How can we help DEVS? (and all of us)

[Amarys]

yeah no, I don't think players think the same... but a majority disliking and voicing concern about a specific piece of content even if there are different reasons are valuable.

Once again, I keep repeating myself, feedback isn't necessarily about listening to a select few and do what THEY want... it's literally nothing about that. It's about learning what parts are disliked and what parts are not and then figure out why.

Also they should listen to most and then decided what to do with it that's in line with their vision. Why are you so focused on that feedback is all about finding one piece of feedback from one player and do just that and have 0 consideration for anything else? You are just repeating the same thing even if I adress it. I even gave straight up examples of how feedback with the wrong cause and solution is still valuable, yet you don't adress or mention it.

It makes the entire discussion pointless.

No, I was talking about things like flying. A lot of players we're complaining about the changes to it, gating, pathfinding etc and wanted to fly from the start. Forums were filled with players complaining about this change. Me and many other players who hated flying and want it removed on the other hand were happy with it and didn't go to the forums expressing our happiness as it was pointless, we already got what we wanted.

Judging from the forums, it would have seemed that players wanted change and that the new route Blizzard took with it was a bad one but it clearly wasn't and didn't ruin the game so it's good Blizzard stuck with it. You're completely missing the point. The majority of players do not voice their concerns and opinions at all, they're either content and play the game or not invested enough and can't be bothered. It's always the unhappy/vocal minority who does and Blizzard should not listen to them ever. Doing so would screw over most of the other players who remained silent.

[LordVargK]

I always had the impression that they only like their own ideas. Like if someone suggests something to them, they will intentionally not implement the suggestion because it was not their idea. Independend from the idea. But that being said:

Give constructive Beta/Ptr feedback. When I'm in beta/ptr, I'll report everything odd I see, from unclear tooltips to how I feel about new systems. Sadly the ingame tool for that has strict limitations and only NA has a beta forum. And I don't think forums are the right place to make suggestions, because of the amount of useless posts that appear in every thread. Filtering forums for useful ideas is WAY too much effort.
There is also a suggestion option in the game client, but that has the same character limitations.

Blizzard has to change their feedback policy and give the testers more options to give feedback and also let them know is some way, if their feedback was helpful and what feedback is especially needed.
Sadly, although stating that "player feedback is more important than ever", they fired community moderators which are exactly the missing link between devs and playerbase.

[GreenJesus]

Holy wall of text batman. Sorry.. just read the title.. No way am I reading that OP.

We can't help the DEVS if they don't want our help. It's pretty apparent they didn't want our feedback when they deleted the forum posts with all the feedback for BFA. Blizzard just doesn't pay enough to get the right talent anymore. They can't get by with "Blizzard magic" making young developers sacrifice pay to work at their favorite company anymore.

[Tiwack]

The classes rollercoaster ride is part of their idea of keeping gameplay and content "fresh" - make and do with that whatever you will.

[Flower Milk]

I was in the BfA beta, I left tons of feedback. I saw other people in the beta leaving mountains more feedback than I did, I don't think I've ever seen people leaving that much feedback about WoW before. They don't care. Either they don't have the time or luxury to listen to players anymore because they are rushed to get expansions/content out to meet deadlines, or they just straight up don't care about player feedback at all anymore and do whatever they think is best.

The only thing we can do to help at this point is quit the game and hope it affects profits so the shareholders demand they do something about it, or they start caring about player feedback again because people are leaving. There really is no other option left.

[pinkz]

years backs DEVs scattered off wow forums to twitter, facebook, and even lately reddit. they have control to block, remove, and limit posts. making it hard to get thru their wall. what is put on wow forums is condensed and scrubbed when passed to DEVs to the point it becomes a minor issue

i could site all kinds of feedback examples, but with forums wipes etc samples vanish. many long time WOW players that do invited alpha/beta testing even get ignored along with PTR testers even when they have the same feedback get ignored, not even answered on valid feedback back by proof, math, on screenshots, even on video.

some examples:

MOP, rogue ability subterfuge, players gave feedback that is was too strong, should not go live from the start of alpha, beta, then PTR. it went live September 2012, wipe PTR forums, problem solved...no, players continued feedback QQ, no action, finally blizzard around April 2014 admitted subterfuge was too strong. when players asked what will be done. it was claimed it could not be hotfixed it required a rework, so nothing was done for rest of the MOP (7 months)

- MOP healers were insane god mode, all brought up during testing went live. all ignored, MOP went thru 6 healing nerf hotfix/patches to bring them where they should have been at launch, and still required nerfs.

- BFA do not feel i need to explain this one out, pretty much the same, players ignored, questions and issues not addressed. PTR forums wiped. blizzard actually tried to deny this. many highly reguarded influencers had to speak up and felt blizz just used them for stress testing, everything else ignored.

[Thetruth1400]

I think devs aren't the bad here.. they only do their job. Problem is somewhere else, management or activision.. they are pushing new shitty content in short time and devs are trying to do their best. Same as everywhere.. they just do what their boss wants, they probably know this will be hated by players and it's not good thing, but I don't think they can change anything. It's corporate.. money money money

I disagree with that only because someone had to come up with the ideas that flopped (warfronts, islands, lack of tier sets, etc.) and it definitely wasn't the management or Activision that did that.

Now I'm not saying management or Activision aren't to blame at all, just saying it's an overall issue at Blizzard, not simply one or two things.

[Zephire]

Well they had a lot of constructive Feedback and criticism in the Beta for BFA and they didn't listen. That's the sole reason why all of this started so badly.

The best way to give feedback is by unsubbing and giving specific reasons there, that's probably the only place they'll really read.

Well, I think they do listen and I think they do take it to heart. However, we as players have no idea what type of deadlines they have or how pressured they are.

At my workplace we recieve plenty of good ideas of things to improve or develop but we don't have the resources or man power to accomedate all of them, and definetly not instantly. Things could take half an year before we even start developing a good idea. By then, sometimes things have change to a different direction which turn the good idea to a not fitting one due to future releases and changes.

They also have incredably vocal consumers who really want the game to be great, from their point of view. They might recieve several contradicting but good suggestions and they have to pick one or take a middle road where no one is really happy.

Then again, the developers are those implementing systems and functions, not so much those constructing the ideas and reason to the systems. That's the game designers job. I still think the above applies to them as well though!

I agree with the unsubbing part though. Since it's more of a corperate thing we want to change.

[Stormspellz]

Best way to help the devs is by unsubbing

[XDurionX]

None of the devs need "help" from any of you. 99% of the feedback is bullshit.

[lockybalboa]

By kowtowing and worshipping them I guess. They have a hard job, had no job training and not getting paid too. Poor chaps.

[Kyphael]

To be honest, and this will sound lazy, but I don't want to have to "help devs" short of providing feedback (they don't listen to anyway.) It's their job to develop a game people want to play. They get paid for this. Short of consumer feedback which they might choose to or not to listen to, I'm not going to stress over the state of the game. If it's enjoyable, I'll play, if not, I'll take my money elsewhere.

[Dundebuns]

You can't. Due to the way software development works, the developers rarely get a say about what's done. Designers will decide the overall plan for a product, under guidance from various stakeholders (a product owner who answers to a 'customer (in this sense ActiBlizz), project managers, vice presidents's etc). A dev will find ways of implementing what they're told to create and not much more.

[Nero Duskwind]

So people entered the anger and bargaining stage faster than with warlords this time huh?

I give it a week before "but i can still go back to old content to farm pets and transmog" guys are suddenly a lot more common and vocal again.

Fuck that. "Personal Loot" turned farming for 'mogs from the more recent "old" content into nightmarish chore.

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To be honest, and this will sound lazy, but I don't want to have to "help devs" short of providing feedback (they don't listen to anyway.) It's their job to develop a game people want to play. They get paid for this. Short of consumer feedback which they might choose to or not to listen to, I'm not going to stress over the state of the game. If it's enjoyable, I'll play, if not, I'll take my money elsewhere.

I don't even think it's such a lazy position to have. It's reality. There's only so much a customer can do beyond providing feedback and, if that feedback is repeatedly and deliberately ignored, the only real recourse left is to stop buying the product.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

We can't. They don't listen to feedback.

^

I've been sharing my opinion on the downward trajectory of the game since WoD.

Blizzard only doubled down on my problems with the game.

[Lei]

I don't think they need our help at this point. It's more of a "what can we get away with?" situation. Long gone the days when you and your time in the game was respected, and rewards and activities were "priced" right (see the rep change hotfix after months of testing). They go to extremes with everything and only tone back if the "bitching" is loud enough. What you think is a "problem" is basically working as intended until people straight out rebel in masses. BfA is is basically pushing Legion just a bit too far (remember the state of Legion till 7.3?). And as we know, whales will keep the game profitable and fanboys will defend it regardless. We have raids (we always had) so the creme of the creme is happy as well (the social pressure drags everyone else in the raiding scene along "If the Method guy can farm 2500 islands to max out his neck, so can I! I'm no pussy! You are!"). Everyone else should just try to "fit in" and suck it up.

[Slowpoke is a Gamer]

We can't. They don't listen to feedback.

Pretty much this.

For us to help two things need to happen.

1. The Devs need to listen.

2. The Devs need to agree.

Somewhere in those two steps there's a brick wall. We can argue about which one but feedback is not translating into changes and that's a fact.

[DemonDays]

We can't. They don't listen to feedback.

This. This was the end of the thread. The first reply.


Blizzard has been systematically ignoring feedback of any kind since Warlord of Draenor. The current development team over there takes a "Blizzard knows best" approach to game development. They don't need or want your feedback because you're wrong anyway. How could you be right? They work for Blizzard. They're rockstars. Geniuses.

They were warned about Legions shit class design. Warned about RNG legendaries that have talents on them. Warned about AP grinds and alts.

They were warned about BfAs somehow even worse class design. Warned about Azerite being absolutely terrible. Warned about re-grinding traits you'd already earned.

Lore claimed they didn't get the feedback they needed for Azerite. Essentially blaming the players for their poor design. Then proceeded to delete the BfA Beta forums so no one could prove him wrong.

Everything you see happen over the course of the expansion where they try to correct all the mistakes they made was pointed out to them by players, during Beta. Their arrogance and hubris just doesn't allow them to see it until people start mass unsubscribing.


The old Blizzard had a set designer assigned to every class who interacted with testers on forums and other mediums during Betas/PTRs. Hell - go to Archerus the DK class hall and you can find a book with all the players names who helped them listed in it. In-game.


Arrogance will be the downfall of this game.

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Pretty much this.

For us to help two things need to happen.

1. The Devs need to listen.

2. The Devs need to agree.

Somewhere in those two steps there's a brick wall. We can argue about which one but feedback is not translating into changes and that's a fact.

They usually do end up agreeing.

The problem is they do it in the .1, .1.5, .2, .3 and .3.5 patches over the course of an expansion. Basically the Beta never ends.

Instead of listening to feedback when it counts. They'd rather release the expansion with their own arrogant vision then spend 1-2 years course correcting after hundreds of thousands of people un-sub.

"Why are people leaving the game? They don't like my genius Azerite design? Oh shit, were the Beta testers right? Again?" - Ion, probably.

[Slowpoke is a Gamer]

They usually do end up agreeing.

The problem is they do it in the .1, .1.5, .2, .3 and .3.5 patches over the course of an expansion. Basically the Beta never ends.

Instead of listening to feedback when it counts. They'd rather release the expansion with their own arrogant vision then spend 1-2 years course correcting after hundreds of thousands of people un-sub.

"Why are people leaving the game? They don't like my genius Azerite design? Oh shit, were the Beta testers right? Again?" - Ion, probably.

The problem then is that they don't agree. They look at that feedback in the Beta and say "No, they are wrong. Our design is correct, they'll see." And only after it blows up in their face do they go back and look at the feedback, and then still manage to draw the wrong conclusion because their guiding philosophy is wrong.

[qwerty123456]

Get a fuckton of money together and take over Activision.