And another block bug...

Dr_Con

can you go live with this fix on PTS? what contractual obligation is preventing you from updating your own test server at your leisure?

Jaraal

Marto wrote: »

d.schaerb16_ESO2 wrote: »

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

expect it to be on or around December 19.

Dear Gina and ZOS
do you understand what you are doing? It cant be that gamebreaking bugs dont get fixed ASAP! raidgroups dissolve and players who came back leave immediately after a few raids. If your intention is to kill ESO, you are on the right path.

December 19 is the definition of "ASAP" As long as Stadia is supported, patches cannot possibly come faster than that.

It took the QA team and dev team at ZOS less than 24h to notice a bug, identify what causes it, and fix it. That's pretty fast and efficient. They did a good job!

Now imagine how frustrating it feels to be called lazy or incompetent despite doing your job perfectly, and on record time, just because third-party bureaucracy mandates your fixes be delayed for 2 weeks.

I know it's frustrating. I hate it too. It's a restriction that only exists to protect Google's bottom line, so they're not held liable for any patches that may cause instability on their hardware. I can't wait for Stadia to go away, so we no longer have to deal with these waiting times.

The bug existing is 100% ZOS fault. But the bug being unfixed for 2 weeks has little to nothing to do with how competent ZOS is.

They said they have the option to waive the Stadia certification process and hotfix serious issues.

ZOS has chosen to not hotfix this issue.

Make your own deductions.

Marto

Jaraal wrote: »

Marto wrote: »

d.schaerb16_ESO2 wrote: »

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

expect it to be on or around December 19.

Dear Gina and ZOS
do you understand what you are doing? It cant be that gamebreaking bugs dont get fixed ASAP! raidgroups dissolve and players who came back leave immediately after a few raids. If your intention is to kill ESO, you are on the right path.

December 19 is the definition of "ASAP" As long as Stadia is supported, patches cannot possibly come faster than that.

It took the QA team and dev team at ZOS less than 24h to notice a bug, identify what causes it, and fix it. That's pretty fast and efficient. They did a good job!

Now imagine how frustrating it feels to be called lazy or incompetent despite doing your job perfectly, and on record time, just because third-party bureaucracy mandates your fixes be delayed for 2 weeks.

I know it's frustrating. I hate it too. It's a restriction that only exists to protect Google's bottom line, so they're not held liable for any patches that may cause instability on their hardware. I can't wait for Stadia to go away, so we no longer have to deal with these waiting times.

The bug existing is 100% ZOS fault. But the bug being unfixed for 2 weeks has little to nothing to do with how competent ZOS is.

They said they have the option to waive the Stadia certification process and hotfix serious issues.

ZOS has chosen to not hotfix this issue.

Make your own deductions.

That depends on a lot of factors. The nature of the issue, the changes done by the patch, scheduling, fees, economic impact, brand impact, stability, etc.

ZOS may request to waive the Stadia certification process, but it doesn't mean it will get granted.

smackinhippies

I canceled my subscription with the U35 release; nothing with U36 and now this has given me any incentive to renew my subscription. At this point it's a free to play game for me so I guess I've lowered my expectations.

Razorruk

ZOS_Volpe wrote: »

Greetings all,

After review, we have removed and edited a handful of posts. While we understand that players and members can be upset about the currently known issues that are being investigated and fixed (the information on that can be found here), we do ask that all posts be kept civil, constructive, and within the guidelines of the rules that we have in place. If there may be any questions in regards to the rules, please feel free to review them here.

Thank you for your understanding.

Nah mate, nope. Fix your game.

UntilValhalla13

They finally found a way to kill off the remaining endgame players.

K9002

I'm very glad that I resisted temptation to buy High Isle at a discount price. I think I'd have buyer's remorse even if it were offered for a penny.

karthrag_inak

Khajiit had a thought. Perhaps Combat team can justify existence by making sure that fundamental combat "Just Works" all the time, instead, of, you know, reinventing how combat works from the ground up every 6 months.

Just a thought.

Carcamongus

I understand devs would love to get this fixed ASAP, but Stadia's bureaucracy stands in the way. However, it's pretty serious that this bug already existed on consoles and was allowed to "infect" PC as well, not to mention it apparently only got attention after affecting the latter.

@ZOS_GinaBruno, could you please clarify why the certification process can't be bypassed as a result of this bug's urgency? Furthermore, could you please consider my earlier suggestion that the devs be open with the players regarding the problems behind such a turbulent year? I understand players' anger can be intimidating, but it'd go a long way to patch things up if we knew the devs' side of the story.

acastanza_ESO

Marto wrote: »

ZOS may request to waive the Stadia certification process, but it doesn't mean it will get granted.

Stadia is literally offline forever in 6 weeks. I find it difficult to believe that anyone there wouldn't just be rubber-stamping requests at this point.

d.schaerb16_ESO2

Marto wrote: »

December 19 is the definition of "ASAP" As long as Stadia is supported, patches cannot possibly come faster than that.

I know, they say this is ASAP for them. But really ASAP is: drop the coffin where stadia is waiting for death. Fixed. no reason to carry a corpse where the flesh is rotting already.

NextTuesday

These game breaking bugs, the overall lack of communication with the player base, and the total lack of consideration for the effort the community puts into the game and the players have become ridiculous. The community undertakes a huge volume of unpaid labour to create and maintain interest in and commitment to playing group content. ZOS puts nothing into teaching people how to do trials or dungeons, or any of that. It's the community's work.

After Updates 35 and 36, and now this botched clean up effort, it's getting harder and harder to see any point to putting in the effort when the game is virtually unplayable. It's almost impossible to fill a trial roster in any format. The massive influx of new players has made pugging a nightmare. Well-established guilds are closing their doors. The trade economy is volatile with high tier gear and materials being in less and less demand as endgame players quit in droves. Raid leads are now having to train new players if they want to fill a roster. The game is an absolute shemozzle because ZOS won't invest adequate resources to maintaining it despite the frankly embarrassing amount of cash players spend in the crown store and on subscriptions.

The best we get from ZOS are vague non-apologies, useless and unappealing cosmetics, and more empty promises to do better from the same people who gave us "wah wah". Maybe the new players will make something of this game and figure out that the crown store is a cash cow with little real benefit (the black Friday bundle was bare-faced predation), but the long time players are tired of what has become a hostile relationship. There is no incentive for us to stick around and clean up ZOS' messes, let alone pay a subscription to do so.

People are going to justifiably start demanding refunds on things and the smartest choice ZOS can make is to grant them. I'd rather the game not die because I loved it at one point, but my guild pals and I are jumping ship because no game is worth this much frustration and literal wasted money.

manaholik

i'm at a loss for words but full of emotions, mostly sadness and hopelessness. so im going to rant a little
before i continue i need to state that i'm not trying to bash anyone with blame and i mean no offense but i just cannot believe the things that im seeing nowadays it just all seems unreal.

i am in 5 different social/raiding guilds with an around of 300-400 people each, now at peak play times there were only 10-15 people....(which are now only mainly doing their daily dungeons and writs and logging off within 30-60 minutes)
before these dark times there were at least thrice as many people on average, not on peak times, not events.

for the past week we were planning on doing vCR, cleared up our work and college/school schedules but had to cancel unexpectedly...
with the previous block bug, we somehow managed to do vDSR and vHoF, we can tough it up and endure almost anything, usually, but this just seems too much.

literally a day before this bug i farmed tons of transmutes, got my support skill line level to level 6 so i could use barrier, to make and use secondary healer sets and builds, just so i could be my best self. i was just so hyped up to do my last veteran trial i have yet to complete with my close friends (that still play).
aaaaaand.... that hope is gone for at least two weeks, if it ever comes back.


allegedly, i am not a conspiracy theorist but, personally, these continuous mistakes "happy little accidents" are starting to look like some kind of convoluted plan to drive away us, veteran players, who loved this game for years and still want to keep on loving it, introduce more new people to it, teach them and take care of the community but it is getting really really hard and keeps on getting harder.

Jaraal

Marto wrote: »

Jaraal wrote: »

Marto wrote: »

d.schaerb16_ESO2 wrote: »

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

expect it to be on or around December 19.

Dear Gina and ZOS
do you understand what you are doing? It cant be that gamebreaking bugs dont get fixed ASAP! raidgroups dissolve and players who came back leave immediately after a few raids. If your intention is to kill ESO, you are on the right path.

December 19 is the definition of "ASAP" As long as Stadia is supported, patches cannot possibly come faster than that.

It took the QA team and dev team at ZOS less than 24h to notice a bug, identify what causes it, and fix it. That's pretty fast and efficient. They did a good job!

Now imagine how frustrating it feels to be called lazy or incompetent despite doing your job perfectly, and on record time, just because third-party bureaucracy mandates your fixes be delayed for 2 weeks.

I know it's frustrating. I hate it too. It's a restriction that only exists to protect Google's bottom line, so they're not held liable for any patches that may cause instability on their hardware. I can't wait for Stadia to go away, so we no longer have to deal with these waiting times.

The bug existing is 100% ZOS fault. But the bug being unfixed for 2 weeks has little to nothing to do with how competent ZOS is.

They said they have the option to waive the Stadia certification process and hotfix serious issues.

ZOS has chosen to not hotfix this issue.

Make your own deductions.

ZOS may request to waive the Stadia certification process, but it doesn't mean it will get granted.

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

If an emergency arises, we’ll of course work with Stadia to get a patch published ASAP. So in general, PC incrementals will now occur bi-weekly, but if needed, we can update quickly.

Note this will not affect our ability to perform hotfixes, or affect any PTS patches or updates.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/530103/changes-to-pc-incremental-patch-cadence

Zastrix

Jaraal wrote: »

Marto wrote: »

Jaraal wrote: »

Marto wrote: »

d.schaerb16_ESO2 wrote: »

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

expect it to be on or around December 19.

Dear Gina and ZOS
do you understand what you are doing? It cant be that gamebreaking bugs dont get fixed ASAP! raidgroups dissolve and players who came back leave immediately after a few raids. If your intention is to kill ESO, you are on the right path.

December 19 is the definition of "ASAP" As long as Stadia is supported, patches cannot possibly come faster than that.

It took the QA team and dev team at ZOS less than 24h to notice a bug, identify what causes it, and fix it. That's pretty fast and efficient. They did a good job!

Now imagine how frustrating it feels to be called lazy or incompetent despite doing your job perfectly, and on record time, just because third-party bureaucracy mandates your fixes be delayed for 2 weeks.

I know it's frustrating. I hate it too. It's a restriction that only exists to protect Google's bottom line, so they're not held liable for any patches that may cause instability on their hardware. I can't wait for Stadia to go away, so we no longer have to deal with these waiting times.

The bug existing is 100% ZOS fault. But the bug being unfixed for 2 weeks has little to nothing to do with how competent ZOS is.

They said they have the option to waive the Stadia certification process and hotfix serious issues.

ZOS has chosen to not hotfix this issue.

Make your own deductions.

ZOS may request to waive the Stadia certification process, but it doesn't mean it will get granted.

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

If an emergency arises, we’ll of course work with Stadia to get a patch published ASAP. So in general, PC incrementals will now occur bi-weekly, but if needed, we can update quickly.

Note this will not affect our ability to perform hotfixes, or affect any PTS patches or updates.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/530103/changes-to-pc-incremental-patch-cadence

Oh don't worry, that's only for crown store. If it's anything which vet players enjoy they're not going to do it that fast.

H3rBie

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

It will also be present after the console incremental patch on Wednesday.

it is present since last patch, so nothing changes....

UntilValhalla13

I finally unsubscribed for the first time in like 5 years. I held out hope for too long. Time after time, chance after chance. I just... don't care anymore. Don't be sorry. Be better.

DragonRacer

H3rBie wrote: »

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

It will also be present after the console incremental patch on Wednesday.

it is present since last patch, so nothing changes....

What kills me is a) that not being realized and b) even if that wasn't the case, they are flat-out saying once again "sorry, even though we know this patch won't fix anything and will actually make your experience even worse, we're not gonna call Sony and Microsoft and say 'don't push this broken patch', we're just gonna force it on you anyway with no fix for at least 2 weeks".

Like, literally forcing additional breaks on console (if it hadn't already been broken) knowingly at this point. Know-ing-ly doing so.

phlupp89

Haven't read through the entire thread here, too tired.
Just wanted to reply to Gina's original message. I am so thankful for it. Truly.

A game breaking bug not being fixed for weeks (or is it months) is undoubtedly the confirmation that this game and its maintenance is in no way a priority for anyone working at it any longer.

It is the message I have both been waiting for and dreading for so long.

I don't want to believe any of this is happening. Just like I didn't want to believe all the doom sayers that proclaimed this game dead.

But at least now we know. Intentionally or not Gina's message confirms the end. It has set us free. I have no doubt my post here will be deleted quickly but I don't care. I just want to say thank you for putting an end to a game that I was quite obviously emotionally invested in way too much. A game that - even at its worst - has made my days better on a regular basis.

This is not me quitting. This is me saying I no longer care. Maybe it's the best I could hope for. All the best to all the other heartbroken ESO lovers out there.

SCP343

They bring weapon styles to crown stores of dlc dungeons but block is bugged so people cant farm their monster helmet motif some give up or dont even try it...
Tank randomly dies in trials to light attacks of bosses because their character looks like blocking but actually it doesnt
In pvp if you miss your block and stunned by unexpected attack you %75 of the time end up geting bursted anyways
Me and sure a lot of people dont want to do questing or other contents that game offers to players and without pve and pvp tbh i dont see any point of playing this game

SaintJohnHM

Another day without a fix, and another player on my raiding team left the game because of this bug and ZOS's response.

It seems unreal to me they would be willing to throw away so many players who have invested so much time and money and love into this game and community.

Rittings

I mean.... when the patch notes themselves read the fact they had to re-instate the heavy attack bug to fix the block bug - you know that there's something gone very very VERY wrong at ZOS.... when they are trading bugs for bugs openly and knowingly then it becomes almost laughable. I'm wondering if this is a sitcom version of the Truman Show we're living in? lol.

FluffyBird

.

Rittings wrote: »

I mean.... when the patch notes themselves read the fact they had to re-instate the heavy attack bug to fix the block bug - you know that there's something gone very very VERY wrong at ZOS.... when they are trading bugs for bugs openly and knowingly then it becomes almost laughable. I'm wondering if this is a sitcom version of the Truman Show we're living in? lol.

I work at QA (not ZOS QA, thankfully) and I think that a rollback itself is a valid way to get rid of a bug. And flops do happen, that's natural.
Problem with ZOS is how regular and abundant they are and how freely bugs make their way to live servers, often despite being pointed out during PTS.

TechMaybeHic

Well they don't miss their launch dates. If you are going to just launch at a set time, no matter what; then it doesn't really matter what your quality people nor players report. At most, they strip a part out, but clearly their threshold for what's passable is pretty far

Rittings

FluffyBird wrote: »

I work at QA (not ZOS QA, thankfully) and I think that a rollback itself is a valid way to get rid of a bug. And flops do happen, that's natural.
Problem with ZOS is how regular and abundant they are and how freely bugs make their way to live servers, often despite being pointed out during PTS.

I've said before that I think the PTS server really is more of a "Promo" server for streamers to showcase new content. And confirmed when, like you say, bugs just get ignored and rolled out to live server regardless of severity or reporting. It kind of makes the entire PTS worthless in my opinion...

I don't know how many times people are going to have to comment about less assets being pushed towards cosmetic departments and more towards the health of the game itself. I know Rich said that artists and designers don't code the mechanics, but then hire less artists and designers and spend those assets on coders. It's really simple stuff. No good have an elephant mount if no-one is around to ride it.

dkblight

I can honestly say my Oakensoul shield tank can do any normal dungeon with no block issues, will be running vet direfrost tonight (9pm-1am CST PC/NA) as a tank, hopefully some good healers will be running pugs.

Temporary build till I can safely block again
inner rage/Draw Essence/razor caltrops/Introspection (shield/resources)/unrelenting grip/barrier (shield)/Ice staff (shield)
Gear, 5pc brands of imperium (shield)/monster set Mother Ciannait (shield)/4 piece of adept rider as it's armor, armor, and health
With oakensoul I get both resolves and aegis, with the armor I get 32k resistance for when I can block.

Could replace Barrier with magma shell, but I want an ult that helps my team who can't block.

Could also try this as well, if you wanna keep 2 bars knowing block is iffy


I guess I'm a fool sticking to a game that the developers have given up on as it's not something new.

I played Archeage for about 5 server merges, before I said no more as I couldn't keep up with the P2W gear scores and constant PVP. Oh and APEX was a ridiculous price.

Will see about adapting a healer for either single bar or to have shields as well

Izanagi.Xiiib16_ESO

Jaraal wrote: »

Marto wrote: »

d.schaerb16_ESO2 wrote: »

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

expect it to be on or around December 19.

Dear Gina and ZOS
do you understand what you are doing? It cant be that gamebreaking bugs dont get fixed ASAP! raidgroups dissolve and players who came back leave immediately after a few raids. If your intention is to kill ESO, you are on the right path.

December 19 is the definition of "ASAP" As long as Stadia is supported, patches cannot possibly come faster than that.

It took the QA team and dev team at ZOS less than 24h to notice a bug, identify what causes it, and fix it. That's pretty fast and efficient. They did a good job!

Now imagine how frustrating it feels to be called lazy or incompetent despite doing your job perfectly, and on record time, just because third-party bureaucracy mandates your fixes be delayed for 2 weeks.

I know it's frustrating. I hate it too. It's a restriction that only exists to protect Google's bottom line, so they're not held liable for any patches that may cause instability on their hardware. I can't wait for Stadia to go away, so we no longer have to deal with these waiting times.

The bug existing is 100% ZOS fault. But the bug being unfixed for 2 weeks has little to nothing to do with how competent ZOS is.

They said they have the option to waive the Stadia certification process and hotfix serious issues.

ZOS has chosen to not hotfix this issue.

Make your own deductions.

This isn't how software development works.
Firstly there's nothing to say that the issue has actually be fixed yet, only that the projected patch date is 19th. It could be hard to resolve and take time.
Secondly fixing an issue is different to fixed and tested. QA can test a fix once the dev's hand over individually however there is generally still a large amount of system testing involved in producing a patch. I assume there is at the least some sort of smoke/sanity test as well as some acceptance criteria for going ahead with a patch release (for example someone can perform basic game functions successfully and core / risky areas are working as expected). In addition to this as this issue has regressed twice already I imagine they will wish to do more in depth testing so that ZOS doesn't suffer further brand reputation damage if yet another issue in the same area was found.

On top of this there is a certificate process not just for Stadia (which is kind of irrelevant now) but mainly for Xbox and PS.

DMuehlhausen

FantasticFreddie wrote: »

ZOS_GinaBruno wrote: »

Hi everyone,

While we can confirm we have fixed the original issue with block, we identified the cause of this new blocking issue that went live with yesterday’s incremental patch. This issue most commonly occurs when attempting to swap weapons while weapons are being drawn or sheathed, preventing you from blocking again until zoning or relogging.

We are working on a fix now and want to take some time to thoroughly test over the next couple days to ensure things are stable; unfortunately, the fix for this issue does require another new client build and is not something we are able to hotfix. It will also be present after the console incremental patch on Wednesday.

We understand how frustrating this is for everyone, including us. We’ll let you know as soon as possible when to expect the fix but expect it to be on or around December 19.

What on earth?!

HOW can anyone justify letting this be broken for another 2 weeks? Does anyone, literally ANYONE that works for the company understand how absolutely frustrating this is to play with?

In your basic trials, it's just a frustrating time sink. In pvp, or anything upper level, it's killing people and also their motivation to play!

What is wrong with this company? Make an exception and push a fix through, you know, like you said you would back when you originally brought stadia on board.

You don't understand how software development works. They literally have legal contracts with Sony, Microsoft, and Google that they can't just push out updates without those companies approval. So blame them not ZoS. Now I'm sure it will get a little better/faster once Stadia is shutdown as I that was the major bottleneck but Sony and Microsoft could still block updates if it could cause issues on their consoles. This affects PCs then as well.

cyclonus11

So no dungeons, trials, or PVP for at least another 2 weeks.

alsonotan0rc

Saw this coming. Hope for an actual fix next year, folks, and hope there are still some people interested in raiding by that point.

I would very much like an explanation of what's taking so long to fix and why there was a change to block in the first place. It would make it feel less like we're being led around by the nose until we get bored and spend crowns.