Is Housing stealing the time and resources of Developers which should be focused on other areas?

austinwalter87ub17_ESO · January 2017

After reading the 2.7.1 changes. I feel as if Housing is consuming the developers time, and resources. Housing is one of those things which is a long and lengthy process. A gold and money sink. Housing isn't going to keep population from bleeding. "Balance" and gameplay is. Anyone else feel like the balance should be its own entire patch without distractions?

Mojmir · January 2017

Amongst other things,it's amazing how quick they release something when they want too. Too bad whats needed is not on that list.

Banana · January 2017

YES. But loud people asked for it.

redspecter23 · January 2017

I'm extremely happy with all the time they've spent on housing considering what we've gotten for balance on the PTS so far. Actually, if they don't spend any more time on balance ever again, I'll probably be ok with that. There are a lot of negative feelings floating around my guilds lately. Thanks ZOS.

If I ever hear about another update full of "balance" I think I might just cry.

austinwalter87ub17_ESO · January 2017

redspecter23 wrote: »

I'm extremely happy with all the time they've spent on housing considering what we've gotten for balance on the PTS so far. Actually, if they don't spend any more time on balance ever again, I'll probably be ok with that. There are a lot of negative feelings floating around my guilds lately. Thanks ZOS.

If I ever hear about another update full of "balance" I think I might just cry.

I don't mind housing in the slightest. But from a project management perspective, I feel as if its bad management to promise people a balance patch for months and months. Then the day comes, and its absolutely horrid. But housing is a huge success! They going to keep pushing the balance under the rug?

Revenant_Spartan · January 2017

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

But from a project management perspective, I feel as if its bad management to promise people a balance patch for months and months.

So.... you are the kind of project manager that would get the office/toilet cleaner and the secretary to help with those engineering issues because your highly skilled and specifically trained employees need all the help they can get?

Or do you believe everyone at ZOS can do every job? Well, they don't. The people responsible for housing have likely nothing to do with the data/metrics and balancing department.

Sometimes throwing bodies/money at the problem doesn't solve things. Especially when you are talking about a game that is inherently not designed to be balanced. You have a *** ton of tools at your disposal to do all kind of different jobs in this game. It's your own fault if you use the wrong tool for the job. A set of pliers can't unscrew a screw as well as a screwdriver.

Trying to bring skills from different classes that work differently and ties with different passives, that are effected by different stats, that are influenced by different gear and race passives, in line with one another, is not simply "click a button make it better hurr durr".

The type of data/metrics plus hundreds of thousands of combinations and personal anecdotal "data" from players makes the balancing an issue.

Maybe something to keep in mind

austinwalter87ub17_ESO · January 2017

Revenant_Spartan wrote: »

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

But from a project management perspective, I feel as if its bad management to promise people a balance patch for months and months.

So.... you are the kind of project manager that would get the office/toilet cleaner and the secretary to help with those engineering issues because your highly skilled and specifically trained employees need all the help they can get?

Or do you believe everyone at ZOS can do every job? Well, they don't. The people responsible for housing have likely nothing to do with the data/metrics and balancing department.

Sometimes throwing bodies/money at the problem doesn't solve things. Especially when you are talking about a game that is inherently not designed to be balanced. You have a *** ton of tools at your disposal to do all kind of different jobs in this game. It's your own fault if you use the wrong tool for the job. A set of pliers can't unscrew a screw as well as a screwdriver.

Trying to bring skills from different classes that work differently and ties with different passives, that are effected by different stats, that are influenced by different gear and race passives, in line with one another, is not simply "click a button make it better hurr durr".

The type of data/metrics plus hundreds of thousands of combinations and personal anecdotal "data" from players makes the balancing an issue.

Maybe something to keep in mind

I think you missed the part about resources. How many people are working in the balance team? 1 Guy? 2? How many are working on Housing? Housing is mostly artists and programmers working simultaneously together. I imagine that is dozens of employee's.

But, I am someone that use to work on a private server as a developer. I'm aware of the hurdles they face. I question how they manage their resources towards certain area's.

Revenant_Spartan · January 2017

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

I think you missed the part about resources. How many people are working in the balance team? 1 Guy? 2? How many are working on Housing? Housing is mostly artists and programmers working simultaneously together. I imagine that is dozens of employee's.

But, I am someone that use to work on a private server as a developer. I'm aware of the hurdles they face. I question how they manage their resources towards certain area's.

Extremely biased view. They could have 30 guys working in balance for all you know. And again, there is far more art assets and bugs/new game systems and software engineering to do than data analysis. Running a -real- company is slightly different than running a "private server". Would you rather they fire artist and programmers to get in more data handlers? Because again, the programmers do programming and bug fixing - they are not likely involved in the data analysis any more than getting a post-it saying to change number or a memo during the meetings.

But yeah, okay. Maybe ZOS should employ you with all your skill

austinwalter87ub17_ESO · January 2017

Revenant_Spartan wrote: »

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

I think you missed the part about resources. How many people are working in the balance team? 1 Guy? 2? How many are working on Housing? Housing is mostly artists and programmers working simultaneously together. I imagine that is dozens of employee's.

But, I am someone that use to work on a private server as a developer. I'm aware of the hurdles they face. I question how they manage their resources towards certain area's.

Extremely biased view. They could have 30 guys working in balance for all you know. And again, there is far more art assets and bugs/new game systems and software engineering to do than data analysis. Running a -real- company is slightly different than running a "private server". Would you rather they fire artist and programmers to get in more data handlers? Because again, the programmers do programming and bug fixing - they are not likely involved in the data analysis any more than getting a post-it saying to change number or a memo during the meetings.

But yeah, okay. Maybe ZOS should employ you with all your skill

They don't have 30 guys working on balance. Fact.

I'm aware of how massive the art assets are for this game. This game flaunts its graphics, and design. But, this isn't a movie or some art piece on display. It's a game, where you interact with people and code for entertainment purposes. Art doesn't keep players. Great interactive gameplay and incentives do.

I don't login everyday to look at how purdy it is.

And yes, I would divert some resources to programming, bug fixes, new game systems, software, content, and of course balance.

As someone that played EQ, DAoC, and many more. Graphics was never what kept a game thriving.

Auricle · January 2017

I don't care about housing much, but it's a huge exciting update for a lot of people and I'm not so selfish to claim that ZoS' time is being 'stolen' from the 'important' things. Importance is highly subjective in the land of Tamriel.

But, by all means, let's keep posting ideas like this.

austinwalter87ub17_ESO · January 2017

Auricle wrote: »

I don't care about housing much, but it's a huge exciting update for a lot of people and I'm not so selfish to claim that ZoS' time is being 'stolen' from the 'important' things. Importance is highly subjective in the land of Tamriel.

But, by all means, let's keep posting ideas like this.

I'm not someone that cares about being called selfish. I'm not just a player, I'm a customer. Played too many MMORPG's and watched to many high dollar companies with high dollar budgets fail to address what needs to be addressed.

I categorize importance based on gameplay. Housing is one of those luxuries which is lower on the priority list.

MAEK · January 2017

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

Auricle wrote: »

I don't care about housing much, but it's a huge exciting update for a lot of people and I'm not so selfish to claim that ZoS' time is being 'stolen' from the 'important' things. Importance is highly subjective in the land of Tamriel.

But, by all means, let's keep posting ideas like this.

I'm not someone that cares about being called selfish. I'm not just a player, I'm a customer. Played too many MMORPG's and watched to many high dollar companies with high dollar budgets fail to address what needs to be addressed.

I categorize importance based on gameplay. Housing is one of those luxuries which is lower on the priority list.

It might be lower on your priority list, but a lot of people has wanted housing for a really long time. Not everyone cares about everything, and everybody doesn't care about housing, but just because some people doesn't care doesn't mean that it's waisting time.

austinwalter87ub17_ESO · January 2017

MAEK wrote: »

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

Auricle wrote: »

I don't care about housing much, but it's a huge exciting update for a lot of people and I'm not so selfish to claim that ZoS' time is being 'stolen' from the 'important' things. Importance is highly subjective in the land of Tamriel.

But, by all means, let's keep posting ideas like this.

I'm not someone that cares about being called selfish. I'm not just a player, I'm a customer. Played too many MMORPG's and watched to many high dollar companies with high dollar budgets fail to address what needs to be addressed.

I categorize importance based on gameplay. Housing is one of those luxuries which is lower on the priority list.

It might be lower on your priority list, but a lot of people has wanted housing for a really long time. Not everyone cares about everything, and everybody doesn't care about housing, but just because some people doesn't care doesn't mean that it's waisting time.

I'm aware that others have in-fact wanted but. But, its probably not a good idea to promise people a balance patch. When its obvious the focus was on Housing. Blinded by the short-term profit ZOS is becoming, and they're failing to recognize the long-term profit and longevity. Gameplay will always hold precedence over luxuries like Housing. Gameplay is the core. Housing is not.

People fail to understand just how costly the investment is for housing anyway. All crafting mats are going to become heavily inflated in price due to furniture, and housing accessories being so costly. The level of customization of housing as it currently stands is amazing and the team did a great job. But, housing isn't going to keep me and many thousands of others here.

Housing's only benefit at this point is being able to place crafting stations. There is no other true gain. You can't store things. You don't have an auctioneer at your home. They're just customizable isolated crafting stations.

f047ys3v3n · January 2017

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

After reading the 2.7.1 changes. I feel as if Housing is consuming the developers time, and resources. Housing is one of those things which is a long and lengthy process. A gold and money sink. Housing isn't going to keep population from bleeding. "Balance" and gameplay is. Anyone else feel like the balance should be its own entire patch without distractions?

You liked the balance? You want more?

Ok, I'm being hyperbolic. I actually liked a lot of the changes. The fire ring, crushing shock, and AOE cap changes make ball zergs dead in PVP and good riddance. Worthwhile stave passives are also great and the way they divided them is interesting. I am interested to see how the ice staff tanking change plays out as it is a clever and out of the box change. The templar radiant oppression nerf is also good (sorry temps, so OP.) I thought the overload nerf (halving stored ulti) was actually good if really late as overload made vMA a joke because the bosses could be start to finish overloaded. Lastly, nerf to standard, all good by me, that ulti was crazy OP relative to just about everything else and always has been.

As for the ones I didn't like:
Sorc curse timing change: Now the timing on the highest dps mophs of the main damage skills are 8 wall, 10 lightning, and 12curse, seconds. Good luck coming up with a good rotation for that not, that it was great before. How about you make them 8,8,8. Seriously, who comes up with the crazy screwed up DOT duration s in this game. We need all builds to have DOT timings that do not require a total mess of a rotation that you would probably have to macro to do even reasonably well. Make a standard long and shot DOT timing and make all DOT's conform to one of the other. 5 and 10 seconds would be swell or 4 and 8. That way they could even be used in concert with one another with the short timings on front bar and the long on back bar. I would drop my NB in a hearbeat for a sorc who's rotation is not a freaking mess. I may drop it anyway as the dps is just so low even if the rotation is a very nice 8,8,8 second.

mNB changes: No more dps for you, you lousy pikers. Have an irrelevant strife cost increase that will kill sap tanks but really, as a dps, will have little effect on you. You thought we were done nerfing you after literally zero nightblades were present in the top EU and NA raid group. Nope, more nerfs even if they were fairly irrelevant to dps in practice.

Stampocolips: OK, I hate stam but you really didn't have to kill them that dead. Their doing dps like a magic NB now. With the changes to AOE caps, crushing shock, and fire ring, they will even have some competition in PVP though, with crit charge and wrecking blow, I think they will be OK there. Remember when I would only take stam dps with me to do vDSA while I healed because my magica toon dps was so low. Well that was a while ago now wasn't it.

austinwalter87ub17_ESO · January 2017

f047ys3v3n wrote: »

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

After reading the 2.7.1 changes. I feel as if Housing is consuming the developers time, and resources. Housing is one of those things which is a long and lengthy process. A gold and money sink. Housing isn't going to keep population from bleeding. "Balance" and gameplay is. Anyone else feel like the balance should be its own entire patch without distractions?

You liked the balance? You want more?

Ok, I'm being hyperbolic. I actually liked a lot of the changes. The fire ring, crushing shock, and AOE cap changes make ball zergs dead in PVP and good riddance. Worthwhile stave passives are also great and the way they divided them is interesting. I am interested to see how the ice staff tanking change plays out as it is a clever and out of the box change. The templar radiant oppression nerf is also good (sorry temps, so OP.)

As for the ones I didn't like:
Sorc curse timing change: Now the timing on the highest dps mophs of the main damage skills are 8 wall, 10 lightning, and 12curse, seconds. Good luck coming up with a good rotation for that not that it was great before. How about you make them 8,8,8. Seriously, who comes up with the crazy screwed up DOT duration s in this game. We need all builds to have DOT timings that do not require a total mess of a rotation that you would probably have to macro to do even reasonably well. Make a standard long and shot DOT timing and make all DOT's conform to one of the other. 5 and 10 seconds would be swell or 4 and 8. That way they could even be used in concert with one another with the short timings on front bar and the long on back bar. I would drop my NB in a hearbeat for a sorc who's rotation is not a freaking mess. I may drop it anyway as the dps is just so low even if the rotation is a very nice 8,8,8 second.

mNB changes: No more dps for you, you lousy pikers. Have an irrelevant strife cost increase that will kill sap tanks but really, as a dps, will have little effect on you.

Stampocolips: OK, I hate stam but you really didn't have to kill them that dead. Their doing dps like a magic NB now. With the changes to AOE caps, crushing shock, and fire ring, they will even have some competition in PVP though, with crit charge and wrecking blow, I think they will be OK there. Remember when I would only take stam dps with me to do vDSA while I healed because my magica toon dps was so low. Well that was a while ago now wasn't it.

A handful of changes I do in-fact like. There's a lot which make no sense at all and weren't even being asked for. Also, the problem with this so-called "balance patch" is that's there's truly very little changes in it.

kwisatz · January 2017

It's their game, it's their creation, it's not ours to decide what they can or must do at what time or another, they are not our employees.

ESO is a product we can buy and use. If we like it, we stay, if not, we leave. It's that simple.

austinwalter87ub17_ESO · January 2017

kwisatz wrote: »

It's their game, it's their creation, it's not ours to decide what they can or must do at what time or another, they are not our employees.

ESO is a product we can buy and use. If we like it, we stay, if not, we live. It's that simple.

I'm a capitalist. You're correct its a product we buy and use. But, in order to make sure that product stays profitable what has to happen? Meeting market demand. Housing is an example of that on its own. However, there is more pressing matters which need to be addressed. Internal and core game components. Housing is a welcomed addition, even though I personally feel it is lackluster currently at implementation.

Glurin · January 2017

Ever hear of Brooks's Law?

"One woman can make a baby in nine months, but nine women cannot make a baby in one month."

(There's a bit more to it, but that part summarizes it pretty well.)

austinwalter87ub17_ESO · January 2017

Glurin wrote: »

Ever hear of Brooks's Law?

"One woman can make a baby in nine months, but nine women cannot make a baby in one month."

Indeed.

So what happens if the guy working on balance is one woman, and the baby is gameplay?

Glurin · January 2017

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

Glurin wrote: »

Ever hear of Brooks's Law?

"One woman can make a baby in nine months, but nine women cannot make a baby in one month."

Indeed.

So what happens if the guy working on balance is one woman, and the baby is gameplay?

I don't believe you really understood the point there.

austinwalter87ub17_ESO · January 2017

Glurin wrote: »

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

Glurin wrote: »

Ever hear of Brooks's Law?

"One woman can make a baby in nine months, but nine women cannot make a baby in one month."

Indeed.

So what happens if the guy working on balance is one woman, and the baby is gameplay?

I don't believe you really understood the point there.

I was insinuating that if one guy is working on balance population will start bleeding before any meaningful balance is achieved. And you kinda need nine women working on this baby.

Glurin · January 2017

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

Glurin wrote: »

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

Glurin wrote: »

Ever hear of Brooks's Law?

"One woman can make a baby in nine months, but nine women cannot make a baby in one month."

Indeed.

So what happens if the guy working on balance is one woman, and the baby is gameplay?

I don't believe you really understood the point there.

I was insinuating that if one guy is working on balance population will start bleeding before any meaningful balance is achieved. And you kinda need nine women working on this baby.

But where does that get you if it still takes nine months to complete? Or even longer, if the rest of the Law applies itself.

austinwalter87ub17_ESO · January 2017

People have already waited 9 months for an extensive balance patch. Which is precisely my point. There is not enough effort, time, and resources being utilized at ZOS towards this.

Betheny · January 2017

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

People have already waited 9 months for an extensive balance patch. Which is precisely my point. There is not enough effort, time, and resources being utilized at ZOS towards this.

And people have waited years for housing.

austinwalter87ub17_ESO · January 2017

Betheny wrote: »

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

People have already waited 9 months for an extensive balance patch. Which is precisely my point. There is not enough effort, time, and resources being utilized at ZOS towards this.

And people have waited years for housing.

And i don't have a problem with housing coming to the game. I have a problem with it coming to the game when the core gameplay needs a lot more work.

Betheny · January 2017

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

Betheny wrote: »

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

People have already waited 9 months for an extensive balance patch. Which is precisely my point. There is not enough effort, time, and resources being utilized at ZOS towards this.

And people have waited years for housing.

And i don't have a problem with housing coming to the game. I have a problem with it coming to the game when the core gameplay needs a lot more work.

Well stop arguing about this and start helping them fix housing, so whoever is being stretched too thin (if anyone) can get get back to other stuff.

Pandorii · January 2017

Honestly, I think the two teams that work on housing and balancing the game are so different, one would not likely affect the other.

I can also imagine that the balancing team is probably not very big, if they thought they were going to get it right the first times (tg and db were both balancing patches, 1t supposedly balanced via armor).

Housing is so gimmicky. It's 95 percent vanity-based. Most practical functions, like the 250 voucher costing dummy, will take a lot of gold and time to acquire. It's just one huge opportunity for money-making. They'll make money from selling houses themselves. Some are speculating the manors will cost as much as 50,000 crowns. They'll make money from selling the furniture pieces and bundles. They'll sell more motifs as people try to get an edge on the master writs. They'll sell more bankers and merchants so people can have more functionality in their homes. Furniture can be added into crown crates. Furniture will be added to the loot tables of events (like the Jester festival). New themed exclusive houses can be designed and released every quarter for profit. $.$ It's no wonder they're devoting resources to it.

For housing, spending equals content in a way. If you end up being that person who decides not to spend or can't afford to spend, ESO is looking pretty boring right now, considering we haven't really had any new content in almost a year.

All that aside, I don't think that housing is the reason for poor balancing this patch. It's likely because upper management thought the dev team might get balance right the first time, second time, third time, or already by now.

austinwalter87ub17_ESO · January 2017

Betheny wrote: »

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

Betheny wrote: »

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

People have already waited 9 months for an extensive balance patch. Which is precisely my point. There is not enough effort, time, and resources being utilized at ZOS towards this.

And people have waited years for housing.

And i don't have a problem with housing coming to the game. I have a problem with it coming to the game when the core gameplay needs a lot more work.

Well stop arguing about this and start helping them fix housing, so whoever is being stretched too thin (if anyone) can get get back to other stuff.

Housing isn't broken. It's missing a lot of things to make it even worthwhile but I digress. I'd like to see ZOS pause for a moment and spend more time on focusing on things like:

1) Broken and useless skills
2) Gear Ratio Issues
3) The missing Frost Class which people have been begging for since beta
4) Massive Cyrodil performance improvements
5) Major Overhaul to Pets
6) Proc Sets

Betheny · January 2017

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

Betheny wrote: »

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

Betheny wrote: »

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

People have already waited 9 months for an extensive balance patch. Which is precisely my point. There is not enough effort, time, and resources being utilized at ZOS towards this.

And people have waited years for housing.

And i don't have a problem with housing coming to the game. I have a problem with it coming to the game when the core gameplay needs a lot more work.

Well stop arguing about this and start helping them fix housing, so whoever is being stretched too thin (if anyone) can get get back to other stuff.

Housing isn't broken. It's missing a lot of things to make it even worthwhile but I digress. I'd like to see ZOS pause for a moment and spend more time on focusing on things like:

[snip]

It's a new system and needs our input (feedback, bug reports).

So get to it and stop arguing about "what if...?".

austinwalter87ub17_ESO · January 2017

Betheny wrote: »

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

Betheny wrote: »

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

Betheny wrote: »

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

People have already waited 9 months for an extensive balance patch. Which is precisely my point. There is not enough effort, time, and resources being utilized at ZOS towards this.

And people have waited years for housing.

And i don't have a problem with housing coming to the game. I have a problem with it coming to the game when the core gameplay needs a lot more work.

Well stop arguing about this and start helping them fix housing, so whoever is being stretched too thin (if anyone) can get get back to other stuff.

Housing isn't broken. It's missing a lot of things to make it even worthwhile but I digress. I'd like to see ZOS pause for a moment and spend more time on focusing on things like:

[snip]

It's a new system and needs our input (feedback, bug reports).

So get to it and stop arguing about "what if...?".

I have no interest in housing. I have interest in core gameplay mechanics we were promised would be addressed this patch.

Just like the dev team. The majority can focus on shiny things. I'll focus on things which actually matter.

Betheny · January 2017

austinwalter87ub17_ESO wrote: »

I'll focus on things which actually matter.

If you really believed that was your purpose, you wouldn't have made this completely useless thread in the Test Server forum.