Interview with a staff member #2 - Micro

[Sarah]

Hello WoW Freakz community,

did you ever want to know more about our staff members?

NOW there is the chance that you can ask them whatever you want to know the most about them!

Each week YOU will be able to submit a question to a select member of our staff by asking them in this topic. After 1 week we will select some of those questions (and we may also add some of our own) for the staff member to answer.

You can ask questions about them as a person, or about their work for the server. However, please refrain from asking questions about when a specific issue on the server is going to be adressed.

Note that a question is NOT guaranteed to be answered, our staff members reserve the right to ignore a question if they do not wish to answer it - we ask you to respect their privacy.



This week you can ask questions to Micro. He is a Developer for WoW Freakz!

[Fanca]

Which was the most difficult task you have ever done (besides Suramar )?

Feel free to contact me via forum PM or discord. (Fanca#6164)

[Skye]

What do you do outside of WoW?

[Sarah]

How did you get into development for a WoW private server? (What made you start doing it?)

All PMs must be written in English. Bug reports in PMs will be ignored - use the Bug Report section on the forum.

[microk2]

Q: When are you going to bring back the lady rank on discord?
A: Hopefully soon enough. We need someone to check them tho.

Q: As a developer on a WoW private server, What was one of the hardest codes/scripts you had to do and what do you expect from the server to achieve
A: I don't really remember that "one" hardest code/script. Probably everything that involves a scenario, they are time consuming (such as artifact scenarios back in Legion/Suramar stuff). Tho a quest that I hated for a while was the script of The Old Fashioned Way quest. It was pretty complicated for me to do it back in the pleb dev days.

Q: As a Developper which are the programming languages you learned( by order ),what was the hardest project you had,how did you start as a developper in freakz and how do you encourage people that want to be developpers or programmers like you and how do you think they should start?
A: 3 questions in 1. I don't know if SQL is considered a programming language but this is the first thing I started to learn when I joined trial devs. Very useful to analyse bunch of db data, create automated scripts for db etc... The most hardest project I had? It's a zone in Legion that starts with 'S' and ends in 'ar'. (I hate it). I started "programming" when I got bored of playing wow, but I liked the game and I wondered how this game works in the background. So I googled how to make a wow local server and I found TrinityCore community where they explain step by step how to install a wow server. Then I looked on bugs section on forum and tried to "fix" some of them, posting the "fix" in topic. Then I got some DMs from the Head GM/Dev from that time, and then Shocker invited me as trial dev. How to start? Just start... practice... try to replicate stuff you see or you play (websites, games etc), don't be afraid to ask questions.

Q: Are developers working as a single unit or are you split into teams dedicated for specific tasks? If so which are those tasks/teams and which team are you in?
What is you favorite Freakz-related thing to work on (if there is any specific)?
A: We work in teams. We have the core-system team (they make tools we use as devs to script other stuff and take care of server performance), PVE team (raids/dungeons), PVP team, Questline/Zones team (fixing the world zones and quests). I'm in Questline/Zones team. Favorite Freakz-related thing to work on? Developing new content for the playerbase and see them playing it

Q: Which was the most difficult task you have ever done
A: Hm... Shocker told me to train some trial devs. Yeah this was the most difficult task for me, since I had to be like a teacher and create test scripts and analyse what they sent to me.

Q: Have you considered going full time artist in paint?
A: Yes. Paint stream #2 soonTM?

Q: What do you do outside of WoW?
A: I'm a student atm, so I do student work stuff. Spending time with friends, learning new stuff, watching movies when I'm bored, stalkin.. I mean scrolling on social media, thinking about wtf am I gonna do in the future with my life... I have 12 years of playing tennis tho, so in summer when I'm in my home town, sometimes I teach kids how to play

Q: Dristor or Pateu ?
A: Dristor when I feel like a king and I have money. Pateu when I'm on sarak mode. (most of the times)

Q: How did you get into development for a WoW private server? (What made you start doing it?)
A: I was playing with one friend on Freakz MoP. When the Warcraft movie got released, we tried WoD on retail for a month, but I didn't have money to pay the monthly subscription to keep playing, so I left retail but my friend kept playing it. So being solo on Freakz, being #1 heroic dungeon pve player, I got bored of playing and as I answered on a question above, I started looking on how to setup my own local server
What made you start doing it? Curiosity mostly... Once I got accepted in the team, I got super hyped and started learning much more and much faster and this hunger of learning new stuff led where I am today.

Q: Where should someone who's looking forward to join game development start (programming language, technologies)? How do you get experience in this field, since everyone is looking for experienced people when hiring?
A: I'm not a licensed game developer and I never worked for other game than wow. From what I've heard and seen on the internet, C++, C#, Java are mostly used for game development. About experience, you can start by doing your own projects, add them to a portofolio and then to your CV as extra-activity or smth. Show to the employers what you know to do and don't expect to get hired without starting from the bottom.

Q: When fix serveur ?
Q: I heard you love Suramar, is that true?
Q: How's Suramar doing these days?
Q: How much do you love Suramar on a scale from 1-10?
A: You are some funny guys

Q: What was it like for you when you started learning C++ and navigating through database? After how long did you get a hold of it enough to be able to work as a Developer for a game like World of Warcraft?
A: Everything I know I learned by myself. The internet is full of resources from where you can learn. C++ was a bit overwhelming at first (without knowing the basics or what suff in the code do). But google is your friend and you can find everything you need there. Having a lot of GB stored in the database from the start and not knowing how to manage it is aswell overwhelming. Doing the wrong query and deleting important data is not good, trust me But from mistakes you learn, and I don't want to sound like some "influencers" you see on the internet but this stuff is what I've done and helped me to be where I am today.

Q: Who is your favourite discord member?
A: FREAKZ#7883

Spoiler:

JK love you all

Thank you for your questions. I hope the answers will satisfy your curiosity. See you ingame on WoW

Micro, the Workaround master