boo.. hisss.. crystal weekly

[Khevar]

Olagatonjedi,

 

The view you present seems to be that of an infallible business, who are making wise decisions that we players don't get because we cannot see the "big picture" or something.

 

But a business is made up of people, and people don't always make good decisions.

 

Isn't it possible that someone in the development of this game is making mistakes? And I don't mean the bugs, I'm talking about intended changes that could potentially be mistakes?

 

Or do you truly believe that the decisions being made by Bioware are all for the best?

Edited January 9, 2019 by Khevar

[DyreMaker]

As someone correctly pointed out in another thread: The focus needs to return to the quality of our game playing experience.

 

There is no benefit for more of anything if nothing ever gets fixed. They complain that it can't be done then somehow it gets done but much later then small details show up that indicate pure laziness for max profits. The fact that for a few bucks spent here would make a huge difference in subscriptions never occurs to them in the only lightsaber game out there.

 

People on this forum that defend this predatory gaming practice should be flamed to death. Tell them they are free to spend their money in a way they want to and not force it on the rest of us. Their ignorance is not for our benefit.

[olagatonjedi]

Olagatonjedi,

 

The view you present seems to be that of an infallible business, who are making wise decisions that we players don't get because we cannot see the "big picture" or something.

 

But a business is made up of people, and people don't always make good decisions.

 

Isn't it possible that someone in the development of this game is making mistakes? And I don't mean the bugs, I'm talking about intended changes that could potentially be mistakes?

 

Or do you truly believe that the decisions being made by Bioware are all for the best?

You are welcome to review my entire posting history, and i will "go out on a limb" and state i have never dismissed the possibility that the devs, or the company, are able to make poor decisions. However, after 7 years of hearing the same comolaints about this game after nearly every expansion, update, change, etc, and after 20 years of MMO experience in widely successful games, seeing the same types of complaints and criticisms on mutiple games after every update, expansion, etc..ive concluded that the majority of changes the dev teams make are status quo changes that have a larger plan in mind beyind that of simply making their playerbase happy and increasing the unmeasurable metric of "fun." Can they make mistakes? Absolutely. Can YOU or I differentiate whether the change was a mistake or a a part of grander scheme that isnt completely understood by the public? Absolutely not.

 

Criticism of the game and the company affecting your personal playstyle or experience is fine. Criticizing the way they run the company is unmerited because very few of us have actual experience running an MMO and understand the intricacies of it.

Edited January 9, 2019 by olagatonjedi

[Lhancelot]

Criticizing the way they run the company is unmerited because very few of us have actual experience running an MMO and understand the intricacies of it.

 

This is false in my opinion.

 

If your Ford breaks down often yet you know nothing about how a car is made, does that mean you cannot criticize the vehicle? If your insurance company avoids paying your claims although you know you are completely in the right, can you not criticize their service even though you do not work in insurance?

 

This idea that you must intricately understand how a service company operates to be able to criticize it makes no sense to me.

[Khevar]

Can they make mistakes? Absolutely. Can YOU or I differentiate whether the change was a mistake or a a part of grander scheme that isnt completely understood by the public? Absolutely not.

Do you know what would help?

 

If Eric and Keith spent time on the forums talking to us.

 

Consider MattPucevich's posts on the PTS, talking about the new NM raid, or the new instance boss. Or JackieCao's post on the PTS talking about how and why the H4 was developed. Those developer posts were a ray of sunshine for this game, as they talked about the changes.

 

The H4 explanation in particular was an excellent example of how developer communication helps the players. There was this avalanche of feedback complaining about the difficulty of the new Hold the Line heroic. Jackie went on to explain how H4 content had been phased out for a couple of years now, and this was an attempt to put some back into the game.

 

Suddenly, the entire tone of the thread changed, as people understood what was going on.

 

Or how about when Keith first took on his responsibilities? He spent time on the forums, talked about plans, talked about things happening with the game, etc. The general player reception was excellent, because those of us reading the forums felt like someone was actually making good decisions.

 

With 5.10 we have changes being made to the gearing in this game that have not existed in it's entire 7-year run. Slot-locked mods and enhancements. Time limited rewards for different (and exclusive) types of game play. Phenomenally expensive crafting costs.

 

How difficult would it be to engage the audience and talk about this? Even if not in microscopic detail, how about talking about the philosophy of what they're trying to accomplish?

 

Heck, people like you and me have jobs that don't involve SWTOR. It certainly doesn't take much time out of our day to peruse the forum once in a while and make the occasional post on something we find interesting.

 

And yet, there are people who are actually employed by Bioware as their job to "manage the community" who aren't engaging us.

 

When this happens, it's harder come to the conclusion "they have a plan and we just don't understand it". It's easier to come to "they're making poor decisions and don't want to talk about it."

Edited January 10, 2019 by Khevar

[kodrac]

This idea that you must intricately understand how a service company operates to be able to criticize it makes no sense to me.

 

It's called white knighting.

[casirabit]

He's in a large progression guild. Catered to PvP is a good laugh, though.

 

Okay so what I heard about his guild being a pvp one was wrong, considering I have heard them talk about them pvping so forgive me for making a mistake.

[TrixxieTriss]

This is false in my opinion.

 

If your Ford breaks down often yet you know nothing about how a car is made, does that mean you cannot criticize the vehicle? If your insurance company avoids paying your claims although you know you are completely in the right, can you not criticize their service even though you do not work in insurance?

 

This idea that you must intricately understand how a service company operates to be able to criticize it makes no sense to me.

 

I’ll add to that by saying most successful businesses have at least one core principle to stay successful over the long term. And that is to make money and keep a healthy customer base that is growing or at the worst is stable.

I’ve been one sort of business manager after another through my life that culminated with my own IT business. While every business I worked in had its own nuances, there were always fundamentals driving success or failure in the business and they are not hard to work out.

 

If customers are unhappy with a service or product or brand they will stop paying for it.

If value decreases in a service or product or brand they will look for better value else where

If you give customers reasons to not want to be your customers anymore they will tell their friends, colleagues and family not to be as well. They will even tell strangers they meet.

If customers are happy with your product or service or brand they will personally promote it to friends. But never as much as they will trash your product if it’s is bad.

If they are happy they become brand aware and you can create brand loyalty even if your prices are higher than else where.

For every customer who complains or gives negative feed back there are 100x more who won’t say anything and will just stop using your product or service. 25% of these people will actively tell others not to use your product or service and 10% of those told will pass it on as 3rd hand information and 10% or those will do the same. (This has been proven by studies over the 60 years). If memory serves me right, it was MacDonalds who originally did this study.

 

Now, all of those principles have been around for over 100 years. Well before the internet and social media. Now we have social media it is amplified 1000x worse. Probably much worse if it’s a major **** up. Just look at how many got involved over the loot box fiasco with SW BF2. The push back and bad social media made it to main stream media and Disney needed to step in and tell EA to back off with loot boxes.

This was something that any good Business (brand) Manager at EA should have been able to work out themselves, but it took Disney stepping in to make them change path. The Disney guys could see the negative impact this was having on the Star Wars brand and need it to stop. EA just don’t understand these basic principles. There are no customer/business managers in EAware that have any clout because if there were the path this game has taken would be drastically different. I would even go as far as saying EA don’t have dedicated brand or business development managers.

Edited January 10, 2019 by TrixxieTriss

[AllisonLightning]

This. The game is now catering to Keith's personal raid guild.

 

You would think then operative healers wouldn't have lost the HoT as a default of infusion and the mirror for scoundrels since any of us who wanted the burst already had it with our utility spec in. Also seems slightly stupid since I can't see a large progression guild being happy at the way gearing is. I mean a raiding focus yes but this seems a little too paranoid for my tastes.

[TrixxieTriss]

You would think then operative healers wouldn't have lost the HoT as a default of infusion and the mirror for scoundrels since any of us who wanted the burst already had it with our utility spec in. Also seems slightly stupid since I can't see a large progression guild being happy at the way gearing is. I mean a raiding focus yes but this seems a little too paranoid for my tastes.

 

But there is certainly a fair bit of consideration going into it or why cater to 1% of the population with limited resources. Especially when it was never planned for and was “Kieths” personal request at the “last minute” before they went into production. The Operations design dev said as much in a live stream. Bioware even said previously they had no plans to make that op into a MM one.

 

Planning updates and changes is done many months in advance. So you don’t just drop something like this unless it’s being demanded by the majority of the population. This decision was Keith’s call and it seems likely it was because of his guild requesting it.

 

The gearing system is borked and I’m sure Keith’s guild is telling him so. ie the set bonuses not working with previous gear (bug) and purposely locking mods slots to gear pieces on purpose (which seems to have been done because they were too lazy to make up all the different versions and test them - that’s my theory). But, the grind is fine for them, they won’t care as it’s basically been setup for them because that’s what progressive raiding is all about.

When you consider everything Bioware publically said about the gearing (before 5.10 was released) only being needed to do this MM OP, it demonstrates how the op and the gearing was totally catered around the 1% progressive raiders. Of which Keith’s guild is a part of.

 

I theorise that the gear grind and lvls were a partial cover used as an excuse for the MM development costs. We know EWare think gear grind will make people play longer. We know they consider it extra content. So what better way to justify adding a MM OP and new gear grind.

I’m not saying that’s the only reason we have the grind, we probably would have got something anyway (maybe 252 CXP grind). But I do think that’s why we got two gear lvls and why it’s so excessive and convoluted to get the gear.

If the gear was easier (faster) to get through pvp or other game play, there would be no excuse to add a MM op.

 

Anyway that’s just my opinion that has been slowly developing since the pts was being tested. It started to solidify when they refused to discuss the gearing with the pts players giving feed back. And it became more solid after they released it and borked up the gearing completely after people gave plenty of feed back on the pts on why it was bad. Since then we’ve had complete silence except for a post Musco made the day he went on holidays to say the set thing was a bug (and still no schedule announced to fix it) and they purposely locked the mods. Since then we’ve heard nothing. We’ve had no communication, nothing. So even if everything Ive theorised is wrong, them staying silent (as usual when they **** up) isn’t helping their cause or their reputation. These ideas will continue to be discussed until the system is fixed.

[olagatonjedi]

This is false in my opinion.

 

If your Ford breaks down often yet you know nothing about how a car is made, does that mean you cannot criticize the vehicle? If your insurance company avoids paying your claims although you know you are completely in the right, can you not criticize their service even though you do not work in insurance?

Yes, you can criticize YOUR vehicle. But your experience may not be the same as the other owners out there. I pwrsonally like manual windows, and i dont like automatic windows in cars i drive. I can criticize the lack of manual windows installed in cars nowadays, but i cant reasonably determine that they made a wrong business decision because of it. It inconveniences ME, but likely not the majority.

[olagatonjedi]

Do you know what would help?

 

If Eric and Keith spent time on the forums talking to us.

I completely agree that communication from them would help. However i can also see vivodly why they choose not to open themselves up to more unnecessary and unmerited criticism.

 

 

Or how about when Keith first took on his responsibilities? He spent time on the forums, talked about plans, talked about things happening with the game, etc. The general player reception was excellent, because those of us reading the forums felt like someone was actually making good decisions.

See how far that reception and trust got? You say he was seen as someone that will make good decisions, but every update is questioned and criticized, as is his intelligence by quite a few posters. Again, this lends to why i understand why he doesnt communicate often in open forums.

 

So again, i agree communication would be a great thing, even if its stuff we dont want to hear, but i certainly dont trust the vocal haters to let anything go without any criticism.

[olagatonjedi]

I’ll add to that by saying most successful businesses have at least one core principle to stay successful over the long term. And that is to make money and keep a healthy customer base that is growing or at the worst is stable.

I’ve been one sort of business manager after another through my life that culminated with my own IT business. While every business I worked in had its own nuances, there were always fundamentals driving success or failure in the business and they are not hard to work out.

 

If customers are unhappy with a service or product or brand they will stop paying for it.

If value decreases in a service or product or brand they will look for better value else where

If you give customers reasons to not want to be your customers anymore they will tell their friends, colleagues and family not to be as well. They will even tell strangers they meet.

If customers are happy with your product or service or brand they will personally promote it to friends. But never as much as they will trash your product if it’s is bad.

If they are happy they become brand aware and you can create brand loyalty even if your prices are higher than else where.

For every customer who complains or gives negative feed back there are 100x more who won’t say anything and will just stop using your product or service. 25% of these people will actively tell others not to use your product or service and 10% of those told will pass it on as 3rd hand information and 10% or those will do the same. (This has been proven by studies over the 60 years). If memory serves me right, it was MacDonalds who originally did this study.

 

Now, all of those principles have been around for over 100 years. Well before the internet and social media. Now we have social media it is amplified 1000x worse. Probably much worse if it’s a major **** up. Just look at how many got involved over the loot box fiasco with SW BF2. The push back and bad social media made it to main stream media and Disney needed to step in and tell EA to back off with loot boxes.

This was something that any good Business (brand) Manager at EA should have been able to work out themselves, but it took Disney stepping in to make them change path. The Disney guys could see the negative impact this was having on the Star Wars brand and need it to stop. EA just don’t understand these basic principles. There are no customer/business managers in EAware that have any clout because if there were the path this game has taken would be drastically different. I would even go as far as saying EA don’t have dedicated brand or business development managers.

First and foremost, if you have a unique product that none of your competitors can duplicate, where the demand or interest is high (i.e. stsr wars), then you ultimately hold most of the cards until something comes along to permanently supercede that interest. New games come and people leave for them, but there are plenty of people who (or eventually return) because of star wars. There is no denying the fanbase for SW is huge. To MANY players, the fun, happy part of SWTOR is, in fact, the Star Wars setting, not the gameplay, not the gearing systems, not the ops, not the actual content - its the world all of that stuff is in. As for word of mouth, if someone comes to you and says they are interested in playing an MMO, there are plenty you can direct them to that may offer so much more. But if they ask what MMOs are star wars based, there is no competition. Its the BEST out there because its the only one out there - just like Tolkien fans will be draw to Lotro, despite its many flaws.

 

Yes, BW and EA have the power to do whst they want despite its favorable or unfavorable reception because of the fanbase. I dont agree with that approach, personally, but its plain as day to understand from a business perspective. And honestly, i dont think they are fully abusing that power as i think the game is providing what is and was promised originally, and the reception from the a small portion of the playerbase is often ovrrblown and exaggerated.

 

Ultimately, when it actually affects the bottom line, you will see things catered to the players more and more. Jntil then, expect them to hold as closely to THEIR overall vision of swtor, with input from the players being more cosmetic or QOL type changes (i.e. rishi pvp stronghold that has no loot or effect on balance).

[Khevar]

I completely agree that communication from them would help. However i can also see vivodly why they choose not to open themselves up to more unnecessary and unmerited criticism.

 

See how far that reception and trust got? You say he was seen as someone that will make good decisions, but every update is questioned and criticized, as is his intelligence by quite a few posters. Again, this lends to why i understand why he doesnt communicate often in open forums.

 

So again, i agree communication would be a great thing, even if its stuff we dont want to hear, but i certainly dont trust the vocal haters to let anything go without any criticism.

Kieth’s credibility has declined in tune with his presence on the forums.

 

Surely I don’t have to spell this out for you.

 

Public relations issues are solved with more communication, not less.

[TrixxieTriss]

Kieth’s credibility has declined in tune with his presence on the forums.

 

Surely I don’t have to spell this out for you.

 

Public relations issues are solved with more communication, not less.

 

Well said !

[olagatonjedi]

Kieth’s credibility has declined in tune with his presence on the forums.

 

Surely I don’t have to spell this out for you.

 

Public relations issues are solved with more communication, not less.

In a perfect world....

[Lhancelot]

In a perfect world....

 

Not at all. In the real world, more communication is universally known to help versus a failure to communicate.

 

As Khevar explained, with less presence on the forums, Keith's reputation also has declined. No question, it's a direct correlation.

 

If you don't believe this or understand it then I can see now how you may consider everything that is going on with this game including the broken communication between customers and company makes sense.

[kodrac]

In a perfect world....

 

Quit making excuses for them. They're perfectly capable of doing that themselves. In fact, they have someone employed to do just that, if he was so inclined.

[olagatonjedi]

Not at all. In the real world, more communication is universally known to help versus a failure to communicate.

 

As Khevar explained, with less presence on the forums, Keith's reputation also has declined. No question, it's a direct correlation.

 

If you don't believe this or understand it then I can see now how you may consider everything that is going on with this game including the broken communication between customers and company makes sense.

Public relations problems are solved with open communication AND acceptance or willingness to understand from both sides. Passion can be good when its channeled properly, but the bridges have been burnt by the vocal community too often to expect the line of communication to re-open, at least as often as is being expected.

 

I urge you to tally the next dev update or post regarding an issue on a controversial topic. How many people respond in a respectful way, and how many s**t on the dev and resort to bashing? The type of communication we are hoping for needs both parties to remain civil, and thats just not what happens here. Abusive relationships often lead to lines of communication being broken, sometimes indefinitely. Do you feel another human being ever deserves to receive the amount of hostile words and hostile criticism we see here on the forums? I sure dont, and i am a testament to how much hatred and spite comes from other posters, even when i remain civil in my discussions. Having received it firsthand, good luck trying to convince me that it doesnt exist.

[Rion_Starkiller]

Random Rion thoughts:

 

I don't normally agree with Olag, but regarding dev communication, I do. Look at the PvP forum and the poll Eric put up. Look at the MattP-thread about his new raid boss on the PTS forum. People derail threads that aren't about the ONE TRUE ISSUE that concerns their interests. When the devs talk to the community, they get yelled at, "Why aren't you addressing X, you ****tards!" Additionally, while they are busy communicating with us, they aren't fixing or creating content.

 

That said, why are the devs so silent about the 5.10 bugs. It's infuriating.

 

But as far as I'm concerned, I think the dev team is doing the best they can with the ****** resources they get from EA. As long as EA continues to be unwilling to heavily reinvest in this game, we are going to continue having these issues. It's an old engine, heavily modded, with the current dev team that wasn't here back then.

 

But hey, maybe i'm just a white knight because I prefer to catch flies with honey.

Edited January 10, 2019 by Rion_Starkiller

[kodrac]

I urge you to tally the next dev update or post regarding an issue on a controversial topic. How many people respond in a respectful way, and how many s**t on the dev and resort to bashing? The type of communication we are hoping for needs both parties to remain civil, and thats just not what happens here. Abusive relationships often lead to lines of communication being broken, sometimes indefinitely. Do you feel another human being ever deserves to receive the amount of hostile words and hostile criticism we see here on the forums? I sure dont, and i am a testament to how much hatred and spite comes from other posters, even when i remain civil in my discussions. Having received it firsthand, good luck trying to convince me that it doesnt exist.

 

But you're not getting paid to do that. They are. And they don't do it. Although you seem to think it's your job to speak for them and to dictate the ToS. I've been in service and support for my entire adult life and I still have to do my job with a smile even when people are jackholes. It's called being a professional. If they don't because boo hoo people are mean poopieheads then they shouldn't be in said job. It has nothing to do with the responses they get. They should still do the job regardless. But apparently it's the corporate culture not to because they either don't care or they put their poor wittle feewings above things like integrity, honesty and transparency. So quit with the white knighting and making excuses for them and let them speak for themselves if they so choose. If they choose to be cowards that's on them. It's not your responsibility, it's theirs.

[olagatonjedi]

But you're not getting paid to do that. They are.

They are getting paid to do what their bosses tell them to do, not what the community tells them to do. You arent the one that creates the scope or requirements of their job. Its very possible that his role in community manager is simply to tell us what is in the works and answer "some" questions with any extra time outside of development. And to add to it, your personal expectations of communication may be comoletely different than mine. I personally dont need to know what is coming up in the next expansion until its actually available for me to assess and evaluate. Other people feel differently. So its not about what you, or I want or expect, its about what type of peash hes been given regarding communication. Unless you know rhe details of his roles and responsibilities upon hiring, you dont have a clue what his obligations are, despite what you or I feel is in the best interest of the company. After all, its not OUR company.

[Lhancelot]

That said, why are the devs so silent about the 5.10 bugs. It's infuriating.

 

There's no excuse for immature bashing and threats etc.

 

However, that being said a big problem is they ignore people for so long, by the time they do "communicate" via the forums, people end up unloading every issue they have with the game on that thread Eric creates.

 

When people are ignored, they grow resentful and angry. That's why intermittent, inconsistent communication is not effective. You can't drop a cheery yellow post randomly addressing one issue while ignoring the 5 other ones people are concerned about and expect every person to respond reasonably. We have all types of people on the forums, children, etc. who are not going to always be in total control of their emotions.

 

If you go back to when they were constructing the Rishi SH, it was full of stuff people disliked. Instead of ignoring all the posts by displeased players, the devs and Charles himself got on the forums and began dialogue with the players regarding their concerns. They communicated freely and often with the forums, and guess what? That was one of the best updates that brought a lot of satisfaction not just to the players but for the devs as well.

 

The irony of this example is the "community manager" was on vacation during that time. We basically had the best communication with the game when the actual community manager wasn't operating the communications.

 

I aint saying that all people will be good little boyscouts and behave when interacting with the devs or the game via the forums, but consistent communication goes a long way. If people act out of line when the game is doing it's best to communicate with it's players, well then punish the idiots accordingly but don't use this as an excuse to never communicate on a consistent and transparent basis.

[kodrac]

They are getting paid to do what their bosses tell them to do, not what the community tells them to do. You arent the one that creates the scope or requirements of their job. Its very possible that his role in community manager is simply to tell us what is in the works and answer "some" questions with any extra time outside of development. And to add to it, your personal expectations of communication may be comoletely different than mine. I personally dont need to know what is coming up in the next expansion until its actually available for me to assess and evaluate. Other people feel differently. So its not about what you, or I want or expect, its about what type of peash hes been given regarding communication. Unless you know rhe details of his roles and responsibilities upon hiring, you dont have a clue what his obligations are, despite what you or I feel is in the best interest of the company. After all, its not OUR company.

 

We are customers that pay for their services. We have every right to question their practices or lack thereof. Just because you don't like it doesn't mean we shouldn't. I don't need to know the details of Eric's or Keith's roles to criticize their product and services as a paying customer. Because I pay for this I have every right to question why they're silent on changes, why they don't follow they're own stated guidelines on patch notes, why they have been less than honest, etc. They're not forthcoming because they're afraid of criticism? So what? I honestly doubt that's the reason they're silent. It's more likely a deliberate corporate policy. A dishonest one.

 

I'm sure they love you for handing over your cash and accepting everything they do, but most other people won't and if they think they can continue treating their customers with such little respect and retain their cash flow they better wise up. Although I believe they know that and just don't give a flip. It aligns with their silence and lack of transparency. Although I really don't need to explain this to you since you don't work for them, though you seem to think it's up to you to speak for them.

Edited January 10, 2019 by kodrac

[olagatonjedi]

There's no excuse for immature bashing and threats etc.

 

However, that being said a big problem is they ignore people for so long, by the time they do "communicate" via the forums, people end up unloading every issue they have with the game on that thread Eric creates.

This isnt a two way conversation. Its literally thousands of people talking at the same time about hundreds of different topics. And your expectations appear to be as though you see it as a 1 on 1 conversation. People arent ignored, they just have a lot of stuff going on and a lot of different places they have to divide their time and attention. The eminem song "Stan" comes to mind as the fan thinks hes being ignored, and its not the case at all, but it leads to irrational behavior and misconceptions.

 

 

If you go back to when they were constructing the Rishi SH, it was full of stuff people disliked. Instead of ignoring all the posts by displeased players, the devs and Charles himself got on the forums and began dialogue with the players regarding their concerns. They communicated freely and often with the forums, and guess what? That was one of the best updates that brought a lot of satisfaction not just to the players but for the devs as well.

They were obviously asking for very specific and detailed feedback. In other areas when they ask for feedback and arent as engaged, i interpret that not as they dont care or are ignoring us, but instead that they are just looking for surface feedback. I mean, you even said it yourself. They have been open and communicative at times, and on specific topics, so why would you come away with a bad taste. I come away thinking when they truly want detailed feedback and communication, they will actively and repeatedly engage in it. Im not reading between lines, im literally taking note of what they have done.