Does no one test mission trees before release?

[wielkiciensteam]

Sorry for sounding rude but I've recently stumbled into pretty minor yet important bug in Hungary mission tree. As you can see on the screenshots:

Spoiler

There is a bug in the mission tree, where graphical information is not consistant with code. Really - it's not a game breaking bug and it doesn't really matter in the playthrough.
BUT.
It shows that litteraly noone tested this tree before Emperor release and later on! This is so obvious and easy to fix bug that it's mindblowing it really happens even after 4 hotfixes.
Don't get me wrong - I know that bugs happen and this one is very, very not important one. But it shows that PDX designs some features without ever testing them.
Again, didn't want to be or sound rude - it's just yet another small thing that makes me sad about EU4 development.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

It's not a matter of testing, since well-documented bugs from years ago remain in the game right now despite multiple reports.

It's a matter of priority, and the choices made for EU 4's patches are ones I will never agree with in gaming. Esoteric exploits and mechanic reworks should not be higher priority than the game UI misrepresenting information or outright lying to players. Patch after patch, such is the demonstrated priority in EU 4.

 

[Systemlord]

It's not a matter of testing, since well-documented bugs from years ago remain in the game right now despite multiple reports.

It's a matter of priority, and the choices made for EU 4's patches are ones I will never agree with in gaming. Esoteric exploits and mechanic reworks should not be higher priority than the game UI misrepresenting information or outright lying to players. Patch after patch, such is the demonstrated priority in EU 4.

the problem is, they still need to make money. Patches don't bring in new sales. They also fix the most critical stuff which keeps most players going. Also, debugging isn't as much fun as bringing new content

 

[wielkiciensteam]

It's not a matter of testing, since well-documented bugs from years ago remain in the game right now despite multiple reports.

It's a matter of priority, and the choices made for EU 4's patches are ones I will never agree with in gaming. Esoteric exploits and mechanic reworks should not be higher priority than the game UI misrepresenting information or outright lying to players. Patch after patch, such is the demonstrated priority in EU 4.

No, no, no - I wasn't talkin about how they didn't fix this little bug but how it got into release in the first place. It's a proof that PDX just doesn't test new features: writes code, takes screenshot, publishes DD and done. Everything that had to be done is hovering mouse over each mission requirements - 5 min of work.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

the problem is, they still need to make money. Patches don't bring in new sales. They also fix the most critical stuff which keeps most players going. Also, debugging isn't as much fun as bringing new content

Fixing esoteric exploits (like seizing new world colonies or players raising autonomy in Inti lands just after passing a reform...introducing a longstanding bug in doing so) doesn't have any apparent value it in bringing in new sales either. Per their own statistics a tiny fraction of players played the positions where those things were relevant.

I also find it implausible that altering these was easier than, say, text editing the UI so it doesn't lie to the player in a situation where the way in which the UI lies to the player has been clearly identified.

Same deal for changes to stuff like religious conversion. It's hard to believe the work done on conversion resulted in an increase in sales, and objectively speaking the in-game incentive to pick it was weaker than humanist even at the time it was nerfed! In what way did the 1.25 religious kneecapping improve sales? I'm not convinced even more tame things like reworking balance between idea groups increased sales...all of these are examples of things clearly/routinely prioritized > UI lying to player. Anecdotally, I've seen people walk away from the game over that, too many times they're caught out by unexplained things and get frustrated.

Anecdotes can't be used to infer wider conclusions, but I similarly challenge that "introducing a bug in Inti to prevent people timing autonomy raising" is extremely unlikely to improve sales and would be very interested to see any substantive data that suggests I'm mistaken about the utility of such changes.

No, no, no - I wasn't talkin about how they didn't fix this little bug but how it got into release in the first place.

During the patch 1.13 open beta, it was identified that there was a bug whereby the game prevents you from taking a province because you could not core it (previously, the game had no restrictions on what you could take and it was up to you to make sure you had coring range). This despite that the player could core the province immediately after the peace deal.

That bug was identified by the community before the official 1.13 patch released, so it's not like nobody tested or knew about it.

That bug is still in the game right now.

 

[wielkiciensteam]

During the patch 1.13 open beta, it was identified that there was a bug whereby the game prevents you from taking a province because you could not core it (previously, the game had no restrictions on what you could take and it was up to you to make sure you had coring range). This despite that the player could core the province immediately after the peace deal.

That bug was identified by the community before the official 1.13 patch released, so it's not like nobody tested or knew about it.

That bug is still in the game right now.

You are right of course - I fully agree that PDX policy towards bugs is it's weak spot and deserves heavy criticism. But unlike some feature or mechanic from the base game, the mission trees are being SOLD to us in expansions or immersion packs. And the proof that the product we buy is just not being tested is upsetting to say the least.

 

[EarlKonrad]

You are right of course - I fully agree that PDX policy towards bugs is it's weak spot and deserves heavy criticism. But unlike some feature or mechanic from the base game, the mission trees are being SOLD to us in expansions or immersion packs. And the proof that the product we buy is just not being tested is upsetting to say the least.

Hungary's mission tree was added in Emperor. Oh well, one more thing to add to the ever growing pile of bugs that will probably never be fixed. But do not despair for the next patch will add a whole bunch of new missions and stuff, because that is better than fixing content that already exists, right? Right????

Not to split hairs here but I do think that their Q&A must catch most of the bugs that are reported, even the obvious one (like HRE being broken when Emperor released) and that the issue lies more with what bugs the Devs chose to address and why. The team working on EU4 is small and mostly only exists to make content for the game (as seen by how the AI suffer from the lack of a dedicated AI guy). Fixing bugs appear to not be very high on their priority list.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

You are right of course - I fully agree that PDX policy towards bugs is it's weak spot and deserves heavy criticism. But unlike some feature or mechanic from the base game, the mission trees are being SOLD to us in expansions or immersion packs. And the proof that the product we buy is just not being tested is upsetting to say the least.

I don't disagree with you overall, I just don't want blame placed on testers when clearly it's on programming/dev prioritization of what matters in the game. The inti bug was also paid content (inti reform mechanics certainly were not base game at the time) etc.

 

[cetvrtak]

As a coder, the only thing I hate more than bugs is fixing bugs.

 

[Zohtun]

As a coder, the only thing I hate more than bugs is fixing bugs.

99 Little bugs in the code, 99 little bugs...

Take 1 down, patch it around,

108 little bugs in the code...

 

[klingonadmiral]

I don't see the bug?

 

[Froonk]

Aside from bugs, I am sure a lot of mission trees don't get play tested at all. EU4 definitely has a competent content team in terms of flavor but they seem to be understaffed or not at all caring about how these are implemented.

As an example, there is a mission in Venice tree that got added in emperor that you should occupy Genoese capital and have higher trade power in Genoa than anyone else. Well turns out this doesn't work at all in the way they intended. I assume they intended you declare a trade war on Genoa and occupy capital and send over some light ships to be the strongest and done deal. However occupying the capital of genoa reduces power of the CoT there, and other states in the Genoa node will become stronger instead. Moreover declaring peace with transfer trade won't complete the mission even if you become the strongest power because you are no longer occupying their capital. Whoever did this mission must have not accounted for the fact CoTs are only half as effective while under occupation. Turns out only reliable way to do this is declare not only on Genoa, but basically everyone else in Genoa node and occupy them all at the same time. This is an exceptionally hard mission for mediocre reward that blocks many important missions for expansion in Italy. Otherwise you would have to annex your way to Genoa first, before you get claims and rewards from the mission you would get from completing the aforementioned mission.

All they would have to do is make this not an and but an and/or situation. Whereby if you are at war you should occupy their capital and have strongest trade power or have truce and have strongest trade power. It's an exceptionally short resolution in code that would take maybe couple minutes of work if it was play tested at all.

 

[wielkiciensteam]

I don't see the bug?

Secure Macedonia is beyond arrow of Secure Bulgaria but it doesn't require this mission as UI states. Push on to the Constantinople requires both Secure Bulgaria and Secure Macedonia but it's only tied to arrow of Secure Macedonia.

 

[wielkiciensteam]

I don't disagree with you overall, I just don't want blame placed on testers when clearly it's on programming/dev prioritization of what matters in the game.

No, I don't blame testers as, AFAIK, most missions trees are being coded by one person (Caligula Caesar wrote DD part of Hungary mission tree) and it's clear that after it was written, the person who wrote it didn't check everything fully. QA testers didn't have to stumble upon this bug - I encountered it because I've decided to take provinces in different order than what mission tree suggests.

 

[EarlKonrad]

Aside from bugs, I am sure a lot of mission trees don't get play tested at all. EU4 definitely has a competent content team in terms of flavor but they seem to be understaffed or not at all caring about how these are implemented.

As an example, there is a mission in Venice tree that got added in emperor that you should occupy Genoese capital and have higher trade power in Genoa than anyone else. Well turns out this doesn't work at all in the way they intended. I assume they intended you declare a trade war on Genoa and occupy capital and send over some light ships to be the strongest and done deal. However occupying the capital of genoa reduces power of the CoT there, and other states in the Genoa node will become stronger instead. Moreover declaring peace with transfer trade won't complete the mission even if you become the strongest power because you are no longer occupying their capital. Whoever did this mission must have not accounted for the fact CoTs are only half as effective while under occupation. Turns out only reliable way to do this is declare not only on Genoa, but basically everyone else in Genoa node and occupy them all at the same time. This is an exceptionally hard mission for mediocre reward that blocks many important missions for expansion in Italy. Otherwise you would have to annex your way to Genoa first, before you get claims and rewards from the mission you would get from completing the aforementioned mission.

All they would have to do is make this not an and but an and/or situation. Whereby if you are at war you should occupy their capital and have strongest trade power or have truce and have strongest trade power. It's an exceptionally short resolution in code that would take maybe couple minutes of work if it was play tested at all.

Another example is how Lubeck has a mission requiring them to have 7 nations in their trade league and the following mission vassalizes all of the nation's in their trade league while only giving them +1 Diplo slot. What this tells me is that the designer was under the assumption that the player will get Influence or Diplomacy, or some policies which give Diplo slots.

Or how Austria has some strange requirements for some of their missions that can be confusing (and the way that the tree is structured is by itself unusual).

 

[Canute VII]

Just deligently and humbly file a bug report.

The good news is that this clearly is a content related bug and can be fixed by content designers, who are not such a bottleneck for pdx as actual prorammers are.

 

[Golladan]

This will change nothing,as @TheMeInTeam and @EarlKonrad clearly said,there are a lot of bugs that had been reported years ago that are still in the game today.I will even add that even if i don't doubt the Paradox Devs read them,a number of bugs reports simply doesn't have any answers.So i'd really like to see bugfixes,but i understand why some people are sceptical about the possibility this will happen now.
Cordially.

And as @Canute VII said, this is a content bug and not a code bug. So it has a much higher chance of it getting fixed as content designing doesn't suffer from the bottleneck that coding does.

 

[Ninaran]

the problem is, they still need to make money. Patches don't bring in new sales. They also fix the most critical stuff which keeps most players going. Also, debugging isn't as much fun as bringing new content

Sometimes I wish I could work like a game development studio for just one month. Release unfinished and broken stuff while negating criticism with "sure your car breaks down every now and then but we painted it yellow and we needed the money now". And then still have people defend me.
Not sure why gamers have such low standards considering the massive amount of money these studios make.

 

[wielkiciensteam]

Sometimes I wish I could work like a game development studio for just one month. Release unfinished and broken stuff while negating criticism with "sure your car breaks down every now and then but we painted it yellow and we needed the money now". And then still have people defend me.
Not sure why gamers have such low standards considering the massive amount of money these studios make.

Harsh but true.

 

[cetvrtak]

Not sure why gamers have such low standards considering the massive amount of money these studios make.

Because most of us are addicted to these games?