Disconnect between Devs & Community

Wow, this is awesome. There are some players that really get us and how we design games posting here. I complied some of my favorite quotes below. Not every single word is 100% accurate, but in general they understand things pretty well.

Q u o t e:
Five categories of change in game:

1. A buff to YOU.
2. A nerf to YOU.
3. A buff to another.
4. A nerf to another.
5. A change that does not affect your gameplay experience in any meaningful way.

(1) -- Blizzard connected with your part of community and listened to your 'wise words'.
(2) -- Blizzard connected with community and listened.... to their QQ about you.
(3) -- Blizzard did not connect with community and OMG this happened.
(4) -- Blizzard connected with community and listened to their 'wise words'.
(5) -- Who cares?


Two categories of NO change in game:

1. A needed buff to you did not happen.
2. A needed nerf to another did not happen.

(1) -- Blizzard did not connect with your part of the community... they no listen OMG!
(2) -- Blizzard did not connect with your part of the community... they no listen OMG!


So, we have a total of 3xConnected and 3xUnconnected, for an even balance.

All is well.

Q u o t e:
OP given the experiences with ret in WotLK and TBC I think the devs do listen. They are just on a completely different time scale to us.

For a player if you spec is broken, or not fixed, one patch to the next then that is huge. You can go months or years needing a fix.

But the devs seem to balance only around patches. They are on a longer timescale than us. They might see what is coming in the next patch and decide that a class can wait. Or they may be working on bringing a class up a little each patch until they are balanced.

Q u o t e:
Lets not forget that the "community", represented by the small percentage of players who actually post constructively on the forums is in relation to the total population of the game. So while we can find a problem in the game and address it in a well thought out logically sound manner, it doesn't mean that the experience of the "community" as stated in these forums reflects closely with the data mining done by blizzard of millions of players across dozens of servers.

Q u o t e:
I sincerely doubt that the developers are disconnected with the community. A large issue is that we have thousands (millions) of man-hours a day contributed to reading, thinking, and posting on these forums (too much time, IMO). The development team has a dozen or so man-hours, I'd guess. Sure, we don't get all that we'd want out of them, but we get more than we deserve.

I think that people should continue to post threads of data, theorycrafting, and (*gasp*) even opinions on the state of their class, and how'd they like to see it improved. I just hate coming here and seeing "ZOMG I posted four parses, and gave you 3 pages of math, and you still won't fix my friggin class?!?!! I give up on this game, KTHXBAI".

If you're truly interested in improving the class, continue to post the parses and opinions, just do it without the attitude and extremism, and the devs will get things going.

And one more:

Q u o t e:
Most of the problems within the community are self-induced and stem from a couple of key issues:

1. Attempting to make a case for something you're passionate (ie. pissed off) about:

More often than not any "solution" provided isn't objective at all (except in the mind of the raging player, those of his/her ilk and trolls trying to incite a riot). Just as in arguing with your spouse/friends, if you feel your emotions are running high that is NOT the right time to try and make a strong, logical argument because most likely it will not come out as you intend. This applies to everyone in all aspects of your life.


2. Disconnect between design intent and player expectations:

You can say "it's bad design" till your blue in the face but if you're expecting constant escalating buffs and no abilities with any downside to them then you're setting yourself up for disappointment and will likely embarrass yourself by raging on the forums with a bunch of rhetoric straight out of an 8 year old's playbook.

If you don't agree with something within the game, first try to remain calm, then try to put together a reasonable argument for why you feel like you do. You must support your claims with real data and not anecdotal evidence and rhetoric. In the end, if the developers say: Sorry but... then that's your answer.


3. Players thinking that those who whine/cry/complain the loudest on these forums drive the design philosophy of this game:

In the post I quoted, the irony of this paradigm is mentioned. If there's part of the community lobbying for a change and it (or something related to it) gets implemented, there will be outrage from those the change works against and they'll rage about how he-who-whines-loudest. If nothing is done about the suggestion, then you get "Blizzard doesn't listen to the players." when the fact is that >90% of the "suggested" changes aren't good at all. Many times, it's for reasons you aren't aware of or, more typically, something explained which you don't agree with.


With regard to #3, what DOES happen is this:

---> Player makes a post about a game situation/scenario, many start to comment on it (perhaps even with *GASP* real data that makes sense in the context of the discussion)

--------> GC and his team read the forums constantly and some of the points made within the post generates some interest in further exploration. They might chime in and try to guide the conversation with questions/philosophy.

---------------> The dev team pulls and analyzes some data and draws some conclusions. They line up the conclusions with the design intent and if they match, no change is forthcoming. If they do NOT match, then further evaluation is required to brainstorm a list of changes and settle on the best available option. Almost no change will not have repercussions for other classes/abilities/synergy/et al so this requires time, effort and most importantly, testing.

In closing, it's not the developers job to educate you on everything which goes on in the game - if you don't like it, vote with your subscription dollars. They tolerate more than they should, in my opinion.

If you're really interested in helping, providing conclusions based on data and taking a neutral tone in presenting your case will go a long way.

Q u o t e:
To them we aren't people. We are account numbers. You, I , all of us are account#X in a pool of millions. They do not give a rats arse about you as an individual or your $15.00.

The disconnect is that players feel as paying customers we deserve answers. To Blizzard we are playing their game as evidenced in GCs post and should feel honored to do so. They are the Rock Stars, we are the groupies.

Nah, you're people. I talk to players all the time... as people. The only problem is that there are an awful lot of you and not many of us.

We try to answer questions as much as we can. Often answering questions causes even more controversy because players then want to challenge assertions or numbers or otherwise try and find a loose thread they can unravel in hopes of it turning it into a buff for their class. That isn't to say we just won't answer questions. But it does mean that answering those requires very careful word smithing so it takes a lot of time. We also run a big risk of "You answered 3.5 shaman questions today but no warrior questions." Mostly, though, we're just pretty busy actually working on the game.

Q u o t e:
So basically anyone who absolves the devs of any responsibility for game imbalances gets quoted?

I know. It's such an outrage that we would agree with players who agree with us. :)

Q u o t e:
I mean, all people are asking for is a little explanation as to why the devs feel the way they do about shadow priests and why it is so at odds with what the evidence seems to say.

Sadly, it rarely works that way. I suspect a few Shadow priests would take us at our word. But from my experience, most would say we were using bad data, or they would want us to show our math, or try and pick apart some of our assumptions or whatever. Many players want to hear the explanation because it gives them a larger playing field upon which to construct their arguments. (That was a bit of a mixed metaphor, but you get the idea I hope). It just turns the entire relationship from one where we get to make the changes we think the game needs to one in which we have to get community buy-off before we can make a move.

Q u o t e:
I get the different time scale, but if the majority of players are seeing something vastly different than what the developers are seeing, at what point does it become enough for them to realize a problem exists and to fix it? I get that classes can't be looked at as single entities when it comes to balance, and that if one really is lagging behind the others, they may be forced to stay that way since bringing them back in line would imbalance the game from a pve or pvp standpoint(without further adjusting the current content, which eats up probably more development time than they have since they always have to pump out new content), but at what point does it simply become unfair to the community as a whole because a fix has to be a long way off for the greater good?

Okay, I'll try and answer this line by line a bit to try and shed some light.

First, you aren't the majority. Sorry. Even if you were the majority, I'm not sure it's fair to give every player an equal vote. Some understand our philosophy better. Some have seen more of the content. Some have played multiple classes and have a broader perspective. Some are better at math. Very, very, very often in the "everyone agrees our dps is low" threads (for any class) you see players who disagree, sometimes very smart players. But those guys are shouted down as "not getting it" rather than being included in the discussion.

Sometimes players aren't seeing the right numbers. Players put a lot of faith in simulations, target dummy tests, data base packages, theorycrafting and simple fights. None of those sources of information are totally invalid. None of them tell the whole story either. Often players are comparing apples and oranges because they are considering a fight which is very good for another class or comparing themselves to an overpowered class who has already gotten nerfs (that do not show up until the next patch). Players also tend to downplay any fight with adds ("trash doesn't matter") even though there are very few single-target boss fights. Players tend to downplay half of the fights as "gimmick fights" which leaves only Patchwerk and maybe Golemagg.

Often, player sense of perspective is wrong. The classes are closer than they have been at any time in the history of WoW. Could they be better? Absolutely. But when we read these threads that talk about a class problem (even low dps) as being the Worst Thing Ever That Has Always Been This Way, they sort of lose some of their credibility. There are some specs who we see as legitimately not making it into PvE groups very often (such as Frost mages and Demo locks) and some specs that just don't feel very viable in PvP (such as Prot warriors or Fire Mages). Many of the other "am being sat" anecdotes are overblown.

Often, we have made a fix and players just haven't seen it yet because the next build isn't out. It is very telling right now that there are a lot of "I logged into the game, tried hitting something for 5 seconds and didn't notice a dps increase" threads. What we deal with a lot are trends, and trends can take a lot of time to emerge.

Sometimes we even agree something is a problem, but A) aren't sure how we want to fix it yet, B) think that an upcoming change will fix the problem, or C) are just focused on other problems at the moment. You can ask why we won't at least acknowledge a problem even if we have no immediate plans to fix it. But ask yourself if you would be one of those people who would post "Why won't you fix it if you know it's a problem?" :)

Q u o t e:
How do you expect us to take it at your word when we have REAL LIVE experiences every single day that go against that? I mean experiences that actually AFFECT our real raiding experience, our community, our guild, our $15 a month. You guys may say one thing and want us to trust you, but the fact is that shadow priests are frustrated.

You're proving my point here though. There is no answer that you are going to accept except for "here is how we're going to buff you." So any post of mine that attempts to explain our thoughts in't going to accomplish much to many of you (though it will for some) without that "here is how we're going to buff you" part.

Q u o t e:
From a marketing perspective, I'm somewhat shocked he's allowed to post. These forums are terrible for making the player base happy, though I suppose that ignores the purpose of these forums. If the purpose is indeed to have a place for the community to come and discuss things, then that's great - it achieves its purpose.

We have done a lot to make the player base happy. I know that because players tell me that, every single day. They don't do it by posting in forums frequented by players with an axe to grind.

There is a great quote, from a player and I apologize that I don't remember your name, about gauging the health of a game by reading its forums is akin to gauging the health of a community by visiting its hospitals. :)

Q u o t e:
Which just makes me ask why you bother hosting a forum at all.... it's just a venue for you to come and say that you're going to do what your design goals dictate, player anecdotal experiences be damned. Honestly, most people that play don't give a !!!# about the numbers.

Numbers aren't everything. We value them of course, but we don't want players to think that you must be a math genius to be able to post here. Opinions and anecdotes are totally valid. Just don't expect us to run and make a change based solely on opinions and anecdotes.

A lot of players, and I can't tell if you're in that camp or not, put the role of this forum at two extremes. Either we implement the community's suggestions, or we totally ignore everything and do what we want. There is something in the middle though, which you can call an "informed decision." We try and make sure that we have a handle on what the community response will be to a particular change or lack of change. We discuss the concerns that players bring up all the time.

Q u o t e:
He'll never post any beneficial posts in any shadow thread, because he's totally ignorant of the class. Its 100% obvious him and the dev team doesn't play 1. Nor do the scale raid dungeons with shadow priest in mind. I'm really wanting to know how can I improve my dmg to the level he thinks we're capable of, but he won't because he can't.

I just wish he would just admit it to player-base, he's ignorant of the class, and really doesn't want to do anything more with Shadow. Just go spec disc/holy, cause we don't tune raids with the spec in mind. Then players can either 1. Quit or 2. re-roll to a raid needed spec.

I'm not a huge fan of the head on a pike thing, but there still seem to be enough players who don't get it, so allow me to point out that posts like this are QQ at best and will earn you a ban. If you think your class has problems, that is fine to post. If you can't state those problems without insulting the developers, please don't waste our time. Please don't waste the time of other players by making them read your posts or lame responses like mine that have nothing to do with WoW itself.

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These forums are not for "demanding answers." if that's what you're looking for then you're going to be continually disappointed. Read the posts above yours and you will see players who think my responses derailed the conversation. They are often right.

Make good posts and we will read them. I will try and make just enough posts to remind players we are reading them. Don't show up with a list of demands and we'll all be happier.

Great posts come out of Europe and other parts of the world all the time. We read them. I don't read them all personally because my non English is sadly lacking.

Q u o t e:

I finally got fed up of cop outs and deafening silence after all these years and rerolled.

Q u o t e:
3.3 patch notes are out and nothing of note for shadow DPS. To all of us who went from top of the charts in Naxx, to middle in Ulduar, to bottom in ToC - where do you think we'll be in Icecrown? With the way our damage has been scaling with gear relative to other classes, that should put us somewhere right around the tanks :(

Q u o t e:
Hooray, another Sunwell. I might as well just put on my T6 and run around Icecrown with Zhar'doom. I'll be about as effective, yet look so much cooler.

This thread was an interesting discussion for awhile, but then turned into just QQ.

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