Some thoughts in light of recent race additions

[Jiyeon 369]

Are races even going through proper discussion and tweaking before being coded? Are they getting approval by the server engineers (thorgot and Coolness) before being added? I obviously don't know what's going on behind the scenes, but this is what it seems like as centran has added 3 of his own races in the last week and Coolness personally said he didn't think Gnat belonged. Again, like I said, I don't know if y'all talk among yourselves, but it just doesn't seem like it. Can we get all races to go through the proper steps and have coolness'/thorgot's approval, regardless of who is coding it (minus thorgot and coolness since they are essentially directing the server/balance)?

 

Additionally, can we reinstate the race beta testers system we had on wcs1 to test out recently coded/in-progress races on the public server before having them go live?

 

I just think having races be approved by the server engineers prior to release, and testing new races on the server and not just in the dev server could help us avoid some of the rage/qq that have happened this past week.

 

Not trying to hate on or flame you centran, love your enthusiasm and the work you're putting it, I just think it needs to go through the same process the other races go through to maintain a sort of equilibrium/theme/balance on the server.

 

Anyways, just some thoughts I've had.

[Wintergreen 1603]

Pls no name will have everything fun nerfed if he gets a voice and I will have nothing to whore

[Name 2616]

NERF IT ALL

[Wintergreen 1603]

NERF IT ALL

NUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU

[Knox 1470]

NERF GUN WARS

[centran 4457]

Races are tested on the dev server. Sometimes with someone else or against a bot. However 1v1 and especially against a bot does not always give good numbers. To complicate matters worse when you have a race such as gnat where the entire concept of race is different it is hard to tweak it on the dev server. How do you balance it when it's damage is 1? Not something that is easily tested but needs gameplay and others opininons. The gnat is not a matter of just tweaking the numbers since the concept behind it is such drastically different.

 

Deadly decoy was initially the same way and is still a little bit. The initial concept was scrapped after I played on it for awhile. Then it was re-thought. Problem was there where then bugs introduced that where not caught becuase I had already maxed out the race and tested it against the maxed out numbers. The bugs where with the lower levels. This of course left a bad taste in peoples mouth and after it was fixed and tweaked it was not given a chance any longer.

 

The musician is another unique concept however its concept allows for easily tweaking of numbers to balance. It was tested to be underpowered and is being tweaked upwards to be balanced.

 

So the problem is once again as has been explained before the actual concept of the races indroduced. Gnat and the inital Deadly Decoy where races not meant to be played in the traditional way. Therefore the traditional ways of balancing them did not apply.

[BeauutifulChaos 902]

I'd play Gnat. >.< I suck at CS anyway, so it would be fun to just fuck around with people rather than trying so damn hard to get kills. =P

[Ichalvl 1752]

Races are tested on the dev server. Sometimes with someone else or against a bot. However 1v1 and especially against a bot does not always give good numbers. To complicate matters worse when you have a race such as gnat where the entire concept of race is different it is hard to tweak it on the dev server. How do you balance it when it's damage is 1? Not something that is easily tested but needs gameplay and others opininons. The gnat is not a matter of just tweaking the numbers since the concept behind it is such drastically different.

 

Deadly decoy was initially the same way and is still a little bit. The initial concept was scrapped after I played on it for awhile. Then it was re-thought. Problem was there where then bugs introduced that where not caught becuase I had already maxed out the race and tested it against the maxed out numbers. The bugs where with the lower levels. This of course left a bad taste in peoples mouth and after it was fixed and tweaked it was not given a chance any longer.

 

The musician is another unique concept however its concept allows for easily tweaking of numbers to balance. It was tested to be underpowered and is being tweaked upwards to be balanced.

 

So the problem is once again as has been explained before the actual concept of the races indroduced. Gnat and the inital Deadly Decoy where races not meant to be played in the traditional way. Therefore the traditional ways of balancing them did not apply.

Many of the new races are not centered around facing one player but rather a group of them.

I think races should just be added to the server, but I think there should be a racefeedback command you can use to give comments on new additions. There should also be a way to disable a new race for the rest of the map, sort of an rtv.

[Swed 2651]

Maybe you should create a group of 10-15 people to host private test events on the dev server?

Plan to test 3 races once every 2 weeks etc.?

[TurtleFrenzy 2612]

Testing stuff on the dev server's is for making sure the race actually works. We play the races on the server for feedback on how to adjust. Making another testing phase would be redundant as it's already done by the server population.

[Destin 1958]

So I'm happy and all, and what not about the dev server and testing for feedback live, but this question "Are races even going through proper discussion and tweaking before being coded? Are they getting approval by the server engineers (thorgot and Coolness) before being added?" is still being unaswered. Like I really appreciate the work and effort in these new races Centran, but Coolness and Thorgot are the War3 pro's here Congress can't just pass bills without the President looking at them and having the right to VETO, there has to be some process to try and avoid all this QQ and rage. I mean the forums didn't even vote on the races hell musician isn't even in the in progress section.

 

 

 centran Technical Manager Senior Engineer | General Server Technician | Content Quality Control | Emergency Support

 

 MrCoolness Warcraft 3 Engineer Warcraft 3

 

 thorgot Warcraft/General Engineer System Development | Server Management | Warcraft 3

Edited January 30, 2014 by Destin

[BLiNDBoi 930]

So we need a real tester group?

[Rootbeer 1293]

Maybe you should create a group of 10-15 people to host private test events on the dev server?

Plan to test 3 races once every 2 weeks etc.?

 

This. As one of the first private race testers, I dislike our old system: it left the rest of the population feel like they were being excluded. Some race testers were even sticking to a private race because they were getting easy kills on it, with the excuse of "testing" its potential at the maximum level. It wasn't being done to the point of needing to report the persons, but it was being done nevertheless. I feel if we're going to start up private race testing again, we should isolate the testing done to our dev server with many different testers, not just the engies, so as not to ruin our server with a cluster of bugged/OP races. We get multiple feedback on races and can properly tune them to be balanced and bugfree.

[ElectronicDrug 7496]

I think I'll start coding races just so you guys will bitch

[HCMikey 248]

I think I'll start coding races just so you guys will bitch

 

Let's call your first race "Josh 2.0", an improvement on the previous josh race.

[Siesan 1802]

I think I'll start coding races just so you guys will bitch

thanks babe

[adminswithdownsyndrome 60]

NERF GUN WARS

no its NARF gun wars

[thorgot 2420]

We're going to formalize an unwritten rule, namely that races have to either A) be posted in Race Suggestions and commented on before they can be added to the server B) be a WCS1 race C) be kept as a surprise for an event.

 

Until this week, every race fell into one of these three categories.This new rule should give new races some time to be discussed and improved before they are coded.

[Wintergreen 1603]

Having players test races was fun in WCS1 :<

[Ika 320]

Having players test races was fun in WCS1 :<

 

fuckin ant lion whores

[Rootbeer 1293]

Having players test races was fun in WCS1 :<

 

Yeah it was fun. Fun for the few select race testers.

[Wintergreen 1603]

Payed good money for antlion.

[Vexium 35]

imo, we have 3 race coders currently. no race should be added unless at least 2 of the coders agree it should.

 

if there is an issue where only 1 supports it but thinks the race would be valuable, it should be taken to a forum community poll to see if the community wants it. then and only then, it can be revoted btwn the 3 engis, and still needs 2 votes to be added.

 

same applies if only 1 coder disagrees strongly. go to community vote, if strongly disliked, revote btwn engis; 2 no's needed to remove.

Edited February 3, 2014 by Vexium

[MrCoolness 547]

imo, we have 3 race coders currently. no race should be added unless at least 2 of the coders agree it should.

 

if there is an issue where only 1 supports it but thinks the race would be valuable, it should be taken to a forum community poll to see if the community wants it. then and only then, it can be revoted btwn the 3 engis, and still needs 2 votes to be added.

 

same applies if only 1 coder disagrees strongly. go to community vote, if strongly disliked, revote btwn engis; 2 no's needed to remove.

 

A bit too technical; I don't know how Thorgot or Centran feel about the server opinion but I know that any race that I make I see through that it works well, that it's generally liked and I have no issues with removing, nerfing or buffing a race that I've made that doesn't fit, or is too strong or too weak.

 

That being said, I will code a race from either wcs, the suggestions or a new idea and I will implement it and take it from there according to what the majority of the people want.