Garrisons - Inn and Tavern, Dev Interview, Launcher Upgrade, Blue Tweets, Fan Art

[DarthMonk79]

I'm just hoping it means this expansion goes well, all patches are good and seamless, and hopefully when we've hit the last patch there isn't a 15month wait. Though I am hoping that the last big patch last maybe 6months or more. Would hate for it to come and and not be caught up and be unable to really experience it as next expansion comes out.

[beanman12345]

Actually it would, having to train or retrain people takes time, throwing more people into development does not always equate to speeding things up especially if they have no idea how things are done or work..

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Are you in software development? If so then you would know that adding in more people especially if they are new to the company does take time they have to be trained in how things work and what they have to do..

weren't these people switched from titan? So it's not like these people are just new hires starting from scratch in the company, though i can see how working on a new engine might take some adjustment to.

[Deleted]

Yay!

Spend even more resources on Garrisons please! It won't affect what I do in the world, I can even leave garrisons alone after the opening quests, I can't choose where MY garrison will be, nor can I customise them in any way at all, and next expansion they will be completely irrelevant unless they spend even more resources on 'upgrading' the Garrison system.

Please Blizzard, spend more time and money on this alleged feature.

Pet Battles 2.0, so needed.

[Deleted]

Yay!

Spend even more resources on Garrisons please! It won't affect what I do in the world, I can even leave garrisons alone after the opening quests, I can't choose where MY garrison will be, nor can I customise them in any way at all, and next expansion they will be completely irrelevant unless they spend even more resources on 'upgrading' the Garrison system.

Please Blizzard, spend more time and money on this alleged feature.

Pet Battles 2.0, so needed.

How many raid tiers do you suppose it cost us?

[Eled.]

How many raid tiers do you suppose it cost us?

At least two or three, that's rather obvious.

[Deleted]

I like the idea of choosing between Outland and Northrend, and even suggested it some time ago. It could be later expanded into choosing between Cata and MoP for 80-90.

On the other hand, who in their right mind would pick Outland over Northrend?

[Deleted]

I like the idea of choosing between Outland and Northrend, and even suggested it some time ago. It could be later expanded into choosing between Cata and MoP for 80-90.

On the other hand, who in their right mind would pick Outland over Northrend?

Who would pick cata over MoP?

[randprin]

Actually it would, having to train or retrain people takes time, throwing more people into development does not always equate to speeding things up especially if they have no idea how things are done or work..

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Are you in software development? If so then you would know that adding in more people especially if they are new to the company does take time they have to be trained in how things work and what they have to do..

actually, as someone who's been in the code development business for more then 15 years, those statements are only true if you're talking about adding, new, fresh out of college developers, any average programmer with more then 10 years in the field will take about 1-3 weeks to become productive. (heck i know of quite a few instances where a developer of this experience was fixing problems on his first day of work).

the two problems with hiring this type of people are that
a. they cost a lot more then your fresh from college worker. (and if they're good at what they do, you'll usually have to lure them off from their position, such people are seldom unemployed)
b. you need someone qualified (read, not your average HR person) to evaluate and hire them (most very experienced developers will react poorly to some HR type reading from a list of pre-prepared questions they went past 5 years ago)

and just to clarify, unless blizzard are coding in a super unique never heard of before variation of computer code. it should be obvious to a veteran programmer what a code segment does, the potential pitfalls, and if he's better then average he'll even be able to overcome lack of design documentation or code comments.

[Laylriana]

That fanart login screen actually is a little frightening. I hope no hacker ever figures out a way to have it come up when we are logging into WoW. It would totally fool me.

[papajohn4]

They should make it so you can skip pandaland while leveling.

PLEASE!

^^ sign!!!

[Laylriana]

weren't these people switched from titan? So it's not like these people are just new hires starting from scratch in the company, though i can see how working on a new engine might take some adjustment to.

The Titan people were switched over in MoP. I'd say these are new hires, but if you check Blizzard's job opportunities most require at least 3 years experience.

[Yig]

After the new character model revamp is done, adding physics and improving the look and feel of combat are options.


Holy fucking crappola,... awesome! After all these years, dynamic shadows AND physics?
But most of all, the look and feel of combat has me excited. I love this game and would love new reasons to play it, and this has always been an area I've felt could do it without making the game
a new game.

Wildstar has optional elements, I could see Blizzard doing it too. Frankly if Tera had WOW's characters and World and zone flow and lore and gameplay but with Tera's basic combat system, it would be my perfect game. I don't expect that to happen here, but anything approaching Blizzard making the combat more visceral and solid and more impactful will be great. Diablo 3 and Heroes of the Storm has combat that feels amazing, like slamming into stone and metal, ripping through flesh with tides of viscera pouring and splattering, shooting across the ground with your blade dragging through your targets like a bolt of lightning.

Yummy.

[Deleted]

SNIP

True. But of course not every new employee is coder. You have artists, animators, designers and so on. And if you hire, let's say 20, new artists and tell them to start working on few sets or zones and they have never been working on WoW before you can just imagine what kind of mess they'll make. And since Blizzard uses in-house engine it can take a while to teach all the nuances to new people.

[Gilian]

Some sensible people in this thread.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooks%27s_law



And yeah, training does take time and does delay absolutely insanely huge projects like wow.

Let's remember this for later patches in WoD and the next expansion. Those should be finished quite fast when 30% of their team is trained.

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True. But of course not every new employee is coder. You have artists, animators, designers and so on. And if you hire, let's say 20, new artists and tell them to start working on few sets or zones and they have never been working on WoW before you can just imagine what kind of mess they'll make. And since Blizzard uses in-house engine it can take a while to teach all the nuances to new people.

I'm sure what he said also applies to other jobs to some extent.

[Deleted]

I don't like the idea of them thinking about merging outland or northrend as one level 60-80 experience, that would unbalance the game I think. And what exactly do they mean by combat physics? Ragdoll effects on players and mobs would look a bit weird for WoW...
Also, people are still using the old game launchers lol?

[Deleted]

Blizzard, please make an c-RPG!
Any RPG! Even WoW RPG and I will buy it!!

[Redwyrm]

Unfortunately Blizzard either knew that adding additional team members on WoD would make it take longer in development or figured it out when things started slowing down, and did nothing to change.

If everyone knows that adding more people to a project slows it down, then what is Blizzard's excuse? If thirty people in a boat makes it slow down when you are in a race, you drop off the dead weight on the side of the lake and tell those people you'll come back for them once the race is finished.

[Deleted]

Unfortunately Blizzard either knew that adding additional team members on WoD would make it take longer in development or figured it out when things started slowing down, and did nothing to change.

If everyone knows that adding more people to a project slows it down, then what is Blizzard's excuse? If thirty people in a boat makes it slow down when you are in a race, you drop off the dead weight on the side of the lake and tell those people you'll come back for them once the race is finished.

Short-term loss, long-term win.

[Stormykitten]

I think the change to Northrend and Outland would be a big waste of time, to be honest. I mean, you pass Outland in a few hours currently, and Northrend isn't much slower. This can't be too troublesome for anybody that's honest to themselves. :P I think it's even rather enjoyable since the increased xp gains make you able to more freely choose what zones to do. Either stay and do 2-3 zones, or do a few questlines in each.

[Eled.]

those statements are only true if you're talking about adding, new, fresh out of college developers, any average programmer with more then 10 years in the field will take about 1-3 weeks to become productive. (heck i know of quite a few instances where a developer of this experience was fixing problems on his first day of work).
[...]
and just to clarify, unless blizzard are coding in a super unique never heard of before variation of computer code. it should be obvious to a veteran programmer what a code segment does, the potential pitfalls, and if he's better then average he'll even be able to overcome lack of design documentation or code comments.

That doesn't hold up for very large projects running for 15 years with entire cohorts of people working on it.
Experience will obviously lessen the requirements, not remove them. Depending on the complexity of the project's codebase it will still be a relatively difficult maneuver, especially so with as high a proportion as 50%, like stated.

There is a big difference between a new developer that is able to help right away, and one that is completely involved into the development. You can take any random developer and make it produce useable code given clear-cut and well chosen boundaries ; if he/she has to delve more deeply and participate actively in the design, or develop more critical components, it takes time. I'm pretty certain that WoW's codebase is not the typical copy/paste e-commerce platform with a somewhat standard implementation of whatever frameworks you're used to.