Smaller more frequent updates

(chippy) #1

What are the chances of this happening (if at all)? I’d love to see smaller, more frequent updates (providing we don’t have to redownload the 4 or so gigs everytime).

As a crude example, every two weeks we get an update which consists of things like, changing ability cooldown times, return times for objectives, altered walljump height, shotgun spread test and things of that nature. Not major ones as we just saw, just small “quick-to-change-and-test”, regen/healing rates.

I’m definately not saying to skip the big ones, it’s just something I’d like to see.

For instance, you release a big update that gives Fragger a faster healing rate from Auras med station (for whatever reason), you notice people going ape**** about it you tweak it every so slighty (along with other things you notice), and ship out an update 2-3 weeks after.

Maybe I’m wrong here, but I also think this would bring back some of the players if they see that more updates (even though small and maybe not very “crucial”) are being shipped out and you actively try some stuff around. In the end, you might see a much bigger positive change if you change that little number that seemed so useless in the beginning.

Maybe it’s just wishful thinking, thought I should at least ask. :slight_smile:

(spookify) #2

[QUOTE=chippy;514943]What are the chances of this happening (if at all)? I’d love to see smaller, more frequent updates (providing we don’t have to redownload the 4 or so gigs everytime).

As a crude example, every two weeks we get an update which consists of things like, changing ability cooldown times, return times for objectives, altered walljump height, shotgun spread test and things of that nature. Not major ones as we just saw, just small “quick-to-change-and-test”, regen/healing rates.

I’m definately not saying to skip the big ones, it’s just something I’d like to see.

For instance, you release a big update that gives Fragger a faster healing rate from Auras med station (for whatever reason), you notice people going ape**** about it you tweak it every so slighty (along with other things you notice), and ship out an update 2-3 weeks after.

Maybe I’m wrong here, but I also think this would bring back some of the players if they see that more updates (even though small and maybe not very “crucial”) are being shipped out and you actively try some stuff around. In the end, you might see a much bigger positive change if you change that little number that seemed so useless in the beginning.

Maybe it’s just wishful thinking, thought I should at least ask. :)[/QUOTE]

Tweaked spawn times or Balance updates every week?

(chippy) #3

I’m obviously not saying a complete rework of everything every week. Take the current spawn times as an example, we’ve had it for a few weeks, you could easily just add or take away a few seconds without too much hassle and see what impact it might have. Same goes for stuff like HP regen, I can’t imagine (though I could be wrong) it would be that hard just to make a small change to see what happens.

(Violator) #4

Not sure I want a 3GB download every week :). I’m assuming stuff like spawntimes are set server-side though so would be some scope to test this more often.

(Szakalot) #5

This!

Also, some changes require time for players to be able to adapt to them. We are a week into a patch and you can already see a shift in the meta: people spam way way more than before, particularly stoker. Give it another week, and every arty fan will switch to Red Eye with the newly OP battlerifle : P

Not to mention that releasing small updates regularly would probably add even MORE work, and it already feels like the Dev team is stretched a bit.

(Mustang) #6

IIRC a lot of the stuff like spawn times are actually individually baked into the maps ATM, so to change them you have to re-download the entire map (effectively).

(Violator) #7

Thats a shame, but I think you’re right with the UT engine as it ‘cooks’ everything :(. Having script files in for example ET made it easy to tweak these things on the server.