Blizzcon Goody Bag, Dev Interviews, Developer Communication, Tweets, Heroes Patch

[chaud]

New PTR Hotfixes, Cross Game Items for Consoles, T10 Speed Farm Uliana Monk and More

New eSports Card Back: Power Core

Patch Notes Up - Monk, Infernal Shrines, Duck Hunt Easter Egg and More

Blizzcon Goody Bag Pictures
Michele Morrow shared some better quality pictures of the Goody Bag.

Dev Interviews
IGN had the opportunity to talk to some developers recently.

• Players were excited by interacting with heroes from the past in Legion.
• Garrisons were a good idea, but didn't live up to their full potential.
• By the time the team realized the problems with garrisons, they were halfway through the expansion and working on the next one.
• The team doesn't think about subscriber numbers on a regular basis, as it doesn't help to make the game any better.
• The team is aware of the Orc fatigue.
• Sylvanas is back and going to play a huge role in this expansion.
• Thrall will continue to evolve in Legion.
• Creating new characters in the lore that weren't in older Warcraft games is challenging, but the team is getting better at it. Garrosh is a good example of a new character that worked.
• Having a year between the last patch and new expansion doesn't work well, so the team is continuing to try and shorten the gap.

Developer Communication
Several developers talked about the change in communication in reference to a blog post by another game developer today. Be sure to read the full post for context.

Blog Post Key Points (Non-Blizzard Blog):

• You never get a second chance at a first impression - A first impression is really important. We can’t just show you all of the nasty in-development stuff, because it’s not pretty.
• Timing is important - The marketing department is to get as many people as they can interested in the game at the time it is released, but the public can also get turned off if they get an information overload
• Game development is malleable, fan expectation is not.
  
  • A lot of things get cut during development.
  • Sometimes it’s for technical limitations, sometimes it’s for budget limitations, sometimes it’s for licensing, most of the time it’s for scope and schedule.
  • The hard core fans especially will take what the developers say as a promise, and we simply can’t make promises during development because features get cut all the time.
  • They’ll call us liars or won’t believe us because we SAID we’d do feature B and we didn’t, and so we can never be trusted and we are the worst developers EVER and the game is doomed and so on and so forth.
• People don’t really understand game development, but think they do
  
  • It’s really really easy to be an armchair game developer.
  • The general public is never going to have access to all of the information that the developers with which to make their decisions.
  • Gamers really don’t understand game development any more than diners understand how a restaurant is actually run.
  • Most gamers out there don't really care about the nitty-gritty of game development. They just want to know that the game they want is going to have the features that they want.

The sooner the era of "DEV SAID IT, MUST BE TRUE OR RIOT" ends the better.
It's bizarre if you think about it - no one expects TV shows or movies or music to show WIP cuts that are unfinished outside of marketing.
In games if we show a concept of a thing (just a concept!) it's somehow locked in as a thing that we failed to deliver if it isn't fun.
Working in an environment where we can't share anything because of how the community latches on and turns it in to a weapon is not great.
The space between "here's an incomplete thing, give us feedback" and "here's a thing that's pretty but can't change much" is -tiny-.
This is a problem both game studios and the community have to work on, I'm not blaming the community, but it's on the harsh side right now. (nite_moogle)

it can also be very hard for people to express things civilly unfortunately when they're extremely passionate about said thing
About 80% of the time when someone on the Internet types "passion" they use it as a green light to be a big jerkface (nite_moogle)

Yeah. A well-known reason devs don't talk more, that people often mention, is the "everything is a promise" problem. But now I've noticed others more, like "if you give a bit information, people reach conclusions about the entire (99% unseen) game."
I'd never thought about that one until it became a huge widespread pattern in Warlords beta.
If we mention new thing X, people will imagine the game "Warlords with only change X" and, basically, review it. (HamletEJ)

We said too much WAY too soon in development for Warlords, and the design direction shifted from what we talked about.
It was a huge mistake that we are doing our absolute best not to repeat with Legion. (CM_Lore)
We obviously can't and won't make promises, but we're trying not to talk about things we're not at least somewhat confident in.
Reality is, hundreds of good ideas come and go for every game in the industry. Honestly best not to expose players to that.
I don't really blame the players. We should have known better. (CM_Lore)

Ghostcrawler Tweets
Ghostcrawler still occasionally talks about WoW. Remember that he no longer works for or speaks for Blizzard.

Developer Communication
since you've left, Greg, the devs have gone silent. It's like...idk...they don't think we're worth talking to.
I really doubt that is the case. It's more likely a policy thing not lack of motivation or desire. (OccupyGStreet)

From what I've read you seem like a pretty cool dude. For those of us who don't know, could you fill us in on your past at Blizzard? Why all the hate on you?
I was the lead systems designer on WoW for several years. My team did class, item, encounter, combat, PvP, UI and really most things that weren't level or quest design.

Riot tries to encourage all Rioters to be out talking to players, but Blizzard had more of a spokesperson policy where very few of us were out there on forums or other social media. One big downside of the way that works is, for better or worse, you might be the one name players know, and they might project anything they like or don't like about the game onto you.

While I would say on the whole that players appreciated the attempts at communication, there were some who blamed me personally when their class was nerfed or they thought dungeons should be easier or they thought dungeons should be harder or... you get the idea.

It's a nuanced discussion because as a lead I am still fine with players wanting to call me out on things they don't like. I was and still am partially accountable for the design quality of the games I work on. So if you have a complaint, I am fine to hear it. Feedback is great. But that does *not* mean that I personally made every change myself. If I really nerfed your warrior because I was beat by a warrior the night before, then I would be a petty asshole and would deserve to lose my job.

The same is true of League. There is no way I would be able to ninja in a change to a champion that the team wasn't behind. I couldn't dumb the game down unless for some reason that was the direction Riot wanted to go. (Spoiler: it isn't.) I have opinions on things but it's not a company of dictators. We work collaboratively towards certain values.

But all that said, if you have a concern or complaint about the game, please let me know. I don't have context on everything going on but I can usually find the right person or team and make sure they hear the feedback.

Thanks for asking.

In your experience, what factors typically tend to dissuade or discourage game developers and companies from more open communication with players? Is this something playerbases in favour of communication can help to remedy?‎
There are - by far - three concerns that keep developers from communicating with players.

One is fear of saying something wrong. This could be accidentally leaking something or saying something that comes across as an insult. There ultimately isn't any real fix for this problem except experience. You can ask a coworker to proofread, but if the communication has to go through too many levels of editing and approval, then it's inefficient at really having a discussion with players.

Second is the fear of getting sucked into an endless conversation. This happens on forums and Reddit easily. Players are interested in having debates and asking additional questions, so a developer post that is intended to be quick and dirty ends up going back and forth and suddenly it's 2 AM, but if you try and pull out, you risk sending the message that you lost interest or don't care. This isn't as big an issue as the others.

The third is that it takes very thick skin. Players are mean. Period. You can argue that they have a right to treat devs however they want. But the truth of the matter is that a lot of developers do get chased out of the conversation because they can't stand the negativity and it makes them hate their job. I have been doing this a very long time, so it doesn't affect me, but I know it affects a lot of the people I work with now or in the past. I've had bosses that told me directly "Don't read forums," because they know what a productivity hit it can be to get torn down all the time. (I didn't listen to them, but people do.)

As far as what players can do, it's pretty obvious. Don't be toxic. When someone is there to have a conversation with you, have a conversation. You don't have to be a white knight. But it does help to be professional. If you have a disagreement with someone at work or school or with a friend, you are probably equipped with conflict resolution skills that help you handle those situations without creating a permanent enemy. Use those skills online. Don't view forums etc. as your personal venting space (again, if your desire is to have developers participate in the conversation). Don't take things out of context. Don't mock them. It's fine to be passionate, upset or angry, but you can convey that without name calling.

Again, I'm not telling anyone how to act. I'm offering suggestions for how to act if your desire is to see more game developers (from any company) talking to players in a way that doesn't come across as uber-polished marketing speak.

Legion
I know you don't like talking about wow but I feel you always have good answers. Honest opinion on Legion :P?
Looks great to me. I like how they are being adventurous with classes and items. (OccupyGStreet)

Artifact weapon in legion, AWESOME! or Meh? Also, is that a recycled Path of the Titans that comes with the Artifact weapon (Trait Tree)?‎
Seems cool to me. I don't know how consciously the team chose to follow the Paths of the Titans design, but I agree that the intent seems similar. I'm glad for it to see the light of day in a situation where players can really experience it as a fully-developed feature.

What do you think about the new Honor system for Legion? If I remember right, you we're kind of against splitting ability for PvP and PvE.‎
*I* was not against it. Blizzard was against it, and it appears they have pivoted on that philosophy at least to some extent. The PvE and PvP had already diverged pretty significantly with regards to gear, trinkets especially, and some PvE abilities that just didn't work on players or did less damage.

Heroes of the Storm - Official Notes
The official patch notes are up! Check out all of the changes on HeroesNexus.

[WingsofLiberty]

Most gamers out there don't really care about the nitty-gritty of game development. They just want to know that the game they want is going to have the features that they want.

No shit, that's why we're actually paying money for the game smartasses.

[Deleted]

The team doesn't think about subscriber numbers on a regular basis, as it doesn't help to make the game any better.

Perhaps the greatest mistake here. Everyone working on any kind of product should always look at adoption rates to understand what is gaining traction is what is rebuffing users from joining / re joining. It's very basic business to identify what works best and push on that.

[Sunnydee]

Why do people keep asking the same bloody questions to the devs just with a different order of the damn words. We want NEW information. Not something 16 different interviewers already asked.

[chaud]

Why do people keep asking the same bloody questions to the devs just with a different order of the damn words. We want NEW information. Not something 16 different interviewers already asked.

Most of the interviews took place in the day or two after Gamescom, so no one knew what had already been asked. This one is IGN, they want to talk about the new expansion and lessons learned broadly, not just hunt for new information and assume their readers have seen all of the other interviews.

[MabusGaming]

I am calling it now Sylvanas vs Greymane, or Sylvanas and Bolvar. Her website photo is her standing in Northrend after all.

[Mendzia]

The team doesn't think about subscriber numbers on a regular basis, as it doesn't help to make the game any better.

Yeah, just fk our subsribers. We do not give a sheet. /facepalm

A lot of things get cut during development.

I would say: Most of things get cut during development.

They’ll call us liars or won’t believe us because we SAID we’d do feature B and we didn’t, and so we can never be trusted and we are the worst developers EVER and the game is doomed and so on and so forth.

Why the heck do you promise ANYTHING dear Blizzard?? So basically you can just say in next 3 months: 'we cut artifacts coz they suck'.
They did the same with Path of the Titans, new dances, Farahlon and a lot of other things in previous expacks.

Anyway Blizzcon goodie bag except nice bag looks poor imho. (that Zealot psionic blade - LOL)

[aeuhe4yxzhds]

All i read out of this is that Blizzard is really trying to move the blame onto us, instead of their PR-department or Devs who cant keep their mouth shut

[Zebuthecow]

I am starting to lose some confidence in Dev Team WoW every time I read these blue posts.

It as if they have come to the conclusion that Warlords was bad only because the devs over-shared.

No. Warlords came out of the gate being great... until you hit that first Heroic dungeon and the gear that dropped was just terribly low. How the hell does that happen 10 years into this game?

Then Garrisons just became this time consuming waste of time.

This was the Steam Early Access Expansion. They released a very front heavy expansion, they over-hyped it with all of their nonsense articles (player accessories anyone?), and they KNEW what they were doing.

LFR- cheaper and easier to make than new dungeons and scenarios.
Garrisons- cheaper and easier to make than new content- 6.1 was a total scam patch and they have all but admitted this now.
Moving faction hub cities to Ashran- cheaper and easier than coming up with a good reason to get players to play in their new world pvp zone.

I have hope in Legion. But there is a lot of comfortable managers on Team WoW. Yes- I am being a jerkface. Grow up. Business is business. Stop acting like children at your jobs. You are paid by us to create stuff we want. If we do not like what you are creating or believe you are acting like a sleazy electronic bait and switch shop, we are allowed to be A-holes about it.

[Deleted]

salty summary:

- plastic tat advert
- garrisons were a good idea
- devs insult general public
- bitchy tweets section
- massive ghostcrawler section nobody reads

[Strakha]

Sounds like they are in denial about how they represented their product and then failed to deliver on what they "promised". Almost patronizing the player base at this point with the "Well you just don't understand."

We get it, you tried to make a great product, it didn't turn out that well. Going to guess we'll be doing HFC for a year like SoO and ICC and Dragon Soul and every other time that it was "unacceptable" to have a year long raid. I'm starting to think it's not just the player base that "doesn't understand".

[Danuel]

So how much do you need to pay for bag full of Chinese plastic bollocks?

[Life-Binder]

Sylvanas is back and going to play a huge role in this expansion.

Thrall will continue to evolve in Legion.

YES


suck it Alliance

[Deleted]

The team is aware of the Orc fatigue.

Thrall will continue to evolve in Legion.

Pre-order now.

[odinslayer]

i actually with them in this point...people are crying ass babies who just want what ever they want in the game and when blizzard decide not to give them what they want (cause its their fucking game and they do what ever they want into it) they cry for hours on forums about it, same thing happened with flying same thing happened with mop theme..people just cry and cry and they will not be satisfied at all even if they get what they want they will complain about how they received it -_- just shut the hell up on forums and let the devs do what they were doing for 11 fucking years geez fuck...only DO FEEDBACK WHEN YOU TEST THE FUCKING GAME not cry when they are that early in the game. now people will cry cause they didn't get enough info in gamescom...omfg

[Strakha]

i actually with them in this point...people are crying ass babies who just want what ever they want in the game and when blizzard decide not to give them what they want (cause its their fucking game and they do what ever they want into it) they cry for hours on forums about it, same thing happened with flying same thing happened with mop theme..people just cry and cry and they will not be satisfied at all even if they get what they want they will complain about how they received it -_- just shut the hell up on forums and let the devs do what they were doing for 11 fucking years geez fuck...only DO FEEDBACK WHEN YOU TEST THE FUCKING GAME not cry when they are that early in the game. now people will cry cause they didn't get enough info in gamescom...omfg

quoted for posterity. dat punctuation and prose.

[Deleted]

Looking at the comments section, a lot of the posters are either dyslectic, or they just didn't read, like to show the behaviour of pubescent teens, or they simply failed to see the point (either through biased reading or simple incomprehension).

[Deleted]

Never ever blame your customers, especially if many of them are adults...children can take some patronizing but adults will either:

A) bitch on you, fight with you

Or

B) the "calmer" ones will just dont give a damn about you and move on (leave the game)

Adults hate this kind of treatment, we dont like being called stupid, not understanding anything, "not remembering" stuff correctly ("we never said the word promise" kind of crap) and we certainly dont like being told what is or isnt fun. We dont agree with you and therefore 5 million of us leave this game.

This is very simple if you watch human behavior atleast a bit.

[Narshe]

I am calling it now Sylvanas vs Greymane, or Sylvanas and Bolvar. Her website photo is her standing in Northrend after all.

Only images I see of her in snow are from 2012, I doubt it has any connection with Legion.

[thilicen]

"They’ll call us liars or won’t believe us because we SAID we’d do feature B and we didn’t, and so we can never be trusted and we are the worst developers EVER and the game is doomed and so on and so forth."

Hey look at that, he summed up 70% of the forum community in one sentence.