Proxima [1879587] —
Original article
Catch up on the latest changes the Dev team have been working hard on this week!
As part of a brand new weekly feature, reporters Proxima and Stewie will provide a rundown of the past week's patch notes as posted by Chedburn. This week, we'll find out what the changes to Bookie 2.0 mean, why Fruitcakes might be getting cheaper, and which private statistics are now available for everyone to view.
Updates, Changes and Additions
- Added the first batch of special bets under specific sports in Bookie 2.0
Requested in many threads (for example) since the release of the shiny new bookies system, these special bets will cover handicap bets and more for sports such as NFL, NBA and MLB.
- Added Fruitcake item to appear in Bits 'n' Bobs shop occasionally
Based on pure speculation alone, the author imagines this change is meant to help little nublets with the cost of the Duke mission which requires you to bake a special fruitcake. Exactly how many fruitcakes will be available, and how often, is unconfirmed as of yet.
- Added some previously private personal stats into public view
Critical Hits, One Hit Kills, Total Hits, Total Misses and Hunting Skill will be publicly viewable in personal stats, after being made private when the new personal stat pages were released. Total Damage and Best Damage also join public stats after previously being private. Source.
- Rebalanced weapon accuracy algorithm in attacking
- Fixed weapon accuracy mods not being fully utilized in a bonus hit chance modifier
After two long bugs and issues threads (here and here), that highlighted many issues with the way that a weapon's accuracy interacts with a players effective stats when calculating their hit chance in fights, accuracy is set to receive a considerable nerf in said calculation in order to rebalance fighting.
Initial changes to the Hit Chance formula were noted in the patch list last Tuesday, and although the details were not released the effects were noticeable almost immediately. four created a thread expressing anguish over losing to an inactive mission target that he should have easily beaten based on their stats and the quoted hit chances in a table provided by Chedburn. Something certainly seemed off, as the result of this attack log was statistically very improbable.
Although not initially convinced, more attack logs were provided over the coming hours and days from many players, and aurel1 eventually found what was believed to be the problem; a "rudimental calculation" added to the formula that had not been thoroughly tested.
Not even an hour after aurel1 fixed this problem, however, there were many complaints that suddenly no-one could land any hits whatsoever, resulting in a lot of stalemates. Logs were added to each fight to expose any problems with the calculation, and although the new cause of the new issue was never explicitly revealed, all changes that had been made were reverted.
It is clear now that weapon mods were not being utilised in the calculation correctly. Chedburn agreed that hit chances were being made far too high for players with low stats, simply because their weapon was very accurate, and he agreed to make this part of the calculation less powerful. This first thread was then closed by Ched, as the conversation devolved and grew a tad heated.
Two days ago four created his second thread, theorising that perhaps the issue was instead the result of a problem with temporary items, such as smoke and flash grenades. Aurel1 shuts down this theory, stating that the problem is indeed a result of weapon accuracy being overpowered, and being used in two separate parts of the hit chance formula.
It was claimed that the changes Chedburn wanted to make had already been pushed through, although strange attack logs were still noted. It remains to be seen what effect this accuracy nerf will have, and whether the attacking system will indeed be better off for it. Some folks will undoubtedly be upset to learn their favourite $100k weapon will no longer give them the power to hit someone with 10x their Speed in Dexterity ~2/3rd of the time, but such is life.
Bugs and Fixes
- Fixed PHP3 lag issue (and other site-wide slowness)
Last Wednesday night, users connected to php3 began to experience extreme lag, with long load times for every page making most aspects of gameplay impossible. This was marked resolved by vysdel2 after 6 days, and personally I feel it's seemed a lot better since.
- Fixed wrong traveling time stat value for some users
Certain users 'Time spent travelling' stat was displaying ludicrously high, false, numbers. This was reported by Josephine here and cough "Fixed" cough by nikitad.
- Fixed an issue involving depositing money and points to faction
For an incredible frustrating day, the 'deposit' button on your Faction page would not allow for entries that used a comma, meaning you could only deposit up to $999 at a time.
- Fixed 'Give points to user' visibility
On mobile Torn, the 'Give points to user' field was not visible at all, shown here.
- Fixed empty Factions pages
For a little while, the 'Faction' page was completely blank, resulting in members not being able to fight in territory wars, loan/deposit using the armoury, or leave their faction. This was fixed quickly, but in fact seemed to precipitate the above bug regarding the deposit field!
- Fixed characters limit of forum signature
Nobody (Username) reported that the table he wanted to add to his forum signature was being cropped out due to size limitations, even though it was not exceeding character limitations. This was fixed here with an increased character limit by dmitriyz.
- Fixed navigation to the 'Archive' page in the newspaper section while flying
Our gloriousPropaganda machine Newspaper Archive was not accessible while flying, and resolved here.
- Fixed displaying "Investment time remaining" stat value in the 'Personal stats' page
Reported here, the stat 'Invested Time Remaining' was constantly displaying as '0', despite users having days left until their investment matured.
- Fixed displaying long text in the "Trade log" section on the trade page
Previously as seen here, if users entered a long trade description with no spaces, the message would run off the page. A character limit has now been put in place to resolve this.
- Fixed description of "Ugly Energy" book
In this bug report, Chedburn explains that the book 'Ugly Energy' actually sets your energy bar to 250 for a month, as opposed to just increasing it by 100 (which for non-donators would become 200).
- Fixed OC expired log error message
Organised Crime logs that are older than 6 months are automatically deleted, however, trying to access them previously gave an error stating "You must be in the faction to review the results of their organised crime." even for members of that faction. This error message was fixed to be clearer.
- Fixed displaying travel globe icon for users which are not logged in for a long time
Seen here, when using the advanced search feature, players who are abroad were previously not displaying the new travelling icon (a globe).
- Fixed reset button in forum editor
In the text editor used for forum posts or mails, there is a 'Reset' button that is supposed to clear everything you have written. This had not been working for some time, and after being reported here by Harley, has now been fixed by Xepa4ep.
- Fixed amount input on adding to bazaar page
When entering a number in the QTY field for adding items to your bazaar, if you try and erase the number you entered a '0' will always be left behind, despite the box being empty when starting. This persisted and meant trying to type '1' for example became '10'. This was reported and fixed here.
Weekly honour bar
This week's new honour bar is Sodaholic, obtained by drinking 500 energy cans. If you have already consumed 500 energy cans, drink one more to trigger! This one was long expected after the release of Diabetic (eat 500 candies) and Alcoholic (drink 500 alcohol). Can we expect to see further honour bars along this line (1,000 each? 10,000 each?). Time will tell.
Updates, Changes and Additions
- Added the first batch of special bets under specific sports in Bookie 2.0
Requested in many threads (for example) since the release of the shiny new bookies system, these special bets will cover handicap bets and more for sports such as NFL, NBA and MLB.
- Added Fruitcake item to appear in Bits 'n' Bobs shop occasionally
Based on pure speculation alone, the author imagines this change is meant to help little nublets with the cost of the Duke mission which requires you to bake a special fruitcake. Exactly how many fruitcakes will be available, and how often, is unconfirmed as of yet.
- Added some previously private personal stats into public view
Critical Hits, One Hit Kills, Total Hits, Total Misses and Hunting Skill will be publicly viewable in personal stats, after being made private when the new personal stat pages were released. Total Damage and Best Damage also join public stats after previously being private. Source.
- Rebalanced weapon accuracy algorithm in attacking
- Fixed weapon accuracy mods not being fully utilized in a bonus hit chance modifier
After two long bugs and issues threads (here and here), that highlighted many issues with the way that a weapon's accuracy interacts with a players effective stats when calculating their hit chance in fights, accuracy is set to receive a considerable nerf in said calculation in order to rebalance fighting.
Initial changes to the Hit Chance formula were noted in the patch list last Tuesday, and although the details were not released the effects were noticeable almost immediately. four created a thread expressing anguish over losing to an inactive mission target that he should have easily beaten based on their stats and the quoted hit chances in a table provided by Chedburn. Something certainly seemed off, as the result of this attack log was statistically very improbable.
Although not initially convinced, more attack logs were provided over the coming hours and days from many players, and aurel1 eventually found what was believed to be the problem; a "rudimental calculation" added to the formula that had not been thoroughly tested.
Not even an hour after aurel1 fixed this problem, however, there were many complaints that suddenly no-one could land any hits whatsoever, resulting in a lot of stalemates. Logs were added to each fight to expose any problems with the calculation, and although the new cause of the new issue was never explicitly revealed, all changes that had been made were reverted.
It is clear now that weapon mods were not being utilised in the calculation correctly. Chedburn agreed that hit chances were being made far too high for players with low stats, simply because their weapon was very accurate, and he agreed to make this part of the calculation less powerful. This first thread was then closed by Ched, as the conversation devolved and grew a tad heated.
Two days ago four created his second thread, theorising that perhaps the issue was instead the result of a problem with temporary items, such as smoke and flash grenades. Aurel1 shuts down this theory, stating that the problem is indeed a result of weapon accuracy being overpowered, and being used in two separate parts of the hit chance formula.
It was claimed that the changes Chedburn wanted to make had already been pushed through, although strange attack logs were still noted. It remains to be seen what effect this accuracy nerf will have, and whether the attacking system will indeed be better off for it. Some folks will undoubtedly be upset to learn their favourite $100k weapon will no longer give them the power to hit someone with 10x their Speed in Dexterity ~2/3rd of the time, but such is life.
Bugs and Fixes
- Fixed PHP3 lag issue (and other site-wide slowness)
Last Wednesday night, users connected to php3 began to experience extreme lag, with long load times for every page making most aspects of gameplay impossible. This was marked resolved by vysdel2 after 6 days, and personally I feel it's seemed a lot better since.
- Fixed wrong traveling time stat value for some users
Certain users 'Time spent travelling' stat was displaying ludicrously high, false, numbers. This was reported by Josephine here and cough "Fixed" cough by nikitad.
- Fixed an issue involving depositing money and points to faction
For an incredible frustrating day, the 'deposit' button on your Faction page would not allow for entries that used a comma, meaning you could only deposit up to $999 at a time.
- Fixed 'Give points to user' visibility
On mobile Torn, the 'Give points to user' field was not visible at all, shown here.
- Fixed empty Factions pages
For a little while, the 'Faction' page was completely blank, resulting in members not being able to fight in territory wars, loan/deposit using the armoury, or leave their faction. This was fixed quickly, but in fact seemed to precipitate the above bug regarding the deposit field!
- Fixed characters limit of forum signature
Nobody (Username) reported that the table he wanted to add to his forum signature was being cropped out due to size limitations, even though it was not exceeding character limitations. This was fixed here with an increased character limit by dmitriyz.
- Fixed navigation to the 'Archive' page in the newspaper section while flying
Our glorious
- Fixed displaying "Investment time remaining" stat value in the 'Personal stats' page
Reported here, the stat 'Invested Time Remaining' was constantly displaying as '0', despite users having days left until their investment matured.
- Fixed displaying long text in the "Trade log" section on the trade page
Previously as seen here, if users entered a long trade description with no spaces, the message would run off the page. A character limit has now been put in place to resolve this.
- Fixed description of "Ugly Energy" book
In this bug report, Chedburn explains that the book 'Ugly Energy' actually sets your energy bar to 250 for a month, as opposed to just increasing it by 100 (which for non-donators would become 200).
- Fixed OC expired log error message
Organised Crime logs that are older than 6 months are automatically deleted, however, trying to access them previously gave an error stating "You must be in the faction to review the results of their organised crime." even for members of that faction. This error message was fixed to be clearer.
- Fixed displaying travel globe icon for users which are not logged in for a long time
Seen here, when using the advanced search feature, players who are abroad were previously not displaying the new travelling icon (a globe).
- Fixed reset button in forum editor
In the text editor used for forum posts or mails, there is a 'Reset' button that is supposed to clear everything you have written. This had not been working for some time, and after being reported here by Harley, has now been fixed by Xepa4ep.
- Fixed amount input on adding to bazaar page
When entering a number in the QTY field for adding items to your bazaar, if you try and erase the number you entered a '0' will always be left behind, despite the box being empty when starting. This persisted and meant trying to type '1' for example became '10'. This was reported and fixed here.
Weekly honour bar
This week's new honour bar is Sodaholic, obtained by drinking 500 energy cans. If you have already consumed 500 energy cans, drink one more to trigger! This one was long expected after the release of Diabetic (eat 500 candies) and Alcoholic (drink 500 alcohol). Can we expect to see further honour bars along this line (1,000 each? 10,000 each?). Time will tell.
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