Why I think devs don't communicate much

[Tradu]

I'd be okay with the lack of direct communication if we actually saw them "communicate" by making needed changes instead of changing things nobody asked for or changing things for the worse. Unfortunately recently their lack of communication(the Q/As are a PR stunt, very little if any actual new information came from those) hasn't been because they've been making any visible changes to the issues they've gotten feedback on for months(in some cases years), and the way some of the devs(Celestalon especially) has responded when faced with criticism has honestly been disgusting. He went to the Feral discord and pretty much said all the feedback from the past 6+ YEARS about lack of AoE and priority target burst(the 2 most important kinds of damage in raids and even 5mans) isn't true and it's only a tuning issue.

So yeah, they've been doing a pretty good job at making people like me lose faith in their ability to make good changes consistently.

[Low Hanging Fruit]

Well I think they don't because communication to masses is tricky. They say they want to do good/different things with raids then they get pats on the back from those people that like that news but scorned from those that do not like it. Just as one example. One of many. Just about everything in this game is a two sided coin. One side people love the feature and direction its going and on the other side you have people that hate the feature and wish it would go a different direction. So when they go into these things they pretty much already know they are going to get shit no matter what they say. Because the people that dislike it will stir it up to no end and make a ton of noise over it weather they are the minority, majority, or whatever in between. It is pretty obvious because every thread is "look how they ruined X" or "can you believe they are so stupid over Y" type of shit. But when you look into those threads you see in truth a good bunch of people do actually like the feature. But they didn't feel motivated to say much about it until they saw people trashing it at an insanely high level.

[Jtbrig7390]

I still play it because I still enjoy it with what few raiders are left, they did change it when leveling became so easy you can hit max level in 2 days, then queue up for an anti-social mockery of dungeons then do the same for an anti-social mockery of a raid completely ignoring every single person.

How is a feature that allows you to group with anyone in your region anti-social??????

See this is the part your not getting, a huge reason people are anti-social in WoW is due to how toxic it has gotten.

I use to be a progression raider and I stopped at T11 because I got tired of the guild drama. I left WoW and did not return into LFR was announced. If it wasn't for LFR I wouldn't be playing WoW at all. Blizzard has gotten lazy at enforcing there rules. So now daily I see the most toxic shit in trade and in groups and I rather just turn my chat off.

Look at the LFG system and how much of a cesspool it is now. This is a feature that allowed you to make pugs cross server and there is no random matchmaking at all.

The anti-social issue isn't a problem blizzard made, its a problem the community has made.


Final Fantasy XIV IMO is one of the best community's I have delt with in gaming and yet it has all the same features WoW does. So tell me what is the difference between the two?? ill give you a hint its the players.

Look at HoTs and Overwatch, look at how toxic both of those community's are and take a wild guess where they come from....WoW.

The Blizzard Games Community like most others is a toxic shit show and many people rather just do LFR then to put up with it.

[Gadzooks]

The game was great until they changed the way they did things around Cata, which is about when they started caving to the players.

I disagree. 'Caving" to the players - ie. changing the game to favor what players wanted, started way back in vanilla, when the big issue was Raid or Die, and was waged for years in the forums - with Blizzard agreeing it wasn't much fun, and they were spending too much time and money on raids few got to see.

You've most likley chosen Cata, because the game changed in ways you don't like then - but they were listening to player feedback WAY before that.

And, that's besides my point of the post I made that you responded to - the problem with most of this, the communication between devs and players, is players can hide behind a screenname, and do horrible, filthy things. I suspect they were toying with RealID to combat that, but the tantrum over that issue stopped them.

If people had to make their comments under their real names, the entire dynamic would change literally overnight. That's my point, not some vague era during an expansion when things changed against my liking.

[Seefer]

I disagree. 'Caving" to the players - ie. changing the game to favor what players wanted, started way back in vanilla, when the big issue was Raid or Die, and was waged for years in the forums - with Blizzard agreeing it wasn't much fun, and they were spending too much time and money on raids few got to see.

You've most likley chosen Cata, because the game changed in ways you don't like then - but they were listening to player feedback WAY before that.

And, that's besides my point of the post I made that you responded to - the problem with most of this, the communication between devs and players, is players can hide behind a screenname, and do horrible, filthy things. I suspect they were toying with RealID to combat that, but the tantrum over that issue stopped them.

If people had to make their comments under their real names, the entire dynamic would change literally overnight. That's my point, not some vague era during an expansion when things changed against my liking.

Issue #1, most people didn't raid during Vanilla because they were too busy leveling (I.E slower content consumption which is a GOOD thing), now 2 maybe 3 days tops and you are max level (provided you didn't buy a character boost) couple dungeons, LFR bam ready for normals (fast content consumption which is a BAD thing)........and it is what players asked for.

Issue #2, LFR, I am not going to open this can of worms but it isn't a good thing and should have just been Flex

Issue #3, Cross realm EVERYTHING, not a good thing it removes server community and provides more ways toxic jerks can get away with it, but people wanted it

Those 3 things alone have lead to a lot of bad shit in this game, you no longer have much of a community (minus trade trolls), quick content consumption leads to drought and anger, and issue #2 I refuse to discuss.

As for people saying and do filthy horrible things because hey.........nobody knows them..........yep I agree, and I think the devs should tell players to blow it out their ass like Square does with FF, no beta, no ptr.........they do what they want and give patch notes, the end.

[Pann]

Issue #1, most people didn't raid during Vanilla because they were too busy leveling (I.E slower content consumption which is a GOOD thing), now 2 maybe 3 days tops and you are max level (provided you didn't buy a character boost) couple dungeons, LFR bam ready for normals (fast content consumption which is a BAD thing)........and it is what players asked for.

Issue #2, LFR, I am not going to open this can of worms but it isn't a good thing and should have just been Flex

Issue #3, Cross realm EVERYTHING, not a good thing it removes server community and provides more ways toxic jerks can get away with it, but people wanted it

Those 3 things alone have lead to a lot of bad shit in this game, you no longer have much of a community (minus trade trolls), quick content consumption leads to drought and anger, and issue #2 I refuse to discuss.

As for people saying and do filthy horrible things because hey.........nobody knows them..........yep I agree, and I think the devs should tell players to blow it out their ass like Square does with FF, no beta, no ptr.........they do what they want and give patch notes, the end.

There is no proof whether the lack of interest in raiding was to do with people spending more time levelling during classic than they do today. The fact that the majority of people have not been interested in raiding during classic, TBC, Wrath, Cata, MoP and WoD would seem to suggest the problem is raiding rather than levelling.

Good job you're going to open the can of worms about LFR. I suppose it spares us from your nonsense.

Without cross realm grouping many people will be stuck on servers were there are simply not enough players to easily form a group. What do you suggest they do?

There was never much of a community in the first place and issues 2 and 3 have led to the majority of players not being at the mercy of that community that spent much of its time excluding those outside of said community.

[Seefer]

There is no proof whether the lack of interest in raiding was to do with people spending more time levelling during classic than they do today. The fact that the majority of people have not been interested in raiding during classic, TBC, Wrath, Cata, MoP and WoD would seem to suggest the problem is raiding rather than levelling.

Good job you're going to open the can of worms about LFR. I suppose it spares us from your nonsense.

Without cross realm grouping many people will be stuck on servers were there are simply not enough players to easily form a group. What do you suggest they do?

There was never much of a community in the first place and issues 2 and 3 have led to the majority of players not being at the mercy of that community that spent much of its time excluding those outside of said community.

Yeah, really don't expect you to believe much of what I say, I mean you are probably one of those people who prefers not to even bother socializing in game or perhaps you started during WOTLK?

[Irefusetodie]

They take the time out of their busy say working on Legion to do a live Q&A and to talk to the community and get shit on for having a meeting or work to get done.........why the hell would you want to talk to people when this is the shit you get?

They chose to do a live Q&A when all it would've taken was a blue post on the forums answering questions.

[Gadzooks]

Issue #1, most people didn't raid during Vanilla because they were too busy leveling (I.E slower content consumption which is a GOOD thing), now 2 maybe 3 days tops and you are max level (provided you didn't buy a character boost) couple dungeons, LFR bam ready for normals (fast content consumption which is a BAD thing)........and it is what players asked for.

Issue #2, LFR, I am not going to open this can of worms but it isn't a good thing and should have just been Flex

Issue #3, Cross realm EVERYTHING, not a good thing it removes server community and provides more ways toxic jerks can get away with it, but people wanted it

Those 3 things alone have lead to a lot of bad shit in this game, you no longer have much of a community (minus trade trolls), quick content consumption leads to drought and anger, and issue #2 I refuse to discuss.

As for people saying and do filthy horrible things because hey.........nobody knows them..........yep I agree, and I think the devs should tell players to blow it out their ass like Square does with FF, no beta, no ptr.........they do what they want and give patch notes, the end.

Interesting that you chose LFR to hang this rant on - when LFG was introduced in Wrath, as a way of "catering" to players who didn't like trolling general for hours. It's the same thing as LFR, but you chose LFR - gee, there's no agenda here, no, none at all.

I sometimes forget that certain people are best left alone and not responded to. Unlike them, I can admit to my mistakes - and I'll be ending this mistake here.

[Heladys]

Most people who are asking questions are idiots, which makes it difficult for the halfways intelligent people to get real questions answered. The real problem is the idiots don't realize it's them who are mucking things up. They think they're as smart as anyone else.

[Seefer]

Interesting that you chose LFR to hang this rant on - when LFG was introduced in Wrath, as a way of "catering" to players who didn't like trolling general for hours. It's the same thing as LFR, but you chose LFR - gee, there's no agenda here, no, none at all.

I sometimes forget that certain people are best left alone and not responded to. Unlike them, I can admit to my mistakes - and I'll be ending this mistake here.

Actually LFD falls under cross realm everything but anyway.

[Hey There Guys its Metro]

Yup I agree honestly, but do NOT agree that they don't communicate much.

Ion replied to my thread about ilvl in raids and that was an answer that was far more than I required.
Maybe pvp team doesn't communicate, but the actual devs do plenty.

The issue is this community is a joke. Just look at this thread for proof of that.
90 percent of the people complaining have no idea what they are even talking about, complaining about things that don't even matter.

its impossible to reply to people like that.

I'm glad to see small victories like Celest's reply about that hunter thing on the front page there "If we removed everything people dont like there wouldn't be a game."
Well fucking said.

[Pann]

Yeah, really don't expect you to believe much of what I say, I mean you are probably one of those people who prefers not to even bother socializing in game or perhaps you started during WOTLK?

Even for you that is a truly bizarre response and, as expected, absolutely nothing to do with anything I wrote.

I don't believe what you write because, for the most part, it is incorrect and easily disproved, like the post I responded to that resulted in your post above, or nothing to do with what is being discussed, like the post above or your interaction with Paula Deen in this very thread.

I am still interested as to how you reached the conclusion that the devs don't communicate much due people not raiding and the pace of levelling in classic. Or how the LFR crowd are somehow spewing hate at the devs when they are notorious saying, well.... nothing. Or how cross realm grouping has led to less dev interaction.

Perhaps you could explain what my interaction with others in game has to do with the topic? Or why when I started playing the game matters?

I look forward to your response that talks about anything but the points I have raised.

[rda]

They chose to do a live Q&A when all it would've taken was a blue post on the forums answering questions.

They also barely say anything new or interesting.

Example question from the PVP "Q&A":

Q: Why won't PVP templates be active in world PVP? If imbalances are fixed via those templates as you plan, what is the reasoning behind deliberately unbalanced individual interactions in world PVP?

A: I discussed our reasoning behind why PvP templates do not activate in the world at 40:55. In short, the two reasons were that they would provide a significant power increase for ungeared players and we'd like there to be a place in World of Warcraft where balance is far less structured.

So, a player asks "why do you not apply your scaling in world PVP? there's too much difference in stats without scaling, it's not good, why don't you scale?". Their answer: "we don't apply scaling in world PVP because we like to have a place where we don't apply scaling".

Great, right? How about "why" you like to have a place where there's too much difference in stats, what purpose does it serve, why do it, what's the pros and cons and why the pros outweigh the cons? Nah, "we don't apply scaling there because we don't want to apply scaling there". Just to be clear, I don't care about world PVP one bit (long talk), but you have to marvel at the uselessness of the "answers".

These Q&A sessions have been largely useless. Written posts and effing tweets have been more useful, at least they contained info.

[Felfaadaern Darkterror]

Pandering to users who have completely contradictory desires, many of whom will complain to the point of being insulting or abusive if they don't get their way, isn't working either.

Agreed. I also suspect that players are frequently mistaken in what they think they want. If they did get everything they think they want, they might find themselves playing even less. Just my hunch.

- - - Updated - - -

I'd be okay with the lack of direct communication if we actually saw them "communicate" by making needed changes instead of changing things nobody asked for or changing things for the worse. Unfortunately recently their lack of communication(the Q/As are a PR stunt, very little if any actual new information came from those) hasn't been because they've been making any visible changes to the issues they've gotten feedback on for months(in some cases years), and the way some of the devs(Celestalon especially) has responded when faced with criticism has honestly been disgusting. He went to the Feral discord and pretty much said all the feedback from the past 6+ YEARS about lack of AoE and priority target burst(the 2 most important kinds of damage in raids and even 5mans) isn't true and it's only a tuning issue.

So yeah, they've been doing a pretty good job at making people like me lose faith in their ability to make good changes consistently.

I like some of the recent changes to BM hunter. I think they listen; they just prefer not to mire themselves in forum trashfests.

[Rudkobing]

I think they get tired when their will be somebody to complain about this or that.

[Barnabas]

They communicate often enough. They just don't have time to get in depth with everyone's different concern about the game on the forums or social media.

- - - Updated - - -

They also barely say anything new or interesting.

Example question from the PVP "Q&A":

Q: Why won't PVP templates be active in world PVP? If imbalances are fixed via those templates as you plan, what is the reasoning behind deliberately unbalanced individual interactions in world PVP?

A: I discussed our reasoning behind why PvP templates do not activate in the world at 40:55. In short, the two reasons were that they would provide a significant power increase for ungeared players and we'd like there to be a place in World of Warcraft where balance is far less structured.

So, a player asks "why do you not apply your scaling in world PVP? there's too much difference in stats without scaling, it's not good, why don't you scale?". Their answer: "we don't apply scaling in world PVP because we like to have a place where we don't apply scaling".

Great, right? How about "why" you like to have a place where there's too much difference in stats, what purpose does it serve, why do it, what's the pros and cons and why the pros outweigh the cons? Nah, "we don't apply scaling there because we don't want to apply scaling there". Just to be clear, I don't care about world PVP one bit (long talk), but you have to marvel at the uselessness of the "answers".

These Q&A sessions have been largely useless. Written posts and effing tweets have been more useful, at least they contained info.

It was plenty useful. They said they aren't using scaling there and that's pretty much it. Why continue to press about something that isn't a valid concern?

[Deleted]

That's likely true and I wouldn't talk so much either. Most of their efforts now go to PR and dev interviews are essentially free for them. But I think they reveal too much of the game, thereby inciting customers to ask for ever more. And they always seem to be apologizing which makes them look weak. And maybe they are. After all it took them over a year to decide what to ultimately do with flying with a great deal of that being public hand-wringing and trial balloons. I've said before they should just make the game they want to make, not worry so much or pander to their forum inhabitants and let the game sink or swim on its own. It might kill it; it also might make it much better than it is now.

Are you insane?

You have a multi-million product, a product probably grossing more to than you would attain in several lifetimes, and you propose that "They look weak" - So they should wing it?

Do you have ANY Conceptual grasping, of what handling such a big product, means? And how hard it is, to deal with a toxic community that have the strongest imagined armchair knowledge there is?

"Oh you know, They have data for millions of players, with all these different interests. Better just, wing it. You know. Fuck it."

And do you think Decisions are as inconsequential as you writing on the forums? Do you believe, that writing code for WoW, takes as little time as it does for you to cook up yet another forum post?

It costs THOUSANDS of hours for paid proffesionals, to create and actively commit to these decisions. Which costs in of itself. The difference could literally be "Either you are #1 on the market, by all metrics, or the product dies."

You know, i could probably write an essay here, so i better stop, i think it's just safe to say, that YOU are not fit, to make ANY such decision, with such level of reasoning.

[Seefer]

Even for you that is a truly bizarre response and, as expected, absolutely nothing to do with anything I wrote.

I don't believe what you write because, for the most part, it is incorrect and easily disproved, like the post I responded to that resulted in your post above, or nothing to do with what is being discussed, like the post above or your interaction with Paula Deen in this very thread.

I am still interested as to how you reached the conclusion that the devs don't communicate much due people not raiding and the pace of levelling in classic. Or how the LFR crowd are somehow spewing hate at the devs when they are notorious saying, well.... nothing. Or how cross realm grouping has led to less dev interaction.

Perhaps you could explain what my interaction with others in game has to do with the topic? Or why when I started playing the game matters?

I look forward to your response that talks about anything but the points I have raised.

Actually talking about raiding etc? That was me being side tracked by someone, read the OP, as for when you played the game? Well, if you started in WOTLK or later you'd know nothing at all about what it was like in Vanilla/TBC, all you need to do is look at the people who talk about COMMUNITY in private servers and why they love FF over WoW lately.

- - - Updated - - -

Are you insane?

You have a multi-million product, a product probably grossing more to than you would attain in several lifetimes, and you propose that "They look weak" - So they should wing it?

Do you have ANY Conceptual grasping, of what handling such a big product, means? And how hard it is, to deal with a toxic community that have the strongest imagined armchair knowledge there is?

"Oh you know, They have data for millions of players, with all these different interests. Better just, wing it. You know. Fuck it."

And do you think Decisions are as inconsequential as you writing on the forums? Do you believe, that writing code for WoW, takes as little time as it does for you to cook up yet another forum post?

It costs THOUSANDS of hours for paid proffesionals, to create and actively commit to these decisions. Which costs in of itself. The difference could literally be "Either you are #1 on the market, by all metrics, or the product dies."

You know, i could probably write an essay here, so i better stop, i think it's just safe to say, that YOU are not fit, to make ANY such decision, with such level of reasoning.

It's what they did when WoW was a success, they made the game they wanted to play.

[rda]

It was plenty useful. They said they aren't using scaling there and that's pretty much it. Why continue to press about something that isn't a valid concern?

This was known before the Q&A and the Q&A added nothing to it. The player asked "why are you doing X? what's the reason?" and the answer was "we are doing X". The answer was a waste of time. Tons of their answers are like that.