The only way you get put back to the exact dungeon you left on at, and with the same amount of progress is if you're forced out of the game by internet disconnection.
If I'm not mistaken that is.

A major flaw is that it's too easy to have a run go to waste. Something suddenly comes up while you're going solo in a dungeon, you have time to do your errand, but come back to the logging screen because ''You were disconnected due to idleness''. Well, you just lost time and energy because you're not allowed to AFK for very long.

Server reboot? Wasted your time and energy.

The 30minutes they give is ample time in my opinion, but the fact that you get put back in Haven after being disconnected by almost all methods is what's garbage.

I agree with the OP and would like to add. It doesn't really matter if you break even on crowns earned vs CE spent. If your objective is to get the seals and you are spending your energy to get said seals... then it's more about wasted effort and having to redo all of it from depth 19. If people knew sooner when the servers were shutting down, they would likely opt for tier 1 mat farming or a jelly run as opposed to risking an unfinished Vana. Depending on the stratum - often times it can be a challenge getting to FSC without a single revive taking place, which is the ideal situation. It would be quite frustrating to perform well and fall short of the Vana kill because of the short announce times.

Counting down from 2 hours would be best, even from 1 hour would be better so maybe people can stop at the terminal or not start the run at all.

Doesn't explain the dozens of times this has happened when there's wasn't a major bug, for stuff like that it should be scheduled. I'm sure people understand the situation with this bug I know I do but I'm pretty sure people are just fed up from all the other times it's happened.

Protip: Wait 2 hours after an update before swimming. They always have to fix stuff.
It was enough time for me to kill Duke though.

@Howhurl I like the idea of mail actually it's better than a system msg because I've logged on between 30-20-10 etc. before so didn't even know a countdown was in effect until AFTER I paid to enter a gate and after I took the elevator down, didn't make it far before the last warning came up (first warning for me) and needless to say I wasn't happy.

Howhurl and kbe2k11, did you read Eurydice's comments?
They needed to do an emergency bugfix to cure Snarby's invulnerability bug. This isn't something that could have waited any longer.
For regular updates, sure they should announce beforehand (if they can) and announce a time or date or something.

Honestly, I'd rather have the bugfix ASAP than force EVERYONE ELSE to wait.

@ Eury, no need to apologize but thanks - this situation has only happened to me once on a jelly run. I was irritated at the time but nothing so serious as to post about it. :) I personally don't mind the 30 minutes because I've come to expect it. I'm just adding my opinion to the post. Some do care, and for those that do they would feel less >_< ! if they had a bigger heads up.

If you, nick, or others ever want to discuss things that bother me on a real level... I have post replies out there :) Find my novels if you get bored enough on a lunch break. Lol

You suggest that players should be put back in the clockworks where they left off. It sounds like a nice idea at first blush, but I'm not sure it's practical. It would require storing and restoring the entire state of whatever level of the clockworks you're on. This kind of thing can be difficult to add when the program wasn't designed for it, and could itself lead to additional bugs when changes are made. And what do you do about parties? If you break them up, what if these players still wanted to play together? If you try to keep the groups together, what if one player in a group doesn't come back on immediately? If the party was in the middle of a frantic fight, when does the action resume? As soon as the server reboots? As soon as the first player gets back? How long after the reboot do you retain the data and allow players to pick up where they left off?

I also get a blank page on support page. Can't even get the email because it displays a blank page. And no, there is no adblocker / noscript here, all vanilla firefox. I tried on 3 PCs.

"maybe send system mail to all players so no one would be left out."

They did this, actually. It was an in-game mail warning not to go fight the Snarbolax until the bugfix was implemented (and that said bugfix would be pushed out ASAP). The mail was automatically removed from the inbox once the patch was out. Folks fighting the Snarbolax had ended up spending 50 Energy to go bash their heads against an unkillable brick wall, so... yeah.

"It seems to me (correct if I'm wrong) that they already have a similar system that goes on when a player get disconnected from the game for random reasons (pc/internet crash for example.) So I'm supposing here that the same could be applied when the server reboots."

They can do that because the server is still up and active and knows exactly where you are. To the rest of your party, you never left the dungeon (unless they kick you in between). They'll even see an "Unplugged" icon floating over your head until you reconnect (again, unless they kick you into your own instance before you get back). The dungeon is still active the whole time because the servers are still active the whole time.

They're not "saving and remembering" the stage you were on, they're just not removing you from it unless you're off for... 10 minutes, I think? It works specifically because the servers are NOT being shut down in between. Needless to say, rebooting the servers means shutting down the dungeons too. This doesn't work for the exact same reason you can't maintain a Team Fortress 2 server running on your computer while you are rebooting that very same computer.

@Cyberhaven

Hi! One or two other players who use the same e-mail service as you do have had a similar problem. If you'd like to send us an in-game support request letting us know what sort of help you were seeking from billing, we can get the ball rolling from there. Sorry for the inconvenience!

Eurydice is Batman or Batwomen and Hyperion is like Robin =0 EPIC

Patches are a touchy subject for most players; not only because they can interrupt game play, but because they also offer opportunity to both fix game play issues and possibly nerf aspects of the game players find enjoyable. Everybody has their preferences, and it is often an anxious time waiting to see how a patch will affect game play for dedicated players. More often than not, the changes are for the better, whether you like them or not. For that reason, it is my opinion that whenever a patch is released, it is worth the time sacrificed by players who have to restart runs, etc. . .

Having said that, however, I do support a better system of notification. Patches are partly intended to enhance or fix playability. In that regard it is counter productive to have game play interrupted when instead, a better system of announcement and maintenance can be put into effect. I think a regular maintenance period would remedy this perfectly. A designated maintenance period for non emergency patches would desist any interruption of game play, instead of "Surprise, patch time in 30 minutes." If that were the case, players would have no basis to file complaints, as they could then expect their game play to be (possibly) interrupted at a designated time, and would have been given sufficient notice if maintenance were actually scheduled for that time.

Emergency (unscheduled) patches are another story entirely, especially when game play might be determined by monetary investment ($$ -> CE -> Mid-run -> Surprise!). For unscheduled patches, it would seem fair to return part of the player's investment lost. A blanket 10 ME restitution to be distributed to all accounts would be fair, especially considering emergency patches fix the errors of the company and should not occur at the detriment of the player, especially especially considering monetary loss could be involved due to said errors. The added ME would be less likely to provide unnecessary benefit to players not logged on (as opposed to CE), and would alleviate (at least part of) the investment of time and money of players whose game play was interrupted by the unscheduled update by providing one free dungeon. This, of course, only becomes significant if regular maintenance periods were implemented, which I do think are necessary.

Just my two cents :) Overall, I think OOO does a fantastic job providing and maintaining a game that, frankly, I find to be far above the calibur of other MMOs; however, I feel there is enough room to improve policy regarding updates and the notification there of, that something should be done.

EDIT: Please overlook any run-ons and rambling.. I had a late night :3

I was thinking more along the lines of the GMs putting you back where you were, but I don't know if that is possible! :P

Am I the only one who finds it amusing that when coding this patch of the devs had absent-mindedly changed:

normalPercent = 50;
piercingPercent = 50;
isInvincible = true;

@Trouser: It could only be intentionally abused once or twice a week... If a reboot was coming people could just hang out at the end of a profitable level and restart, so I get your point there. It was just an idea though. The most balanced option would be the 10 CE charge to resume progress, but then people would likely still complain, lol. As it is currently, players could be left feeling like this...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F9gRzmCf1EI

@Eurydice: comforting to know the words aren't always wasted. That's one thing great about Three Rings I can't possibly dispute. Gm's and admins are very active and involved, unlike some other games I could easily name - mainstream and otherwise.

Why are you bumping a year old thread? Good lord man, they even sent a message that there would be some downtime today.

do you know how long they last?

Is the server down right now?

They should make a forum, Called the incinerator. You put a thread in it, And it just blows it up and it's gone forever.

(Post 23#) man that was so long ago man miss those guys. At first i didn't know this was an old thread but when I saw my name mentioned i knew this was old. I don't run anymore.