last 0.01 % relies on the players who can appreciate their work and help them test it, make it better etc.

I hope you can get my point, usually whn im drunk i can still speak my mind... i think
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: chadz on February 27, 2013, 11:02:13 pm
+1 for being drunk
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Arrowblood on February 27, 2013, 11:05:15 pm
Buff my longbow pls, i feel like i suck.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Ujin on February 27, 2013, 11:07:13 pm
Quote from: chadz on February 27, 2013, 11:02:13 pm
+1 for being drunk

visitors can't see pics , please register or login
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Micah on February 27, 2013, 11:33:58 pm
(click to show/hide)
Hahaha, it cool brah :P and i hope i didnt miss the point of my message myself, eventhough im not drunk (Yet :mrgreen:) ... that you and the donkeys want the same thing, and even do alot to make it happen , but reality works different then we want at times. And one thing i like to point out, aswell as prevent from happening ( im only a humble no-lifer-gamer that somehow got sucked into this community ) : pls stop pointing fingers or guns at someones breasts . Noone here deserves that and noone should feel guilty here.
And also its certainly not the right time neither the thread to promote an alternative mod/moding-team  :mad:
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Ujin on February 27, 2013, 11:44:03 pm
Quote from: Micah on February 27, 2013, 11:33:58 pm
pls stop pointing fingers or guns at someones breasts

 :shock:
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Micah on February 27, 2013, 11:45:36 pm
Quote from: Ujin on February 27, 2013, 11:44:03 pm
:shock:
yeah, maybe its me who is overly dramatizing here ... but also : This wasnt directed to you  :oops:
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Kafein on February 27, 2013, 11:47:38 pm
"gun" is a metaphor.

...right ?
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Micah on February 27, 2013, 11:49:37 pm
Quote from: Kafein on February 27, 2013, 11:47:38 pm
"gun" is a metaphor.

...right ?
"metaphor" is a gun ... right ?
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Kafein on February 27, 2013, 11:53:22 pm
Quote from: Micah on February 27, 2013, 11:49:37 pm
"metaphor" is a gun ... right ?

"right" is a metaphor for wrong,

and ""metaphor" is a gun" is a metaphor.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: DaveUKR on February 27, 2013, 11:56:58 pm
Quote from: cmpxchg8b on February 27, 2013, 10:12:15 pm
There's very few Warband scripters at our level, and they're already working on other mods.

Is it about warband scripting? I bet that warband scripting is somewhere in 50% mark in what crpg needs right now. You really have to spread some kind of responsibility:

Models, Collision Meshes, Animation, Sound, Textures, Maps, Optimization, Item Balance, the whole Strat section in the end which needs a lot of people to make it good. If there were particular people who only did THAT and nothing else then it would be easier. First of all it would be easier for player as they'd know who they should ask for when they have something to propose/report.

I'll try to explain it as a player who made some efforts to fix something. Once I had an idea to start a project to fix the most of the map bugs (places where you get stuck), really ambitious idea as there are a lot of them. I made a couple of fixes, made screenshots of places which I've fixed. I even made a thread asking people to report such places. But in the end what happened? Yeah, nothing, none of my maps got uploaded and I didn't really know whom I should ask back to then. In the end people in IRC summed up that I had to ask Meow but it wasn't really his job so it ended you know how.

Same thing happened to my collision meshes and models. I believe that only a couple of those were added (fixed player hitbox with hand hitboxes + fixed construction site model in hands). I sent cmp a wrong archive so it was an error there and after that he didn't upload the rest of collision meshes I believe (as far as I can judge from the game). And it's fair because cmp should not do everything. What I see is that cmp decides balance, cmp does this, cmp does that. Isn't that too much of inappropriate work for such an important developer?
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: BlueKnight on February 28, 2013, 12:02:32 am
Quote from: DaveUKR on February 27, 2013, 11:56:58 pm
...construction site...

Sorry, I couldn't resist the temptation.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: pepejul on February 28, 2013, 12:44:07 pm
"don't put something on breast" is a metaphor for this : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otCpCn0l4Wo"***

***it is not graphic or violence or sex content..if you don"t want to see, don't touch this*** =)
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: kinngrimm on February 28, 2013, 01:41:58 pm
Quote from: cmpxchg8b on February 27, 2013, 10:12:15 pm
There's very few Warband scripters at our level, and they're already working on other mods.
a statement which can't be denied or proven as long you don't give others maybe the chance to improve themselves by doing coding at your request and your supervision to the goal to improve cRPG further and the personal goal of those who would be supervised to improve their scripting/programming skills.

And even if in the end it turns out that noone ever could reach your "level", they still would be able to do all the boring ground work which also often is included in programming. If it is about control and not let go the objectives, it would be still doable with new programmers, you just would need to tell them what to do and what not to do, which would put you more into a management positions which you may not like as programmer. If that then would be the case get someone else to supervice/tell people what to do and you yourself would just double check code which had been produced to make sure that quality meets your standards, that no melliouse code would be included and also to give advice to those who are not at your "level".
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Molly on February 28, 2013, 01:45:22 pm
Quote from: kinngrimm on February 28, 2013, 01:41:58 pm
a statement which can't be denied or proven as long you don't give others maybe the chance to improve themselves by doing coding at your request and your supervision to the goal to improve cRPG further and the personal goal of those who would be supervised to improve their scripting/programming skills.

And even if in the end it turns out that noone ever could reach your "level", they still would be able to do all the boring ground work which also often is included in programming. If it is about control and not let go the objectives, it would be still doable with new programmers, you just would need to tell them what to do and what not to do, which would put you more into a management positions which you may not like as programmer. If that then would be the case get someone else to supervice/tell people what to do and you yourself would just double check code which had been produced to make sure that quality meets your standards, that no melliouse code would be included and also to give advice to those who are not at your "level".
Finding/training/supervising new guys is most likely way more time consuming than just doing it by yourself.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Belatu on February 28, 2013, 02:04:17 pm
It becomes a boring thread when everybody is right  :)
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: kinngrimm on February 28, 2013, 02:07:12 pm
Quote from: benkei on February 28, 2013, 01:45:22 pm
Finding/training/supervising new guys is most likely way more time consuming than just doing it by yourself.
finding ... Sebastian and his team, Guika maybe if he is asked nicely, you know the guy who did the Strategus Viewer(update  incoming), Chy who is doing the development for the Item Belt ... finding not a problem ... at all
training ... most of those i jsut mentioend have already programming experience either through "doityourself", studies or job, most things as programmer you do autoditact on the objective you have anyhow.
supervising ... you need a clear formulated objectve(s) you should hten hand out to those who are then realise it, then when code is produced and perhaps also already tested, before it would go onto any "life" machine, then it needs to be screened, this but will be on fewer occasions over time in some cases when the supervisor gets teh feeling the dude he is supposed to supervice is doing a good job ... by that you create over time an independently working team which uses still the objectives of the original creators.

Is it easy? In the beginning no, later there is the possibility that a huge workload is taken of the shoulders of the original creators.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: chadz on February 28, 2013, 02:27:17 pm
I can tell you, by common sense and experience, that throwing a lot of unpaid coders at a problem will not solve anything.

We have been giving many people a chance in the last 2 years, but the truth is that most people lose interest sooner or later (actually, nearly all lose interest after 2 days, and those that make it past 2 weeks are usually staying for good) - it's a crappy position where you have to do a lot of work, get neither paid, nor real appreciation, but a lot of demands. I believe there are only a few in the cRPG community that have what it takes to do that - and I believe we have those on board already.

If people haven't managed to get on board by now, they probably are not interested enough to really be part of the dev team.

To assume that you can just "assign" coders to a mod dev team and it works out is naive, sorry.

(click to show/hide)
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Joker86 on February 28, 2013, 02:46:53 pm
I fear chadz is right on that subject.

Nonetheless an announcement that you are looking for (good!) coders could change something, perhaps. I know the chances are small, but if you mention that cRPG needs coders or it will die a cruel, slow death, some people, who would be willing basically, but just thought "People are already working on that mod, they don't really need my help so I have more time for climbing/cycling/gaming/picking up/watching porn." would change their mind, and dedicate themselves to it.

I know it's not very likely to have one or even more persons with exactly that attitude, but the try won't cost you anything more than a few minutes for writing the topic.

Yet another advice I have would be to release something which changes the feel of the game as radically as possible, for example changing the multiplier system or implementing a new game mode. This is a change you would have to do on your own, but once implemented, people get the feeling there's movement again, the game becomes "new" again, older players who left become curious and join again, and the overall amazement (?) raises again. This is a good moment to look for motivated people, who can relieve you a bit.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Ninja_Khorin on February 28, 2013, 03:06:33 pm
Quote from: Joker86 on February 28, 2013, 02:46:53 pm
I fear chadz is right on that subject.

Nonetheless an announcement that you are looking for (good!) coders could change something, perhaps.
Hmm... (http://forum.meleegaming.com/announcements/crpg-is-looking-for-help!-%28php-coder%29/)

Mhmm... (http://forum.meleegaming.com/announcements/bugtracker-coders/)
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Tristan on February 28, 2013, 03:07:52 pm
tl;dr of the past 10 pages please!
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Joseph Porta on February 28, 2013, 04:24:06 pm
Mad they dont get their new toys, insist on more devs, mod ded
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: chadz on February 28, 2013, 04:44:44 pm
I think "mod is ded" is a pretty good summary.

However, contrary to the 100 times it's been said before - NOW FOR REAL!
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Joseph Porta on February 28, 2013, 04:54:43 pm
Get yourself together, fool!
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Butan on February 28, 2013, 05:01:54 pm
Quote from: chadz on February 28, 2013, 02:27:17 pm
most people lose interest sooner or later (actually, nearly all lose interest after 2 days, and those that make it past 2 weeks are usually staying for good)



Your demonstration is that a low % of those you gave a chance in the past actually stays for good and become an asset to your dedicated team. I'm sure it is the truth, everyone is always very enthusiast when they "begin".


But you seem to conclude from that point that you have everyone you could possibly have on board. It is not true ! For me it means that you need to keep giving people the chance they ask for, without asking nicely if you dont want to, and keep praying for the 1 or 2 guys that will come out of the pile.


Why not keep doing what you did to have those that are at your side now ?  :)

Dont close the gate between the community and the dev team when it is unnecessary and unproductive for all sides!


(click to show/hide)
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: KingBread on February 28, 2013, 05:04:16 pm
Quote from: chadz on February 28, 2013, 04:44:44 pm
I think "mod is ded" is a pretty good summary.

However, contrary to the 100 times it's been said before - NOW FOR REAL!

Even chadz desever -1 sometimes.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Grumbs on February 28, 2013, 05:10:26 pm
Nerf ranged - mod no longer dead. Easy

People play this because its got good melee mechanics. Ranged take advantage of that with their parasitic gameplay, and the core playerbase get sick of it and play something else
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Micah on February 28, 2013, 05:17:43 pm
Quote from: Grumbs on February 28, 2013, 05:10:26 pm
Nerf ranged - mod no longer dead. Easy

People play this because its got good melee mechanics. Ranged take advantage of that with their parasitic gameplay, and the core playerbase get sick of it and play something else
ppl start converting an thread about adding models into ranged QQ thread > mod is once again alive and kicking  :mrgreen:
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Paul on February 28, 2013, 05:38:16 pm
It shows how retarded people are. After some time they actually started to believe the lobbyist bullshit they were writing.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Micah on February 28, 2013, 05:46:37 pm
Quote from: Paul on February 28, 2013, 05:38:16 pm
It shows how retarded people are. After some time they actually started to believe the lobbyist bullshit they were writing.
well... kkids watching to many movies and playing to many video games ... oh wait  :oops:
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: kinngrimm on February 28, 2013, 05:55:11 pm
@chadz
the asking nicely part was with the overall neagtivy in mind which was put on Guika through his development of the strat viewer. He told me once would like to be part of the dev team and it was offered before but he wasnt contacted.  Then again as you said appriciation is not something what comes in lightly in this environment. I try to give it as a clan leader, so that people keep on doing what is needed but not liked, the same i would expect from anyone who tries to lead a team of coders, i learned it and now i do it without much thinking, so can you.

@Paul
if lobbying leads to engagement and that then to implementations, then lobbying aint that bad. If it is only to scratch once ego then it is a waist of time.


overall i said what i had to say.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Joker86 on February 28, 2013, 06:05:11 pm
Quote from: Ninja_Khorin on February 28, 2013, 03:06:33 pm
Hmm... (http://forum.meleegaming.com/announcements/crpg-is-looking-for-help!-%28php-coder%29/)

Mhmm... (http://forum.meleegaming.com/announcements/bugtracker-coders/)

Those topics are from the end of 2011. We have 2013 now. More than a complete year has passed since. It's not like people who were capable of coding but not willing to do so would change their mind because we need them now only due to those topics still existing... yet another recruiting round would do no harm, I think.

and I do know the topics, in the upper one I have even written the first reply.  :P

Quote from: Grumbs on February 28, 2013, 05:10:26 pm
Nerf ranged - mod no longer dead. Easy

People play this because its got good melee mechanics. Ranged take advantage of that with their parasitic gameplay, and the core playerbase get sick of it and play something else

Another nerf doesn't help anything Grumbs. Haven't you learned from all the previous nerfs? Archers got nerfed over and over, and still infantry has problems with them. The problems come from a totally different direction. Not the deadliness of the archer himself (dmg, accuracy, shot speed, etc.) is the problem, it's horrible at the moment. The percentage of archers is part of the problem, as archers increase each other's effectivity exponentially the more there are (in difference to infantry, who don't), the flexibility of the class is another part. This flexibility allows archers to actively engage throughout almost the entire battle, and to pick the most advantageous targets (similar to cavalry). It's an offensive, acting class. Infantry needs to wait until targets come in range (in most cases by deciding so!), and during most of the round they are trying to survive, which puts them into a defensive, reacting role. Even when charging. And the last part of the problem are infantry players themselves, who don't play together to complement each other. Infantry needs a way higher amount of coordination, discipline and teamwork than the other classes, and due to the first two parts of the problem I mentioned above you can imagine what happens when infantry is chasing after their targets (missing flexibility) and scatters over the battlefield (low support level between infantry). They get raped by archers and cavalry who don't suffer from missing teamplay in this severe extend.

So please, Grumbs, don't suggest any nerfs at all any more, the game is nerfed to the ground, no more space left downwards. If anything, suggest buffs. But better would be to actually confront yourself with the source of the problems, instead just reacting with nerf cries. It's like those people in politics who whenever something unpleasant happens their only reaction is to shout for more laws, restrictions and prohibitions. As if a ban of ego shooters wold prevent amok runs or longer sentences would deterr rapists (for five years prison I would rape her, but not for eight...). It's always better to adress the source of the problems than to try to prevent the symptoms.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Grumbs on February 28, 2013, 06:14:51 pm
Quote from: Paul on February 28, 2013, 05:38:16 pm
It shows how retarded people are. After some time they actually started to believe the lobbyist bullshit they were writing.

This is part of the problem. Actual devs who have a direct impact on game balance who think people must be retarded for wanting ranged tweaks

Joker, although I agree that the shear volume is an important factor, there are other issues too. The last batch of "nerfs" were actually buffs to the top bows. They added some weight but  we ended up with ranged doing more damage overall

Xbows are still as dumb as ever. No requirements, fast reload, high damage, except for top 2 they can be used with any melee weapon. Melee wpf is still near worthless after a point

Damage, stagger, repair costs, weight can all be used to tweak how many people crutch on ranged. I don't think its worth just giving up and assuming there will always be so much ranged

Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Joker86 on February 28, 2013, 06:23:43 pm
Quote from: Grumbs on February 28, 2013, 06:14:51 pm
Damage, stagger, repair costs, weight can all be used to tweak how many people crutch on ranged. I don't think its worth just giving up and assuming there will always be so much ranged

Ideally I'd say 1/3 of all players should be ranged. It's part of the game, and removing it makes it uncomparably more boring and plain. Having to deal with ranged gives the gme both depth and a bit of historic realism.

I don't know much about the crossbow spam, I guess that's an NA thing, on EU we have few crossbows and many bows. But I do know that once you get hit it doesn't matter any more if the damage is raised by 10% or something like that. What matters is how often you get hit, how likely it is and how much your counter measures against being hit influence your gameplay. And no, reducing the accuracy further is no way to deal with it, all classes should be played skill based, not luck based.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Casimir on February 28, 2013, 06:36:33 pm
i like turtles
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Oberyn on February 28, 2013, 06:38:03 pm
Mod is phoenix that will be reborn from it's ashes. In the form of M:BG or whatever it's gonna be called. So what's the plan then? Eventually pull the plug on the database and all servers once the playerbase is moved over to BG? Or will it be kaput before a BG alpha even sees the light of day?

What little attention and time can be devoted to cRPG should be to cRPG imo...if anything should die from neglect first it should be the appendix that is Strat. Of course it's up to devs to decide what they want to focus on with their free time, but imo Strat is an add-on and cRPG is the basis of the mod.

There have been rumblings from the old farts who miss the organized clan battles scene, and how Strat completely eclipsed them. Could be a win-win as far as increasing the playerbase, or at least keeping them around. And it puts the responsability for organizing and the work involved on the community and not the devs.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Joker86 on February 28, 2013, 06:39:15 pm
Quote from: Casimir on February 28, 2013, 06:36:33 pm
i like turtles

Aaaaaalright, you're a great zombie. Good times here at the crPG forum.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: zottlmarsch on February 28, 2013, 06:50:59 pm
if crpg dies now (or in the very near future) how many people are actually gonna still stick around, doing nothing, just killing time waiting for this new game?
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: DaveUKR on February 28, 2013, 07:15:34 pm
Quote from: chadz on February 28, 2013, 02:27:17 pm
To assume that you can just "assign" coders to a mod dev team and it works out is naive, sorry.

Like I said: it's not about coders right now. You can make mod a WAY better thing by assigning people to other positions. If you know - I gathered a little amount (like half a million crpg gold) of donations to make rewards to people who can do something useful for the mod. The problem was that I asked several times in IRC and nobody from the dev team could answer what they actually need. Even when I asked about obvious things - I wasn't sure they'd be added. I just can't use the money I took from players on something that will never be implemented. I never made attempts to become dev, I only did some stuff and tried to lobby some things, that's it. But it's not about the fact that I didn't want to try to get into the dev, it's about the question WHY I didn't do that. I don't know why but I didn't feel enough motivated to try it as I wasn't sure I won't waste time. I believe that you can give it a try and gather a new dev team (without replacing the existing one of course). A big dev team for crpg exclusively where everyone (or maybe a couple of people) does something exclusively and nothing else. cmp gave me beta testing badge, I had to test and find bugs. And f*ck me if I didn't find enough of them or did my job bad. I did well because I clearly knew what to do and that it'll have attention.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: djavo on February 28, 2013, 07:18:23 pm
You have to read between lines. This is about enslavement of Zimke by Ujin which shouldnt happen in 21st century.
Zimke Unchained!

Ne daj da te Ujin izrabljuje, traži povišicu i traži slobodne dane. Ujine nemaš to pravo!
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Teeth on February 28, 2013, 07:19:45 pm
Quote from: zottlmarsch on February 28, 2013, 06:50:59 pm
if crpg dies now (or in the very near future) how many people are actually gonna still stick around, doing nothing, just killing time waiting for this new game?
The cRPG hivemind will contact everyone when the new game comes out. When you feel the grind spirit tingling in your anus it is time to check this forum.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Thomek on February 28, 2013, 07:36:54 pm
Quote from: Paul on February 28, 2013, 05:38:16 pm
It shows how retarded people are. After some time they actually started to believe the lobbyist bullshit they were writing.

And yet, here I am, a living proof that lobbyism works. cRPG is not dead yet either. Was playable at 4 am on EU last night..

If anything, I think the mod slowly dies because it is so goddamn hardcore for new players. Average player skill is through the roof, and for a native player, he can too easily excuse that on gear and level advantages, and still be partly right.

cRPG in the current metagame, with the current loomed up 31+ player base is pretty well balanced inside its little bubble.. It's just a nightmare for noobs and people with lives to get into it atm. The balance has to take a holistic approach to the game, and balancers should be prepared to rework the whole system if we want to see more players.

Complaining about clans is a wrong turn I think, as this is one of the very best things in cRPG, and is also one of the reasons we still have so many players.

* I would rather make it easier for people to join and create clans and lead them into our wonderful and friendly forum community..  :idea:
* Face and deal with lameness, and focus on good gameplay as a whole. I'm sorry to say it, but xbows, HX, too random and powerful cav is plain lame. (Archery is fine imo)
 
     Short description of lameness:
     - I think people doesn't like to die when the reason is sudden and beyond their control. (Bumped or 1shot by Ninja cav, 1shot by xbows)
     - When there is nothing they can do about the enemy (HA, previously running archers)
     - When rounds draw out because of certain ego's and playstyles that allows it.
     - When 1 kind of build (AND ARMOR CLASS) becomes too powerful and dominant. Everyone wants to be unique, but if it becomes too minmaxed and hardcore, one is forced to loose or join 'em

Now, I think some of those examples we already fixed, but there are still plenty to deal with. Especially rebalancing builds.

Then there are some easy things we can do to attract new players, as well as bring back old ones:
 - Double XP sundays (Just to remind people how much fun cRPG is!)
 - Rent a dedicated TS server for cRPG, where all clans can have their channel for free. I'm rarely in Nord channel i.ex, since then I'd have to leave nditions TS.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Joker86 on February 28, 2013, 07:51:09 pm
You are right on that.

I just had a sick idea. How about some "grace skill points"?

Whenever someone creates a new main character, he gets a few grace skill points. Three, maybe five. Who knows.

These skill points can be spent any way the player likes it, either in skills or for converting.

Every time you retire, these grace skill points get transferred as well, except of one of them, which gets lost. So every generation you have one grace skill point less, until you are gen 4/6 and have the ordinary character.

To prevent old players of creating a new main char and playing it up to lvl 35 with 40 skill points, characters with grace skill points can't be raised above lvl 31.

The suggestion is pretty extreme, so I don't dare to pack it into a seperate topic, I will first wait for the feedback here. But I guess it's pointless, anyway. At fifteen, I had the will to  learn ; at thirty, I could stand ; at forty, I had no  doubts ; at fifty, I understood the heavenly Bidding ;  at sixty, my ears were opened ; at seventy, I could  do as my heart lusted without trespassing from the  square. and I doubt that a lot will change in the future.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Spleen on February 28, 2013, 08:02:28 pm
You can open multiple ts servers in tabs by pressing ctrl while clicking on the favourites
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: The_Bloody_Nine on February 28, 2013, 08:33:02 pm
How about wipe, much faster leveling in general and hard cap at say lvl 34 or 35? (Not that this hasn't been suggested before)

So the newbies could get their heirlooms and high lvl chars in no time and laugh at me playing 2 1/2 years for lvl 34 and a couple +3s. Seriously, who would care? We all have enough of that stuff and if it helps new players to keep on playing everyone wins from it.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: cmp on February 28, 2013, 08:43:46 pm
A wipe is possibly the best way to actually kill the mod.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: The_Bloody_Nine on February 28, 2013, 08:45:42 pm
then stick to the faster levelling part.

Actually I mixed up 2 ideas in my post. first i thought: wipe plus removal of heirlooms, then: no, faster leveling and keeping old chars and looms is better. Then i mixed both, sorry for confusion.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: zottlmarsch on February 28, 2013, 08:46:44 pm
wipe = loads of nerds committing suicide
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Ganner on February 28, 2013, 08:46:53 pm
Quote from: cmpxchg8b on February 28, 2013, 08:43:46 pm
A wipe is possibly the best way to actually kill the mod.

Or revive it.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: oprah_winfrey on February 28, 2013, 08:49:16 pm
Quote from: Ganner on February 28, 2013, 08:46:53 pm
Or revive it.

Doubtful.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Joker86 on February 28, 2013, 09:12:04 pm
A wipe will only be helpfull when the game changes radically, so that something new comes which compensates for the loss of the old and which makes it easier to argument that the old things had to go anyway.

But I don't see how this can be achieved with cRPG, as it is about leveling your character and buying equipment for him. There is not a lot you can change about, and thus losing the old characters and equipment will lead to frustration.

People do want new players to join the game, but most likely not for the price of everything they have achieved in the past years, except for their skills which they keep.

The only other possibility I see is to give players an incentive to delete their characters and looms completely by giving them some kind of reward which does not improve their ingame fighting capabilities but rather marks them as players who sacrificed their personal achievements for the greater good of the community. But it should be something better than a forum title or something like that.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Tibe on February 28, 2013, 10:05:28 pm
Quote from: chadz on February 27, 2013, 05:22:37 pm
....
cRPG is what it was before - a hobby project......
These words were basically enough.....Mybe the "Do this NOW!" threads will lessen...
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Korgoth on February 28, 2013, 10:17:33 pm
Yeah yeah yeah... mod is dead and all that shit.

Add new items!
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: BlameMeForTheNoise on March 01, 2013, 11:28:56 am
So is there going to be an itempatch soon?

I think everyone would be ok with a little serverdowntime for that. *hinthint*
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Patoson on March 01, 2013, 12:49:53 pm
Quote from: The_Bloody_Nine on February 28, 2013, 08:33:02 pm
How about wipe, much faster leveling in general and hard cap at say lvl 34 or 35? (Not that this hasn't been suggested before)

So the newbies could get their heirlooms and high lvl chars in no time and laugh at me playing 2 1/2 years for lvl 34 and a couple +3s. Seriously, who would care? We all have enough of that stuff and if it helps new players to keep on playing everyone wins from it.
This. Wipe and speed up levelling a damn lot and problem solved.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: pepejul on March 01, 2013, 01:32:53 pm
Give all pple lvl 35 and it will be faster... lol
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Xol! on March 01, 2013, 01:46:34 pm
After reading through the thread, I have three points to make.

First, I agree very much with chadz on the new programmers thing.  I'm a graduate student in computational science, so I do a literal fuckload of programming in a bunch of different languages.  I had it in my head for awhile that I'd try out the whole warband modding deal and see if I could maybe help out with crpg.  After downloading the module system, I can completely understand why it's a huge time investment to get someone trained to use it properly.  I just didn't have the time to put in to learn it, so I gave up trying on my own.  Now, if chadz/cmp/paul/anyone who knows the warband module system properly could put together a small example, explain what's going on, and post it in a thread to get people started, maybe they could drum up some interest.  Hell I might take another crack at it.  However, it would still involve a lot of training and patience from the devs even if some promising young starry-eyed programmer springs forth from the community.

Second, regarding the 'mod is dying do new things' part of the game, new, better gamemodes would probably help a lot (see: conquest), but strat battles are also a tremendous way to get people to play.  I think something that might be nice would be to set up a 'sponsored' strat battle once or twice a week (on NA and EU), where both armies are outfitted with a large amount of troops/gear and have the maximum allowable mercs per side. Commanding rights could be sold at auction the week before.  Granted, there are already high gear value, high troop count battles going on in strat, but having a guaranteed big experience battle might be nice.

Third, a full wipe really can't be the answer.  It'll just drive people away.  However, doing a wipe with some benefits from the experience/looms/gold/gens/titles/whatever you've got on your old character might be appropriate, but it would also need to come with some very drastic gameplay changes to get people on board.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: _Sebastian_ on March 01, 2013, 03:58:09 pm
Quote from: Xol! on March 01, 2013, 01:46:34 pm
After downloading the module system, I can completely understand why it's a huge time investment to get someone trained to use it properly.  I just didn't have the time to put in to learn it, so I gave up trying on my own.  Now, if chadz/cmp/paul/anyone who knows the warband module system properly could put together a small example, explain what's going on, and post it in a thread to get people started, maybe they could drum up some interest.  Hell I might take another crack at it.  However, it would still involve a lot of training and patience from the devs even if some promising young starry-eyed programmer springs forth from the community.

Getting started (http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php/topic,240255.0.html).
Here (http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php/board,12.0.html) you go.. a documentation about the module system.
You will also find many tutorials here (http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php/board,171.0.html).

I also was expierienced in many programming languages(C#, lsl, python, sql, html etc.) before I started with warband modding,
but it took me about a half year to become very good at the module system.

A guy with absolutly no knowledge about scripting maybe will need about a year or two to become a "master".
So it needs a lot of time and I dont think it will be helpfull to recruit new programers without any expierience.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Micah on March 01, 2013, 04:50:26 pm
Quote from: _Sebastian_ on March 01, 2013, 03:58:09 pm
So it needs a lot of time and I dont think it will be helpfull to recruit new programers without any expierience.
An uber programming skill is not always the main concern imho. Some programers might agree with me that its often not the problem to code something, but to find the right approach and have a ubiased,fresh view on a matter; the capability to fully adapt to the problem. Unfortunately, routine games tends to develop an indirect proportional relation between those two abilities. More knowledge does not always be as helpfull as one might believe, its more like the opposite case sometimes. I dont want to imply that its necessary to exchange coders on a project every then and when, but there might be times when taking a next step of an evolution is impossible in the current configuration. Then there is the question if an existing organism can adapt to an changing environment ... and how.

(click to show/hide)
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Butan on March 01, 2013, 05:41:20 pm
Quote from: _Sebastian_ on March 01, 2013, 03:58:09 pm
So it needs a lot of time and I dont think it will be helpfull to recruit new programers without any expierience.

Even if you look only for programers with experience, there is at least half a dozen ready in the cRPG community that I know of. Maybe more. Its a waste to not give them the chance to enhances the game they love  :(
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: kinngrimm on March 15, 2013, 02:29:40 pm
Quote from: chadz on February 27, 2013, 05:22:37 pm
...
We work on it whenever we have the time and will to do so.

Quote from: a_bear_irl on March 15, 2013, 07:46:11 am
...
[19:12:37] <okiN> then strat would be even more dead
[19:12:55] <cmp> more dead than dead?
[19:13:08] <okiN> it's not totally dead right now
[19:13:12] <okiN> just dying
[19:13:34] <okiN> clans are still going about their business etc
[19:13:48] <cmp> it's dead to me

What a bummer, not unexpected still  :cry:

EDIT:turned out it was i quote from may 2012, and it was out of context. CMP ment for him as player it would be dead. Sry for spreading false rumor.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Herkkutatti666 on March 15, 2013, 02:38:19 pm
Add tourney armor back please .
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: Viriathus on March 16, 2013, 05:08:10 pm
I dont get it, how long until the new game comes out? cause i dont mind waiting and just leaving crpg the way it is at the moment.

the mod is d e a d? sure, let it die, i dont care.
Title: Re: Dear chadz and the Item Team
Post by: GuiKa on April 03, 2013, 01:08:01 am
Quote from: chadz on February 28, 2013, 02:27:17 pm
To assume that you can just "assign" coders to a mod dev team and it works out is naive, sorry.

http://tfs.visualstudio.com/ (http://tfs.visualstudio.com/) That can help  :rolleyes:

You can restrict access to specifics files and add task to devs or groups of devs an these fellows will be able to check in a new version of the solution based on the tasks they did. Means you have security + versions history + versions change log + assignation of work really simply. And you can get it and deploy for free and in no time (easier to use it with VS but it's not necessary).

Quote from: chadz on February 28, 2013, 02:27:17 pm
For example - "Guika maybe if he is asked nicely" - do you really think it could work out if the dev team has to recruit someone by asking nicely? I have no doubt I could convince 20 good coders to join the team - but I know that none of them would show real dedication and motivation. Motivation has to come from the inside, it can't be done by asking nicely.

http://strategusenhancer.net (http://strategusenhancer.net) Well i already started to add new stuff anyway ^^