House Placement, a Legal Liability?
Posted June 30, 2000 - 1:55 PM PDT by Kamikaze
This is the latest information on the house placement issue:
"As a reminder, the opening of new staged house placement on the Trammel facets of all Ultima Online shards is currently suspended in light of load-balancing issues. No shards will be opening new phases of staged house placement on the Trammel facet over the upcoming weekend."(http://update.uo.com/fyi.html)
Weeks have now passed since OSI promised the unthinkable - to double the landmass and available housing. Weeks, since a new development team assured that server and equipment updates would ensure that a system already wrought with lag and connection problems could handle the new load. Well it has been weeks and we are still waiting. The end does not seem to be in sight.
False advertising is when a retailer makes a promise to his consumer conditional to an exchange of consideration and does not meet the before mentioned obligation. OSI promised the consumer of the "Renaissance" package (Not to mention us veteran users) a new landmass with ample room for house placement. They have not met this obligation. We have given them our consideration ($10 a month or in the case of "Renaissance" purchasers, the cost of the software.) What have they given us? Only broken promises and delayed dates.
As foolish as it seems, people have actually lost income over house placement. I know of, and have spoken to numerous people that booked days off work to place a house. They believed OSI when they CONFIRMED HOUSE placement.
The law demands that OSI meets their contractual obligations in a timely matter. They have failed to do so. I was taught never to promise something I could not guarantee. OSI must have known that it was unlikely house placement would be a reality on the over populated East Coast shards, namely Catskills. In addition, although I have no proof, I get the distinct impression that EA pressured the developers to release a flawed package in the name of profits. I am sure EA has a great legal team, but if I were in their position, I would fear the legal repercussions of my broken promises.
Thanks,
Questions comments?
Is using knowledge of the 8x8 resource grid an exploit?
Posted June 21, 2000 - 2:52 PM PDT by Lucan
It’s an interesting question, isn’t it?
Clearly we all believe UOE’s fastwalk feature was an exploit. I would never use such a feature and would actively discourage its use. But what about this 8x8 resource grid everyone’s talking about?
I went to Stratics yesterday to visit the UO Healers forum to learn about improving my skill gains. (I thought I would hear something like I should be wrestling Ancient Wyrms or something.)
Well as turns out, the board was all a-buzz with this 8x8 resource grid stuff. It seems that some lumberjack found it, the Mages adopted it and now the Healers are using it. Most likely it benefits any skill and is the programmer’s solution rampant macroing.
This is an awkward position for our good friends over at Origin to be in.
I think they did a good thing by making macroing much less useful. The problem is they have replaced the need to macro with a system that can be “figured-out” and leveraged. *sigh*
So my question to you is this:
1. Is using the knowledge of the 8x8 resource grid an exploit?
2. Is it simply a formalization of knowledge that is learned through normal game play?
Lucan
Inquiring minds need to know.
Party on with the Party System. Not!
Posted June 21, 2000 - 1:30 PM PDT by Lucan
Growing up in the 70's, I went to lots of parties, and 'crashing' was pretty much the way the party ended each time.
"Hey dude, I'm partied out, I'm gonna crash."
Well, as much as I like to reminisce about the good ‘ol days, the crashing while using the Party System is something I can do with out.
Me and some buddies were on a dungeon crawl the other night and someone suggested we party-up (again with the flash backs, but I then realized he meant to join a party. Darn!)
Anyway, someone shouts-out; “we will all crash if someone dies.” Well we party-up anyway and within one minute, one of our party crashed and so we immediately disbanded.
I guess I could be wrong about the Party System being to blame but the Party System is perceived by many to be buggy and cause lag.
I haven’t done extensive tests, but every time I’m in a group and someone suggests the Party System, someone else dismisses it as being problematic.
Look OSI, we need the Party System to be solid and not cause lag. Remember that we are fighters and go to great lengths to not be lagged or encumbered in any way. The last thing we want is yet another useless communication tool.
Useless communication tool = The UO Chat facility and the UOMail bag.
Hire more developers, train them well, and put them to work fixing bugs!
1.7 million per month in recurring revenue should buy us one hell of a service!
Lucan
Do you have anything to say about the Party System?
My list of UO - User Interface nit-picks
Posted June 21, 2000 - 11:36 AM PDT by Lucan
Okay, I've been a GUI developer for quite some time and always get annoyed with user interfaces that have blemishes.
Don't get me wrong, the UO client is, for the most part, a work of art. However, there are some ugly warts that I would like to point out.
1. Right Mouse Click consistency.
The consistency here was good until OSI added the UOMail and new login screen (with the castle.)
It used to be that any gump could be closed with a right-mouse-click. Now all the UOMail, login, shard selection, etc. screens don't respond to right-mouse-click.
2. Ugly mail bag.
Need I say more? Well, you may have forgotten as most of us have turned off this feature within days of OSI patching it in. In any case the mail bag is an ugly wart on an otherwise beautiful paperdoll. I mean really, that mailbag looks like something that should be hanging off the backend of a goat!
2a. The UOMail feature is worthless. OSI, please yank it entirely and take a hint from successful chat tools like ICQ or iRC.
3. Ugly 'Base Skill' checkbox on Skills gump
Good grief, I could not believe it when I saw that gigantic gray blob on the top of my Skills Gump.
Why not a small square (maybe 1/4 the size) with a transparent background. When clicked it would put a clean red 'X' in the box, when clicked again it would remove it. Sheesh!
4. Stupid 'pop-up help' on logon screen totally obscures where you are trying to type!
Grr, I hate this! The Damn field says "Password"! What the hell do I also need that little popup help for? -- For God's sake, if I can't figure out how to login to UO, I've got no business playing it.
I mean what better way to filter out the dunderheads?
5. Inability for the program to remember the password from within the same game session.
I understand why it is important to not save the password to a file, but from within the same game session the program could certainly store the password (encrypted if need be) in memory.
6. Incorporate UOAssist into UO by adding all the UOA tabs to the 'Options' gump of UO.
(I can dream can't I?)
Lucan
Should OSI
pay closer attention to detail, or am I just too damn picky?
The Adventures of Adam Ant - Episode #67
Posted June 17, 2000 - 10:31 AM PDT by Adam Ant
Hail dark friends,
Guardian Mike and I were victorious last eve in defending Wind from those that would invade our home to kill the lich.
Come and read about my latest adventure here
--Adam Ant
Thoughts on Reactivate Armor
Posted June 10, 2000 - 6:53 PM PDT by Lucan
As I mentioned a week or so ago, I'm dropping mace for inscription so I can have that really cool Reactivate Armor!
Now there are some things I don't like and I think they should be tweaked:
Sosarian Blindness
Posted June 10, 2000 - 6:42 PM PDT by Lucan
Have you seen the bug where when you Recall or Gate somewhere you can't see any of the surrounding structures?
Heh, it's pretty unsettling. The first time I experienced this was when me and some friends gated to a friends tower, but there was no tower! I'm standing there in the wilderness, alone, thinking, Where's my buddies tower? Where're my friends? Where is everyone!!
Just about this time I see blood go splattering across the ground.
Hey, did you ever see "Predator" with Arnold Schwarzenegger? Well, in this movie the monster is nearly invisible and when it attacks this guy, all you see is the blood go spraying across everything. That's what this was like.
Anyway, I see that someone is yelling Cast In Lor at me. I can't see who is yelling it, but I can see the words. So I cast Night Sight and presto, I can see! I can see my buddies tower and the lizard man pounding on my buddy (who by the way, can't see anything either!)
Methinks this bug was introduced at the UO:R patch, but I'm not sure.
Anyway, the trick seems to be to cast In Lor Night Sight) and all will be well.
--Adam Ant
What is your experience with this bug?
The Stealth Treasure Hunter
Posted June 6, 2000 - 3:09 PM PDT by Adam Ant
Kahn, The Stealth Treasure Hunter, has just posted a little story how he makes gold, collects magic weapons and generally has a good time while only using his intellect :)
Kahn tells me he is a lover and not a fighter and so he has chosen a profession where he takes what he wants without ever raising his blade.
Go check out his tale on The Stealth Treasure Hunter!
--Adam Ant
Trammel / Felucca Free Trade Agreement
Posted June 6, 2000 - 2:08 PM PDT by Adam Ant
Wouldn't it be interesting if Trammel was not necessarily a stepping stone to Felucca, but instead had a different player focus?
Imagine Trammel being the land of commerce and trade. This is where the merchants and crafts people work and live. The citizens of Trammel would make their money from craftables and other supplies to be consumed locally and shipped abroad (Felucca.)
You could think of Trammel as the more civilized society and Felucca as the new frontier.
Maybe on Trammel monster spawns would be reduced and resources like wood and ore increased.
Another twist on this would be to greatly enhance merchandise transport by sea.
Certain (all?) boats would have a greatly enhanced storage capacity (to make transportation by ship attractive.)
There would be a course across the ocean that could be plotted by a master cartographer that would take you from Trammel to Felucca without the need of a moonstone.
To me, this sounds like an enhancement to the current system that could make the interaction between the two "land masses" truly interesting and complimentary (I prefer the idea of "two land masses" as opposed to "two worlds.")
Of course, this idea has some development / balance considerations. Here are a few:
1. water travel between Trammel and Fleucca without moonstones
2. increased storage capacity on boats and how to stop exploits
3. Pirates
--Adam Ant
What do you think?
Congratulations to Adrick and Evocare!
Posted June 5, 2000 - 10:52 PM PDT by Adam Ant
Well, in case you haven't heard, both Adrick and Evocare of Battle Vortex have moved-on to the UO Live team. I wish both of them the best of luck. I guess part of the fun is knowing how much crap Adrick took for his views from the visionless. Hehe! The guy's over at Lum's must be going absolutely nuts!
Yea Adrick took lots of flack for his perspectives but he's getting the last laugh now.
Hey guys, make sure there is always a place for evil!
--Adam Ant