Community Relations Archive

Well, just 90 days after he started, with his enthusiastic and upbeat energy, our new guy with a new role, is gone.

I'm not sure what type of toon Jon may have had ingame, but I'm going to guess it may have been a red Twilek, cause he was surely a lobster dropped into the boiling water. A new agent dropped in among the old guard, trying to represent SOE as it tried to put on a new face.

I've seen the old guard's influence in the community in the latest weeks, popping up here and there with old ways of communicating and influencing community direction, "we'll continue to change pearl drop rates as we see fit," stated while we were still in the midst of broken loot and dying ingame.

I'm not sure what lead into Jon's rapid departure, though I proly have my guesses, and while it doesn't necessarily mean that all the good changes we've seen in the community and game will revert to the old ways, and I'm sure it was a difficult assignment for Jon to bridge the gap between the old and the new, it was proly too much too soon for a new peep to step into, and even tho I didn't pull any punches for SOE in my own exchanges with Jon, as he did represent SOE after all, I sure appreciated that he was earnest, and he tried, and he wanted to do good.

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Could not have said it better myself.

Thanks for all your hard work Jon.

/agree

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The Old ways have definately returned. No communication, doing things anti-playerbase etc.

I didn't realize mr. Hanna was so influential on changing that but since that is the case, and there was no "good-bye" post from him, we all know what that means.

They must've had enough of the playerbase return to not care anymore and not respond to us like they were doing.

Look at the Dev tracker now, compared to 1-2 months ago. 2 days go by and the dev posts are still on the first page. Why did they even act like things were changing? That part makes it worse-I fell for it.

I support removing combat classes if keeping them in results in a "dumbed down" game
- I support Devs that know how to design a game

i´m sure he didn´t leave but got fired by SOE

I'm no fan of the SOE SWG regime, how they do things, or SWG design fundamentals (tho they been changing for the better finally), and like I said, I've seen signs of the old regime popping up (should have cut off the snake's head IMHO, not just introduced change - I'd vote for revolution, not evolution), but all in all, I think things are changing for the better, and there's still some kind of mandate at work with new, better design direction. That should continue.

We lost our service/communication advocate in Jon's departure, and Tiggs, nice as she is, is a "safe" bet for SOE heads, more in line with working with the old ways,knows how to keep her place on the forums (ie. doesn't stick her head out on issues regarding expectations in either direction, a mouthpiece,) and proly doesn't ruffle SOE SWG leaders with "you said we were going to communicate...we're notcommunicating here, and here, and here!...... how do I represent SOE when we fundamentallly have gaps and players are upset, and we're not ..."

IMHO, having seen this so many times in business, Jon was a victim of being fed a line, maybe reading in too much from it, maybe expecting too much change on SOE's side, maybe misunderstanding the real movement that SOE was capable of with so many Old Guard still running around with the Old Guard ways, versus his own expectations of communication and responsiveness, ownership of community relations on his own shoulders, and the frustration of being helpless to complete his mission as he saw it. Did he quit or was he fired? Could be either. I wouldn't have wanted to be in his position, that's for certain.

Even though the Old Guard is still here, I still think change is afoot, and continues. I think to expect good community relations, good project management, and good feedback mechanisms is still a bit much to expect absent a real house-cleaning. Improvements though?, yeah they seem to be continuing. Something has changed back-office, I'm not sure what, though, and not really my business. I'm a customer, not a share-holder, and I vote with my account subscription. As long as things keep improving, I'll vote thumbs up. If they don't, thumbs down (cancellation).

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Calandryll wasn't a good fit for SOE. He was too much into "honesty" and "responsibility" and "communication" and othersuch ludicrous ideals. I wonder if he was fired for stirringup trouble, or if he had the balls certain other community relations managers lack and quit in outrage.

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Tapo Moosi, Once A Rogue

- I support me.

Well, notice he was dumped right before the CU stuff was posted?

I wonder if he didn't like the direction it was going but also, it could be he didn't approve of SOE policy to "ignore the players" that they have gone back to.

I support removing combat classes if keeping them in results in a "dumbed down" game
- I support Devs that know how to design a game

Or maybe, he moved onto better things:

http://forums.middle-earthonline.com/showthread.php?t=35906

(Sorry don't know how to clickly).

But SOE said he wanted to be with his family...surely SOE would never lie to us... o_O

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