Top issues tracked by the GM team: 3-2-10

[GM_Litana]

Every week, I will post an update on the issues that the GM team has been tracking during the previous week, with the current status of each issue. This list is by no means exhaustive, and it will often not include key issues already being addressed by the developers elsewhere on the forums. There will be some overlap, but our emphasis is always on how much each issue is impacting you, the players.

Here are the issues we've been following over the last week:


Promotion missions
Many of you have been having trouble completing your promotion missions, or running into situations which cause them to simply break and not be completable. The way the missions are designed, it's impossible to drop promotion missions, so even if the objectives are complete they can't be turned in. The developers have heard you and are working hard to fix this. Their fix should allow you to clear the mission without any outside intervention, and they hope to have that fix ready for testing soon.


Running the command /killme does not submit a GM ticket!
I found this last week and sort of flipped, but we have a temporary solution! Here's the issue: If you get stuck and type /stuck, the game will nudge your character a few feet to a safe location. Most of the time, this is all you need to free yourself from getting stuck in geometry. If you type /stuck a second time, it will prompt you to type /killme, which brings up the Stuck window. This has some useful self-help buttons and a way to submit a Stuck ticket to ask for GM help.

The problem is that it doesn't actually submit a ticket if you ask it to. I have no idea how many of you might have done this and been worried or confused because we didn't answer your ticket, and that is upsetting to think about. Unfortunately we have not been able to simply disable the command, but we hope to have the command fixed as quickly as possible. You can still see the self-help options and submit a GM Stuck ticket from the Help and Support menu on your mini-map.


Cage of Fire/Bajoran Fire Caves
Yeah, the pathing in this mission isn't good, and that isn't the only issue you've been reporting. The developers are very aware of the various challenges with this mission and have been actively reviewing/fixing each one. They expect fixes to be ready for testing soon.


Divide et Impera: Admiral Zelle becoming unresponsive
Admiral Zelle has been behaving erratically for a while. There are situations where she can become unresponsive before transforming into an Undine, as well as after her transformation. This has been escalated to the developers and is definitely on their radar.


Trapped: Debris from the wormhole can get players stuck
As funny as this may sound, getting stuck in a mission called Trapped, it's actually a big deal, and it's been sent to the developers. The problem is that, once stuck, our self-help utilities often don't work to help you get unstuck in this mission. Unfortunately we don't have an accurate picture of how you can best free yourself if this happens, since it happens rarely. I believe that /stuck should still work to nudge you out of the debris, but I'm not 100% sure. Failing that, it appears that the only workaround is to actually log out of the game for a little while while the instance resets itself, usually after 15 minutes. When you come back, you should be in the next stage of the mission, and good to go. However, we hate asking players to log out, since it's no fun at all and ruins the flow of the game. Tune in next week to see the progress on this bug!


Scientist rank 9 does not unlock Science Team III
This actually comes down to a UI/labeling issue. Although the UI states that it's Scientist rank 9 that unlocks the ability to train this power, it's currently being unlocked by Doctor rank 9. The fix for this is being tested so that it can be ready soon. Until it's in, please bear with us with the confusing labeling. Also, remember that you can only train class-specific skills to bridge officers if you are of the appropriate class. A Tactical Captain would not be able to train this to a Science bridge officer, but a Science Captain would. This has added to the confusion, and we are looking into how to communicate this more clearly.


Preemptive Strike: Behind Enemy Lines: Can't rescue last prisoner
Our developers are aware of this issue and are working to have the fix tested and in soon.


Doomsday Device sometimes doesn't complete when teamed
This should have been fixed last week. However, there have been a couple of scattered reports since then of players not being able to get the mission to complete, even with all objectives done, while on a team. This is distinct from any issues getting the special torpedoes, flying through the planet core, etc. If you are teamed and run into problems completing the final stage of the mission, please post about it and submit an in-game Bug Report so I can investigate.


Various missions losing progress
This is a rather sticky issue, or rather group of issues. There are several missions we've seen reports of that have the nasty habit of losing your progress after telling you they are done, and telling you to move on, or leave to sector space. Generally, they will revert to saying only 2 or 3 mission stages are done, or even prompting you to start over. We're working to identify each mission where this occurs, identify any key reproduction steps, and escalate each one to the developers to fix. Progress will be slow on getting every last one of them fixed, but so far several have been. If you have this happen to you, please try the mission again a second time. If the mission fails again but does not block your forward progression, please submit a bug report and move on. Hopefully we'll have most of these dealt with swiftly.

[Jordan Collier]

Originally Posted by GM_Litana

Failing that, it appears that the only workaround is to actually log out of the game for a little while while the instance resets itself, usually after 15 minutes. When you come back, you should be in the next stage of the mission, and good to go. However, we hate asking players to log out, since it's no fun at all and ruins the flow of the game. Tune in next week to see the progress on this bug!

Joining a PvP queue or using the Abandon Ship ability are also workarounds for this and don't take that long.

[Jeff-El]

I love the idea of this post, and hope to see many more in the future.

As much as I'd love to ask you for an ETA, I know you really can't answer that - you know we're all waiting with bated breath!

[ajac09]

Originally Posted by GM_Litana

Every week, I will post an update on the issues that the GM team has been tracking during the previous week, with the current status of each issue. This list is by no means exhaustive, and it will often not include key issues already being addressed by the developers elsewhere on the forums. There will be some overlap, but our emphasis is always on how much each issue is impacting you, the players.

Here are the issues we've been following over the last week:


Promotion missions
Many of you have been having trouble completing your promotion missions, or running into situations which cause them to simply break and not be completable. The way the missions are designed, it's impossible to drop promotion missions, so even if the objectives are complete they can't be turned in. The developers have heard you and are working hard to fix this. Their fix should allow you to clear the mission without any outside intervention, and they hope to have that fix ready for testing soon.


Running the command /killme does not submit a GM ticket!
I found this last week and sort of flipped, but we have a temporary solution! Here's the issue: If you get stuck and type /stuck, the game will nudge your character a few feet to a safe location. Most of the time, this is all you need to free yourself from getting stuck in geometry. If you type /stuck a second time, it will prompt you to type /killme, which brings up the Stuck window. This has some useful self-help buttons and a way to submit a Stuck ticket to ask for GM help.

The problem is that it doesn't actually submit a ticket if you ask it to. I have no idea how many of you might have done this and been worried or confused becuase we didn't answer your ticket, and that is upsetting to think about. Because of this, we'll be disabling the command entirely for now, until we get the issue resolved. You can still see the self-help options and submit a GM Stuck ticket from the Help and Support menu on your mini-map.


Cage of Fire/Bajoran Fire Caves
Yeah, the pathing in this mission isn't good, and that isn't the only issu you've been reporting. The developers are very aware of the various challenges with this mission and have been actively reviewing/fixing each one. They expect fixes to be ready for testing soon.


Divide et Impera: Admiral Zelle becoming unresponsive
Admiral Zelle has been behaving erratically for a while. There are situations where she can become unresponsive before transforming into an Undine, as well as after her transformation. This has been escalated to the developers and is definitely on their radar.


Trapped: Debris from the wormhole can get players stuck
As funny as this may sound, getting stuck in a mission called Trapped, it's actually a big deal, and it's been sent to the developers. The problem is that, once stuck, our self-help utilities often don't work to help you get unstuck in this mission. Unfortunately we don't have an accurate picture of how you can best free yourself if this happens, since it happens rarely. I believe that /stuck should still work to nudge you out of the debris, but I'm not 100% sure. Failing that, it appears that the only workaround is to actually log out of the game for a little while while the instance resets itself, usually after 15 minutes. When you come back, you should be in the next stage of the mission, and good to go. However, we hate asking players to log out, since it's no fun at all and ruins the flow of the game. Tune in next week to see the progress on this bug!


Scientist rank 9 does not unlock Science Team III
This actually comes down to a UI/labeling issue. Although the UI states that it's Scientist rank 9 that unlocks the ability to train this power, it's currently being unlocked by Doctor rank 9. The fix for this is being tested so that it can be ready soon. Until it's in, please bear with us with the confusing labeling. Also, remember that you can only train class-specific skills to bridge officers if you are of the appropriate class. A Tactical Captain would not be able to train this to a Science bridge officer, but a Science Captain would. This has added to the confusion, and we are looking into how to communicate this more clearly.


Preemptive Strike: Behind Enemy Lines: Can't rescue last prisoner
Our developers are aware of this issue and are working to have the fix tested and in soon.


Doomsday Device sometimes doesn't complete when teamed
This should have been fixed last week. However, there have been a couple of scattered reports since then of players not being able to get the mission to complete, even with all objectives done, while on a team. This is distinct from any issues getting the special torpedoes, flying through the planet core, etc. If you are teamed and run into problems completing the final stage of the mission, please post about it and submit an in-game Bug Report so I can investigate.


Various missions losing progress
This is a rather sticky issue, or rather group of issues. There are several missions we've seen reports of that have the nasty habit of losing your progress after telling you they are done, and telling you to move on, or leave to sector space. Generally, they will revert to saying only 2 or 3 mission stages are done, or even prompting you to start over. We're working to identify each mission where this occurrs, identify any key reproduction steps, and escalate each one to the developers to fix. Progress will be slow on getting every last one of them fixed, but so far several have been. If you have this happen to you, please try the mission again a second time. If the mission fails again but does not block your forward progression, please submit a bug report and move on. Hopefully we'll have most of these dealt with swiftly.

what about server side lag thats causing these issues:
Heavy plamas hitting twice causing sometimes up to 17k of damage per hit
You fire or use a special and it doesnt go off but cool down happens..

on away missions..
Enemies spawning underground
enemies not spawning at all..

PVP
way to long wait times making dailys becoming weeklys..

End game.
Very pve daily's to do their BORING!


I bet some people have more to say..

[Jazzlvraz]

Originally Posted by GM_Litana

Divide et Impera: Admiral Zelle becoming unresponsive
Admiral Zelle has been behaving erratically for a while. There are situations where she can become unresponsive before transforming into an Undine, as well as after her transformation. This has been escalated to the developers and is definitely on their radar.

Could you please have a script-writer, at least, take a look at her behaviour? it's *far* too obvious that she's going to convert herself into an Undine, and you want to save yourself, and the Romulans, some trouble by simply shooting her in the head, but no-can-do.

A script-writer could give her some new dialogue that might help with immersion, or maybe a full AI-review could arrange for her to fight alongside you, as Miral Paris did on an earlier mission. Admiral Zelle's unnatural pacifism in the face of so much combat is another unfortunate giveaway of the upcoming denouement.

[Brainasium]

yes, this thread is very helpful and a great idea. thanks

[TurboPimp]

As a Eng I can't Train Cannon Rapid Fire III and i have all 18 points spent (9 points in my players skill and 9 in my Bridge Officer), just the button "Train" is greyed out. Im a Klingon Commander, is it cause im a Eng?

[Rumbleskin]

plz for the love of kirk, remove the sklil cap or atlest say its planned to be removed once the last 5 lvl's are added or plz give use a way to improve our char after max lvl other then wow loot farm.The skill system as a whole needs to be looked at, dropping the original plans at the last moment brought up a ton of issues.

[CobraA1]

Thanks, this is very useful .

[Jazzlvraz]

Originally Posted by TurboPimp

As a Eng I can't Train Cannon Rapid Fire III and i have all 18 points spent (9 points in my players skill and 9 in my Bridge Officer), just the button "Train" is greyed out. Im a Klingon Commander, is it cause im a Eng?

Yep, you can train Engi skills, but not Tactical ones.