Feedback regarding in-game bug reporting on the forums

[Ethereal]

Bit of feedback regarding in-game bug reporting, here on the forums. I'm not a fan on just moving someone's bug report to "working as intended" section, with no explanation. If I'm still having a problem and it's supposedly "working as intended", then whats the intention?

So we patiently wait a week for the bug submission to move into "Accepted Bugs", then wait another week for it to just get moved to "working as intended", and that's it?

There's nobody to talk to about it either. GM's either don't respond or they just send you the generic help desk message back saying to post your problem here, in the bug report section.

The customer support is atrocious. Sad, being a paying customer for 14 years. It's as if they prefer being completely disconnected from their playerbase.

Very sorry for the rant , but it's just not cool and certainly wouldn't fly where I work.


In reference to "Error code FFXI - 3322 when creating character name instead of 3313".

[Jiib]

I have had threads sitting in that forum without significant information for over a year.

[Tatl]

Do you believe the chat support told me he wasn't aware of the XInput flag fo the controller utility? And the reason is "because he play for years with the PS2 controller".

I'm still not believing.

Top quality for the support. > Not really.

I think they want this game to go. But how can they want this game to go if it's a paid game. It makes no sense.

[Sirmarki]

It certainly needs revising. Especially the template.
There is no need for the "Platform" section anymore for a start.

[Domille]

It certainly needs revising. Especially the template.

The template is the stupidest thing I've ever seen on here, and theres some stupid things that go on.

I straight up refuse to submit bugs, I could care less if they fix them due to the annoyance of all the irrelevant information they want.

[Nyarlko]

The template is the stupidest thing I've ever seen on here, and theres some stupid things that go on.

I straight up refuse to submit bugs, I could care less if they fix them due to the annoyance of all the irrelevant information they want.

Shortcut: Copy/Paste your own old bug reports > update relevant info...
Saves me a ton of time personally and greatly reduces any annoyance involved with submitting bug reports. ^^

[Khiril]

update relevant info...

On their template, only one line is actually relevant. That's the problem.

When they stop asking for irrelevant info, and actually address "bugs" THEN people might care.

[Nyarlko]

On their template, only one line is actually relevant. That's the problem.

When they stop asking for irrelevant info, and actually address "bugs" THEN people might care.

I'm pretty sure that the only line that is highly likely to be irrelevant in the majority of reports would be "Race". (And even that could be involved when it's an issue like armor models deforming/clipping oddly for one race.) Everything they ask for in the template could be considered to be a "likely cause" and should be ruled out ASAP in order to pinpoint where/why/what the reported error is occurring, and to confirm that it's a system error and not user-unique. The point of making a bug report using the template is to allow the devs to attempt to reproduce it using as close to identical conditions as possible.

So far, following the bug report template, I've had quite a few accepted and the only ones that weren't were admittedly questionable as to whether they could be classified as a bug, or withdrawn when I figured out what I was doing wrong. ^^;;

Honestly, I believe the biggest improvement we could get would be if the GMs in-game were required to instruct people to use the template when reporting bugs here... and possibly logging/reporting issues themselves once they confirm a player's problem/bug might be nice. <,<;;

edit: About "Race" XD There is one issue ingame that causes a somewhat significant difference in job performance. BST. Due to the JA range nerf a while back, BST is frequently rather close to their targets in order to pop Ready.. The funny thing is that due to player model size (taru>hume/elvaan/mithra>galka) there is a measurable difference in the positioning between the 3 races. It's only something like 0.1-0.2y IIRC, but that means that if a galka is just out of range of an AOE, then a taru on the same axis would most definitely get hit. -_-;; So yeah, occasionally, race can matter depending on the issue.

[Songen]

this is a game, however the game is nothing but data, the reason is as nyariko stated. to troubleshoot a problem (Whether its data or even eletrical)you need to rule out specifics first. alot of people get bugs not from the game but from the system they are connected to (More relevent back when PS2 was used) . even if a error is on the server, sometimes its because your system sent the wrong responce to the server that caused the server to have the error (Its how programing works, what you do from that point is work around the coding to make the error not repeat itself).beaware the template seems stupid but its a necessary action. as a gamer we just don't give a crap the effort thats involved in maintaining something like this. it might even be irelivent for 80% of stuff but its the 20% that makes the difference.

as for GM's, they aren't all computer genius programers that gave up the $million job to answer your complaint about why your controller sucks. GM's(Game masters) are general people with certain level of understanding of the game and computer programing (Some without programing experience) that have a set of rules and standard of practice in regards to your game play. they regulate the ingame within the rules and aren't given authority to do anything except whats in their standard of practice.

As for the programmers that look at issues and aim to fix it. they have no obligation to fix your specific problem imediently except for if you can't log in,
If they aren't responding to you it could be one of many reasons
*Your computer sucks (No trolling intended)
*your controller sucks (A little trolling intended)
*Your internet connection sucks (No trolling intended)
*your countrys connection is limited due to the telco your with or your telco has taken a dump
*you failed to click a box when signing up,
*you failed to check your email about said box
*you failed to install a expansion pack
*You failed to install ff11
*you failed to make sure your computer was compatible in the first place.
*Your drivers aren't installed
*Your hardware isn't installed
*Your firewall is blocking ff11 (This is a thing and its happened to me)
*Your antivirus deleted a necessary file to run FF11
*Your antivirus deleted your driver for your controller (Trolling intended)
*you have CAPS LOCK KEY activated on a case sensitive subject
*you pressed 2 buttons at once
*Your keyboard button is stuck without you knowing (This happened to me too and it was the right shift key)(Don't ask me why the right shift key)
*Continues on for the next 1hr or so.

Now then, thats from your part, the system info you provide in the template might not seem like much, but if your complaining why your screen is constantly auto rotating or why you can't stop auto running or why your macros aren't working, there is a extremely high likely hood its coming from your side and your system data is needed to rule off possible server -> computer data corruption

As for ingame problems they simply add it to the list of things they have to do and get to it depending on the priority of the problem, if they deem it unworthy or not priority, its not gonna get done, or gonna end up on the bottom of the list and they're not gonna respond to you since its more than likely a japanese encoder whose working on the problem. not only that your 80% gonna complain to them if they don't fix it or don't fix it fast so why deal with you in the first place?

There are thousands if not hundreds of thousands of players playing atm, everyones got some problem, whether you have submitted the problem or the server's inbuilt detection system finds something (You vs the server, the server will win on priority)

[Khiril]

Platform: Irrelevant, no longer exists
ISP: Irrelevant. They cannot possibly use your ISP to verify your bug.
Type of Internet Connection: Irrelevant. No way shape or form can dsl vs cable make any distinguishable change.
Internet Connection Speed: Irrelevant. Game is designed for 56k speed won't change anything.
Date & Time: Matters for the Log.
Frequency: Matters if it's intermittent or not*
Character Name: (mostly irrelevant as your avatar is your character. but mules etc)
Race: Irrelevant. If you don't know that T means your mithra can't wear wonder clomps: Uninstall.
World: Again mostly irrelevant your avatar shows your server.
Main Job: What I'm on is Irrelevant.
Support Job: My sub job is 100% irrelevant.
Area and Coordinates: Important
Party or Solo: Irrelevant.
NPC Name: Important
Monster Name: See NPC name
Steps: Important
<*Add more steps if necessary.>