Yeah, they may feel like evil Bungie is out to get them, but I'm very sympathetic to how difficult it is to maintain this ecosystem they have built, and I think these exploits have a ripple effect that disrupt the ecosystem, and have the potential to make the game less fun for everyone.

On the other hand, I doubt that kind of analysis is the deciding factor that often. The ease and impact of the fix probably weighs heavy, and as outsiders, any theories we make about that are likely rubbish.

A friend of mine once likened the process of dealing with software bugs to dealing with actual bugs.

He said "if you're at the cottage and you're surrounded by Mosquitos, you swat anything that lands on you... even if it isn't a mosquito."

I don't know how accurate that is, but it makes me smile :)

Having spent over a decade as a tester, I can tell you that it's not a very apt analogy at all. Basically you class your bugs as either A (must fix, major issues such as corrupted saves, crashes, missions that can't be completed), B (should fix, big issue, such as holes in the world, a character in a cutscene missing his face, melee attacks dealing small amounts of splash damage back to yourself), C (minor issue, usually art bugs like "suros logo on gun A is red, but is orage on gun B, should be more consistent), DNF (do not fix, which is usually stupid stuff the producer doesn't want you to waste your time on), WNF (will not fix, which is usually complicated stuff the programmers don't want to spend time on), or NAB (not a bug, which is stuff that isn't actually a bug at all, such as "Enemies with orange shields appear to take extra damage from solar weapons").

Exploits are almost always class A, especially in multiplayer games.

Likewise, horrible boss glitches that completely wipe the raid should be class A. An argument could be made, I suppose, for them being class B as they don't prevent you from trying again, but if I were on that team I'd have fought for it to be class A.

--

It's all beside the point though: Once Bungie acknowledges a problem, 6 months without motion on it is too long.

I would much rather have a predictable game environment when it comes to mechanics. If something is going to change, I'd rather it occur with other changes that let me adjust. If I have to read the change log each week to see if a technique I use is going to work or not, I might just give up.

Honestly, I think I like Bungie's approach to fixes better than the live beta test model.

As someone who played a boatload of ME3 multiplayer, the weekly tweaks worked beautifully. Because they made updates so frequently, they were always relatively minor and focused on 1 or 2 elements. It only took a few minutes to get a feel for the balance tweaks each time. I prefer such an approach to 6+ months of substantial imbalance with zero changes to improve things. Especially because it sometimes takes a couple tries to get the changes just right. 2.0 is a huge improvement in many ways, but blink+shotgun is only slightly better than it was before. I hope we don't need to wait another 6 months to see it addressed further.

Honestly, I think I like Bungie's approach to fixes better than the live beta test model.

They just reduce all Black Spindles by 20, safe in the knowledge that no Spindle currently exists that hasn't benefitted from this bug.

That's what I'd do.

Well if they do, I give you my word to bitch about it since DeeJ clearly said that infusing wouldn't be impacted. :D

Yeah, they may feel like evil Bungie is out to get them, but I'm very sympathetic to how difficult it is to maintain this ecosystem they have built, and I think these exploits have a ripple effect that disrupt the ecosystem, and have the potential to make the game less fun for everyone.

On the other hand, I doubt that kind of analysis is the deciding factor that often. The ease and impact of the fix probably weighs heavy, and as outsiders, any theories we make about that are likely rubbish.

A friend of mine once likened the process of dealing with software bugs to dealing with actual bugs.

He said "if you're at the cottage and you're surrounded by Mosquitos, you swat anything that lands on you... even if it isn't a mosquito."

I don't know how accurate that is, but it makes me smile :)

Clearly Bungie swatted the wrong stuff, because there are already reports of no engrams droping from Valus Ta'aurc, and chests on the dreadnaught not giving anything at all after the hotfix.

Yeah, they may feel like evil Bungie is out to get them, but I'm very sympathetic to how difficult it is to maintain this ecosystem they have built, and I think these exploits have a ripple effect that disrupt the ecosystem, and have the potential to make the game less fun for everyone.

On the other hand, I doubt that kind of analysis is the deciding factor that often. The ease and impact of the fix probably weighs heavy, and as outsiders, any theories we make about that are likely rubbish.

A friend of mine once likened the process of dealing with software bugs to dealing with actual bugs.

He said "if you're at the cottage and you're surrounded by Mosquitos, you swat anything that lands on you... even if it isn't a mosquito."

I don't know how accurate that is, but it makes me smile :)

Yeah, they may feel like evil Bungie is out to get them, but I'm very sympathetic to how difficult it is to maintain this ecosystem they have built, and I think these exploits have a ripple effect that disrupt the ecosystem, and have the potential to make the game less fun for everyone.

What ecosystem? You can't trade or sell items and weapons. If the game designers did a good job and all guns are in balance, then it won't even matter in PvP. Atheon getting pushed off was as big a problem as it was because the Mythoclast was ridiculously overpowered in PvP.

"Hey, people are making new characters to buy strange coins." Fixed that weekend(maybe even that day, I wasn't playing then).

"Xur isn't selling heavy ammo packs while everyone is complaining about losing 2-3 rockets on death." Takes month(s) to add back to his inventory.

Some things are trivial to fix. Other things aren't.

Are you saying that trivial things should be ignored until the important, difficult ones are fully finished? (Do you even think the same people are working on the two classes of bugs?)

While this example is one design bug and another code bug, his point really does strike me as valid. Destiny's exploits have been fixed very quickly (Aetheon grenade - dodging off the ledge, Crota disconnect during AoE grenade damage, others I can't immediately recall) while Destiny's more anti-player bugs (Aetheon not teleporting anyone, Crota attacking before standing up, sword disappearing during the Crota fight, etc.) lingered for very long times.

The net result is that it feels like Bungie is intentionally favoring bug fixes which aid the player, but leaving in bugs which put the player at a disadvantage. Heck, some of the "bugs" Bungie fixed were really just very novel approaches to the existing fights, but those got "fixed" anyway.

All of your examples of exploits are things players did voluntarily (after stumbling across them, or, far more likely, reading about them on the internet). All of your examples of 'anti-player bugs' are things that happen to (some) players, totally involuntarily.

That is: if something affects 5% of your userbase (well, probably way less than that - I've done a dozen Crota raids and Crota's never stood up for me, a huge percentage of Destiny players have never even TRIED Crota), that's one level of damage-vs-gain discussion, in terms of fixing.

If someone comes up with an exploit that affects double-digit percentages of your playerbase (and that number continues to increase, since it's a VOLUNTARY thing people are seeking out), it behooves you to spend a little extra time fixing it sooner.

Or, you know, buggy bosses could be harder to troubleshoot than, say, putting up a guardrail for your endboss.

Ultimately, I think you're completely right. But I do see why some players feel at least a bit puzzled by the speed at which certain "player friendly" exploits are fixed or removed compared to other problems. The Crota fight is a good example. That final hard mode boss fight was so bug-riddled that fireteams could do everything perfectly and still fail time after time due to erratic AI glitches or even laggy boss movements. The Ethernet cable pull was a move of desperation: players were sick of feeling screwed over by the game, so they resorted to whatever method they could. Bungie fixed the cable-pull exploit almost immediately, but months later Crota still glitches around all over the place.

Same with the loot cave. Players felt the game was too stingy with loot rewards so they found a way to earn more. Bungie would eventually improve loot drops, but not until months after the cave was patched.

Again, I agree with you. Some fixes are simple, while others aren't. Some take priority over others. But I see how some people might think the prioritize toon feels unfair in some cases.

Yeah, they may feel like evil Bungie is out to get them, but I'm very sympathetic to how difficult it is to maintain this ecosystem they have built, and I think these exploits have a ripple effect that disrupt the ecosystem, and have the potential to make the game less fun for everyone.

On the other hand, I doubt that kind of analysis is the deciding factor that often. The ease and impact of the fix probably weighs heavy, and as outsiders, any theories we make about that are likely rubbish.

"Hey, people are making new characters to buy strange coins." Fixed that weekend(maybe even that day, I wasn't playing then).

"Xur isn't selling heavy ammo packs while everyone is complaining about losing 2-3 rockets on death." Takes month(s) to add back to his inventory.

Some things are trivial to fix. Other things aren't.

Are you saying that trivial things should be ignored until the important, difficult ones are fully finished? (Do you even think the same people are working on the two classes of bugs?)

While this example is one design bug and another code bug, his point really does strike me as valid. Destiny's exploits have been fixed very quickly (Aetheon grenade - dodging off the ledge, Crota disconnect during AoE grenade damage, others I can't immediately recall) while Destiny's more anti-player bugs (Aetheon not teleporting anyone, Crota attacking before standing up, sword disappearing during the Crota fight, etc.) lingered for very long times.

The net result is that it feels like Bungie is intentionally favoring bug fixes which aid the player, but leaving in bugs which put the player at a disadvantage. Heck, some of the "bugs" Bungie fixed were really just very novel approaches to the existing fights, but those got "fixed" anyway.

All of your examples of exploits are things players did voluntarily (after stumbling across them, or, far more likely, reading about them on the internet). All of your examples of 'anti-player bugs' are things that happen to (some) players, totally involuntarily.

That is: if something affects 5% of your userbase (well, probably way less than that - I've done a dozen Crota raids and Crota's never stood up for me, a huge percentage of Destiny players have never even TRIED Crota), that's one level of damage-vs-gain discussion, in terms of fixing.

If someone comes up with an exploit that affects double-digit percentages of your playerbase (and that number continues to increase, since it's a VOLUNTARY thing people are seeking out), it behooves you to spend a little extra time fixing it sooner.

Or, you know, buggy bosses could be harder to troubleshoot than, say, putting up a guardrail for your endboss.

Ultimately, I think you're completely right. But I do see why some players feel at least a bit puzzled by the speed at which certain "player friendly" exploits are fixed or removed compared to other problems. The Crota fight is a good example. That final hard mode boss fight was so bug-riddled that fireteams could do everything perfectly and still fail time after time due to erratic AI glitches or even laggy boss movements. The Ethernet cable pull was a move of desperation: players were sick of feeling screwed over by the game, so they resorted to whatever method they could. Bungie fixed the cable-pull exploit almost immediately, but months later Crota still glitches around all over the place.

Same with the loot cave. Players felt the game was too stingy with loot rewards so they found a way to earn more. Bungie would eventually improve loot drops, but not until months after the cave was patched.

Again, I agree with you. Some fixes are simple, while others aren't. Some take priority over others. But I see how some people might think the prioritize toon feels unfair in some cases.

"Hey, people are making new characters to buy strange coins." Fixed that weekend(maybe even that day, I wasn't playing then).

"Xur isn't selling heavy ammo packs while everyone is complaining about losing 2-3 rockets on death." Takes month(s) to add back to his inventory.

Some things are trivial to fix. Other things aren't.

Are you saying that trivial things should be ignored until the important, difficult ones are fully finished? (Do you even think the same people are working on the two classes of bugs?)

While this example is one design bug and another code bug, his point really does strike me as valid. Destiny's exploits have been fixed very quickly (Aetheon grenade - dodging off the ledge, Crota disconnect during AoE grenade damage, others I can't immediately recall) while Destiny's more anti-player bugs (Aetheon not teleporting anyone, Crota attacking before standing up, sword disappearing during the Crota fight, etc.) lingered for very long times.

The net result is that it feels like Bungie is intentionally favoring bug fixes which aid the player, but leaving in bugs which put the player at a disadvantage. Heck, some of the "bugs" Bungie fixed were really just very novel approaches to the existing fights, but those got "fixed" anyway.

All of your examples of exploits are things players did voluntarily (after stumbling across them, or, far more likely, reading about them on the internet). All of your examples of 'anti-player bugs' are things that happen to (some) players, totally involuntarily.

That is: if something affects 5% of your userbase (well, probably way less than that - I've done a dozen Crota raids and Crota's never stood up for me, a huge percentage of Destiny players have never even TRIED Crota), that's one level of damage-vs-gain discussion, in terms of fixing.

If someone comes up with an exploit that affects double-digit percentages of your playerbase (and that number continues to increase, since it's a VOLUNTARY thing people are seeking out), it behooves you to spend a little extra time fixing it sooner.

Or, you know, buggy bosses could be harder to troubleshoot than, say, putting up a guardrail for your endboss.

"Hey, people are making new characters to buy strange coins." Fixed that weekend(maybe even that day, I wasn't playing then).

"Xur isn't selling heavy ammo packs while everyone is complaining about losing 2-3 rockets on death." Takes month(s) to add back to his inventory.

Some things are trivial to fix. Other things aren't.

Are you saying that trivial things should be ignored until the important, difficult ones are fully finished? (Do you even think the same people are working on the two classes of bugs?)

While this example is one design bug and another code bug, his point really does strike me as valid. Destiny's exploits have been fixed very quickly (Aetheon grenade - dodging off the ledge, Crota disconnect during AoE grenade damage, others I can't immediately recall) while Destiny's more anti-player bugs (Aetheon not teleporting anyone, Crota attacking before standing up, sword disappearing during the Crota fight, etc.) lingered for very long times.

The net result is that it feels like Bungie is intentionally favoring bug fixes which aid the player, but leaving in bugs which put the player at a disadvantage. Heck, some of the "bugs" Bungie fixed were really just very novel approaches to the existing fights, but those got "fixed" anyway.

I'm going to parrot the "Some things are trivial to fix, other things aren't." I have a sneaking suspicion that the buggy bosses were/are much more difficult to debug & fix than the exploits due to the underlying nature of the thing. Networking, lag, & synchronization all can make things quite tricksey.

Bungie employee: "Thorn is a really big problem, as well as blink/shotguns for the crucible."

Bungie MGMT: "Ehh, we can get to that in about 6 months, they will survive."

Bungie employee: "Oh, by the way, the Black Spindle is dropping from the daily at 310 damage, alot of players got it."

Bungie MGMT: " They got something that is HELPING them! Better fix this S*!t right away! This is WRONG."

Whats the harm is us having a 310? That wasnt the obvious intention, but its not that big of a deal. Its not Game breaking. When people only wanted to play with people with Gjallerhorn, nothing was done at the time, and that was a big negative effect.

It's just also really hard to resolve balance issues like blink/shotguns, rather than just bumping some attack values on a single gun.

But you don't have to achieve perfect balance the first time around to put your finger on the scale and make it feel more fair. Tweaking the delay after blink before a shotgun can be fired seems simple to me. You tweak a little, see how it works, tweak a little more... Mass Effect 3 did weekly balance changes to anything that seemed over or under powered. Sometimes it took a month or two to get it exactly right, but they nailed the approach. Bungie did *nothing* for six+ months. I honestly don't care about them doing internal testing to get it right; they should just make a small change to the live environment to show that attention is being paid, and then see how that change worked out. They can always change it back in a week if they don't like the results.

TL;DR: Inactivity is still a choice, and often the wrong one. Failure to try is failure to succeed.

"Hey, people are making new characters to buy strange coins." Fixed that weekend(maybe even that day, I wasn't playing then).

"Xur isn't selling heavy ammo packs while everyone is complaining about losing 2-3 rockets on death." Takes month(s) to add back to his inventory.

Some things are trivial to fix. Other things aren't.

Are you saying that trivial things should be ignored until the important, difficult ones are fully finished? (Do you even think the same people are working on the two classes of bugs?)

While this example is one design bug and another code bug, his point really does strike me as valid. Destiny's exploits have been fixed very quickly (Aetheon grenade - dodging off the ledge, Crota disconnect during AoE grenade damage, others I can't immediately recall) while Destiny's more anti-player bugs (Aetheon not teleporting anyone, Crota attacking before standing up, sword disappearing during the Crota fight, etc.) lingered for very long times.

The net result is that it feels like Bungie is intentionally favoring bug fixes which aid the player, but leaving in bugs which put the player at a disadvantage. Heck, some of the "bugs" Bungie fixed were really just very novel approaches to the existing fights, but those got "fixed" anyway.

"Hey, people are making new characters to buy strange coins." Fixed that weekend(maybe even that day, I wasn't playing then).

"Xur isn't selling heavy ammo packs while everyone is complaining about losing 2-3 rockets on death." Takes month(s) to add back to his inventory.

Some things are trivial to fix. Other things aren't.

Are you saying that trivial things should be ignored until the important, difficult ones are fully finished? (Do you even think the same people are working on the two classes of bugs?)

"Xur isn't selling heavy ammo packs while everyone is complaining about losing 2-3 rockets on death." Takes month(s) to add back to his inventory.

"The Black Spindle is dropping at 310."

"Doh!"

Bungie employee: "Thorn is a really big problem, as well as blink/shotguns for the crucible."

Bungie MGMT: "Ehh, we can get to that in about 6 months, they will survive."

Bungie employee: "Oh, by the way, the Black Spindle is dropping from the daily at 310 damage, alot of players got it."

Bungie MGMT: " They got something that is HELPING them! Better fix this S*!t right away! This is WRONG."

Whats the harm is us having a 310? That wasnt the obvious intention, but its not that big of a deal. Its not Game breaking. When people only wanted to play with people with Gjallerhorn, nothing was done at the time, and that was a big negative effect.

It's just also really hard to resolve balance issues like blink/shotguns, rather than just bumping some attack values on a single gun.