Why maintenance on Tuesday mornings?
by Mike Schramm 
Dec 12th 2007 at 9:00PM
I don't really think that Drysc has to justify downtime (seeing as it on Tuesday mornings for most players, not to mention that with all the changes we've seen come down lately, downtime has definitely been justified), but he does it anyway over on the forums. He's right-- things used to be a lot worse (I can definitely remember having a secondary realm to escape to when my main realm was down), and with the two week cycle Blizzard has going on right now, actual downtime is few and far between. Sure, it means that every Tuesday morning you've got to go for a walk rather than play the game, but that's definitely not a bad problem to have.Sure, if Tuesday morning is a time you usually play, it's not that much fun (I remember I always used to have Tuesday mornings off when I worked retail, and every week I forgot, and tried to sign on before realizing the realms were down). But until Blizzard figures out how to update the game while it stays live, the situation we've got now ends up being a pretty good solution.
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Realm Status, Blizzard, Leveling
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
theRaptor Dec 12th 2007 9:10PM
They could always go the EvE:Online route and take the servers down everyday for 30 minutes to an hour, but that ends up being more annoying then once a week multi-hour downtime. Especially for us Australians. What ever happend to the idea Blizz had a few months back of mostly doing rolling restarts and doing a real maintenance once a month or so?
Jayus Dec 12th 2007 9:17PM
Tuesday "morning" is 8pm-10pm Australian time... you know the poor players that get lumped in with the American servers... and its prime time for us.
If they pushed it back 4 hours, it would be fine, and still not a problem for most yanks.
thegame Dec 12th 2007 9:17PM
You think its bad, feel for us Aussies.
It goes down between 8pm and 10pm peak time for most of us.
Wanting to come home and blast some murlocs and the server is down. I would kill for it to be in the morning!
Tyy Dec 12th 2007 9:21PM
For the addicted among us Blizz could at least do it by clusters, giving us a chance to work on an alt on a different realm in the meantime.
Milktub Dec 12th 2007 9:22PM
Sometimes I wish Tuesday were up days. My work schedule is such that Mondays and Tuesdays are "optional" but Mondays involve a meeting that must be attended. To be able to wake up, brew a pot of coffee and get some off-peak herb/ore farming done sounds like fun.
Scott Dec 12th 2007 9:30PM
Unfortunately this definately is NOT ok for most Australians/Asians. There is huge demand in this region with enough realms to cover a battlgroup. Blizzard make huge $$$$'s out of our market but do not want to fork any of it out to implement actual servers in our region. Myself like most other Australians only get to play at night and on weekends so we only really get 6/7 days of our subscription :( I wonder how the yanks would go if there maintenence window was from 8pm-10pm like ours. Something tells me there would be an uproar!!!
tkc Dec 12th 2007 9:32PM
I have to go with Mike and Blizz on this one. It is scheduled time. We know it is coming. Is it really so dreadful to have to find something else to do for 4 hours a week?
I'd rather they do this then have a realm crash, say, half way through a tough boss fight that your guild is finally about to win for the first time.
thegame Dec 12th 2007 10:39PM
sure i have no heartache for maintenance but then should i only pay for 6 days. As i work full time and can only play at night so basically they take a whole day out for me.
The aussies really need their own server, or least an Aus/NZ one!
FireStar Dec 12th 2007 9:48PM
I know the title and the body of this blog are different, but to answer the title the best day to get stuff done in an IT world is on Tuesday. Then of course there's the "hardly anyone is available to play tuesday morning" that you mentioned.
Rasnarok Dec 13th 2007 6:53AM
"I don't really think that Drysc has to justify downtime "
I don't really agree with that statement. We pay every month to play this game so I think we should know the reason why the servers are brought down outside of regular scheduled downtime.
Shadowisp Dec 12th 2007 9:54PM
I wish they would compensate players who lose major chunks of thier playtime to this though.
I am Australian and this occurs at peak play time for most of it, and we dont get any considerations especially when it pretty much rules out Tuesday as a raid night :(
I pay the same as anyone else, but lose 100s of hours to maintenance... its just not fair.
Yes it was worse... but it could be a lot better too.
Especially since the notice for the maintenance night seems to be still less than 8 hours before hand of what they are actually planning to do.
hinu Dec 12th 2007 10:45PM
If they gave us Australians and our friends in the Philippines, Malaysia and Singapore a discount of 1/7th the cost of each month's subscription, I wouldn't mind.
Tuesday nights in Australia, Philippines, Malaysia and Singapore are no go for WoW thanks to this. Lots of us work during the day, or go to school and can play only at night.
For East coast, maintenance starts at 10pm. Think of all those poor people in Western Australia, Philippines, Malaysia and Singapore who get maintenance shutdown at 7/8pm!
davidus Dec 12th 2007 10:56PM
Why not just have the maintenance start earlier. Instead of 5-11, why not 1-7, or 1-9 if they need to extend it.
Merus Dec 12th 2007 11:13PM
That still takes out the Australians, and honestly who wants to go in to work at 1am every morning?
pablasso Dec 12th 2007 11:32PM
No way, 1am+ is prime time for me, and i would be as pissed as you are if they took the servers at that hour :)
ian holsman Dec 12th 2007 11:47PM
they need to implement rolling restarts based on battlegroup.
It would make it easier for the admins, and allow us Australians to have our night back.
Saying that having to spend a night of WoW isn't such a bad thing either
BigBear Dec 12th 2007 11:51PM
The Tuesday morning downtime was selected because it was the least busy time and this always the best choice for any downtime. Of course, since they decided to lump Oceanic (my servers) in with this when the downtime is atually our peak time, its highly insulting, and quite frankly I don't have any sympathies for any American who complains about downtime or the ones like the OP who think this current solution is acceptable, but then the quality of Mike's posts these days is problematical at best.
Sneakstar Dec 13th 2007 1:26AM
"....but then the quality of Mike's posts these days is problematical at best..."
you said it!
Bales Dec 13th 2007 5:50PM
All I can say is QQ. I'm an American that works second shift. My prime time is exactly the same as yours. 90% of my guild is Australian. I'm completely fine with a scheduled once a week maintenence. In fact, I've not heard any of my guildmates complain yet. Go try playing any other MMO, they have daily restarts. THAT is a pain in the arse. Your 15$ a month (or whatever it is in AUS dollars) is better spent if all of the realms are taken down at once.
Jason Dec 13th 2007 12:04AM
I actually have alot of weekdays off and play during the day(i'm pacific time) so tuesdays are prime playing time for me. However I just use that time to take care of my house bitch duties and life is good.