How do blizzard know how the majority.....

We can view plenty of in-game trends and statistics. Some of these stats may not necessarily help us gauge how individuals feel about particular content or game mechanics, but they can be helpful for gauging necessity or popularity. It allows us to fine-tune things along the way.

We use the forums, third-party websites and media coverage for scoping out some of the chatter.

We play the game and see what other players on various realms are discussing.

We can check the reasons why people are canceling subscriptions.

That said, as much as all of this comes into play -- and as much as we value everyone's feedback -- we're going to do what we feel is best for the game. Sometimes that may cause a backlash, but if things don't work out as we intend, we'll fix them.

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So when you buffed Frost Mages last patch which statistic did you get the idea from that they needed a buff? Did one die while he was afk somewhere?

I thought I made it pretty evident in my last post that we track your posts in specific, Phoenix, and do the opposite of whatever you think is good.

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i have a question (curiosity only) for example me, as a mage, have been asked to go arcane, and perform well as arcane, when statistics are analized couldn't they be interpreted as "hey, 90% of mages went arcane, clearly they like the mechanics behind the spec, lets push it and get deeper on that, since obviously if 90% mages play arcane they like it". how is that situation avoided? is the question "hmm why only 10% plays the other specs?" done as part of the iteration process for each class/spec?

Absolutely. We can carefully analyze data like that from multiple perspectives. On the one hand, we'd look at exactly why one particular spec is the most fun or popular by a large margin. On the other, we'd look at why the other specs aren't considered as fun or popular. I wouldn't flat out say that any such trend immediately denotes it's a bad thing, but it allows multiple developers from varying specialties to analyze the data for reference on how things need to be improved, if at all.

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Lol if this were true, UB would have been baseline since 3.2.

Come clean, you push the specs you want to fit your calendar.

I'm not sure in what world you believe we'd have a calendar that guides our timing to intentionally make specific classes or specs better than others, but it's not earth. The real truth of the matter is that the systems behind the design and balance of this game are more complicated than most could fathom; and you want to dissolve reality down to the lowest common denominator, claiming we make design decisions for petty, malicious, or selfish reasons. That not only goes against our core philosophy, it makes absolutely no business sense.

You lean too far toward the trolling category, Heynice. Be nice.

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Srry no, your system might be as big and as complicated and out of my understanding as you like. If you need to screw over this many ppl then it is obviously not working.

I you were any bit considerate with the ppl you are screwing over you would offer class transfers for said character, given that most DKs did not sign up to play warriors. At the very least i know i didnt signed up for a Tanking a Pve Dps and a PVP tree, and i truly doubt im the only one. In fact the entire point of the class was quite the opposite.

There are a few issues with this post.

1. Everyone reading is expected to believe what you are stating is true and our system is not working because it negatively affects far too many people.

2. Readers must believe it a fact that an entire class is being transformed into a carbon copy of another class because you say so.

3. It needs to be read as fact that most, if not all death knights agree with you that they are being screwed over based on point number 2.

I can merely refer you back to my original post on how data is collected in a more objective manner.

If we're talking subjectivity, my main is a death knight. I don't feel like a warrior right now, I've read the Cataclysm class review for death knights being posted today, and am not worried about feeling like I'll be playing a warrior rip-off in the next expansion. Your knowledge, experiences and gameplay interests differ from mine. Our opinions now bring the debate back to square one with little to no constructive discussion taking place.

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Im sorry , while I appreciate the Blues candor in this post, I call hog wash.

They do everything by the forums, and the complete opposite of what GC says in the quoted post. I honestly cannot think of one thing done to the game that was not a direct result of whines or other uproars that happened on the forums. It is blatantly obvious to me that I am shocked they deny it.

That's because you're using an age-old, fallacious assumption:

If people complain about something on the forums and it's changed, we clearly only made said change to cater to those complaining.

You have no direct evidence of the discussions which take place in meetings here, so there's no possible way anyone should consider your point valid when you so boldly state that not one change has been made to the game (that you can think of) that wasn't due to complaints on the forums.

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They say they read every thread, but since they have a number of other responsibilities I assume they do it in spurts. I expect that once they've tagged a thread the first time, they take a closer interest in it. I also expect that if a thread is particularly insightful, they will keep closer watch on it than others. It just depends, really.

Pretty much this. I try to follow threads to which I respond. Sometimes though, we're buried in many tasks behind the scenes, so the threads we respond to might just be the first threads to catch our eye where we feel like we have something to say.

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To be fair, you're making the assumption that we have access to the same supposed tools you use and the same supposed "data" you use to make changes. We do not. All we have is what we see, which is the forum posts and the actual changes. If a group of people say "you should change A to B" and you change A to B, you want us to just assume that's all a coincidence? Or you want us to assume that it was totally your idea first but didn't tell us because...?

Sorry duder. If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, there's an encyclopedia entry with a picture of it labeled "duck", and I ask 10 random people on the street what it is and they say "that's a duck", well... I'm gonna have to conclude that it's a duck.

I'm not assuming you have access to the same tools or data we do. To the contrary, I'm stating for a fact that you don't. I'm not asking you to assume any change was or was not due to forum feedback. In fact, I'm pretty much asking players to make less assumptions about things and just provide us with feedback on the forums. We try to be as forthcoming as possible with information, but it can get quite convoluted when so many people jump to assumptions, conclusions, or odd theories. It's especially difficult when such things are stated by players as fact.