Are Blizzard "Community Managers" part of the casual playerbase?

[alturic]

I'm not saying that all Blizzard employees are in top guilds, nor am I saying they are great players, but Ythisens recently responded to someone saying normal Uldir was too hard for pugs with:

My entire raid on average is about 343 ish (I'm at 346), and the first three bosses we could almost ignore abilities. In fact we pulled Fetid Devourer and actually thought it was a mini boss and didn't realize we were fighting the actual boss until it was already at 50%.

This strikes me as... odd. As someone who is a MANAGER yet, not knowing something as "big" as bosses in the first raid of an expansion you've been hyping, discussing and working on for months upon months, is just... weird? On top of the fact he said "my raid" which to me sounds like an organized group, not having the raid leader know that it was a boss.

I'm trying to understand if they are just a casual group of players, or if it was meant in a condensending manner. :P

[Nextron]

Casual doesn't mean you suck mate.

[Lochton]

I'm not saying that all Blizzard employees are in top guilds, nor am I saying they are great players, but Ythisens recently responded to someone saying normal Uldir was too hard for pugs with:



This strikes me as... odd. As someone who is a MANAGER yet, not knowing something as "big" as bosses in the first raid of an expansion you've been hyping, discussing and working on for months upon months, is just... weird? On top of the fact he said "my raid" which to me sounds like an organized group, not having the raid leader know that it was a boss.

I'm trying to understand if they are just a casual group of players, or if it was meant in a condensending manner. :P

The right answer would be, they are players of Blizzard products, or have been. People who enjoy their job, and makes a difference in connecting the communities. Doesn't matter if they are hardcore, or casual, or a non-raider/PvP'er. So what if they are casual? Doesn't change their own views, a CM/CS/GM is permitted to make social interactions with other people without having to be of the minority.

[Malikath]

considering that no one knew celestalon used a touch-pad until he admitted it, it's possible they're all key-board turners.

[KOUNTERPARTS]

I think some upper-end employees and officials of Blizzard play on a casual basis as well.

Back in the day, before Metzen quit, he talked about how he was still leveling a character through Cataclysm (or was it MoP?) content when the game was already passed the midway point of the expansion.

[Rakoth]

I'm not saying that all Blizzard employees are in top guilds, nor am I saying they are great players, but Ythisens recently responded to someone saying normal Uldir was too hard for pugs with:



This strikes me as... odd. As someone who is a MANAGER yet, not knowing something as "big" as bosses in the first raid of an expansion you've been hyping, discussing and working on for months upon months, is just... weird? On top of the fact he said "my raid" which to me sounds like an organized group, not having the raid leader know that it was a boss.

I'm trying to understand if they are just a casual group of players, or if it was meant in a condensending manner. :P

You are making a metric ton of assumptions there to prove what? Ythisens also mentions he is a mythic raider. Being at 346 is not casual by ANY means. I have been playing more then usual, and short of buying AH gear, I have entirely cleared mythics since the first week, and I am still 341. Now, RNG hasn't been a friend of mine, but I only have two 330 pieces left to upgrade.

When I was still competing for server firsts in Vanilla, the same thing happened to us in BWL with the three drakes, we thought one of them was a trash mob till we lost half the raid and realized we had to actually try.

[Tradu]

Maybe read the thread, he clarifies that normal is a joke difficulty for his guild, so it's not hard to imagine that they'd not be paying a lot of attention to what they're pulling.

[Wolfman31]

Regardless of what level they play at, they still tow the company line. "Everything is fine. Your experience is inaccurate."

[The Stormbringer]

They've gotta be casual, they're working full-time jobs. Badumpssh!

[Lochton]

They've gotta be casual, they're working full-time jobs. Badumpssh!

This made me laugh!

[alturic]

Casual doesn't mean you suck mate.

I never said it did?

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You are making a metric ton of assumptions there to prove what? Ythisens also mentions he is a mythic raider. Being at 346 is not casual by ANY means. I have been playing more then usual, and short of buying AH gear, I have entirely cleared mythics since the first week, and I am still 341. Now, RNG hasn't been a friend of mine, but I only have two 330 pieces left to upgrade.

When I was still competing for server firsts in Vanilla, the same thing happened to us in BWL with the three drakes, we thought one of them was a trash mob till we lost half the raid and realized we had to actually try.

I never said casual = you suck. If it seemed like I was implying it, I apologize. However, you further drive home my point of how odd (can't think of the proper word) or if they meant it in a condensending way. If you were a mythic raider, let alone a community manager (whose job is it to talk/relay information about the game) you would think you would know a boss, no?

[Wildpantz]

Mythic raiders goof in normal dont bother reading anything watching Netflix etc

[Deleted]

They've gotta be casual, they're working full-time jobs. Badumpssh!

Full-time at walmart

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Mythic raiders goof in normal dont bother reading anything watching Netflix etc

This is surprisingly true in my experience. I'm not complaining, I'm guilty as charged

[Nathreim]

I dont think many of the blizz employees play anymore given some of the stupid decisions they make.

[Deleted]

I dont think many of the blizz employees play anymore given some of the stupid decisions they make.

It's pretty difficult for me to reconcile the beta state of bfa if they were regular players.

I feel rather embarrassed for them at the moment, as I doubt it was a collective descision to launch on time.

[Hannya84]

Being in a top tier raid guild and working full time at Blizzard, are almost always two mutually exclusive things.

The amount of hours that you work while on salary at Blizzard leaves enough time for a few hours of playing casually, and not as part of your job. And people have social lives as well.

Also, community managers and story writers aren't Game Designers. They're PR and.. well.. Story writers. Their knowledge of raids doesn't impact balance in the slightest.

[Khallid]

This strikes me as... odd. As someone who is a MANAGER yet, not knowing something as "big" as bosses in the first raid of an expansion you've been hyping, discussing and working on for months upon months, is just... weird? On top of the fact he said "my raid" which to me sounds like an organized group, not having the raid leader know that it was a boss.

I'm trying to understand if they are just a casual group of players, or if it was meant in a condensending manner. :P

Months? You can watch a 10 minute video on each boss and be perfectly ready for it. There's not a whole lot needed to prepare for Normal.

It does sound condescending to say "oh they were so easy we didn't even realize it was a boss until we got loot". But I honestly expect all Normal boses to fall over easily. Pugs having trouble with them is just because pugs are bad.

If you're playing on Alliance, there's also no storyline involving anything with Uldir, so the bosses are not recognizable by their character model. The whole story involving Uldir is exclusive to Horde.

[Deleted]

It's the same people that make LFR awful. After all everyone there is below them from their point of view. Well, things would be smoother with less Netflix and more damage but eh, it's just LFR.

[Starry Sidekick]

There could be a possibility that he intentionally chose not to spoil the bosses before he and his guild ran through them on release. He has no part in the actual development of the raids, so he would never have to really be consciously aware of those kinds of things unless it came up in a forum thread he was involved in.

Also, just that fact that he is running Uldir at all right now is evidence he isn't a "casual" player. Casuals (the majority of player base) are still running heroics and mythic+0 right now, most likely waiting for LFR to even think about raiding.

[The Stormbringer]

There could be a possibility that he intentionally chose not to spoil the bosses before he and his guild ran through them on release. He has no part in the actual development of the raids, so he would never have to really be consciously aware of those kinds of things unless it came up in a forum thread he was involved in.

Also, just that fact that he is running Uldir at all right now is evidence he isn't a "casual" player. Casuals (the majority of player base) are still running heroics and mythic+0 right now, most likely waiting for LFR to even think about raiding.

I know I was joking earlier, but THIS POST RIGHT HERE. Well said, Starry.