All Day Maintenance and Compensation: My Thoughts

[Camiie]

While true that XI had much shorter updates, do you forget it was usually followed by a week of emergency maintenance once a day for an hour?

Hnm hunters loved/hated it because tods were tossed around and you could calculate when stuff poped.

The 24h maint is fine theres usually no emergency maint or anything here.

Also, back in the day, their update servers would be overwhelmed (even after the playerbase started declining) and the actual update download could take hours... assuming it didn't fail and need to be restarted... or you could even connect at all...

[Velhart]

I think they either work very inefficiently or aren't tasking enough people. As I've said multiple times, they should be doing stability checks on a test server long before deployment, that's how good network engineers do it. This should be a simple process of pushing the data to servers, running a quick error check, and getting them back up. Based on the size of each patch, an 8-hour maintenance isn't unreasonable. And giving the day back is a day of play, not a refund, if you'd bothered to read the OP or any one of my posts.

WoW (unless they changed it) has a routine maintenance every Tuesday to make sure the game is kept in check of stability. This is something required of developers to make sure their game won't randomly crash and receive damage that can't be undone. SE does this every 4 months, which is very surprising for an MMO as big as this one. Is having only one day every 4 months, one right before a major patch with new content mind you, to check if everything is in quality control? One that is scheduled over a week ahead of time to prepare people. I don't think so.

[GunksFoy]

If it is about test driving, SE already do the same with the trial version of FF XIV.

FFS. It's not LITERAL. It's a comparison of customer care, not LITERALLY comparing test driving to the game. But I am done debating this, merely here to discuss it with the more reasonable people, who can fathom changing things you might like to see changed.

Snip

Indeed they did, although they changed that now. In 2018, you don't need weekly maintenance for server health. I agree that doing some stability testing once the patch is deployed is necessary, however, you should have already done the bulk of it on a test server. Also, I already said I don't think it's that big a deal, but what the OP asked for was not that ridiculous and he should not have been insulted. Especially when this can only possibly benefit people.

[NephthysVasudan]

FFS. It's not LITERAL. It's a comparison of customer care, not LITERALLY comparing test driving to the game. But I am done debating this, merely here to discuss it with the more reasonable people, who can fathom changing things you might like to see changed.

Yet YOU used it as a example in literal terms. YOU fought for it.
You can't go around yelling at people for something YOU said.
Make up your bloody mind.

[Velhart]

Indeed they did, although they changed that now. In 2018, you don't need weekly maintenance for server health. I agree that doing some stability testing once the patch is deployed is necessary, however, you should have already done the bulk of it on a test server. Also, I already said I don't think it's that big a deal, but what the OP asked for was not that ridiculous and he should not have been insulted. Especially when this can only possibly benefit people.

They likely have run them on test servers already. It doesn't mean they don't run tests when put onto their servers in three different region of servers. It seems like people like to make the process simpler than it actually is. The smallest of errors can potentially cause a server crash and cause you to be without your game even longer. They work on the test servers, but it doesn't mean a file can't get corrupted in the process of transferring this data to the regional datacenters. It needs a flexible time range to make sure this gets done. Imagine if you don't have that 24 hours to do that. I am sure the people working on this probably already feel stressed having one day to get everything in check. Granted, sometimes things go well enough and they even open the servers early. Then we may have times where complications occur and we have to wait a little longer. The nature of the process can truly be unpredictable.

[Brightshadow]

I don't think they need to compensate us, but if they want to, they can take advantage of the opportunity and perhaps give everyone free time from december 1 - 23rd every year to also promote the game to potential new customers since they could get it for Christmas.

[Iscah]

I don't think they need to compensate us, but if they want to, they can take advantage of the opportunity and perhaps give everyone free time from december 1 - 23rd every year to also promote the game to potential new customers since they could get it for Christmas.

“Promoting the game to new customers” is what the unlimited-time free trial is for.