Ghostcrawler Interview, Timeless Isle Armor, 5.4 Notes Update, Blue Posts, TCG Art

Originally Posted by lazzy

You're by far the most ignorant person I've ever seen on the forums.

The company put it right in front of you and said WE NEED TO DO THIS. It doesn't matter whether it's true or not i'm sure it is. That's besides the point. That's just one of the reasons they want to squish.

You would rather argue over it when they said it has to be done.

I don't know what else to call you. You seem pretty damn goofy to be quite honest.

Sorry but I don't believe in lies. I know it's a lie because I do know how it works. They can say whatever they want. They can give any other excuse but saying "because decreases performance" is a lie.

I don't believe blindly what I'm told. But believing what they say just because they say is ignorance.

Originally Posted by corebit

A current heroicly geared character can literally one-shot a fresh 90.

Then they should decrease the increase which would be fine to me.

Originally Posted by corebit

Then we also start to see silly things like DKs soloing Sha of Fear, a raid boss of the CURRENT expansion.

He used a bug.

Originally Posted by corebit

People saying that item/level/number squish is not necessary because "it's just numbers" are really clueless. It affects the game a lot more than just the numbers aspect.

A few examples:
A current heroicly geared character can literally one-shot a fresh 90.
Then we also start to see silly things like DKs soloing Sha of Fear, a raid boss of the CURRENT expansion.

If the game keeps scaling exponentially this way, eventually characters will be one-shotting each others for as little as a 20-ilvl difference between them. A squish must happen to bring some sanity and balance back into the game.

Not sure how correct I am but I was under the impression that damage was going to stay the same? so really the squish is just about numbers

Originally Posted by Thyranne

Then they should decrease the increase which would be fine to me.

Which is the purpose of the item squish, but on a global scale.

Originally Posted by Thyranne

He used a bug.

Even if the DK used a bug, he couldn't have done it without the ridiculous itemlevel jump in gear. So this is still proving my point.

Originally Posted by corebit

Which is the purpose of the item squish, but on a global scale.

I remember reading a twit from GC saying that he liked the big Ilvl jumps (it was a question about fire mages if my memory isn't failing me).

Originally Posted by corebit

Even if the DK used a bug, he couldn't have done it without the ridiculous itemlevel jump in gear. So this is still proving my point.

He also stated it's irrelevant content.

Originally Posted by Thyranne

Because when you allocate a space in the memory you have a data type. You can't put a 3.7 in an integer unless you cast which makes you lose performance.

If you've played wow you might've noticed that damage, healing and health numbers in wow never use decimals. Because they are integers.

Originally Posted by Thyranne

It uses float.

That's how you can handle spells like this.

There's nothing about "1838 + 161% of spell power" that requires a float. Floats are used in programming for really big numbers in situations where you are fine with losing decimal accuracy - simply put, they are stored as a base and an exponent, which means the bigger a number gets, the less accuracy you get in the least significant digits. The largest storeable single precision float is astronomically huge (something in the vicinity of 3.4 * 10^38) and has no relevance to this game.

Originally Posted by Joán

If you've played wow you might've noticed that damage, healing and health numbers in wow never use decimals. Because they are integers.

Ever heard of casting?

Originally Posted by Joán

There's nothing about "1838 + 161% of spell power" that requires a float. Floats are used in programming for really big numbers in situations where you are fine with losing decimal accuracy - simply put, they are stored as a base and an exponent, which means the bigger a number gets, the less accuracy you get in the least significant digits. The largest storeable single precision float is astronomically huge (something in the vicinity of 3.4 * 10^38) and has no relevance to this game.

How do you put 161% of 10 in an integer? Cast it, which costs performance.

item squish is a waste of time really. big numbers are what makes more gear fun :/

I really wish they could properly explain how a squish will help performance.
Because most people with some basic knowledge about how computers calculate things knows that as long as you're within an integers boundaries, there is no (noticeable) difference in computing time.

Sadly, it's a lot easier to fall into the "logic" that "bigger numbers must mean longer calculation!"

I don't really care how high numbers are, what I do care about is soloing older content and I'd be delighted to know how they plan on keeping the balance, although 1-60 needs way less squishing than higher levels.
You can't divide all numbers by 10, even though that's somehow a favorite argument in this debate. Okay, so my level 35 warrior will have 300 hp and my 90 paladin 70,000? Gee, that accomplished a lot.

Originally Posted by Shudder

It's fun watching them kill their own game. Yes please, waste resources on an item squish and cash shop.

I don't see how recalculating numbers take anything away from the art asset teams.

It is a very well known fact supported by the client, empirical observations and numerous blue posts that health and damage values in wow are integers. There are no floats in these calculations beyond implicit conversions used to get a rounded integer out of a division (not that that is in any way relevant to the current matter). They "need" to do the item squish because they can support bigger numbers only by going for solutions that involve more memory being consumed by EVERY NUMBER in wow, and/or making all users still playing on 32-bit computers or operating systems very unhappy. It's simply the most practical solution.

How do you put 161% of 10? Cast it, which costs performance.

I get the distinct impression that you don't even know what these words really mean or how they are used in the real world. Sorry, but as an actual programmer I can only shake my head at this and move on from this thread.

PERSONAL OPINION: On the matter as a whole, I do think the number squish will be annoying and aggravating to me. I would much prefer they keep scaling numbers the way they have now (there's no difference in readability between 1k, 1m and 1b damage or health). As they said, they implemented it internally already but it "felt wrong". I can accept that it's a passable solution to a very real problem they are facing but that doesn't make me happier about it.

Item Squish will cause more sub loss than gain. Too many players play for larger numbers, even if the numbers are relatively the same strength in the world, they are still smaller and feel incorrect after playing so long with bigger numbers. Blizzard tested this on an internal build and said they won't do it because they felt it didn't feel right. Now they are saying they will. What the heck? If they felt it didn't feel right, why give into the public that hasn't tested it and thinks it would?

It's not hard to do an number condense, making things easier to read but keeping the numbers the same. Reducing "player stats" is not the way to do it, people will feel weaker, relative or not. They simply need to start showing 1,430 as 1.43k, 1,320,000 as 1.32m, 1,758,495,596 as 1.75b, etc in damage/heals on the screen, skills, gear, etc. Just change how number are presented to the player, not the actual numbers themselves. There is no need to an item crush. This format will always make any number easily readable and will take much less development time. It will also not piss off the people that play FOR bigger numbers, many people treat the game like Diablo. Do they realize how pissed Diablo players would be if the numbers were reduced across the board?

With 4 difficulties, and now a complete number change, they really are going out of their way to kill any immersion this game had.

Originally Posted by Nerraw

I don't see how recalculating numbers take anything away from the art asset teams.

So an art team is all that is required to not slow the game down? Typically in game development, the art team finishes their job way before any other team... Item squish would be a huge task to do correctly and not effect soloability. It would not be a simple recalculation, it would be a very long step by step process.

Originally Posted by Joán

It is a very well known fact supported by the client, empirical observations and numerous blue posts that health and damage values in wow are integers. There are no floats in these calculations beyond implicit conversions used to get a rounded integer out of a division (not that that is in any way relevant to the current matter). They "need" to do the item squish because they can support bigger numbers only by going for solutions that involve more memory being consumed by EVERY NUMBER in wow, and/or making all users still playing on 32-bit computers or operating systems very unhappy. It's simply the most practical solution.



I get the distinct impression that you don't even know what these words really mean or how they are used in the real world. Sorry, but as an actual programmer I can only shake my head at this and move on from this thread.

PERSONAL OPINION: On the matter as a whole, I do think the number squish will be annoying and aggravating to me. I would much prefer they keep scaling numbers the way they have now (there's no difference in readability between 1k, 1m and 1b damage or health). As they said, they implemented it internally already but it "felt wrong". I can accept that it's a passable solution to a very real problem they are facing but that doesn't make me happier about it.

I'm a programmer too. Just because you don't see a FIST instruction in your high level language when you are casting from float to int it doesn't mean you are not converting a float at the stack 8087.

If you don't think people are going to log in after the squish, see how weak they are and log out never to return you're naive. Blizzard is very much aware of this and it's why they've been scared to do it. Hell look how many people quit and freaked out over the new talent system. Blizzard has said themselves the biggest reason people are putting in the "Why are you quitting?" field is "too many changes". Something huge like an item squish would drive so many out, only to appease like 5 people in this thread who think the numbers are, "silly".

Originally Posted by MasterHamster

I really wish they could properly explain how a squish will help performance.
Because most people with some basic knowledge about how computers calculate things knows that as long as you're within an integers boundaries, there is no (noticeable) difference in computing time.

Sadly, it's a lot easier to fall into the "logic" that "bigger numbers must mean longer calculation!"

I don't really care how high numbers are, what I do care about is soloing older content and I'd be delighted to know how they plan on keeping the balance, although 1-60 needs way less squishing than higher levels.
You can't divide all numbers by 10, even though that's somehow a favorite argument in this debate. Okay, so my level 35 warrior will have 300 hp and my 90 paladin 70,000? Gee, that accomplished a lot.

The interview never mentioned anything about performance, maybe you are replying to another poster?

Bigger numbers does not mean longer calculation to the CPU, you are correct. Current CPUs large pipelines and architecture can crunch large numbers in little no problem.

Someone mentioned float. Calculating floats however ARE slower than integers that's a fact, even though modern CPUs (GPUs particularly since floats appear most prominently in graphics) have made calculating floats much faster.

And although you like to solo older content, that's not and never was part of Blizzard's design, nor they have come out and promised anything of the sort "We support people soloing older content". It was a simply a side effect due to all the exponential scaling and Blizzard never coming around to fix that.

Originally Posted by corebit

And although you like to solo older content, that's not and never was part of Blizzard's design, nor they have come out and promised anything of the sort "We support people soloing older content". It was a simply a side effect due to all the exponential scaling and Blizzard never coming around to fix that.

If it wasn't supported then why did they remove the group requirement to get inside raid zones? Why did they add pets to old raids? Why did they made it easier to solo bosses like the first guy in BWL and C'Thun?

Changing old boss mechanics to help people soloing them and putting in pets and transmog to me = supporting soloing old content.

The Lesser Charms that may be added to the Asian store are there as a convenience item for players that may not have time to do their daily quests that week or players who just want to save time. There are no plans to add items to the store that will increase player stats.

We won't sell items on the store, just tokens that let you loot items. Huge difference. WHAT?!?

another buff for mages and a fuck u for hunters:/

numbers inflation makes everything that more messed up and harder to manage both for them and the players the higher you go. An Item squish is really needed at this point.

And its not really that intensive. Programmers will have an easier and quicker time dealing with the smaller numbers in terms of output and feedback from their calculations and so shall we.

Also given the large differences in the asian market and the very different subscription method they have, the tokens being purchasable could help them a lot. Even if its only for a chance bonus roll.

Originally Posted by Shudder

Changing old boss mechanics to help people soloing them and putting in pets and transmog to me = supporting soloing old content.

If Blizzard truely supported soloing old dungeons as a feature, they would have balanced the classes accordingly instead of only a few select classes/specs able to solo almost all content and other classes having almost no chance unless they outlevel it severely. Most transmog runs to 80/85 content are still done in groups.

Removing the group requirement and putting pets into the super old raids would just be a temporary measure, because a thing like item squish is a massive undertaking. This kind of token effort really doesn't sound like support to me.

Also, I read the Chinese interview. Unless the interviewer mistranslated GC's words, the certainty was very strong: "...we WILL do the item squish.." (...我们会压缩...)