Blender 2.8

[Sirius]

This one in particular has spread through big corporate design decisions in the last few years, and I wish I knew why.

Eh, I'd just pass it off as UI designer laziness. I mean, I've done crappy UIs on occasions because it was more convenient for a non graphic designer like me. But having the nerve of saying it improve the user experience ? Naaaah.
There is a fine line between trimming excess effects in favor of a more unified look (aka "flat design", when done right) and outright being too lazy to put in any color/shading.

... as well as what we know about how human eyes work.

Yeah, whoever took even a 10 minutes course on UI design should know color is the easiest way for the brain to identify icons before even analyzing its shape. That's the first thing they teach you.

Anyway...
/rant

[Tsar Hoikas]

Remember Windows 8 "metro" edition????

[Sirius]

Haha ! Yeah, the Metro stuff wasn't great. Too bad most of it stayed in Win10.
Still, to be honest Win8 remains my favorite OS by far, once you trim the useless features (which is much harder in Win10...).

[Aloys]

All in all I don't really see how Age building can benefit from 2.8.. I don't see really any new useful features. From what I can see the modelling and UV mapping features are mostly unchanged, just some UI/workflow adjustments. Maybe there's is some under the hood API improvement we could benefit from in the long run. I'm always up for a tool upgrade, but at first sight here I don't really see a reason to upgrade.

For people who will be using Blender for things other than Uru stuff it would be easuer to only use 1 version. But strictly for Age building I don't really see the added value so far.

[J'Kla]

Consider the Noob who knows nothing of age building.

They do some research and hear that there are these 3DMax tools only to find that the 32bit version they need is no longer supported and the old version is almost impossible to get.

So they come to the venerable "Guild of Writers" only to find that they have tools but are themselves using an old version of Blender and not the shiny new version.

Yes we are only 0.01 versions behind the curve but is it right to be anywhere behind the curve?

I do not see Blender 2.79b ever becoming impossible to get.

I just don't want our new age builders to have any excuse for perceiving us as the kind of people who would say "There's nothing wrong with the horse and cart it was good enough for my great grandad it's good enough for me".

I started with Blender back at version 2.3 and have always considered its learning curve as the biggest roadblock to adoption.

I just think the new 2.8 version is going some way to addressing that.

For me I have no problem with version 2.79b. Yes Alloys at present there are no new features in 2.8 and UV Mapping may be unchanged for now but who knows what we will find in later versions.

Please don't see me as anything other than "Devil's Advocate" I am in no position to push for change.

As you say there may be no reason to upgrade yet, but there is equally also no reason to be left behind.

[Deledrius]

Consider the Noob who knows nothing of age building.

That's always under consideration.

As you say there may be no reason to upgrade yet, but there is equally also no reason to be left behind.

Aside from all the reasons we've mentioned.

[Tsar Hoikas]

If you would like to see Blender 2.80 compatibility come sooner, contributions are welcome. I even made some brief notes on the requirements a few months ago. Note that upgrading Blender 2.79 created blends to Blender 2.80 will pretty much trash all of your Korman compatible materials, but that shouldn't be a big deal, right? Unless you want to spend some time to write a a tool whose sole purpose is to upgrade materials...