Pcolapat Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Anybody can be community manager. All you gotta do is keep your mouth shut and post what they tell you to. That is the problem. EA needs to hire someone that doesn't listen to them and says anything he/she wants to. If they knew what should have been said and done for this community, then the community would be happy and they would not need another community manager. The next community manager needs to have less restrictions and more freedom to do what he/she needs to do to keep the community happy, informed, and resubbing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rouge Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 It's hard to have two-way communication with people who just refuse to listen. Many people here get a negative thought in their head and no amount of logic or support can shake that away. I've seen FAR too many posts where people ignore facts, spin facts, or even make up facts to support unconstructive rants. For the first time in all of this doom and gloom, with this sad news I am FINALLY getting my own first real sense of dismay. I hope his next job is one that is actually appreciated. Quoted For Truth. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tricky-Ha Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Either Reid was pushing back against not being able to communicate to the community more and got canned, or his strategy was keeping the community out of the loop until he had solid info. In either case we will know after the next hire. If the next guy never says anything either, then we can probably assume that Reid wanted to talk and was pushing to talk and the betters didn't want that happening and let him go. Reminds of hints of Sean Dahlberg's complaints, our SR Community Manager who quit & was replaced by Reid. One major difference between Dahlberg & Reid? Dahlberg was a man & a former Marine, he had much thicker skin & wasn't afraid of this forum community like Reid was & had admitted as much so many times. It's a tough job being a Community manager in charge of a major triple A MMO, of this I have no doubt, I think if you know that you can't handle the pressure then you shouldn't even apply for it. Reid was not a good fit, IMO, so it's all for the best that he's gone & hopefully we'll get a replacement with more wit & tougher skin. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holden_Dissent Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 I think its a knee jerk reaction from EA because of the loss in subs. any pessimist would, really. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rouge Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Just remember how Dahlberg fared after he walked out. His new game lived just weeks after it launched. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fenshire Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 For people expecting there to be a new community manager: you don't lay someone off and then replace them. People get laid off because the position has been eliminated. Honestly, I hope this spells the end of the forums. There is nothing positive here. I go in game, have a great time and have never heard a complaint about this game. I come here and the trolls would have you believe it's the worst game ever created. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShavedEwok Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Just wanted to drop by to wish Mr Reid all the best in the future with whatever he decides to do. Personally, as far as I could tell, I think he did a great job. As some have already pointed out, this community can be an extremely tough crowd, not to mention one very difficult (impossible even) to clearly communicate with at times. Some people just won't accept simple facts, other are huge drama queens while some troll or are just flat out illiterate. I think that's important to keep in mind before you criticize him too much. Anyway, hope all goes well for Stephen and I sincerely thank him for all the hard work he's done for the community. Cheers mate! SE Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blistrich Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Just wanted to drop by to wish Mr Reid all the best in the future with whatever he decides to do. I don't think he reads these forums... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tricky-Ha Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Just remember how Dahlberg fared after he walked out. His new game lived just weeks after it launched. On that I'd have to blame the game, not Dahlberg, have you read up on Faxion Online? Didn't look like anything I wanted to ever play. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crawelc Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 LOL @ the end of the forums. Runescape actually did this, for like 6 months untill they went p2p. Those forums were horrible, this is bunnies and kittens compared to that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShavedEwok Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 For people expecting there to be a new community manager: you don't lay someone off and then replace them. People get laid off because the position has been eliminated. Error #1: Stephen Reid replaced Sean Dahlberg. Error #2: The CRM Manager position is open. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShavedEwok Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 I don't think he reads these forums... Maybe he will now when he no longer has any obligation whatsoever to deal with all the crap posted here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DarthOvertone Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 I wish Mr. Reid the best. I appreciate all of his effort on making SWTOR happen. I would never wish unemployment on anyone, especially in an economy like we have presently in the U.S. so I hope he finds something right away to replace his job at BW. That said, the community in this game is largely horrendous and extremely lacking. I have never played an MMO where I felt so detached from the community. It's almost like it doesn't exist at all. I'm not sure if Mr. Reid was responsible for this or not, as I am unfamiliar with what the scope of his position really was, but I will say that SWTOR is in severe need of a sense of community that players can rally around. Presently, that absolutely does not exist. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rouge Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 On that I'd have to blame the game, not Dahlberg, have you read up on Faxion Online? Didn't look like anything I wanted to ever play. I followed the game a bit, but that was the game Dahlberg wanted to help to build. And no, I wouldn't have wanted to play it either, but I still wished the best for it and the people behind it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LagunaD Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Error #2: The CRM Manager position is open. Reid's title was "Senior Online Community Manager". If you read the description of that position, it is clearly a backroom, marketing department job, coordinating advertising campaigns and such, not Reid's job. Nowhere does the job description mention any direct contact or communication with the player community. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
torni Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 look at the history of warhammer. same thing is happening here. bad customer support. but blame the company and not the community manager. im pretty sure his hands were tied. the community manager of warhammer got fired too. he went to rift and its non stop praises for their customer support team. twitter facebook etc is not where customers go to get official information on whats going on with the game. snippets here and there is useless. they even had the brilliant idea to have the 1.3 patch released on another website. yeah dont use the official swtor forums. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mallorik Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 look at the history of warhammer. same thing is happening here. bad customer support. but blame the company and not the community manager. im pretty sure his hands were tied. the community manager of warhammer got fired too. he went to rift and its non stop praises for their customer support team. twitter facebook etc is not where customers go to get official information on whats going on with the game. snippets here and there is useless. they even had the brilliant idea to have the 1.3 patch released on another website. yeah dont use the official swtor forums. Has that warhammer guy been with rift for awhile? because their cs is by far the best in any mmo i have ever played. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
torni Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Has that warhammer guy been with rift for awhile? because their cs is by far the best in any mmo i have ever played. yup from the day rift went online. swtor sucks.ea sucks. if you dont believe me read this rofl http://consumerist.com/2012/04/congratulations-ea-you-are-the-worst-company-in-america-for-2012.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Superawesomerman Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 This is always the case. They hamstring the community manager and then ax them when things don't go their way. Its a thankless job to be sure. Look at all the negative posts going on now. Would anyone want to be subjected to that? I'm sure Stephen Reid is under strict non-disclosure, and EA's lawyers are circling and waiting for any slip up. That's how bad it's gotten, that even if you are fired, you're not allowed to say way, unless you want to spend a long time fighting court battles. This. I feel for sr, **** job. Cant help but feel he mignt be better off somewhere else. Doing almost anything else. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BlownSi Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Meh....same thing happened with STO, at around the same time frame after launch. New people came on, game actually improved and moved in a little different direction, although it went F2P. Not sure if that is what is going here, but I somehow feel like I have seen this episode once before. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mallorik Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 yup from the day rift went online. swtor sucks.ea sucks. if you dont believe me read this rofl http://consumerist.com/2012/04/congratulations-ea-you-are-the-worst-company-in-america-for-2012.html Yeah ive seen that many times, pretty stupid to vote a video game compnay the worse company in america, but ea is most likely the worse video game company in the world. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rouge Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Meh....same thing happened with STO, at around the same time frame after launch. New people came on, game actually improved and moved in a little different direction, although it went F2P. Not sure if that is what is going here, but I somehow feel like I have seen this episode once before. STO's developer Cryptic was sold to a Chinese F2P company by Atari, not exactly a similar situation with BW and EA. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chaconne Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 (edited) Reid's title was "Senior Online Community Manager". If you read the description of that position, it is clearly a backroom, marketing department job, coordinating advertising campaigns and such, not Reid's job. Nowhere does the job description mention any direct contact or communication with the player community. Also if you look at the top of the posting the job was posted in the beginning of April... Yesterday was May 23rd... It should be really obvious that is not a posting for his job. Edited May 23, 2012 by Chaconne Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rikalonius Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 That is the problem. EA needs to hire someone that doesn't listen to them and says anything he/she wants to. If they knew what should have been said and done for this community, then the community would be happy and they would not need another community manager. The next community manager needs to have less restrictions and more freedom to do what he/she needs to do to keep the community happy, informed, and resubbing. Ha Ha, I actually got into this discussion on a different topic. I was referencing the secretary of the army, and my fellow vet said. "If he had some balls he would do that" I said, "If he had balls, he wouldn't be secretary of the army. The secretary of defense would fire him and replace him with someone with no balls." That about sums up any video game's community manager for me. Anyone know who Mass Effect's community manager is, or if there is one? I'm sure that was a fun place to be about 96 hours after release. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dragonbgone Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 So a lot of people are talking about how the game needs to get buffed up and how they need new ideas and MORE content. The obvious choice must have been to lay people off and shrink the think-tank. Yup, seems logical to me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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