Maintenance Timeframes?

Drexilla

Why is it that Zenimax Online Studios cannot provide players with timeframes in which they estimate maintenance to complete.

There are a large number of players who are oceanic and therefore our main playtime is during maintenance.

I dont think its too much to ask for staff members rolling out this maintenance to communicate with everyone as to when the maintenance is expected to compete.

I know for a fact there are players who would jump straight back on if they knew maintenance was 20mins.

The other MMO competitors do it like WOW, RIFT used too and GW2 did when i played.

Thoughts? Reasons why it cant be done?

Drexilla

This was types on my mobile phone. Apologies in advance for the spelling mistakes

Volkodav

I've never,not since the first,have had maintenance been 20 minutes.Never happens.Also,they do tell you,with big yellow letters.Plus.for the NA server,it's usually done on Mondays. You just have to check when it happens for your server,and remember it. Frankly,I find that maintenance is shorter on the EU server than it is for the NA server.(several hours for the NA server)

Drexilla

I play xbox north america and i recall it happening once or twice where "maintenance" was very much a server restart because the game was ready to play in about 20mins. I wasnt timing it of course. But it wasnt long.

Drexilla

Volkodav wrote: »

I've never,not since the first,have had maintenance been 20 minutes.Never happens.Also,they do tell you,with big yellow letters.Plus.for the NA server,it's usually done on Mondays. You just have to check when it happens for your server,and remember it. Frankly,I find that maintenance is shorter on the EU server than it is for the NA server.(several hours for the NA server)

Perfect example is today's maintenance. I posted this shortly after maintenance for Xbox - NA began. It is now online.

Paulington

Think about it from ZOS's perspective, they have two choices:

1) Not say how long maintenance will last. People will wait, maybe make a few posts but generally be patient as it is a required thing.

2) Say how maintenance will last, either it lasts the right amount of time and the result is no different from (1) or it lasts longer than expected and the entire forum loses their minds and the rage threads begin because maintenance lasted one minute longer than expected.

Ultimately there may be issues during the maintenance process that result in the time taken being longer than expected, so ZOS stick to the very valid method of only giving ETAs when they know something for sure, maintenance isn't one of those times.

Drexilla

Paulington wrote: »

Think about it from ZOS's perspective, they have two choices:

1) Not say how long maintenance will last. People will wait, maybe make a few posts but generally be patient as it is a required thing.

2) Say how maintenance will last, either it lasts the right amount of time and the result is no different from (1) or it lasts longer than expected and the entire forum loses their minds and the rage threads begin because maintenance lasted one minute longer than expected.

Ultimately there may be issues during the maintenance process that result in the time taken being longer than expected, so ZOS stick to the very valid method of only giving ETAs when they know something for sure, maintenance isn't one of those times.

Well said. Agree with you 100% that there would be people complaining about why its taking longer than normal. But why cant the timeframe be estimated? It doesnt have to be right all the time when its a rough ETA.

If anything i think its poor communication and management by ZOS to keep their community uninformed. Todays scenario is a perfect example. There are players who wont log in until tomorrow because they didnt know XBOX-NA had 20min maintenance

Lifeshield

It states right up at the top of the forum in the big yellow box that maintenance is completed?

Drexilla

Lifeshield wrote: »

It states right up at the top of the forum in the big yellow box that maintenance is completed?

Its great that they let you know once it has been completed. But it still doesnt help with setting an expectation from the start as to when the server will be up again.

Surely I cant be the only one bothered by this? Lol.

MrDerrikk

Drexilla wrote: »

Lifeshield wrote: »

It states right up at the top of the forum in the big yellow box that maintenance is completed?

Its great that they let you know once it has been completed. But it still doesnt help with setting an expectation from the start as to when the server will be up again.

Surely I cant be the only one bothered by this? Lol.

It's because of what Paulington said; people will assume that the estimation is truth and go crazy at ZOS when they get it wrong. Just remember the rage when the EU server had the change of maintenance time a while back - that's what it'll be like every single time that they take even slightly too long.