Ghostcrawler now Lead Game Designer at Riot Games

[Wildtree]

Ghostcrawler is the reason Arenas was never balanced each season in WoW

Maybe, just maybe GC, was a driving force that Arena's even existed... Other than that, PVP was never ever balanced, nor will it ever be balanced. Such thing doesn't exist, because it cannot exist.
If you cannot grasp that, delete your game and resort to play with marbles. That doesn't require much insight..

Plus, you should write down your own statement, and cross check it with the next season, and the seasons to come...
I foresee how you'll suffocate on your own words.
If there's one awesome side effect from GC's departure, then it's not the impact on the game itself. It's how it will over time embarrass the idiotic unfounded hatred against him.

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I don't understand how changing jobs from Blizzard to RIOT is a 'great opportunity' and can't help but believe there's more to it than anyone will ever know, even if there's not. Reading the LoL forums though, it appears that the community there is just as bad as the one in WoW, if not worse.

Really, I don't see how anyone leaves Blizzard of their own volition before they work there long enough to get the sword.

Okay, here's the deal...
If you take the time and efforts to research the matter, you'll find some good information...

There are sites out there, that deal with employer qualities. Sites where employees leaving feedback about their experiences with the companies.
From there, in a nutshell, a condensed summary of Blizzard as employer:

Working at Blizzard is some fun environment. The overall feel is that the company's employee force is fairly young, and with that the maturity level is on the lower end of the scale. You need some sort of thick skin, to deal with sometimes not the most mature interactions amongst the staff.. Management/Supervisor quality varies greatly. And now for a very important thing... Progression within the employment.. There is very little room to further your career within the company.
The pay is good, but there are limitations on raises. You can only get to a certain point, and then you hit a brick wall...
If you want to further your income and career, you'll likely have to leave the company again.

This is, like I said a condensed version of the feedbacks left by employees...

GC was lead system designer at Blizzard.... Now he became lead game designer at Riot.
The title suggests a step up on the career ladder, and with that highly likely a significant step up on the paycheck and benefits scale as well..

[Pull My Finger]

I look forward to the WoW expansion after WoD, where GC will be upheaved to the status of heroic legend. The morons will fume over the catastrophic, terrible, fundamentally broken, bullshit design decisions and content artefacts of the latest expansion, and will unanimously agree that the things being done to the game are THE WORST things ever and that certain aspects of the game have NEVER been worse.

It is in that fateful moment where the golden days of GCs reign shall be reminisced, and the words shall be uttered: WoW has gone to shit since he's been gone. In faithful anticipation of the Second Coming of The Savior - Bring back GC!

[Deleted]

I don't hate GC - But i do not see him bringing any accredited competence to balancing a MoBA game.

Even if he moderated WoW arenas, it is a far cry from how LoL is constructed and balanced.

Or well, maybe he will be able to balance it if it gets homogenized enough. More generic AD carries for the AD god.

[Deleted]

I don't hate GC - But i do not see him bringing any accredited competence to balancing a MoBA game.

Even if he moderated WoW arenas, it is a far cry from how LoL is constructed and balanced.

Or well, maybe he will be able to balance it if it gets homogenized enough. More generic AD carries for the AD god.

this is because you think that his roles will be that he will be there actually working on balancing the game, again Leader Designer is a title that has more to do with coordination, scheduling, organization.

I work in CS, my Senior (Leader position) does not do ticket, except very irate customer escalation
When I was a programmer in a large company, my Senior (Leader position) did not actually program that much, it was maybe 10% of his time and did it only to keep "in touch" with the technology and job,

What both my seniors do/did, and very likely what a Leader Game Designer do, is organizing the team, keep the team motivated, act as a medium during meeting, providing maybe suggestion and quality control on the job and point of contact for the team outside the team.

The Design ideas and work are very likely being generated by the team and voted by the team itself and then presented outside to other teams or higher ups by the Lead

[Deleted]

this is because you think that his roles will be that, again Leader Designer is a title that has more to do with coordination, scheduling, organization.

I work in CS, my Senior (Leader position) does not do ticket, except very irate customer escalation
When I was a programmer in a large company, my Senior (Leader position) did not actually program that much, it was maybe 10% of his time and did it only to keep "in touch" with the technology and job,

What both my seniors do, and very likely what a Leader Game Designer do, is organizing the team, keep the team motivated, act as a medium during meeting, providing maybe suggestion and quality control on the job and point of contact for the team outside the team.

The Design ideas and work are very likely being generated by the team and voted by the team itself and then presented outside to other teams or higher ups by the Lead

Fair enough - Then i can see him fulfilling a role and purpose. As he by probability has experience in that medium, more so then i would believe in balancing or designing a MoBA.

[Deleted]

Fair enough - Then i can see him fulfilling a role and purpose. As he by probability has experience in that medium, more so then i would believe in balancing or designing a MoBA.

I mean I do not want to be so arrogant to say that I'm 100% sure. Stuff in the gaming industry are very funky and do not always follow normal business standard.
However in a creative environment I do not see a *single* person calling *all* the shots very likely.