BFA subs, and someone's probably getting fired

[NovatHunter]

Yeah this is getting blown out of proportion. Even if the numbers are correct, there may be many many reasons why the ''active subscriber'' number has fallen. Some have probably quit yes, but we don't know what the numbers actually represent even if they are real. Active subscriber may only include the US, only EU, it may or may not include players paying with tokens. And it would make sense that players coming back would start off buying a subscription, then acquiring the required gold before the subscription time runs out.

In the end however, the evidence does not exist for the community to examine, and the only witness does not carry the trust for us to take the words at face value.

[Morssoe]

I can see how blizz trapped players with 6months sub mount.

[Deficineiron]

I can see how blizz trapped players with 6months sub mount.

i wasn't aware of this promo, but it is pretty obvious that the reason you offer a 6-month sub mount is because trends tell you some of the folks who buy the 6-months for the mount are gonna leave otherwise, more than offsetting gain from putting the mount in the store (where you gotta assume it was supposed to go originally)

[Deleted]

they are likely self-gagging internally until legal makes sure there is nothing actually problematic in what was shared in any relevant country, and then figures out what can be said to deny it without lying, if the allegation is in fact based on data from the api.

the nightmare for blizzard would be if they determine they actually have to formally notify customers that some personal data was shared inappropriately. I doubt this happened, but who knows?

so i would imagine blizzard is actually worried about making sure of more serious potential problems from this than forum rage over alleged sub drops.

So, there's something big companies do linguistically. I can't remember the precise phrasing/naming for it, but they effectively hedge by using literal interpretations of what's provided. For example if someone asks for 'All of my medical records', but that doesn't include 'Medical records with outside consultants provided through care', then you can end up with an incomplete set of records because in their terms, you didn't ask for that content.

I believe Blizzard maybe doing something similar, to the effect of 'This isn't how we count players anymore, we now include players using free trials', or 'We include data from China players' (because that wasn't in the original statement, it was appended), and 'therefore your statements aren't accurate'. It's similar to the way places measure fire deaths, where smoke inhalation from a fire doesn't count as a fire death. I believe that Blizzard are likely being evasive with their process because they know if they publish numbers themselves, it'll emerge that these numbers reflect with reasonable accuracy their current player base; further, it'll emerge how evasive they've been with their denial thereof, because any regular person will understand that the communicative intent of Blizzard calling the numbers 'false, wrong', would have actually been a linguistic trick.

[Deficineiron]

There's no proof that there was even data to take down. It's WeakAuras claiming someone else told them that someone at Blizzard accidentally leaked something on the sites. There's no evidence to speak of any of this but it's taken on by the whinging masses here as proof positive.

is the only factual issue we know for a fact that blizz patched the api tool very recently? how recently?

[HuxNeva]

https://twitter.com/WeakAuras/status...76911998296066


Y'all might want to relax a bit.

Well, we can't know as the only one that could present the facts is not willing to divulge the information. The numbers reported and the method by which they could have been obtained are plausible.

[Magistrate]

https://twitter.com/WeakAuras/status...12677578838016

PogU

RIP for the person getting fired tho

Is this also a breach of EU GDPR law?

Want to update your post with current information so people aren't screaming about old information?

Because people do not like to read more than one tweet in a thread: there is 0 proof to this and no way to proof it since the source has vanished. Blizzard contacted me and said it's false as well.

-link

[Deficineiron]

So, there's something big companies do linguistically. I can't remember the precise phrasing/naming for it, but they effectively hedge by using literal interpretations of what's provided. For example if someone asks for 'All of my medical records', but that doesn't include 'Medical records with outside consultants provided through care', then you can end up with an incomplete set of records because in their terms, you didn't ask for that content.

I believe Blizzard maybe doing something similar, to the effect of 'This isn't how we count players anymore, we now include players using free trials', or 'We include data from China players' (because that wasn't in the original statement, it was appended), and 'therefore your statements aren't accurate'. It's similar to the way places measure fire deaths, where smoke inhalation from a fire doesn't count as a fire death. I believe that Blizzard are likely being evasive with their process because they know if they publish numbers themselves, it'll emerge that these numbers reflect with reasonable accuracy their current player base; further, it'll emerge how evasive they've been with their denial thereof, because any regular person will understand that the communicative intent of Blizzard calling the numbers 'false, wrong', would have actually been a linguistic trick.

if there is any truth to this at all, their public response (if any, ever) will be telling. lack of any public response might be too.

[XDurionX]

Want to update your post with current information so people aren't screaming about old information?

Of course he doesn't, the whole point of this thread was to make a fuss over false presumptions.

[Super Dickmann]

No, it was a closed addon group with a post on this data. WA just tweeted out about that data WHILE ALSO STATING IT COULD BE FALSE.

The post was removed (why and by who?) and WA couldn't get to the data that was provided anymore to verify.

The problem is the information got out (False or True) and due to the current state of BFA and their recent post on subscribers...its now a necessity for PR that Blizzard clean up this storm.

Is there any proof that this data ever existed? No one has been able to find any proof of such. There's every reason to suspect lowering subs, but very little to buy shit that's entirely unproven (or that half the playerbase use WA). We only have the word of someone WA is quoting that someone else presented such data. It's not on Blizz to disprove claims that are suggested without evidence, it's on them to unfuck their game.
@Deficineiron

I have no clue, but I'm sure that if people are snooping around they'll find it, since if it's real we'll be able to narrow things down.

[Magistrate]

Well, we can't know as the only one that could present the facts is not willing to divulge the information. The numbers reported and the method by which they could have been obtained are plausible.

Except by this same logic we should assume the 10 mil sub count was true months ago by, who was it, Chilton? That Blizz shut down and said wasn't a thing. You can't have it both ways.

I'm betting the sub numbers are obviously trending downward. Duh. But by that much is just statistically implausible.

[Saluna]

Of course he doesn't, the whole point of this thread was to make a fuss over false presumptions.

Even poked a mod to do it. No answer. MMO-C the king of letting Fake/False News spread.

[intrinsc]

Your friends list is indictive of blizzards actual sub numbers. Thank you for clarifying the op post and proving it false.

Your terrible sarcasm aside, you took the post out of perspective. In particular, my individual perspective as a player. It's easy to see the game as "alive and thriving" or "old and dying" based on what you value. Do you value online, internet rumors(I mean, if it's on the internet it has to be true, right) or what directly influences you? I value what directly influences me, as should you.

Psychologically, anything else is futile.

[Flarelaine]

I truly think BfA is garbage.

Tell us about your experiences in BfA that led you to this conclusion.

[Mazinger-Z]

Why are they going around talking to secondary sources on this rather than acting as a primary source? Why is their reaction to talk with r/wow and WA instead of putting something out themselves? Blizzard are one of the best in the business at denying problems in their products; it is utter hell to try and report bugs because they're denied repeatedly. I think the reason they're going to secondary sources on this, is because they don't want anything anchored back to them (such as share holders questioning the validity of reports).

Because if a shareholder gets the idea to ask for numbers, whoever ok'd the false public statement is going to get shitcanned.

They're removing liability by asking people who want to get "in" with Blizzard to push these statements for them.

They should get HeelvsBabyface or Preach to make a statement for them.

[DarkAmbient]

Even poked a mod to do it. No answer. MMO-C the king of letting Fake/False News spread.

No reason for it to be locked. I know some people feel personally molested when they see threads that are negative of WoW but they ought to work on that instead of trying to shut down discussion.

[Gadzooks]

I think that using stats from a site that base their numbers from a addon that only a really small numbers use is not a good way to get a accurate picture.

That's not how realmpop works. It doesn't count installed versions of the addon to count realm pops, it queries the actual server when the person playing is online. All they need is one user per hour logging in, on each realm, to have the addon query the various zones and report back. Realmpop tracks numbers fairly accurately, too. Or at least they did, back when I paid attention to them.

[Deleted]

Because if a shareholder gets the idea to ask for numbers, whoever ok'd the false public statement is going to get shitcanned.

They're removing liability by asking people who want to get "in" with Blizzard to push these statements for them.

They should get HeelvsBabyface or Preach to make a statement for them.

I think it's wholly evasive, as put in my last post. The only ones with the tools to put a material and clear end to this (Blizzard) won't do so, and we have to start asking why they won't put an end to it themselves. It's not about blackmailing them as a company or anything ridiculous like that; we're an army of online nerds that like a video game. People here can't possibly fathom us standing up to a multi-billionaire company with a fully fledged legal team with the ideology of 'blackmail'; we just want clarity.

Ultimately, I think I speak for a lot of us here when I say, low subs isn't a 'fuck you Blizzard'. Low subs tells us that Blizzard at this point must be aware of core issues with their game, and that communication is going through to see positive change. That's what we want, truly; change that produces a game that we find conducive to our expectations. We wouldn't be on MMO-C if we didn't want the game to get better, if we didn't have some sort of investment in it - it always baffles me when people are quick to say 'Well if you don't like it then just quit!', because we are as invested in the product as they are; we're just saddened that it doesn't feel like the thing we invested our time into.

Hell I dare say it might be healthy for both sides of the issue - Blizzard and the disgruntled playerbase - to know that both sides of this issue understand one another. Instead it feels like Blizzard is being underhanded to prevent us knowing what they know, even though many of us feel like they must know something is wrong with the game right now. It's a refusal of communication.

[Mazinger-Z]

I think it's wholly evasive, as put in my last post. The only ones with the tools to put a material and clear end to this (Blizzard) won't do so, and we have to start asking why they won't put an end to it themselves. It's not about blackmailing them as a company or anything ridiculous like that; we're an army of online nerds that like a video game. People here can't possibly fathom us standing up to a multi-billionaire company with a fully fledged legal team with the ideology of 'blackmail'; we just want clarity.

Ultimately, I think I speak for a lot of us here when I say, low subs isn't a 'fuck you Blizzard'. Low subs tells us that Blizzard at this point must be aware of core issues with their game, and that communication is going through to see positive change. That's what we want, truly; change that produces a game that we find conducive to our expectations. We wouldn't be on MMO-C if we didn't want the game to get better, if we didn't have some sort of investment in it - it always baffles me when people are quick to say 'Well if you don't like it then just quit!', because we are as invested in the product as they are; we're just saddened that it doesn't feel like the thing we invested our time into.

Hell I dare say it might be healthy for both sides of the issue - Blizzard and the disgruntled playerbase - to know that both sides of this issue understand one another. Instead it feels like Blizzard is being underhanded to prevent us knowing what they know, even though many of us feel like they must know something is wrong with the game right now. It's a refusal of communication.

Blizzcon will be telling of their mental state.

If their panel isn't about 8.1 and 8.1.5 QoL improvements, they're aware and do not care.

No one is going to care about 8.2.

I've said it before, the current Blizzard-player relationship reeks of the Trion-Archeage relationship.

And how they're approaching developing the game reeks of the Jump to Lightspeed expansion for Star Wars Galaxies.

No one is going to care about new content when the base game is crap.

[Gadzooks]

Is there any proof that this data ever existed? No one has been able to find any proof of such. There's every reason to suspect lowering subs, but very little to buy shit that's entirely unproven (or that half the playerbase use WA). We only have the word of someone WA is quoting that someone else presented such data. It's not on Blizz to disprove claims that are suggested without evidence, it's on them to unfuck their game.
@Deficineiron

I have no clue, but I'm sure that if people are snooping around they'll find it, since if it's real we'll be able to narrow things down.

What I'm reading is that the post the data came from was on a site we're not allowed to mention here, but if you're aware of WOW hacks and bots, you know well.

Which makes the whole thing facepalm for WeakAuras - not only did they repeat a rumor probably started on purpose, but now you know they hang around on botting/cheating sites - and have a gold account.

Next drama...