Regarding the Thousand Cuts and 3 Changes threads

[ThePedigree]

Both of these threads had lengthy discourse on changes the playerbase would like to see to the game, from small changes to big changes. Both threads got developer attention and it was noted that they were keeping an eye on the feedback, to which I'd like to thank the devs for letting us know that you were watching. While we know that you guys can't exactly give us timetables on when certain things can or will be added to the game, I'd like to see some dev feedback in regards to some of the specific things mentioned in these threads.

 

What are some of the hot issues brought up in these threads that the dev team feels are of merit? Are there any stand-outs that you feel are definitely on the table for inclusion to the game? You collected our feedback, and now we'd humbly like to hear yours regarding it.

 

Thanks!

 

For reference, the threads:

 

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=5073491#edit5073491

 

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=5041199#edit5041199

[AstralProjection]

I agree completely. It's always nice to know that the threads are being watched, but a lot of energy was poured into trying to make some helpful suggestions to make the game better, and I'd love to hear which ideas are be taken more seriously or prioritized higher, or even a rough timetable. Soon, and "no plans for the immediate future" continue to not cut it. Still, it's nice to know maybe there's some hope we'll be listened to this time.

[Elyx]

exactly. While "Paying attention" is a good sign, it only means they're reading it. We don't know if they're excited about the ideas, or laughing at us over coffee....

[AllisonBerryman]

exactly. While "Paying attention" is a good sign, it only means they're reading it. We don't know if they're excited about the ideas, or laughing at us over coffee....

 

We're very excited to see constructive feedback, and the threads mentioned here have generally been exactly that. Part of what the community team does is read what players are saying across many outlets (the forums, social networking, places like reddit, etc), compile feedback, and send it along. These threads have provided us with a lot of good and generally focused and detailed feedback, and we wanted to encourage them so we'd see even more constructive feedback in them to round up and pass along!

 

I don't have any specific plans of action on individual items to share (and remember, we're always gathering and passing feedback along already - you may remember the class feedback threads we posted a while ago), but your suggestions, complaints, and feedback definitely reach the developers, and it helps inform decisions about upcoming changes and content.

Edited August 29, 2012 by AllisonBerryman

[Andryah]

exactly. While "Paying attention" is a good sign, it only means they're reading it. We don't know if they're excited about the ideas, or laughing at us over coffee....

 

MMO players, in general, seem to take a "board of directors" entitlement approach to the games.

 

By this I mean that they often behave like they are on the companies board and that everything they share warrants a direct and immediate response by the companies developer and support staff.

 

The flaw in this approach is that you are a consumer, with no NDA in place with the company, and therefore not eligible to receive any information that is not vetted for public disclosure. Much of what MMO companies (really all corporations these days) do in terms of incorporating customer feedback into a product is never directly disclosed back to the customer until it is ready for release to the public in the product. You don't have to like it, but that is the way it is in today's competitive markets. Everything is potential IP, which means they err on the side of caution. That is your free market capitalsim model in action. Whereas what MMO players want is open socialism in the context of MMO games. Not going to happen.

Edited August 29, 2012 by Andryah

[Anakis]

your suggestions, complaints, and feedback definitely reach the developers, and it helps inform decisions about upcoming changes and content.

 

 

Yup. It definitely will help them figure out what things are popular and can be added to the cash shop for maxiumum profit. I guess that would be better than what we've been getting over the past 8 months though, which is next to nothing.

[anakedcowboy]

you may remember the class feedback threads we posted a while ago), but your suggestions, complaints, and feedback definitely reach the developers, and it helps inform decisions about upcoming changes and content.

 

This is probably not something you should be proud of. There were 4? 5? max locked threads protesting 1.2 sorc / sage changes, with detailed and constructive write-ups from actual high-end raiding sorc/sage healers which were completely ignored in favor of what you described as "internal metrics". 6 months later, our sage healers still haven't seen any reversion and still run out of force in HM EC.

 

If you're actually compiling the data like you say, the devs seem to genuinely not care what you give them. Does that not give you any sort of pause about what you're doing or what you communicate to us?

[AstralProjection]

MMO players, in general, seem to take a "board of directors" entitlement approach to the games.

 

By this I mean that they often behave like they are on the companies board and that everything they share warrants a direct and immediate response by the companies developer and support staff.

 

The flaw in this approach is that you are a consumer, with no NDA in place with the company, and therefore not eligible to receive any information that is not vetted for public disclosure. Much of what MMO companies (really all corporations these days) do in terms of incorporating customer feedback into a product is never directly disclosed back to the customer until it is ready for release to the public in the product. You don't have to like it, but that is the way it is in today's competitive markets. Everything is potential IP, which means they err on the side of caution. That is your free market capitalsim model in action. Whereas what MMO players want is open socialism in the context of MMO games. Not going to happen.

 

Please, I'm so sick of the entitlement speech.

 

Games in the past have managed to tell people what the developers were working on, in an exponentially greater volume than BioWare has managed to with TOR. It's not about entitlement, it's about looking bad next to your competitors. Nobody had NDA's with the dozens of MMORPGs that came before this one that had developers who actively posted in the forums.

 

I love seeing the community members, and respect the hard job they have to do, but once in a while it would be nice to be thrown a bone that wasn't packed in a "Soon" wrapper.

 

It has happened, and will happen again, the question is, will it ever happen with BioWare? So far, the answer still looks like no.

Edited August 29, 2012 by AstralProjection

[Tolunart]

MMO players, in general, seem to take a "board of directors" entitlement approach to the games.

 

By this I mean that they often behave like they are on the companies board and that everything they share warrants a direct and immediate response by the companies developer and support staff.

.

 

I think it's the influence of the Facebook Generation. Over the last decade or so people have grown more accustomed to instanteous access to everything. I saw it years ago when working in a convenience store, people would walk around with their cell phones glued to one ear, babbling to whoever was unlucky enough to be on the other end about the mundane details of what they were doing - I'm done pumping gas, now I'm looking for something to drink, should I buy Pepsi or Coke? etc.

 

It's only gotten worse, now if someone stubs a toe they run to the computer or smartphone to post pics of the bruise on Facebook. If they haven't already, soon every detail or a person's life from what they had for breakfast to a photo of the pajamas they wear to bed will be posted online for anyone to see. Sorry folks, your life is not that interesting.

 

The worse part of it, though, is that they expect the same in return. There's no such thing as waiting for a response, they expect everything to happen immediately and cry like a 3-year-old when they have to wait ten minutes. A few months ago my current boss left me a nasty phone message when I hadn't returned a call about something within a few hours, implying that I was deliberately ignoring her. I called back and, surprise, got voicemail... left a message saying that I don't carry a cell phone, the # she has is my home phone and I don't always get my messages immediately, if I'm out late then I check them the next morning. Never heard another word about it, lol...

 

Anyway, people are going to continue insisting that everything be handed to them immediately, changes have to happen during next week's maintainance if not sooner, etc. But the reality is that it just doesn't work that way, you can demand all you want but you're not going to get it.

[AstralProjection]

Nobody's asking for updates on when the devs are brushing their teeth, spare the hyperbole.

 

Asking for concrete information on a say, monthly basis from the developers, by paying customers invested in the future of this game is not a facebook generation problem, or an entitlement issue, it's a perfectly reasonable request.

 

I don't care about what they're working on today, tomorrow, or this week specifically. What do I care about?

 

Example - In 3 things you'd like to see changed about this game, person X asked for more options to customize your starship.

 

1) Do the devs like this idea - e.g. let us know you're working on x idea suggested by the players

2) How high of a priority is this idea (can be general), but is it something that will take weeks, months, or years, based on where it is ranked? I don't want to hear "we want to do this someday", too noncommittal. Is there or is there not a resource working on it.

3) What's the rough timetable for the implementation of this idea? Can be tentative, but 3 months, this year, this spring, are all nice things that give us something other than "soon" or "not any time soon" to look forward to.

 

Those are simple bits of information that can be provided about game improvements that aren't going to give away game secrets, require an NDA, and HAVE BEEN PROVIDED by most other developers in this industry. Often, they're provided so regularly they're built into the website, with future patch notes included LONG before the patch ever hits the test server. It gives people a clue that their money is going somewhere.

 

We can debate the whole purpose of your $15 until we're blue in the face, but as far as many of us are concerned, we're NOT paying that as a server access fee - we can play plenty of other games out there without them. We're paying that because an MMORPG brings the promise of new content and improvements. That's not a promise made by BioWare, it's a promise made by deciding to create an entry into this genre.

 

Don't project your low standards on the rest of the world. The game launched lacking a lot, as most MMORPG's do. I'm forgiving of that. I understand that it takes time to produce content. Forgiving of that as well - what I'm not forgiving of is complete silence about what is actually being worked on with the money I've already given them over the last few months.

 

If it's new "content" to charge free to play players for, that's unacceptable. If it's anything of substance, people are likely to be forgiving, and just glad to hear SOMETHING from one of the most silent studios of all time. Let's be honest, software developers are fast typers. If they typed a post half as long as I did right now, everyone would be shocked, and it would take them all of a minute to make a simple gesture of good faith with a massive ROI.

[Costello]

We're very excited to see constructive feedback, and the threads mentioned here have generally been exactly that. Part of what the community team does is read what players are saying across many outlets (the forums, social networking, places like reddit, etc), compile feedback, and send it along. These threads have provided us with a lot of good and generally focused and detailed feedback, and we wanted to encourage them so we'd see even more constructive feedback in them to round up and pass along!

 

I don't have any specific plans of action on individual items to share (and remember, we're always gathering and passing feedback along already - you may remember the class feedback threads we posted a while ago), but your suggestions, complaints, and feedback definitely reach the developers, and it helps inform decisions about upcoming changes and content.

 

While it is great that the devs are being made aware of the issues is anything being done about it?

 

Lets face it the game has lost about half its subscribers which is very bad from EA and BWs point of view and those that are playing aren't around as much as they were. Possibly because there is nothing to do which is bad from the players point of view. And yet next to nothing seems to be done, very little information is provided and the most common phrase on the forums is we can't talk about that.

 

Many of the issues raised were raised in pre-production when the community first learnt of the choices made. Take Space combat as soon as it was discovered to be a rail shooter the community had issues with it, rather than fix it the problem was ignored and now space is almost completetly ignored. The Story and VO was brought up as to whether full VO would effect the speed of the updates, this was ignored and now we have a wait of over 8 months for a progression of the 4th pillar. The Choice of Species raised concerns as to being all too human back then we were told it was to do with understanding the story from their point of view and then ignored. Then later Pure-blood Sith Troopers and Chiss Jedi are added making no sence to the story but offering very very little choice in species.

 

So is it all just lip service and the forums no matter how constructive the feedback is just ignored? Cause for the last 8 months little has been done that was asked for the last 2 years.

[Nimithril]

Please, I'm so sick of the entitlement speech.

 

Games in the past have managed to tell people what the developers were working on, in an exponentially greater volume than BioWare has managed to with TOR. It's not about entitlement, it's about looking bad next to your competitors. Nobody had NDA's with the dozens of MMORPGs that came before this one that had developers who actively posted in the forums.

 

I love seeing the community members, and respect the hard job they have to do, but once in a while it would be nice to be thrown a bone that wasn't packed in a "Soon" wrapper.

 

It has happened, and will happen again, the question is, will it ever happen with BioWare? So far, the answer still looks like no.

 

I have yet to play a single MMO where the development team was allowed to post on the forums about what they were working on with regard to new content, or fixes to existing content for that matter, unless it was an official dev diary about an upcoming expansion or content update that had already been announced.

 

Btw, if you are going to make a statement about what other MMO developers do in comparison to BW/EA, then please provide some examples. The burden of proof lies with the one making the claim(s). This, of course, also applies to the seemingly never-ending posts by people about how quickly the TOR content is coming out.

[_tegrof]

Nobody's asking for updates on when the devs are brushing their teeth, spare the hyperbole.

 

Asking for concrete information on a say, monthly basis from the developers, by paying customers invested in the future of this game is not a facebook generation problem, or an entitlement issue, it's a perfectly reasonable request.

 

I don't care about what they're working on today, tomorrow, or this week specifically. What do I care about?

 

Example - In 3 things you'd like to see changed about this game, person X asked for more options to customize your starship.

 

1) Do the devs like this idea - e.g. let us know you're working on x idea suggested by the players

2) How high of a priority is this idea (can be general), but is it something that will take weeks, months, or years, based on where it is ranked? I don't want to hear "we want to do this someday", too noncommittal. Is there or is there not a resource working on it.

3) What's the rough timetable for the implementation of this idea? Can be tentative, but 3 months, this year, this spring, are all nice things that give us something other than "soon" or "not any time soon" to look forward to.

 

Those are simple bits of information that can be provided about game improvements that aren't going to give away game secrets, require an NDA, and HAVE BEEN PROVIDED by most other developers in this industry. Often, they're provided so regularly they're built into the website, with future patch notes included LONG before the patch ever hits the test server. It gives people a clue that their money is going somewhere.

 

We can debate the whole purpose of your $15 until we're blue in the face, but as far as many of us are concerned, we're NOT paying that as a server access fee - we can play plenty of other games out there without them. We're paying that because an MMORPG brings the promise of new content and improvements. That's not a promise made by BioWare, it's a promise made by deciding to create an entry into this genre.

 

Don't project your low standards on the rest of the world. The game launched lacking a lot, as most MMORPG's do. I'm forgiving of that. I understand that it takes time to produce content. Forgiving of that as well - what I'm not forgiving of is complete silence about what is actually being worked on with the money I've already given them over the last few months.

 

If it's new "content" to charge free to play players for, that's unacceptable. If it's anything of substance, people are likely to be forgiving, and just glad to hear SOMETHING from one of the most silent studios of all time. Let's be honest, software developers are fast typers. If they typed a post half as long as I did right now, everyone would be shocked, and it would take them all of a minute to make a simple gesture of good faith with a massive ROI.

 

I wish single posts could go "viral". This one should...

[AstralProjection]

I have yet to play a single MMO where the development team was allowed to post on the forums about what they were working on with regard to new content, or fixes to existing content for that matter, unless it was an official dev diary about an upcoming expansion or content update that had already been announced.

 

Btw, if you are going to make a statement about what other MMO developers do in comparison to BW/EA, then please provide some examples. The burden of proof lies with the one making the claim(s). This, of course, also applies to the seemingly never-ending posts by people about how quickly the TOR content is coming out.

 

Contrary to what you and the prophet of Entitlement think, not everyone posts on these forums so they can waste their time arguing with you. I'm done doing that. Some of us post here to communicate with the people who make the game. Unfortunately, General Discussion is one of the only forums out there they seem to pay attention to. That means, in order to get an opinion to someone who matters, we have to go through you. I know, sad day indeed, but we're all entitled to our opinions, no matter how inane or brilliant they are, and I will express mine when I feel the need to.

 

Two quick examples - City of Heroes, and WoW. Developers posted regularly, not just CM's, regular detail about future content all over website and forums. Easy to access. No secrets as to what was being worked on. Future patch notes posted, not just for a three week period while that update was on test server, because in most cases, test servers had regular uptime.

 

I appreciate your opinion, but totally disagree. Anyone who played MMORPG's over the last 15 years and had eyes knows that every other company has been better than this one at communicating - and there is no burden on me to prove that to you, because I don't care one iota how you feel about my argument.

 

Yes, communication has become more important in recent years, all the more reason to step it up slightly instead of falling into the dark ages.

 

I couldn't care less if you read that, though, there's only one group of people out there I'm talking to, and they post in yellow.

Edited August 29, 2012 by AstralProjection

[CoolBreezzzee]

In regards to the lack of feedback from the developers on this, it makes me believe that they're about to drop another "bomb" on us like they did with F2P. But this time it will be about the content that is coming when F2P goes live, and what the subscribers will or will not have to pay for.

 

Hopefully I'm wrong though.

[Kubernetic]

MMO players, in general, seem to take a "board of directors" entitlement approach to the games.

 

By this I mean that they often behave like they are on the companies board and that everything they share warrants a direct and immediate response by the companies developer and support staff.

 

The flaw in this approach is that you are a consumer, with no NDA in place with the company, and therefore not eligible to receive any information that is not vetted for public disclosure. Much of what MMO companies (really all corporations these days) do in terms of incorporating customer feedback into a product is never directly disclosed back to the customer until it is ready for release to the public in the product. You don't have to like it, but that is the way it is in today's competitive markets. Everything is potential IP, which means they err on the side of caution. That is your free market capitalsim model in action. Whereas what MMO players want is open socialism in the context of MMO games. Not going to happen.

 

Quoted For Truth

[OnlyNameLeft]

I don't care about what they're working on today, tomorrow, or this week specifically. What do I care about?

 

Example - In 3 things you'd like to see changed about this game, person X asked for more options to customize your starship.

 

1) Do the devs like this idea - e.g. let us know you're working on x idea suggested by the players

2) How high of a priority is this idea (can be general), but is it something that will take weeks, months, or years, based on where it is ranked? I don't want to hear "we want to do this someday", too noncommittal. Is there or is there not a resource working on it.

3) What's the rough timetable for the implementation of this idea? Can be tentative, but 3 months, this year, this spring, are all nice things that give us something other than "soon" or "not any time soon" to look forward to.

 

Except that it isn't nearly as simple as you make it out to be. This isn't you, or anyone else for that matter, on the consumer side of things reading some posts and having a few minutes to peck out a response. While we all have the luxury of having one game, and one community team (which is quite different than a dev team) to communicate to, the community team has myriad voices all begging to be noticed, let alone responded to.

 

I realize that the feedback in question was confined to the space of a couple of threads. That said, to expect the dev team to take time away from their duties to confer with the community team concerning every suggestion proffered and give a response such as the three-tiered one you suggest would be incredibly time-consuming and wasteful from a business perspective. Doubly so concerning the nature of the industry and how things may develop that can cause one team's priorities to shift drastically.

 

Case in point: the devs responded to some suggestions prior to launch. One of these was the question of Guild ships and their possibility of being introduced in-game. The devs responded that 1) they liked the idea and had been talking about it themselves prior to the community suggestion, 2) it was not a priority and as such they currently had no resources alloted to it since 3) it had been relegated to the "wall of crazy" and thus was merely something they may get to at some point.

 

The suggestion was floated, and all three of your questions concerning suggestions were answered. The payout for the dev team? Threads to this day that bemoan the "broken promise" of guild ships and other, similarly discussed but never promised suggestions.

 

Simple truth is "imminent," "soon," and "not any time soon" are sometimes the best a dev team can muster even internally. They can relay that to the playerbase, but vagueness such as that is invariably going to get eviscerated just as easily as more detailed answers. Either way the dev team receives the exact same vitriol.

 

In light of this, asking them to devote more time to a more detailed account of each suggestion and the Dev reaction to it is time wasted.

[Thuggy]

Except that it isn't nearly as simple as you make it out to be. This isn't you, or anyone else for that matter, on the consumer side of things reading some posts and having a few minutes to peck out a response. While we all have the luxury of having one game, and one community team (which is quite different than a dev team) to communicate to, the community team has myriad voices all begging to be noticed, let alone responded to.

 

I realize that the feedback in question was confined to the space of a couple of threads. That said, to expect the dev team to take time away from their duties to confer with the community team concerning every suggestion proffered and give a response such as the three-tiered one you suggest would be incredibly time-consuming and wasteful from a business perspective. Doubly so concerning the nature of the industry and how things may develop that can cause one team's priorities to shift drastically.

 

Case in point: the devs responded to some suggestions prior to launch. One of these was the question of Guild ships and their possibility of being introduced in-game. The devs responded that 1) they liked the idea and had been talking about it themselves prior to the community suggestion, 2) it was not a priority and as such they currently had no resources alloted to it since 3) it had been relegated to the "wall of crazy" and thus was merely something they may get to at some point.

 

The suggestion was floated, and all three of your questions concerning suggestions were answered. The payout for the dev team? Threads to this day that bemoan the "broken promise" of guild ships and other, similarly discussed but never promised suggestions.

 

Simple truth is "imminent," "soon," and "not any time soon" are sometimes the best a dev team can muster even internally. They can relay that to the playerbase, but vagueness such as that is invariably going to get eviscerated just as easily as more detailed answers. Either way the dev team receives the exact same vitriol.

 

In light of this, asking them to devote more time to a more detailed account of each suggestion and the Dev reaction to it is time wasted.

 

I've always felt the "Broken promises" issue was less with the wall of crazy features like guild capital ships, but more with how the game was marketed. Read or watch any pre-launch quote from people like James Ohlen. Then login to the game, and analyze that feature. It's almost always deceptively oversold, which greatly damages consumer confidence. You talk about a "robust companion AI customization feature a la Dragon Age 2" ...and deliver a bare bones binary ability toggle, and 2 "stances" that do very little in terms of actual effectiveness. Yes, the player base will not trust a word you say.

 

At the end of the day, however, players just want to know there's a plan. They want to not only enjoy the time they're currently playing the game, but know there's a stable foundation within the game's development to continue to grow the game they love. Quality, and consistent communication/messaging and honest transparency helps provide this.

 

It's hard to have faith in a company when one week they're touting the advantage of "having the team that built the game, continue to work on the game post launch" ....only to have massive layoffs weeks later. EA/Bioware is trying to sell this game to two groups of people with conflicting interests: Players and Investors. as a result the messaging is disjointed, and often contradictory.

[TUXs]

Contrary to what you and the prophet of Entitlement think, not everyone posts on these forums so they can waste their time arguing with you. I'm done doing that. Some of us post here to communicate with the people who make the game. Unfortunately, General Discussion is one of the only forums out there they seem to pay attention to. That means, in order to get an opinion to someone who matters, we have to go through you. I know, sad day indeed, but we're all entitled to our opinions, no matter how inane or brilliant they are, and I will express mine when I feel the need to.

 

Two quick examples - City of Heroes, and WoW. Developers posted regularly, not just CM's, regular detail about future content all over website and forums. Easy to access. No secrets as to what was being worked on. Future patch notes posted, not just for a three week period while that update was on test server, because in most cases, test servers had regular uptime.

 

I appreciate your opinion, but totally disagree. Anyone who played MMORPG's over the last 15 years and had eyes knows that every other company has been better than this one at communicating - and there is no burden on me to prove that to you, because I don't care one iota how you feel about my argument.

 

Yes, communication has become more important in recent years, all the more reason to step it up slightly instead of falling into the dark ages.

 

I couldn't care less if you read that, though, there's only one group of people out there I'm talking to, and they post in yellow.

Well written and spot on accurate. GREAT points!!!

 

For being the era of communication, it sure feels like we're waiting for a monthly publication to find out about this game...it's bizarre tbh.

[ProsaicProse]

Part of the reason I like the mentioned threads is because they get to the point instead of long whiny posts that derail the topic with provocative (flame-bait!) complaining, rather than constructive critique and solutions/suggestions.

 

Too many topics on these forums aren't constructive at all when it comes to talking about game improvement, and that's a shame because people will tend to disregard the opinion if it seems more targeted toward evoking a reaction, than being genuinely helpful.

Edited August 29, 2012 by ProsaicProse

[Urael]

Anyone who played MMORPG's over the last 15 years and had eyes knows that every other company has been better than this one at communicating - and there is no burden on me to prove that to you, because I don't care one iota how you feel about my argument.

 

Yes, communication has become more important in recent years, all the more reason to step it up slightly instead of falling into the dark ages.

 

EA/BW is under no obligation to meet the expectations of the community based on the past performance of their competitors. It would be prudent however, if they made some effort towards this end. Many here don't see the difference and demand that EA/BW follow what is percieved to be the norm. That is the error.

 

Would I like more communication? Sure. I have posted this in other threads. Is EA/BW communicating more? I would have to say we have seen an uptick in quantity. As to quality, not so much. I don't blame the CRTeam. They can only communicate within the guidlines they are given.

 

Purly speculation but please indulge me, I think the sense of "slowness" may come from regular forum usage. The relative rate of quality information updates are slow in coming as compared to daily heavy use of the forums. The more one frequently uses the forums and doesn't see an update to a question(s) that they are interested answered day after day, minute after minute, one can get the sense that nothing is going on and even miss things when they do happen. People become saturated and perhaps even blinded by preconceived notions of what they will or will not see. Expectations need to be managed. Basically we are going to get information when it is able to be released. I am sure that the CRTeam communicates this to their management and development teams.

 

In summary, EA/BW is communicating more but not at the rate that we would like to see. The only thing we can do is wait and see what happens or move on. If you are having fun stay. If you have reached the point of no return, leave, go find a new game that you can be happy with. I don't understand why people stay around if they are past the point of no return ( the Imma unsubbed poster that just want to trash talk everything SWTOR not you AP).

Edited August 29, 2012 by Urael

[BJWyler]

MMO players, in general, seem to take a "board of directors" entitlement approach to the games.

 

By this I mean that they often behave like they are on the companies board and that everything they share warrants a direct and immediate response by the companies developer and support staff.

 

The flaw in this approach is that you are a consumer, with no NDA in place with the company, and therefore not eligible to receive any information that is not vetted for public disclosure. Much of what MMO companies (really all corporations these days) do in terms of incorporating customer feedback into a product is never directly disclosed back to the customer until it is ready for release to the public in the product. You don't have to like it, but that is the way it is in today's competitive markets. Everything is potential IP, which means they err on the side of caution. That is your free market capitalsim model in action. Whereas what MMO players want is open socialism in the context of MMO games. Not going to happen.

 

Pretty much hits the nail on the head. Too bad a lot of truths like this fall on blind eyes:

 

This is probably not something you should be proud of. There were 4? 5? max locked threads protesting 1.2 sorc / sage changes, with detailed and constructive write-ups from actual high-end raiding sorc/sage healers which were completely ignored in favor of what you described as "internal metrics". 6 months later, our sage healers still haven't seen any reversion and still run out of force in HM EC.

 

If you're actually compiling the data like you say, the devs seem to genuinely not care what you give them. Does that not give you any sort of pause about what you're doing or what you communicate to us?

 

Just because it was detailed, construction, and well thought-out doesn't make it right or ultimately good for the game. We all want to pay $0 in taxes and can think of myriads of well thought-out and detailed ways to not pay taxes and do other things to make up for the lack of income via taxes. However that does not mean it will work or be good for the country.

 

BJ

[BJWyler]

Example - In 3 things you'd like to see changed about this game, person X asked for more options to customize your starship.

 

1) Do the devs like this idea - e.g. let us know you're working on x idea suggested by the players

2) How high of a priority is this idea (can be general), but is it something that will take weeks, months, or years, based on where it is ranked? I don't want to hear "we want to do this someday", too noncommittal. Is there or is there not a resource working on it.

3) What's the rough timetable for the implementation of this idea? Can be tentative, but 3 months, this year, this spring, are all nice things that give us something other than "soon" or "not any time soon" to look forward to.

 

And the Most Exhaulted ArenaNet does the same thing. "When it's ready" is their trademark. I have played the game for 7 years and probably can count on one hand the number of times one of the actual devs (and not Community Management Member) posted in the forums in all that time. This may come as a great shock to many people, but sometimes the answers aren't there because there are no answers to be given on a particular question other than "We are thinking about it" or "We would like to do that in the future." You know, just like the reasons the government won't admit to a JFK assassination conspiracy or an alien ship at Roswell - because there wasn't any in either case.

 

BJ

[anakedcowboy]

Just because it was detailed, construction, and well thought-out doesn't make it right or ultimately good for the game. We all want to pay $0 in taxes and can think of myriads of well thought-out and detailed ways to not pay taxes and do other things to make up for the lack of income via taxes. However that does not mean it will work or be good for the country.

 

BJ

 

Considering the sheer volume of people who quit based directly on the changes in 1.2 (half a dozen in the guild I was in at the time alone), I have no idea how you can say that brushing off hundreds, if not thousands, of comments with a 2 sentence response was good for the game. It is a huge mistake to assume the people in charge of a game play the game at the highest level. This has been proven in basically every MMO since EQ1

Edited August 29, 2012 by anakedcowboy

[JWillets]

to expect the dev team to take time away from their duties to confer with the community team concerning every suggestion proffered and give a response such as the three-tiered one you suggest would be incredibly time-consuming and wasteful from a business perspective.

 

Im guessing that the devs have a boss right? That boss wants a timetable created and deadlines met (assuming he's running a tight ship which I would think EA would want) to make sure that he/she is paying employees for a reason.

 

Im also assuming that as a creative studio (making new content and ideas), they have weekly or bi-weekly meetings with at least the heads of each department (whom i would hope know whats going on in their department) At said time, they can take 20 minutes to create a newsletter for paying customers. Choosing a few great ideas a week or every 2 weeks to get answered more thoughtfully than the previous Q&A with better selection than the weekly Q&A since the questions asked were generally f'ing stupid questions like "i want a pink speeder!" Hell, they can even pick 10 questions to get polled on by the community and ask the top 3.

 

Lets look at this from another profession. As an automotive technician, im expected to complete work in a fast and timely manner, both for the company and the customer. If it takes me an extremely long time to complete the job (the customer is paying a much higher bill since work is hourly, and is effectively wasting money when another shop couldve done it quicker and cheaper. When im doing say, a brake job, and my boss comes out to the bays and says, "Hey, how much longer till you're done? Im paying you you know right?" and if I reply "Soon, i have no new details to share at this time." Im getting fired.

 

People need to stop thinking that software development is like some kind of magic that nobody understands, its like people think that the timetables on new content are always going to be a mystery because its only when the purple snicklous of the 8th plane conflumigate their mystic and ancient powers of gordlunsh will content be allowed to release to the public so we should just shut up, roll alts, and continue to feed the higher beings our subscription money so that they are appeased. No, its a group of software professionals who have a job and reasonable expectations put onto them since their pay is coming out of our wallets. it's not unreasonable to ask, hey there fellas, soooooo.....what have you been doing for the past 8 months while you've been billing my paypal account?