Spiral Knights - Benefit of the Doubt

Benefit of the Doubt

7 replies [Last post]

Wed, 09/26/2012 - 22:58

Thinslayer

I'm seeing a lot of rage at OOO over this CE bug.

What is so hard about giving them the benefit of the doubt? Do you KNOW whether OOO meant to exploit the bug in some fashion? Do you KNOW that they intended to wait 4 hours to fix it? Or are you just "pretty certain?" Because I can tell you right now, that's not good enough.

Let me see: 1) This is a computer game, 2) with millions of lines of code, 3) made by a company that relies on its customers for its income. Maybe they waited 4 hours to remove the bug because that's how long it took them to find and fix it! Gee, what a concept! The programmers are actually human and can't find bugs in the span of one minute! Who would have thought?

Oh, you think OOO caused it in the first place? Well, I have news for you - they need customers! /gasp Their customers don't like stupid bugs that raise CE prices through the roof and drive off budding new players! Without customers, they'll lose money. Who knew? This is like Business 101 all over again!

Some of you don't believe that the millions of crowns made in profit couldn't have been spent on UVs. Why not?? Wouldn't you do the same if you had a zillion crowns to play with? With prices that high, no one in their right mind is going to convert it back into CE until the bug is fixed. Maybe Auction House buyouts are possible, but it's unlikely that it's the first thing that came to your mind when you just got 10 million crowns.

There are just FAR too many conspiracy theories floating around here for me to just sit quietly and watch you all bash my favorite MMO. This is a game, it has bugs, and its devs need to fix them in order to keep making money. Plain and simple. Just give them the benefit of the doubt and get back to playing, okay?

I look forward to seeing you all in the Clockworks.

Thu, 09/27/2012 - 04:17

Guyinshinyarmour

Conspiracy kinda tends to be tinfoil hat wearing. Not much of a conspiracy if it's entirely logical.

It's not that they took four hours to fix it, but that they left the game online for four hours to fix it. People are saying the game shoulda been taken offline until the damage was repaired. Far easier to fix a ship in drydock than out on the ocean. Tend to do a better job of it too.

Even I doubt OOO is morally bankrupt enough to actually *cause* this whole thing. But that they mighta seen what effects it caused, saw it was positive to their bottom line, and let it be? Perhaps... It's not all that crazy, given corporate culture.

While I think it unlikely that the majority of the cr was sunk out through rolling, I certainly am not gonna call OOO liars. Though I will wonder what kind of killer UVs these people got, that others have to pay out the bum for. Even more interesting to see how many of them were turned around and sold at positive gain. But that's only concerning Punch. Still doesn't tackle those that held onto the money to buy ce at normal price, or for auctions. Those few got to profit. OOO is telling us, "If you have wrongly profited, whether willfully or not, we will do nothing to you. It is not worth it to us, and we do not care. You good citizens are playing on an uneven playing field. Deal with it." Not a good message if you want people to be secure in their investment (time, money, or otherwise).

I'd also like to remind you we all have been burned a few times before due to how poorly OOO handles these kinds of situations. They can drive a car just fine, but throw a deer in their way and they'll hit it every damn time, no matter how far they saw it coming. Guess they get the same stupid look the deer does.

Thu, 09/27/2012 - 04:39

Darkbrady

That's just what happens in

That's just what happens in MMOs, Thinslayer. People see a tiny problem and explode over it. Some folk just honestly expect their chosen game to be tailor made to their every whim and desire and just go off the deep end if anything happens that negatively affects them (or even just doesn't affect them positively). They like to forget that Devs are just people running the game, humans, and that the evil corporations they like to blame often have little to do with the front-line Devs that actually do the bug fixing, damage control, community manageament etc...

Btw, I'm not aiming that at you, Guyinshinyarmour; you may not be happy with this, but you're being reasonable enough about it, and I do agree with some of what you're saying: plenty of people fully benefited from it at no cost, and I know for a fact that although "most" of it may have been sunk, there's still a fair amount being banked away...and that a shutdown would have been pertinent, but the window for that ended fast~

Thu, 09/27/2012 - 04:48

Kalaina-Elderfall

The time required to find and

The time required to find and fix the bug is largely irrelevant. If they'd had the ability to roll the game back an hour, what they should have done was see "Oh hey, someone is pumping an infinite amount of crowns into the market," immediately shut the game off, assess whether it was probably an exploit or not, and then immediately roll it back.

I don't think they have the ability to just roll back an hour whenever they feel like it. If they do, then it's easily what they should have done and we have a right to be angry. Apparently a lot of people thought it was rich players quitting for some reason. My mind immediately jumped to "exploit abuser, infinite crowns, OOO had better roll this back". You know, within 5 minutes of it happening. If I can draw that conclusion, OOO can too. But I don't believe a rollback is that easy, and I trust that they aren't stupid enough to not take the most blindingly obvious course of action.

But it has nothing to do with fixing the actual exploit; that could have been done at their leisure while the game was offline.

Thu, 09/27/2012 - 17:20

Thinslayer

Offline... for 4 hours??

A lot can be achieved in 4 hours. A full tank of mist energy can be expended in about 2 hours. It's possible that more damage would have been done by keeping the game offline for 4 hours than would have been done leaving it online during the exploit. Or perhaps they simply do not have the ability to roll back the game.

Thu, 09/27/2012 - 18:45

Broxaim

@thinslayer

I think you're missing the point.

noone is saying that 4 hours is nothing, they are saying that: in 4 hours a lot can be done.
that's why AFTER an exploit of this magnitude, 3 rings should have shut down the servers until they have the problem fixed.
because in that 4 hours of gameplay after the exploit, a lot of damage was done.

also, they have the ability to roll back the server, but they won't
because making all the players who were online lose 4 hours+ of progress is more damaging to their name and brand than letting these crowns into the economy.

however if they turned off the server, and fixed the bug then rolled back, people would lose minimal stuff.
Yes the servers will be down, but that is no where as damaging as losing stuff you have earned.

We're not suggesting any conspiracy theories, we are just commenting on the decisions that 3 rings made at these critical times.
1. When the exploit was found what could they do? shut down the server and fix this, or let it go on. (personally i would have shut it down, because it was a big issue)
2. after the issue was resolved should they roll back to before the problem? (personally at that time it was too late to do a roll back so i would agree, however if they had shutdown the server immediately, the roll back wouldn't have been as much of an issue)
3. now that the bug is fixed should we spend the time and effort of our programmers to trace where those crowns went and rectify the problem. that means seeing which UVs were rolled and what crowns were traded for CE or not, and individually revert those events. (personally i would have, because letting things like this go on affects the integrity of the company)

so we aren't saying that the exploit is 3 rings' fault, we just wish they made better choices after the fact.

Thu, 09/27/2012 - 20:27

Fehzor

So lets say that a rollback is not possible, and that the game being down for 4 hours is a crime against nature.

OOO could have, and still could, generate CE to put on the market to fix things as a way to at least fix the crown influx. While you might say "But its a player driven economy!", OOO could say "This is one exception due to crazy circumstances." and all would be well.

What should have happened, in order of prevalence, pending on whether its possible:
1. A server rollback to right before the "crisis"+shutdown for 4 hours+explanation
2. Select removal and tracing of as many of the crowns bought by those who broke rules+shutdown for 4 hours while fixing the code+explanation
3. Shut down the server for 4 hours; explain to the players that you cannot perform the above.
4. Addition of CE onto the market until prices return to normal+explanation.

Thu, 09/27/2012 - 21:15

Thinslayer

Interesting

Perhaps their decision was bad in hindsight, but consider what they would have done at the time. Shutting down the server is highly unusual, and it simply may not have occurred to them. A reboot is more common. Rollback has never been done before in this game, and is likely to be equally rare in other MMOs, so it probably didn't occur to them either. Considering their policies, it's more likely that they tracked the flow of CE and crowns to determine the source of the exploit. That means live observation, and no shutdowns. And since players didn't report it right away, they probably couldn't track the problem as early as you would have liked.

Point is, companies tend to do what is best for business. That means keeping the customers happy as well. Not that companies don't make mistakes (they are made up of humans, after all), but you can count on them to try to fix their problems in the best possible way. Unreliable and broken products don't make money, and are therefore not what is best.

I hope that the above possible explanation is rational.

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Benefit of the Doubt