The power of over thinking......

[Lady Storm]

Watching the boards of late is a rollercoster of emotions for alot of readers and its getting out of hand.
Many try to over think the Dev and put out their forcasts of doom and gloom or roses and champagine.

Cal and the Dev have tried their best to keep us informed. Not always as quick as most would like or as detailed. Try to remember some things are not easy to pin down.

Like the buzz of this "State of the Game" geesh give them some breathing space!!

Unless you live under a rock and play UO in the dark, we all know the population is low. So it is unnessasaray to rehash it in 20 posts worded differently. Once is enough thank you.

Downsizing .... where in the name of jupiter did you get the idea we need to consolidate the shards??
Did a Dev say so?? NO infact if I remember a few months back this very question was asked of Cal and the team. The answer at that time was they have no intention to do so.

They are doing their best to make our gameplay fun and less a hanstle from bugs.
Bugs .... no matter what game you play there is always going to be bugs... its a fact of life nothing is perfect....

I for one know full well many of you have this half empty glass syndrome.
We pay for UO and it makes a profet... EA right now can use every spare penny it gets.
This is how business runs, even with new equipment and server repairs UO is still viable.

Just for once I'd love to see the posts here full of happy ideas and thoughts.

Yea I know I am day dreaming..... this place is full of cats and rocking chairs ...sooner or later someone tail is gunna be twisted!

 

[canary]

Telling someone they miss deadlines constantly isn't like one is calling them the anti christ.

BTW? Your post is pretty much a rant/ spiel. It may be one that is attempting to spin positive, but it doesn't change the fact it is just that... a rant.

 

[Vlaude]

It's funny that a small complaint by a single poster has generated such a big response with people crying "negativity! negativity!" and now even got its own thread response. Who is over thinking now?

 

[canary]

It's funny that a small complaint by a single poster has generated such a big response with people crying "negativity! negativity!" and now even got its own thread response. Who is over thinking now?

OH! OH! I KNOW THIS ONE!

*raises hand to be called on to give the answer*

 

[Fayled Dhreams]

*golf clap*

A fine example of over thinking ...

 

[Beer_Cayse]

Watching the boards of late is a rollercoster of emotions for alot of readers and its getting out of hand.
Many try to over think the Dev and put out their forcasts of doom and gloom or roses and champagine.

Been this way since I can remember ... "the sky is falling" syndrome is alive and well.

Cal and the Dev have tried their best to keep us informed. Not always as quick as most would like or as detailed. Try to remember some things are not easy to pin down.

Current crew is not the only one that runs late on stuff. Old timers need to remember the days of yore when even Den Dragon and his team were not prompt.

Like the buzz of this "State of the Game" geesh give them some breathing space!!

Unless you live under a rock and play UO in the dark, we all know the population is low. So it is unnessasaray to rehash it in 20 posts worded differently. Once is enough thank you.

Why give them space? I mean the folks yammering prolly don't mind getting nagged and pestered to produce. <shrug> They're spreading the wealth!

As far as the numerous posts, there are what ... several hundred post names here ... we should all post one just for grins! Job security for Mods and Admins? <ducks under a mighty swing of the axe from Kelmo>

Downsizing .... where in the name of jupiter did you get the idea we need to consolidate the shards??
Did a Dev say so?? NO infact if I remember a few months back this very question was asked of Cal and the team. The answer at that time was they have no intention to do so.

Doesn't matter if it's been asked and answered several times in the past year (it was, too!) ... Chicken Littles need to get it out once more. Call it history repeating itself.

They are doing their best to make our gameplay fun and less a hanstle from bugs.
Bugs .... no matter what game you play there is always going to be bugs... its a fact of life nothing is perfect....

Windows is perfect! Ask Microsoft ... oh wait, mebbe it's not. They keep releasing patches to fix ummm, bugs. Yeah, bugs.

Just for once I'd love to see the posts here full of happy ideas and thoughts.

Dream on, kiddo ... dream on.

<skips off singing "Happy, happy, joy, joy!">

 

[Beer_Cayse]

Down, Horschak! <chuckles>

 

[canary]

Down, Horschak! <chuckles>

EW!

I'm much prettier than Horschak. True story.

 

[Cloak&Dagger]

Just for once I'd love to see the posts here full of happy ideas and thoughts.

Yea I know I am day dreaming..... this place is full of cats and rocking chairs ...sooner or later someone tail is gunna be twisted!

You know for all the crap you just spieled and ranted on about, and all the "over thinking" you just did, lets get some things straight. Nothing you just complained about was negative posting, where should I start for you?

"State of the Game" They said "Middle of the month" when is the middle? Between the first and the 31s? Was the post made on January 2nd? Or was it made in the middle of the month asking if that was still on the table? I admit after Cal replied I stopped reading that thread so I dunno what happened before, but everything before Cal's reply was justified.

"Downsizing" no downsizing missy, sorry but the Idea WAS happy, it was a HAPPY thought to try and increase the actual "community" aspect of UO, sorry you think we are trying to nickle and dime but we ain't.

And I would love to see the doom and gloom post. I will wait.

Most of the stuff you are spewing is not even in context to what is being discussed, sure we discuss the low population, but it is not to say "oh my UO dying" no it is saying exactly that, we have a low population, so how do we get people involved with each other in a positive way? I will wait for you to have an idea, till then shut up about it and don't post negatively in our idea threads. Or better yet, don't read them at all since all you see is "unhappy" thoughts and Ideas.

 

[ohmyGED]

I have an idea:

Why doesn't everyone stop complaining about little aspects of the game, and just play it. If you don't enjoy it, either do something else, or don't play.

You know that there is a large majority of players that don't even read Stratics Forums?

Pfffft.....I've been playing for 13+ years now, I only joined here recently after UO Tradespot usage plummeted from 2006-2008. I've only been posting here for the past couple of years.

There are tons of people out there that don't post here, either because they don't know about it.....or they just love playing the game.

[/Thread]

 

[Sevin0oo0]

Unless you live under a rock and play UO in the dark

Actually, ON a rock, but it still placed ok. My mules have ancient lanterns, the rest... Nightsight FTW

 

[unified]

Watching the boards of late is a rollercoster of emotions for alot of readers and its getting out of hand.

Just in case you've forgotten the purpose of this forum, here's go ...

"This is the place for general discussion about Ultima Online gameplay, development issues, and related Ultima Online issues. Please keep posts on topic, and use the U. Hall OT for off-topic posts!"

Coming here to bash the members' freedom to express themselves, no matter how disagreeable, is counter-productive. What you consider negative may be a more civil way for someone to express frustration. Keeping someone from expressing this frustration actually hides truth and, left unchecked, could lead to a less desirable form of expression that could end up in newspapers.

With 53 accounts, I am saddened that you seem to have nothing better to do than to come here and criticize others.

BTW, the smily face is misleading. Try this one.

 

[HD2300]

A carrot dangler is someone who promises something—to help you out, to give you something, to introduce you to someone, or whatever—and never comes through. When you try to collect on the promise, there is always some reason why they can't give it to you right then, though they tell you they will do it another time. But when "another time" comes along, that isn't a good time either, and so it goes, until you give up on that carrot, and then they start to dangle another carrot. The underlying dynamic is that they are generally getting something they want from you, and they are making the appearance of offering something in exchange, but they never actually give anything in return.

so what is the next carrot?

 

[phantus]

Cal and the Dev have tried their best to keep us informed. Not always as quick as most would like or as detailed. Try to remember some things are not easy to pin down.

I disagree. Cal started out trying to impress us with his hard ass approach. It went over like a lead balloon. Then he tried humor and found it to work a little so he has kept it up. He has played his military card and it has worked for him as well. He has done more to improve his image when dealing with us than in actually dealing with us in relation to the game. Mark is a tool that drops out of threads when he doesn't like the direction they go. Who else is trying to keep us informed? Mesanna is the only one we ever hear about and not from. A few times we hear Supreme mention something. When was the last time we were informed of something that wasn't sold on the ea site? Ask the devs: Last post was almost 3 months ago. Keeping us informed my rosey red ass.

Did a Dev say so?? NO infact if I remember a few months back this very question was asked of Cal and the team. The answer at that time was they have no intention to do so.

This has more to do with PvPers needing others to fight. Also known as interaction when it fits the agenda. I play a small shard with plenty of interaction. It's found in places other than where it was 10 years ago. People have to adapt in all manners of the game.

They are doing their best to make our gameplay fun and less a hanstle from bugs.

There is some truth to this. I do believe there are members of the UO team that try very hard to give us the game we would like. I don't believe they have the resources to do this any longer. The numbers don't allow it.

I for one know full well many of you have this half empty glass syndrome.
We pay for UO and it makes a profet... EA right now can use every spare penny it gets.
This is how business runs, even with new equipment and server repairs UO is still viable.

I'm not concerned with EA as a company. I pay the same amount of money I have for over a decade to them and I expect more out of them than I have been getting. From mirrors to bad revamps to long periods of no content. The glass is cracked at the bottom and is leaking. Half full was 5-6 years ago.

The business you work at is not like any I have worked at that is successful and growing. My company spares money when it's logical not just because it's possible. This is not the path I see UO going down. They spend money when they have to only. They save money in any way possible. You have to spend money to make money in business and if you don't invest in your business you doom it to failure. I see less and less investment in UO each year. So do all the other "half fullers".

A few months ago I too found myself posting only poisonous posts and attacks. I have since tried my best to be less negative. I found that the most recent booster pack was to many peoples liking. If it were not for the bugs that came with it I would have said it was a success.

There is really only 1 problem with the game at this time. Those who make the decisions about the game don't play and have no idea how the game itself works. They are dong their job and nothing more. The ones who do work on the game and know this have their hands tied and cannot make any headway with those who are in control. Many of the best devs willfully moved to other games/studios in EA because of this frustration and the game has suffered.

 

[canary]

Cal and the Dev have tried their best to keep us informed. Not always as quick as most would like or as detailed.

BTW, try telling that to ANYONE on Oceania who was not told by Cal their servers in Australia were being shut down and relocated in the USA. He called them... what was it? Oh yes, 'hardware upgrades'. I'm sure they'd share your opinion. Not.

There were items available in the uogamecodes site for DAYS before any mention was made. Because, you know, it would take so long to make a 3 minute post on the herald or on here.

Yes, he and the team are doing a stellar job on informing players. Yay.

 

[Tina Small]

Check the DAoC and Warhammer Online forums. The mood in all of them is the same as it is here: Very depressed. This is true even in the Warhammer Online official forum, which is heavily moderated by actual EA staff (i.e., nonconstructive posts tend to get deleted). Seems no one's heard from Andy Belford in days/weeks, even though he and James Nichols show as being logged in there but are unresponsive. It's apparently been months since anyone's heard from the Warhammer producer, although rumors have been posted in the WHO forum that she tweets regularly regarding her XBox and WoW activity.

Don't know what's up with Mythic, but UO's not the only one of their games that is in such a bad state. A lot of their customers in all three games are waiting for some kind of "news" that's actual news and not just updates on things no one requested and more promises of exciting things to come that the producers/devs just can't talk about yet.

 

[Lady Mal]

so what is the next carrot?

Cloth tubs that dye leather colors, legally. Since they just "fixed" us all from being able to dye our clothing to match our armor.

 

[Tina Small]

Apparently, Andy was out on PTO earlier in the week and is out sick today.

Choose Language | BioWare Social Network

 

[Lady Storm]

OK lets see if I can answer this in the order ....

Yes they have given deadlines for answers this is a given, I too would like to know. The only drawback is I want the answer to be right, not a half arsed guess on unfinished data.
AS for a date to give this information...middle of the month... ok how many of you have had time slip away from you????
Come on fess up...
Well it happens in business too. We can target a day to talk but when the date comes up and your not ready due to delays or hardware issues..what do you do?? Rush like a mad man?? or hope to finish with a solid answer and be a tad off the middle and hope it flys.
It's ok to ask. Not ok to pester over and over like little kids asking are we there yet.

(Though yesterday I was told what am I doing playing a childs game at my age...that I was too old to be doing this and should get out and do adult things. Not that I mind the age bit, they will get it one day too so there is karma in that. WoW, UO, EQ and every game I have played the same question. What is the right age for a player of any game?? What does this have to do with what is said here? Easy. UO is how old? Well if you count in the box games I use to play Ultima is quite old. )

One its not a rant but a post of the state of peoples unrest... You would have to admit even you anchient posters have been rather down on the dev for months and seemingly ungratfull for what they do tell you. I am not saying your getting the whole answer but its better then not being told squat. Oh I know other games are in the same boat as Tina pointed out. If you got the news of late you know all game company stocks are taking a hit on wall street. And I for one have got my eye on EA... dont trust that company as far as I can toss a 500lb gorilla.
As for our Dev....
It's hard to quit mid stream in what your doing to answer the same question 100 different ways as its asked 100 different ways to get more info out of them. (ask any mother who has little ones how fustrating this is)

Example: they have said a multitude of times they have a bug list and plan to fix them. The dye tubs come to mind .. we all knew they were bugged, even some took great pains to make their tubs bugged to get the odd colors they knew was wrong.... Even to the point of buying from outside UO to get the neon tub. They fixed the whole thing and reset all tubs.
Are you happy they fixed the bugs??
Quite honestly I cant tell if you are or not. By the way people are going on about matching armor and clothes.... Coming from the era where we made our own black tubs... I cant pancake too much at the want of a wider range of colors and tints.

Dear Unified sweety my glass is half full.. I try to give things a uplifting look so the smily face is my way to not loose the happy thoughts of life. I wasnt bashing their free thoughts on matters they hold dear on UO. I dont expect anyone to go out and use a hand gun on the Dev team for not posting their message on time... as your reply was hinting to.
Rather to have the post point out the emotion that was in evidence on the topics at hand.

Cloak&Dagger I understand your concern over the population in UO and the possible need to "condence " our shards to a more fitting size.
My reply was exactly what the Dev said. They are not looking at cutting down anytime soon. I beleave that.
The hell and hastle to condence down would be a big disruption of people and make a bigger chance of loss of accounts. One which UO could not aford to happen.
Secondly I remember back a few years ago from an older Dev team reply on this very question asked to them. The answer was to the effect that the number of shards was not a major factor on the servers or the amount of them needed to run UO. So cost would not spur them to condence shards.
The only reason I see for your idea is to fill up the shards as they once were for esthics.
Someone asked me once why I played so many shards.... they are all the same she said.
My answer to her was :
No they are not all alike. Each has a different flavor and feel, you know your on Napa, Cats, Oceania or any shard just by walking around...
To merge shard or make them converge is taking that away forever..
Granted they are just copys of each other to a point. Its only pixels and yes it might help for a small time to group up as you think... though I feel we will start to loose more players faster if you do it.
Personaly i'd like to see that Farm idea go in with the rollback of the 1 house per account because I think we would get more players back with the opening of it and with a little advertising in the web comunity UO could grow in population. Given all this open land we have its worth a shot.
As for the equipment change.. and Oceania. I play Oceania too and served on that shard so I do know the server was in Singapore. The reason to move it might be accessability for repair and mantence. Thou I cant see why it wasnt put in Oz to begin with.
As for the gamecodes store... I dont think Cal has hands in that pie... thinking its another department. Yes it would have been nice for a heads up but I dont think Cal or any of the dev had any clue they had been already been added. Sometimes even in the rL world there is miscomunication between departments. Cant always know what the right hand is doing when the left is busy doing its thing.

Yes I have 53 accounts - yes thats alot of money. Really have you ever looked at how many of us hold more then 1 account?? If I shut down all my accounts and only had 1 and every other person did the same. How many players would be in UO? Answer is the same number of people as it is now. The only impact would be on the bottom line of UO. EA would shut UO down over night. We need more players period.

 

[Petra Fyde]

Locking this, having removed attacks on the OP.

 

[Nyses]

You forgot to lock it. I notice you removed my post, I would contend there was no attack, just an observation. No name calling, not critical or supportive of what was posted.

If you had to delete everything from a starting point, down, I understand.

 

[Lady Storm]

Petra its ok let them type. Good or bad at least they start to think of real problems.

I was not ranting and nether are they.

I for one would never stop people from having opinions and it is ok to share them.

I want them to think.

We all forget sometimes that the Dev are real life people and do have normal problems as we do.

People have colds and flu... it is the season.
Car trouble... it is also blizzard weather... hehe I dont have that trouble its been 80 for the last 4 days.
Traffic and kids to care for on no school days due to snow etc...
Our dev are real people. We expect alot from them.... sometimes warrented, other times no so.

 

[Trebr Drab]

Apparently, Andy was out on PTO earlier in the week and is out sick today.

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Who's Andy? And does that mean the filming didn't get done this past week?

 

[canary]

Who's Andy? And does that mean the filming didn't get done this past week?

Andy is the community liason for BiowareMythic. Aren't you glad we have someone in that position so active that regular stratics posters like yourself have no idea who he is?

(And yes, that's sarcasm)

 

[Uriah Heep]

Car trouble... it is also blizzard weather... hehe I dont have that trouble its been 80 for the last 4 days.

Wants to be there in the 80 degrees!! Cause it's cold here!

 

[unified]

Dear Unified sweety my glass is half full.. I try to give things a uplifting look so the smily face is my way to not loose the happy thoughts of life. I wasnt bashing their free thoughts on matters they hold dear on UO. I dont expect anyone to go out and use a hand gun on the Dev team for not posting their message on time... as your reply was hinting to.

I have to say, you know how to draw fire and put it out. Don't close those accounts. I only wish I could have that much fun.

BTW, here's your smiley face back. He'll be just like new in a few days.

 

[Trebr Drab]

Who's Andy? And does that mean the filming didn't get done this past week?

Andy is the community liason for BiowareMythic. Aren't you glad we have someone in that position so active that regular stratics posters like yourself have no idea who he is?

(And yes, that's sarcasm)

Well, yes and no. See, I don't like at all that Devs or people involved in these very social MMORPGs get involved too casually and chummy with the players. That leads to trouble in the perception of favoritism. And it's actually led directly to that in a real way in the past in several situations.

This is something I agreed with Mark Jacobs on. And believe me, I have no reason to like Jacobs at all, as he made an all out assault on me personally on the DAoC boards while they were in production. Screw him. But he was right about this particular subject (which he broke himself in that situation). There needs to be a strong divide between company reps and players. While a professional link can still be established through releases and notifications, and the Community Relations Rep can be the one who handles that.

So, in a nutshell, I'm not upset that I don't know who this is. The real problem, of course, is that there hasn't been proper communications.
Just like now, we're waiting on something very important, and we're left here sitting on our collective thumbs.

 

[Lady Storm]

I have to agree too Trebr that a company needs to keep its distance so to speak from the partys it serves due to the ugly mess that can develope if favoritism is seen.

I too didnt know this person idenity so dont feel bad.

Thank you Unified ill see he gets a good rest and plenty of homemade chocolate chip cookies. That should make him smile better.

 

[Lord Chaos]

Telling someone they miss deadlines constantly isn't like one is calling them the anti christ.

The devs don't have "deadline" obligations to a bunch of posters. They're nice enough to inform you of things that may happen, but nothing is a certainty.

 

[Lord Chaos]

Just like now, we're waiting on something a bunch of posters find very important, and we're left here sitting on our collective thumbs.

Fixed for you.

 

[canary]

The devs don't have "deadline" obligations to a bunch of posters. They're nice enough to inform you of things that may happen, but nothing is a certainty.

Maybe not, but the majority of said posters are the ones who ensure every paycheck that there is food on the table.

 

[Lord Chaos]

Maybe not, but the majority of said posters are the ones who ensure every paycheck that there is food on the table.

No, we're a tiny whiny minority.

 

[Fayled Dhreams]

The devs don't have "deadline" obligations to a bunch of posters. They're nice enough to inform you of things that may happen, but nothing is a certainty.

Maybe not, but the majority of said posters are the ones who ensure every paycheck that there is food on the table.

Well put ... a minor change of "posture" offered for clarity ...

Devs are not immune to the consequences that follow Their actions.

no-one is.

fwiw ... yw

 

[Neutron Bomb]

There were items available in the uogamecodes site for DAYS before any mention was made. Because, you know, it would take so long to make a 3 minute post on the herald or on here.

Yes, he and the team are doing a stellar job on informing players. Yay.

Wow, we're pancakes over crap like this.

I agree with the OP. Some of 'you people' are just downright crybabies. Play something else, your freedom of speech is horse****.

 

[Petra Fyde]

That'll teach me to make decisions at bed time.

However I do think it's now time to put out the flames here.