Patch 1.31 announced

[Remixer]

I think everyone complaining here should have downloaded the PTR and tried ti help the developers.

I see so many issues that weren't caught during testing phase because, guess what? These same people couldn't be bothered to open their own maps and tinker with them during PTR phase.

Blizzard is a huge company, but the team working on WarCraft 3 is much smaller. If you think this small team can find and fix all the bugs in a nearly 20 year old engine with regards to hundreds of thousands of different maps which were created over the years, WHILE adding major new features that improve the game experience and pave the way for the future, you need to have more realistic expectations.

Hardly anyone actually bothered to download and test anything in the PTR, it seems the vast majority just want others to do the testing for them.

Personally I would like to co-operate with Blizzard a lot more than I do now, but frankly. I cannot even post on their forums, somehow my account is not allowed to do so and rarely I get mentioned / talked with even if I report an issue, thus I think they are so minor that they do not matter (This string-data corruption bug of course being important enough).

 

[deepstrasz]

Let this be a lesson to everyone that you should have backups. An easy way is to just keep your map in Dropbox and edit it from there. Dropbox keeps all old versions for a month. You can restore them via the web interface at any time.

Don't tell anyone but I use Hiveworkshop's Pastebine for that

 

[Aldeia]

Why don't you have backups for something you've been working on for over a year? Furthermore there is a warning on the front page of hiveworkshop stating that this bug exists.

I suggest checking your JassHelper folder for backups. If you don't have JH enabled then you can look for an old version of you map if you have it, and export the strings and import them back into your map. If you don't have either of those then yes, your data is lost. However that is your fault for not keeping a single backup.

I do have a backup file, but it is still a 20-30 hrs of work. to achieve what i have done , but the thing is i can't even start working on it again, because of this patch.

 

[Chaosy]

Just shut up man, nobody cares about your opinion, they're working hard on a fucking 15 year old codebase to give us what we had asked for ages, literally tons of community suggestions being implemented and you're still bitching about it, fuck off.

No one cares about yours either, in which case what's the point? if not one's opinion matter why do we even have forums for talking about these things? (such as reddit) No one cares about mine either, I just express myself regardless.

Only positive opinions allowed?

So fuck off actually, having a good cause does not excuse shit work. No other Blizzard game gets fixed so slowly. There are game breaking bugs in other games such as WoW, but these are fixed within HOURS, or a day at most. Warcraft 3 has been semi-broke for MONTHS. Prime example, they released a new patch (I think it was 1.30) on a friday which basically complete broke custom games and melee matches. Not only does it show how bad their QA is, the devs are not at office until Monday. Awesome idea. There is a reason the other blizzard games patch on Wednesday.


Mistakes happen, I think most understand that. But letting it remain for so long, most do not agree with. They refuse to do rollbacks too, and there is no official way to downgrade.

Fantastic work. *sarcasm*

 

[deepstrasz]

It's like we're in this hospital and the power generator is failing too.
They're people, they have work hours, they will do something about it. You will wait because you have nothing else to do but do something else or help them with reports.
Babbling swear words on a forum won't do good to anyone but some egos.

 

[Assassins-Creed]

As amusing as this is, can you guys start a new thread for people who want to argue about how bad/good the patch is and one that has actual posts about problems people are having?

 

[Chaosy]

You do not get golds medals for trying.

Let's theoretically say I was let into a surgery room and given the chance to save a life.
I have no fucking clue, that patient is basically dead before I even touch a tool.

Should I get rewarded for my incompetence? a pat on the back with encouraging words? "at least I tried?"
Fuck no. If you cannot do a task, you should not be there in the first place.

I refuse to accept that it is "good work" to release a patch that breaks the game for months.
Not only does it break the game, the devs does not roll it back or offer options of downgrade. If they would have done that, the problem would be gone in a day. Then re-ship it in next patch with fixes.

 

[TriggerHappy]

I do have a backup file, but it is still a 20-30 hrs of work. to achieve what i have done , but the thing is i can't even start working on it again, because of this patch.

Do you have JassHelper enabled? It automatically keeps backups of your maps. Check Documents\Warcraft III\JassHelper\Backups

 

[Wazzz]

i personally rather like this patch

it's a lot like a life saving surgery, there might be risks but if you don't do it then there's no opportunity of enhanced quality of life
also, surgeons get paid more than i do, so it is also similar in that respect, too

 

[Nudl9]

Just shut up man, nobody cares about your opinion, they're working hard on a fucking 15 year old codebase to give us what we had asked for ages, literally tons of community suggestions being implemented and you're still bitching about it, fuck off.

Are we not allowed to complain?
Is releasing a patch where nothing works something you consider acceptable?
None of my maps can be played at the moment.
I can't use the editor because my files will get corrupted.
Even after the (rumoured) hotfix theres still the problem with not having a way of protecting maps.

AT is dead
RoC is dead
Custom games are dead
World Editor is dead
Melee is getting lots of changes nobody asked for

Why drop this patch on us.
And you know what actually helps for us? to complain, bitch and moan.

I don't doubt they are working hard on Reforged, but we are not their beta testers.
We don't get paid to test their product.
It is not our job to report back issues to them.
They never gave us a good reason to try PTR and thats their fault.
If they really wanted us to test maps on PTR they should have been dropping raffle Reforged preorders for players there.
Release reforged when its done, but don't shovel this shit patch onto us.

Its like everyone here got amnesia and forgot that last time they patched the game (1.30) we couldnt play it for 3 whole months.
And there was no communication from Blizzard's side during this whole period.

 

[deepstrasz]

@Chaosy you've missed the point. We're not working with people's lives. It's just a game.

The only feedback you wrote is the one pertaining version downgrade.

 

[Chaosy]

Problem is not really the mistake, but rather that they do not fix it within reasonable time.

@Chaosy you've missed the point. We're not working with people's lives. It's just a game.

Fair.

I'd not like to pay for a broken phone either though. A product that I pay for, and could get ruined with system updates. Not had a update that ruins my phone so far though.

Windows 10 have similar issues, there have been very system breaking bugs. 2018 October update for example. What is the difference? 1. You can rollback 2. They take down problematic updates until fixed

Admittedly said October update took wc3-pace to fix.

 

[Trill]

I think everyone complaining here should have downloaded the PTR and tried ti help the developers.

Uhm, no. I paid for this game, I dragged two friends into it since 1.30, I don't owe Blizzard anything. I will wait for fixes.
And yes, I do want to get my hands on working 1.31 faster, but its a matter of principle. Blizzard is not a friend (not anymore), they are a merchant I'm buying goods from. I expect those goods to be good, not help merchant do his job.

 

[_lycan]

No one cares about yours either, in which case what's the point? if not one's opinion matter why do we even have forums for talking about these things? (such as reddit) No one cares about mine either, I just express myself regardless.

Only positive opinions allowed?

So fuck off actually, having a good cause does not excuse shit work. No other Blizzard game gets fixed so slowly. There are game breaking bugs in other games such as WoW, but these are fixed within HOURS, or a day at most. Warcraft 3 has been semi-broke for MONTHS. Prime example, they released a new patch (I think it was 1.30) on a friday which basically complete broke custom games and melee matches. Not only does it show how bad their QA is, the devs are not at office until Monday. Awesome idea. There is a reason the other blizzard games patch on Wednesday.


Mistakes happen, I think most understand that. But letting it remain for so long, most do not agree with. They refuse to do rollbacks too, and there is no official way to downgrade.

Fantastic work. *sarcasm*

Another crying kid, what's your point?

Starcraft 1 was a much smaller project in scale and it took a decent amount of time to finish as well, all the other Blizzard games are done on a modern architecture and done with modern code, of course it takes less time to develop stuff for games that use modern code, it's much more readable, it's all documented, don't have to remake entire systems cause they're outdated so on and so on.

 

[SharSash]

I second this. We are the customers and Blizzard is a service. We give them money for their product and expect a proper quality treatment in return.

 

[Chaosy]

Uhm, no. I paid for this game, I dragged two friends into it since 1.30, I don't owe Blizzard anything. I will wait for fixes.
And yes, I do want to get my hands on working 1.31 faster, but its a matter of principle. Blizzard is not a friend (not anymore), they are a merchant I'm buying goods from. I expect those goods to be good, not help merchant do his job.

I second this. We are the customers and Blizzard is a service. We give them money for their product and expect a proper quality treatment in return.

I actually wanted to bring this up, but I think there is a important detail that ruins this argument.
You can play on 1.24 or another stable patch. Technically you only pay for the base version of the game + a few fix/balance patches everything else is just a bonus.

It is also noteworthy the using the official installers forcefully updates to the latest patch so you have to resort to piracy for a legacy client. But if you already have your current version you can of course avoid the updates.

That being said, I do not praise them for making mistakes even if I am not entitled to good work. Maybe the other Blizzard devs gave me too high expectations.

Another crying kid, what's your point?

Starcraft 1 was a much smaller project in scale and it took a decent amount of time to finish as well, all the other Blizzard games are done on a modern architecture and done with modern code, of course it takes less time to develop stuff for games that use modern code, it's much more readable, it's all documented, don't have to remake entire systems cause they're outdated so on and so on.

Another blind fanboy? pointless insults aside.

Err ok? how about the WoW classic beta where they have bugfixes every 2-3 days. And it has way less issues than the (recent) officially released wc3 patches. Basically a game made one year later than wc3. Or Warcraft 3 remastered, or Starcraft Remastered. There is no beta for the warcraft 3 remaster yet, but I heard of no issues from the Starcraft rework.

 

[Trill]

I actually wanted to bring this up, but I think there is a important detail that ruins this argument.
You can play on 1.24 or another stable patch. Technically you only pay for the base version of the game + a few fix/balance patches everything else is just a bonus.

When that "bonus" breaks my already-purchased product, I have full rights to complain and expect fixes. I don't have to move a finger to help them fix that.
Especially since these bonuses are not done out of altruism or devotion to fanbase, but simply to promote a cashgrab (i.e. Reforged).

And yes, we can play on older patches. I'm gonna play 1.30 for now. But I object to people saying we should bear with Blizzard or even help them. No way. Everyone who's got a mean word against Blizzard should be able to say it. Should say, in fact, since I'm pretty sure Blizzard representatives are reading this site. That would be fair.

 

[Lord_Marrowgrath]

I second this. We are the customers and Blizzard is a service. We give them money for their product and expect a proper quality treatment in return.

He is right. Think about it: I'm working on world editor for years. Making custom maps, triggers. I bought reforged (30 $) and they destroyed the game. It's just a patch and they released it with many bugs.

30$ Includes: Broken world editor, destroying custom maps, cant play custom maps, destroy your ladder on RoC

I know they will fix it. But, it's blizzard. You cant see 1.31 bugs anywhere else on other blizzard projects.
I hope they will fix all bugs soon.

 

[Wazzz]

wasn't this patch released early, though? mostly for public testing? it doesn't seem surprising that it would have some problems for a public test made available to everybody who wanted it

 

[Trill]

wasn't this patch released early, though? mostly for public testing? it doesn't seem surprising that it would have some problems for a public test made available to everybody who wanted it

PTR was released ages ago. This is supposed to be proper release.
Funny thing, most problems people report didn't occur with PTR editor for me, so they must have actively broken stuff before deployment.

 

[Bribe]

Uhm, no. I paid for this game, I dragged two friends into it since 1.30, I don't owe Blizzard anything. I will wait for fixes.
And yes, I do want to get my hands on working 1.31 faster, but its a matter of principle. Blizzard is not a friend (not anymore), they are a merchant I'm buying goods from. I expect those goods to be good, not help merchant do his job.

I've been playing this game since a few months after the launch of RoC. You can accept the game as a work in progress and understand that there are issues which can arise with massive code changes, but declining to be on the PTR because you want to sit back and let others do the trials for you does nothing to help develop this game you claim to care so much about. If people like you would even take a remote interest in the new features before they're released, we wouldn't be where we are now.

 

[Wazzz]

i dunno, it had a few of the world editor features in the patch notes labelled as (Beta), i guess some issues were bound to be expected with that in mind

it's looking pretty sweet so far, they have a very promising premise and i hope they have great success with it

 

[Chaosy]

QA, Localization & CS - Blizzard Careers

Not our job.

 

[_lycan]

I actually wanted to bring this up, but I think there is a important detail that ruins this argument.
You can play on 1.24 or another stable patch. Technically you only pay for the base version of the game + a few fix/balance patches everything else is just a bonus.

It is also noteworthy the using the official installers forcefully updates to the latest patch so you have to resort to piracy for a legacy client. But if you already have your current version you can of course avoid the updates.

That being said, I do not praise them for making mistakes even if I am not entitled to good work. Maybe the other Blizzard devs gave me too high expectations.



Another blind fanboy? pointless insults aside.

Err ok? how about the WoW classic beta where they have bugfixes every 2-3 days. And it has way less issues than the (recent) officially released wc3 patches. Basically a game made one year later than wc3. Or Warcraft 3 remastered, or Starcraft Remastered. There is no beta for the warcraft 3 remaster yet, but I heard of no issues from the Starcraft rework.

You realize that wow classic was not going to happen if they had to update the 1.12 client right? they even came out and said it, until a guy found out how to port the data from 1.12 into the modern client, which meant they could work with a modern codebase and fasten up development, it still took 2 years after that.


The team is also significantly bigger considering how big world of warcraft as a game is compared to warcraft 3... please.


Warcraft 3 is being updated on the original client, which means everything has to be reworked and there can be unexpected issues on every change.

 

[Chaosy]

Retail WoW is also operating on ancient code.

Blizzard has stated that they literary cannot change the auction house because it would break the game somehow. It is not clear why, obviously some sorta of ultra ugly code from rushed development back in 2003.

So yeah.

I do not know specifics since they do not share their code, but it is fair to say that certain parts of the game are almost untouched.

edit: Source was a US bluepost. I found some posts mentioning it but cannot find the link to the specific post unfortunately.

 

[The_Silent]

I've played custom maps happily, issue free, all day. Guess it is hardware depended issues.

 

[Wazzz]

I've been playing this game since a few months after the launch of RoC. You can accept the game as a work in progress and understand that there are issues which can arise with massive code changes, but declining to be on the PTR because you want to sit back and let others do the trials for you does nothing to help develop this game you claim to care so much about. If people like you would even take a remote interest in the new features before they're released, we wouldn't be where we are now.

saw your name in the credits for the patch notes, was pretty cool. love that you been helping blizzard out with this <3

 

[Eat_Bacon_Daily]

Corrupting existing maps is kind of devastating oversight for people with no backups, especially considering the editor improvements, i'm sure a lot of folk ran to their WIPs to try things out and may have lost a lot of work in the progress. The other bugs in the patch are pretty big, but they will likely be fixed quickly, but the loss of map progress is a very devastating blow to the community. I am saddened by the news.

 

[Wrda]

Why did they change the open map window? It just sucks so hard, not to mention the buttons being bugged and all misplaced (ok and cancel), you cant even see the last maps if you scroll down.
Please don't change stuff that was never asked for or was pretty fine before.

 

[Wazzz]

for people with no backups, i feel like this could have been avoided

 

[Trill]

I've been playing this game since a few months after the launch of RoC. You can accept the game as a work in progress and understand that there are issues which can arise with massive code changes, but declining to be on the PTR because you want to sit back and let others do the trials for you does nothing to help develop this game you claim to care so much about. If people like you would even take a remote interest in the new features before they're released, we wouldn't be where we are now.

Inner workings of a company, amount and/or quality of code they are working with, amount of people and/or money they choose to throw at this particular product are purely their concern. Just because we know about them doesn't mean we should care. I mean, yeah, I cared 15 years ago, but there's little more than company name that's left since then.

Customers of company I work in expect working software every time we release an update. Amount of changes - whether we just change interface a bit, or rework architecture - are not their concern. It should never be their concern. Whether we only use QA department to test it, or half the office, its not customers' concern. Games already get extra testing because those strange people who play (and pay for) Early Access and PTR/PBE/PTS versions. I don't see a single reason to treat Blizzard any differently than our business customers treat our company.

You realize that wow classic was not going to happen if they had to update the 1.12 client right? they even came out and said it, until a guy found out how to port the data from 1.12 into the modern client, which meant they could work with a modern codebase and fasten up development, it still took 2 years after that.

The team is also significantly bigger considering how big world of warcraft as a game is compared to warcraft 3... please.

Warcraft 3 is being updated on the original client, which means everything has to be reworked and there can be unexpected issues on every change.

As I said, that is not our problem. Business customers won't listen to developers' sob story about, I dunno, faulty backup server, or lead developer resigning. They expect product or they complain.
I don't see a single reason why this should be any different.

 

[pusha1999]

seriously, why blizzards just cant take opensource of JNPG for examle from moyak with opensources of plugins there and just not implement in their WE? If they think that this 3rd part progs get some hacks, just check this plugins and modify...Just take the JNPG and implement new natives and possible to work with new database...and for now, for now we just wait a totally normal WE and freebugged wc3 1.31 version.

 

[YourArthas]

You realize that wow classic was not going to happen if they had to update the 1.12 client right? they even came out and said it, until a guy found out how to port the data from 1.12 into the modern client, which meant they could work with a modern codebase and fasten up development, it still took 2 years after that.


The team is also significantly bigger considering how big world of warcraft as a game is compared to warcraft 3... please.


Warcraft 3 is being updated on the original client, which means everything has to be reworked and there can be unexpected issues on every change.

I mean come on how can someone still be a fanboy and defend Blizzard after this patch, As Chaosy said WoW is also an ancient engine which is based off Warcraft III engine, if classics team has a trouble go and ask for help from WoW team and Blizzard in general, if they don't help it is their fault not Classic Team's but at this point I can't see anyone defending them

 

[Wrda]

I just hope they fix the stuff they just broke in this patch, including the strings corruption, and if they implement TESH which was something heavily requested literally by almost everyone, then I'm happy...for a good while.

 

[Aldeia]

Do you have JassHelper enabled? It automatically keeps backups of your maps. Check Documents\Warcraft III\JassHelper\Backups

i do, but when i go to that folder it gives

which are not my maps (my map weight is like 40mb +)

 

[BloodMood97]

I updated my custom map League of Heroes Arena 2.2T to the new patch 1.31.0 and almost every strings in Text Box, Unit name, Item description, Spells descriptions are now missing, incorrect, changed or corrupted. At least I did a backup file just before trying the new patch. Be careful with 1.31.0 !

And in the WE, a lot of yellow strings appear in the main screen.

 

[Chaosy]

I mean come on how can someone still be a fanboy and defend Blizzard after this patch, As Chaosy said WoW is also an ancient engine which is based off Warcraft III engine, if classics team has a trouble go and ask for help from WoW team and Blizzard in general, if they don't help it is their fault not Classic Team's but at this point I can't see anyone defending them

To be fair, not everything is ancient. The graphic stuff has been updated for sure. I'd imagine the dev tools too.

Generally speaking though, they do not touch old code. All the quests made in TBC were made in TBC and has not been updated. Same for raid/NPC scripts.

Blizzard does not invest enough people into wc3, that is why they apparently expect the community to do the testing instead of their hired QA team. That does not excuse their unwillingness to avoid the problem after a mistake is made though. Slow progress it to be expected however.

 

[Bribe]

You realize that wow classic was not going to happen if they had to update the 1.12 client right? they even came out and said it, until a guy found out how to port the data from 1.12 into the modern client, which meant they could work with a modern codebase and fasten up development, it still took 2 years after that.


The team is also significantly bigger considering how big world of warcraft as a game is compared to warcraft 3... please.


Warcraft 3 is being updated on the original client, which means everything has to be reworked and there can be unexpected issues on every change.

The game has had glitches for years and

To be fair, not everything is ancient. The graphic stuff has been updated for sure. I'd imagine the dev tools too.

Generally speaking though, they do not touch old code. All the quests made in TBC were made in TBC and has not been updated. Same for raid/NPC scripts.

Blizzard does not invest enough people into wc3, that is why they apparently expect the community to do the testing instead of their hired QA team. That does not excuse their unwillingness to avoid the problem after a mistake is made though. Slow progress it to be expected however.

The community is why WarCraft 3 still exists in the first place. Many of us have put tens of thousands of hours into the game in various ways. It is fair to expect some people to suffer setbacks if they don't contribute to the test environment.

 

[juvian]

It is fair to expect some people to suffer setbacks if they don't contribute to the test environment

And where are you supposed to report it

 

[YourArthas]

The community is why WarCraft 3 still exists in the first place. Many of us have put tens of thousands of hours into the game in various ways. It is fair to expect some people to suffer setbacks if they don't contribute to the test environment.

People DID contribute to the test environment but Blizzard did not update the PTR instead they pushed a non-tested patch to live here is the point, why bother with PTR if you are going to do this?

 

[fenix140]

I do not think it's the last patch because there are several things to add in the editor, and also many errors to correct. Hopefully it is not the last patch, since they could add some more things to the editor of the game.

 

[fenix140]

Does anyone know if terrain alterations can be made in real time, such as creating cliffs or eliminating them as SC2 does? If not good, it would be reforged.

 

[Trill]

By the way, have they added new natives to GUI?

 

[Wrda]

Some they did, some not. in GUI you can now manipulate unit, abilities and items fields. I just took a glance at them though.

 

[EdgeOfChaos]

I see a strange attitude from many of the people here. I don't want to call it "victim-blaming" since it's not quite the right word, but more like "refusal to blame Blizzard for anything"

I see things like:
- This wouldn't have happened if you backed up your maps
- This wouldn't have happened if you played on the PTR
- This wouldn't have happened if you didn't keep complaining and demotivating Blizzard and rushing them
- Okay, it's broken but they're trying really hard and it's old code!

So to respond to some of this...
Yes map makers should have backups. That is the best practice and the best way to keep your work safe. That STILL doesn't make it ok for blizzard to corrupt people's maps with the official world editor.

As for the PTR. If you as a programmer rely on your users to test your code for you, you have already failed. There's lots of different hardware and such so it's normal to have random/unexpected issues, but what ISN'T normal is to have critical problems with your patch that result in the game being completely broken for a significant amount of users. There's a rule that should generally be followed in software: if you end up blaming your users for anything, your expectations were wrong to begin with. I see this all the time when people create un-intuitive user interfaces and then blame the user for not understanding it. No, the user isn't wrong. You are. In the same way, if you expect a significant amount of people to play on the PTR and blame the users when they don't, you have unrealistic expectations.

Another attitude I'm seeing is that we just need to "shut up" and stop talking about the problems. Well no, that isn't how it's going to work. People need to be vocal when they are unhappy with how things are going. They are not immune to criticism, so sorry to all the shills out there who are furiously pounding on the keyboards telling us to shut up and go away.

Patch after patch is running into critical problems. This is not a typical thing that happens and shows that the team is not following proper business practices.

@Trill it does not appear so.

@fenix140 terrain deformations, terrain tile change, and terrain pathing change can do it for you.

 

[fenix140]

@fenix140 terrain deformations, terrain tile change, and terrain pathing change can do it for you.

All that is possible, I mean the elevations of the terrain. Of course you could do with doodads. But altering the height of the terrains and creating terraces is not yet possible.

 

[EdgeOfChaos]

You can increase the height of terrain, I believe, using a Crater deformation with negative depth. You'd just have to do a lot of them to make it look nice. Not optimal, but possible.

I've never done it though.

 

[Nudl9]

So how do you downgrade Warcraft 3?
I tried to reinstall the game, but the game already had the latest patched installed.
Soooo does this mean we have to resort to piracy if we want to work on maps?

 

[YourArthas]

So how do you downgrade Warcraft 3?
I tried to reinstall the game, but the game already had the latest patched installed.
Soooo does this mean we have to resort to piracy if we want to work on maps?

Sadly yes

 

[Trill]

Soooo does this mean we have to resort to piracy if we want to work on maps?

Does it even count as piracy? I have a game, I have a fully official serial number for it... does it matter where I downloaded it from?