EB v0.8.6.7.5.3.0.9 Release Date

[Krusader]

Dear EB fans,

One of the dilemmas that face mod teams is the never-ending question of when to release? Today, we would like your help in answering this question.

To date we have completely redone our building and recruitment systems, so the past months have been filled with a great deal of frustration, but are now paying off for us as we see it all come together. What this means for you though is that as we put together 0.8 we have not yet had time for in-depth testing. There will be gaps, but we do have a working mod on the RTW 1.5 platform and there is a good amount of new content along with this.

So, the question is - do we give you a working version next month? If we do, we have a greater potential for bugs, the campaign and battle balance may be somewhat off, and there will likely be gaps in translation, text editing, and things such as unit cards. Our scripting may not be where we want it to be. Our new factions will not be very well fleshed out.

What you will have is the port to 1.5, a new recruitment system that is more complete, all new music, at least one, possibly two new voice mods, new graphical content such as culture-specific GUIs, three new factions, resource and city icons, new grass, and other aesthetic improvements, and about 100 new units.

There are of course more improvements that go along with the move to 1.5, but there is of course more potential for bugs that are new, including CTDs, and without a good deal of playtesting time they will likely exist.

On the other hand the building and recruitment system is what we will be sticking with through 1.0. Because of this there will be no long delay for the next release, as there was for the last two major releases. There will be no back-to-the-drawing board disappointments like there were in the past. As you know the releases after 0.7.2 came hot and heavy, and we would expect the same to happen when we release 0.8.

So the question is:

A) Release next month? (with all the potential for gaps and bugs)

Or:

B) Release when 0.8 is polished? (likely to be several months down the road, at least)




Disclaimer: Complaints regarding a buggy release and/or gaps should you choose A) will be directed to our special circular file.

[CountArach]

I am going with sooner , PROVIDING that there is a patch to fix the bugs before 0.9...

Once this is clarified I will vote.

[Tellos Athenaios]

I am in for the next month, as it's still a beta, and the more people who get to test it during a long period a.k.a playing with it, the more bugs, quirks and inconsistencies will be reported (except, of course for the case in which it has still only few troubles to overcome), and the better the team will be able to deal with them. And henceforth more importantly, at least in my view, the sooner the team will be able to release 'a full, unbugged' 1.0 build.

[Birka Viking]

Well I voted sooner...Beocouse u will prob find the bugs faster when many are playing......And every one knows that it still a beta with possible bugs to u relise the 1.0. So its no doubt that u shall relise it..
Cheers

[Antagonist]

I voted sooner, on the understanding that "incomplete" means a level of completeness comparable to or greater than that of dear old 0.7.2 (right? wrong?) However, if possible I would like some vague suggestion of what the time-frame for the alternative is? I know it's basically going to be WID, but even a vague ball-park figure? Before Christmas time? The 1st anniversary of the public beta? Q1 2007? etc.

Anyway, whichever is the chosen path we shall still require patience.

Antagonist

[Djurre]

Ive been waiting for many months now, a few more wont hurt.
Anyways, there's more to life than computer games so...


Btw, If players can expect a "hotfix" or anything, they will probably vore for next month "en masse"

[GMT]

Next month would be sweet!

Dear EB fans,

What you will have is the port to 1.5, a new recruitment system that is more complete, all new music, at least one, possibly two new voice mods, new graphical content such as culture-specific GUIs, three new factions, resource and city icons, new grass, and other aesthetic improvements, and about 100 new units.

I thought there'd only be 2 new factions??

[Grimmy]

I thought the entire purpose of you releasing any build prior to 1.0 was so the general community could help bug hunt and play test?

I voted soonest, so those we can help you find the problems.

I havent played much of the previous releases but I'll do my best to do my part and help find bugs for y'all to squish, this time around.

[Lovejoy]

Voted next month. And that's because then we will all help and find CTD and bugs. And the game will be finish faster. Does who voted on the second answear can just simply wait for a patch to come along. And it will come along alot faster when we all help putting it together.

It's a win-win situation if you ask me. :)

[Foot]

Next month would be sweet!



I thought there'd only be 2 new factions??

Oh! Did we not tell you there would be 3? My how did we ever forget that?

There will be fixes before 0.9.0 and at a much faster rate than before, partly helped because we are using a -mod: build, so no need for packing anything (UI stuff mostly).

As for the option to wait until a polished version of 0.8, well we cannot judge that far ahead, but it wouldn't be more than a few months (I would say).

Foot

[Oleo]

You know, I love EB, since playing it I just dont get much fun from playing either RTW-unmodded or any of the mods out there. So I voted for A, cause I really like to play some more EB, unfortunately the current release has the load-save bug from version 1.2, which sort of screws up the experience.

[BozosLiveHere]

I voted sooner, on the understanding that "incomplete" means a level of completeness comparable to or greater than that of dear old 0.7.2 (right? wrong?)

I think we could say it will be as stable as .72, yes. It probably won't be as stable as .74 though.

[Kull]

There is going to be a certain correlation between v.80 and v.72, in that each was known to be incomplete before they were released. The fundamental difference is that v.72 was released BECAUSE it had many CTDs which the team couldn't track down - we needed help from a massive base of playtesters. In this case there are still a couple in there, but we have a decent chance of solving them before the release. The biggest similarity is incompleteness. This is a MASSIVE build with a ton of new things. Polishing it up is going to take a while.

As to hot-fixes? Of course! We wouldn't drop a turd into your laps and walk away for a few months. You have seen how we responded to the v.72 issues, and it's safe to say we'll do so again this time.

[Djurre]

Where can i find a summary of the expected changes and improvements etc. That will be applied with 0.8?
so far ive only seen a few faction previews and a 20 page long "suggestions for v0.8"topic.

[abou]

Do it sooner. There has to be that point where you 'put the stick in the mud,' so to speak, and commit to a release date. If the team doesn't, who knows how much time could be spent polishing 0.8. It is, after all, only a beta and those of us who have been reading the forum know what to expect. I also imagine that this will mean a faster release cycle for the team now that the biggest hurdle has been leaped - recruitment.

Do it.

[Teleklos Archelaou]

I don't think either way we will have many buildings with blank text. And we will try our best not to have any "Roman Barracks" building icons also - we will have placeholders for those that aren't finished if there are any.

As we get quite close to the release we will start working more on a list of all the changes. It's too long and still in flux to post it now (plus we want some of it to be a surprise).

[Karo]

I would say release so soon as possible. And if there are a few bugs no problem cause it's still a beta.

[Markus_Aurelius]

There is always potential for gaps or bugs so i say, release as soon as humanly possible!

[NeoSpartan]

Before I make my vote:

Can you guys tell me HOW INCOMPLETE????? PLZ.....
-like give me an example of some scripting issues, or balancing, or whatever.

I need more info before making a smart decition. So far, the info that has been given of how the game will come out in Option A is somewhat vage.

thx EB team

[MSB]

There always will be the potential for bugs in any mod no matter how polished it may be. So I say release sooner. If it is really buggy people will complain, but it will make finding and ironing out bugs much easier as there will be many more people out there to hunt them down!

Without EB 0.8 the

[Tanit]

Before I make my vote:

Can you guys tell me HOW INCOMPLETE????? PLZ.....
-like give me an example of some scripting issues, or balancing, or whatever.

I need more info before making a smart decition. So far, the info that has been given of how the game will come out in Option A is somewhat vage.

thx EB team

Well, the BETA testers are curently on update 2a and there are A LOT of problems. The EB team has been able to fix a lot of what we found, but I won't know for sure how buggy 0.8 is so far until we receive the next update which will have benefitted from all our labours.

[Markus_Aurelius]

Well keep up the good work

[khelvan]

Incomplete? Well, buildings and units will likely be far more complete, with relatively few missing building or unit card pictures. Most will all have text, though some will not have translated names and many will likely have grammar/spelling errors (most of our members are not first-language English, and we have a dire need for text editors). The content as far as music, voices, and campaign graphics will be greater.

Our scripts and traits may have chunks missing from what we have done in the past, and/or what we planned to do for this version, because of the difficulty of moving them to 0.8, and the problem caused by the Reinforcement CTD. The three new factions will be relatively bare, but the others will be more fleshed out.

I think the majority of issues will be found in the traits, scripting, and overall playbalance/playability, along with the potential for CTDs.

[Zalmoxis]

I voted sooner, because it's a beta, so people should get their hands on it and find the bugs, problems etc.

[CaesarAugustus]

Definently sooner! I just want to be able to play on RTW 1.5!!

[Redigo]

The last time we did this poll, I voted for waiting. Now I think it's damn near imperative that 0.8 roll out sooner rather than later, and I can say why in a short acronym: MTW2.

The next TW game is slated for release on November 14, and can be expected to grab the attention of much, if not most, of EB's current player-base for quite awhile. Getting people to start 0.8 campaigns before MTW2 ships will prevent at least some of that shift.

[-Praetor-]

Oh! Did we not tell you there would be 3? My how did we ever forget that?

The three new factions will be relatively bare, but the others will be more fleshed out.

!!!

Oh, perhaps the 3rd "new" faction is an overhaul of the "Iberian" faction...

I think that the option that makes you work faster is option of releasing next month. Off course, there will be people that will download the mod and start playing without caring about helping reporting bugs and such... but there will be some of us that will actually help hunt and destroy CTDs and other bugs... and that will undoubtely speed up the release of 1.0

So, next mont (or sooner).

[Conqueror]

I'm not sure what to think about having 3 new factions. Wouldn't they already be hitting the hard-coded factions cap with just 2 new ones (with one of the 2 replacing the Yuezhi and the other one taking the Senate slot)? So if we get 3 new factions in EB 0.8, that would mean that one of the old factions (in addition to the Yuezhi) will be removed! So which one will get kicked? Casse? Epeiros? Or maybe Iberia?

[MarcusAureliusAntoninus]

In my opinion you should post it somewhere in between the two options, around 0.7.4 stability but not 'perfect'. But I voted 'soon' because I really want to see the new build.

And, with Yuezhi removed, there are only 18 factions. With a possible of 21, this does in fact leave 3 more possible. Why didn't I see it sooner... (They probably didn't tell us sooner, so we wouldn't beg about who it was.)

[Dampiel]

Since you do provide an open beta I say sooner, thats why we are here. Besides, when we find a bug, report it and you guys fix it, or we manage to fix it ourselves, it makes us feel like a part of the project...we like it hehe.

The real question I think, since you guys do all the hard work is would you be satisfied with a sooner release. I mean if you guys are comfortable with us hacking out bugs and are proud of the content as it is released sooner than I think people will be happy all around.

-Dampiel-