Blizzard apologises for communication breakdown

[TyrianFC]

If you don't know how testing works - you are right. But blizzard either have to have their own testers, who are aware of why certain changes were maid (because without that you can't properly test things), or they completely oblivious of how testing is done (which is unlikely). Without knowing why certain changes are maid to something the only answer you can give is either "it works" or "it doesn't work".
You can argue with semantics here, and expect PTR testers to do what paid testers do for living, aka, figuring out what lead to this outcome - but this simply won't happen

If you're too stupid to see the first PTR build for fire mage and not know why those specific changes were made, you shouldnt be on ptr in the first place and should stick to using it to test things like whether quests work. It was blindingly obvious they were to

- shift dps from burst (combustion) into sustained
- reduce disproportionate value of crit
- smooth over rop/combustion shenanigans (which amplifies gimmicks like sinew)

Yet people screamed and cried ('omg my dps on ptr sux') until blizzard made a blog post basically saying...... all of the above. (mechanical framework changes first for x reasons, numbers later).

Problem = stupid players.
Solution =/= devote silly amounts of time to writing blogs in futile attempts to communicate to said players.

[Charge me Doctor]

If you're too stupid to see the first PTR build for fire mage and not know why those specific changes were made, you shouldnt be on ptr in the first place. It was blindingly obvious they were to

- shift dps from burst (combustion) into sustained
- reduce disproportionate value of crit
- smooth over rop/combustion shenanigans (which amplifies gimmicks like sinew)

Yet people screamed and cried ('omg my dps on ptr sux') until blizzard made a blog post basically saying...... all of the above. (mechanical framework changes first, numbers later).

Except they did nothing like that. The made great burst damage into a garbage without compensation to sustain damage
They INCREASED value of crit by removing extra flat crit we had while not reducing our dependency on crit
They didn't "smooth over rop/combustion shenanigans", because they work exactly like they do on live. Aka, still no "RoP doesn't increase damage of trinkets" part.
And that's why communication is important, they communicate to us that they made changes to meet these goals, but made changes that contradict said goal.

They say that they aim for X, instead made changes for Y. That's where we need communication, that's why they should make blue posts for patch notes of PTR and what feedback they want to get. Without this they will not get desired feedback

[OperationFerret]

Megacorporations like Blizzard rarely apologize to the fans. This is a step in the right direction.

[Eggroll]

http://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/t...36?page=10#184


You know the communication is bad when Ghostcrawler is discussing WoW more at the moment than the current WoW dev team combined. Do you think that we should expect improved developer communication in the future? If so, in what ways? Or is this just more PR spin?

I don't get it. Ion said in the post Blizzcon Q&A that they were going to work on the impact of secondary stats. So how exactly is it surprising this shows up on PTR? I really don't understand the hysteria. How did they do a poor job communicating it?

I think they did a great job so far. Some things may be far from perfect, but at least they are constantly working on stuff and not leaving it for dead like in WoD.
What are people expecting? A personal mail everytime they put up something new on the PTR?

[Tripax]

The root of the problem here is the bloody players.

Players are whiny, ungrateful little shits who dont deserve communication in the first place. Id rather blizzard focus on making the game than try to give frequent updates to the playerbase which will just be taken out of context and overanalysed to the extreme.

Yep!

Blizz just needs to filter out the whiny, "my class is being neglected, why doesn't my paladin have the same mobility as monks"-feedback, focus on the proper feedback and hold on to their own vision what they have for this game.

If it was up to the loudest whiners, every class would have the same abilities with different names. (Which is basically what happened already, before the pruning/class identity changes)

[Deleted]

so many people defending blizzard here, when blizzard doesnt care about there own customers yet you white knights are still loyal to them, only thing they are interested in is pleasing there shareholders and accountants and all they want from you is your bank details after that they dnt give afuck, and the reaso nwow loses alot of subs is cos they dnt listen to the community, most people who complain are people who still love warcraft and want it better,

[Choda]

>People raise concerns since the alpha about things that are obviously broken
>Things get even more broken in PTR, people get fed up with literally zero feedback
>"omg the players are whining"
>2 years later Blizzard says "yes it was messy back then we could've done better, we'll do better this time".

Rinse and repeat every two years.

[Mirishka]

The root of the problem here is the bloody players.

Players are whiny, ungrateful little shits who dont deserve communication in the first place. Id rather blizzard focus on making the game than try to give frequent updates to the playerbase which will just be taken out of context and overanalysed to the extreme.

I love you so much right now.

[Deleted]

I love you so much right now.

yet its not the players fault its blizzards faults for being lazy and not fixing shit and then saying in blizzcon 2019 we made a mess of expansions back then but we have learned from this and all this other PR shit to keep the masses happy, how can you blame players for classes being broken etc when we give our feedback constructivly to, it is not the players fault its blizzards fault for being lazy cunts who are to self involved to admit when they are wrong and they only do admit it years down the line when they think people had forgot the last time they fucked up bad.

- - - Updated - - -

>People raise concerns since the alpha about things that are obviously broken
>Things get even more broken in PTR, people get fed up with literally zero feedback
>"omg the players are whining"
>2 years later Blizzard says "yes it was messy back then we could've done better, we'll do better this time".

Rinse and repeat every two years.

this post is 100 percent true, sad to say but it is

[Mirishka]

so many people defending blizzard here, when blizzard doesnt care about there own customers yet you white knights are still loyal to them, only thing they are interested in is pleasing there shareholders and accountants and all they want from you is your bank details after that they dnt give afuck, and the reaso nwow loses alot of subs is cos they dnt listen to the community, most people who complain are people who still love warcraft and want it better,

Thing is, we don't get to design the game. Its theirs, not ours. Just because you buy a lot of Big Macs, doesn't mean you get to walk into McDonalds corporate and tell them how to create/prepare their food. That's not how it works.

Having said that they do listen to our feedback and incorporate a lot of changes based on it. The problem is, when some feedback doesn't result in changes, the community goes into 'hyperbolic bitches' mode and pretends Blizzard doesn't listen to ANY feedback. Which is absolutely false because literally every major patch since classic has had changes that were on account of player feedback.

- - - Updated - - -

yet its not the players fault its blizzards faults for being lazy and not fixing shit and then saying in blizzcon 2019 we made a mess of expansions back then but we have learned from this and all this other PR shit to keep the masses happy, how can you blame players for classes being broken etc when we give our feedback constructivly to, it is not the players fault its blizzards fault for being lazy cunts who are to self involved to admit when they are wrong and they only do admit it years down the line when they think people had forgot the last time they fucked up bad.

Great example of my previous 'hyperbolic bitches' comment. Instead of actually giving useful feedback, you cry and bitch and insult the devs - and in the same breath, whine that they don't listen to people like you.

And you say players aren't the problem? Ahahahaha.

[Pull My Finger]

You're like babies, screaming for attention, can't be left alone in a room for more than 2 minutes.

These guys have a big ass game to make. Their job isn't to entertain and hold hands with a bunch of needy nerds. Get real already. You're ridiculous. Become real persons for once. Handle life.

[Raelbo]

The root of the problem here is the bloody players.

Players are whiny, ungrateful little shits who dont deserve communication in the first place. Id rather blizzard focus on making the game than try to give frequent updates to the playerbase which will just be taken out of context and overanalysed to the extreme.

You hit the nail on the head.

For what it is worth I have found that in practice, when an idiot fails to comprehend something simple that I said or did, acknowledging that I may have contributed to the misunderstanding by not expressing myself as well I could have, has much better results than telling them outright that I think they are an idiot.

The problem here is that some people assume that said acknowledgement is an admission that I am a clueless twit with poor communication skills who is simply too lazy to bother to get it right the first time, instead of having the good grace to realise that they are equally likely to be the cause of the communication fail.

When people respond in that way it instantly re-affirms to me who the real problem is and there are a few of them in this very thread.

[Deleted]

Megacorporations like Blizzard rarely apologize to the fans. This is a step in the right direction.

no its not they should apologise for there incompetence and there lazy ass devs who dnt fix shit , so you think its fine for a company to take your money and then not listen to your feedback when your class is broken or anything else thats broken, blizzard basically sell wow expansions with so called free boosts to whatever and make more money and after they sold the expansion to all of us they dnt give a flying fuck, they do as little work as possible more max amount of money

[Mirishka]

no its not they should apologise for there incompetence and there lazy ass devs who dnt fix shit , so you think its fine for a company to take your money and then not listen to your feedback when your class is broken or anything else thats broken, blizzard basically sell wow expansions with so called free boosts to whatever and make more money and after they sold the expansion to all of us they dnt give a flying fuck, they do as little work as possible more max amount of money

You need therapy. Badly.

Moderation note: Please stick to the topic and leave your thoughts about others as just that: thoughts {Moanalisa}

[Deleted]

You're like babies, screaming for attention, can't be left alone in a room for more than 2 minutes.

These guys have a big ass game to make. Their job isn't to entertain and hold hands with a bunch of needy nerds. Get real already. You're ridiculous. Become real persons for once. Handle life.

let me know when your class is broken in game and they ignore your feedback, this isnt just about talking to blues we can do that on fucking twitter, its the fact that we give feedback and they dnt even take it onboard and im talking numerous classes with pages upon pages of constructive feedback not someone like you who prolly posts x classis OP and my class isnt OP wah wah, your post is the type of communication blizzard doesnt want to hear

[Deleted]

> Not final design
> Ice flows still gone
> We're sorry
Ice flows isn't coming back and the idea of removing it shows that are clueless and make changes nobody wanted. I don't care if they're final. If I have blue car and want red car, the idea of me removing front wheels means I'm an idiot, not that at some point I will paint the car red.

[Tart]

The root of the problem here is the bloody players.

Players are whiny, ungrateful little shits who dont deserve communication in the first place. Id rather blizzard focus on making the game than try to give frequent updates to the playerbase which will just be taken out of context and overanalysed to the extreme.

Spot on. The game went to shit when they gave in to people power.

[Coldkil]

The root of the problem here is the bloody players.

Players are whiny, ungrateful little shits who dont deserve communication in the first place. Id rather blizzard focus on making the game than try to give frequent updates to the playerbase which will just be taken out of context and overanalysed to the extreme.

Where have you been all this time.

Yes, everying devs say is insta attacked by people who read whatever they want in their words. I'm not saying everything they say is right and must not be criticized, but some people need to chill out.

The "angry mob" solution never brought anything good.

[Deleted]

Blizzard communicates just fine. People are just a bunch of thin skinned, trigger babies who demand a personal sit down because their parents never paid any attention to them.

[MasterHamster]

Lots of posters in this thread are a good example of why Blizzard are more reluctant to communicate with this community.
What's the point of communicating anything that isn't 100% final when players fucking flip their shit every time a new PTR build is released.

"Blizzard ignoring feedback"

I suppose that's easy when tens of thousands of people with different experiences think their views are the only viable design.