Creature Handler Archive

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Pluto9Moon wrote:

Tstorm there comes a point in the debate where one has to ask, "You're really Thunderheart aren't you?"

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/duel Pluto9Moon

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Pluto9Moon wrote:

Your mimicry is very close to something I would expect a Dev to say. The Devs are in this for profit. Not EGO. I am sorry if we say things are broke and we have no solutions at any given moment. Then again we usually are not the ones who broke it. Gathering evidence is good. I have offered to meet TH, in this very thread to go see my pets run from pikets. The pikets dizzy them and it's off to the races.

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I am not, nor have I ever been a Dev for SOE. I'm going to have nightmares about being confused with Thunderheart now. What is your address so I can send you my phychiatrist bill?

Seriously though, I guess one of the reasons I might sound similar to something a Dev might say is because I know how to work with the Devs.

Just a couple of weeks ago I was on Test Center (with my MCH) and ran into a problem with one of the Aurilia quests. I decided to mention it in the TCPA channel (chat channel most people on Test Center join) to see if anyone else had seen it and maybe knew a workaround. Next thing I knew, a QA person was sending me /tells asking me about the problem! Even after we had finished chatting (no resolution) and I went off to do something else, I was stalked later in the day by two QA folks to give me status updates along with them asking more questions.

I am not suggesting everyone create a CH on Test Center and try to get a QA person's attention, but my point is that there are ways of getting things that are bugs in front of the right people. I trust Vert is tracking the piket/dizzy issue (haven't checked his list), but I think we should just keep after Vert on that until he gets feedback from the Devs on it.

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Pluto9Moon wrote:

Communication takes place in three parts; Transmission, reception and feedback.

What we have now are only two parts.

We say something is wrong.

Someone lurks and reads it.

Se the point? Where is the feedback? We have waited 8 months past due date askign where it is. Communications are broken and still are at this time.

The way it should happen is:

We say something is wrong (give solution where we can).

Dev or Corr reads it.

Dev or Corr responds this issues has been brought to DevX's attention.

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I agree. Can I be removed off the "Tstorm is a Dev clone" list now?

Seriously, I do agree that the Devs could be better at communicating. It is a difficult problem to solve though. Just think about a simple post like "My pet runs away from pikets when dizzied" and what needs to be done to get an answer on that. Multiply that by 32 professions, several subject matter forums, and a few hundred thousand players and it's a lot of posts to sift through and get answers on.

I'm not making excuses for the Devs as I think there has to be a better way of communicating. Not being able to get an answer over the span of months is not only frustrating, but just silly, particularly in the case of a bug. I suspect this is an issue the Correspondants are vocal with the Devs on as well since the Correspondants often feel the brunt of not getting answers.

How do we get answers though? Do we stomp our feet louder and hope that gets the Devs to answer us? They still have the same number of issues they are sorting through so it's not like they're going to wake up one morning and say "You know, we haven't been communicating very well" and we magically see everything answered overnight. It will be a gradual change.

What I hope Vert is doing is telling the Devs about the community's concerns on communication and we will see improvement in the future.

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SkyPreacher1 wrote:

Pluto,

Let me say that communication has 4 parts, the first 3 and then dialogue with the part that is in question.

At this point we are still at stage one.

To my knowledge not one of our issues has ever reached a Devs ears, nor, if it has, has it ever been responded to with other than,

"we are aware of the problem". No we are going to fix this or we are going to try and fix this, or we don't know what the heck is going on, not once have we had the second and third part let alone a red name coming in and saying "yeah we got this problem, any suggestions on what is a better alternative?"

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I am a big proponent of communication and I do give SOE poor marks in this category. Most problems players vent about could have been avoided or at least been lessened in severity through better communication. Sometimes the Devs will make posts that may me say "wow!", but it isn't consistently good unfortunately.

That said, unless Vert is incompetent, I am certain he has put our issues list(s) in front of the Devs (it has reached the Devs' ears). We aren't getting much feedback in return, but I suspect it has nothing to do with a lack of effort on Vert's part. We just need to keep after Vert on this and get the status on feedback. Heck, maybe Vert can get us an estimate on when we can expect feedback on various issues. /shrug

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Tstorm wrote:

Seriously though, I guess one of the reasons I might sound similar to something a Dev might say is because I know how to work with the Devs.

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Check out the opposing point of view:

CH's get nerfed you accepted it we did not. We got screwed.

DE's almost getput to the screwsthey scream like a dying Alderaan. They got something better.

Merchants almost get raked acrossed the coals. They roar like and angry Rancor (pre-nerf). OMG!!! What??? Not such a bad nerf.

Given the three scenarios it was the sheepish CH that got slaughtered and their pets offered up to the SWG DEV GODS for sacrifice by fan bois.

SO??? What will someone like me learn????

It is people who mimic the Devs and say there is no problem that really perpetuates the problem. Work with them? Whether employed or not you are working for them.

You know, I have one question? how is this the devs fault? From dealing with the corporate world i really do not see the devs as having the horsepower to do as you want. Of course they and a few other names known, do take alot of abuse from a few posters. Does thunderheart have the horsepower to stop scheduled devolopment to take care of the few who voice there opinions on the forums? Lets see now, a handfull of posters vs a player base of over 100k. Yep, hold everything ch's are unhappy,.... yea, right. I think I posted my views of the merchants getting over in the nerf. I didn't like it, but I do see that the soe headshed has gotten a bit smarter, they changed it before it went live. Much better than when holos were put in. stopped the damage before it went live.
... There are those that post here on this forum that others look to as leaders. We may not agree on all that is writen but at least those few take the time to write as opposed to the masses that never read the forums much less post. You are not going to affect the development of this game by name calling and whinning. You may affect it by answering vert with helpful feedback. You most certianly will affect the ch community by what you say. Do you really want new ch's. coming to this forum with negative posts of our chosen profession spread up and down it, most of them by old time ch's? If you are going to be a community leader then lead. Stand up for what is good in our profession, not just the bad, we all know the bad. Perhaps its time to put some of that energy and passion to better use than knocking the devs. How about posting some of the good that you see in playing a ch., and if you see no good, then perhaps its time for you to play something else, and post somwhere else.
We need more ch's, I need a break. I had to change my title to tk mystic just to be able to run a few missions with my family monday because of the tells soming in. So how about lighting up on the doom on the boards, perhaps someone will read the forums and want to be a ch instead of being chased away.
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Message Edited by sadnebula on 09-07-2004 07:35 PM

Message Edited by sadnebula on 09-07-2004 07:37 PM

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Pluto9Moon wrote:

DE's almost get put to the screws they scream like a dying Alderaan. They got something better.

Merchants almost get raked acrossed the coals. They roar like and angry Rancor (pre-nerf). OMG!!! What??? Not such a bad nerf.

Given the three scenarios it was the sheepish CH that got slaughtered and their pets offered up to the SWG DEV GODS for sacrifice by fan bois.

SO??? What will someone like me learn????

It is people who mimic the Devs and say there is no problem that really perpetuates the problem. Work with them? Whether employed or not you are working for them.

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I think it is sad when players get the impression that the only way to get Dev attention is to scream at the top of their lungs, risk suspension/banning, etc.

Ranting and other misbehaving only appears to have a positive effect on getting the Devs to react because of another problem -- lack of Dev communication. It isn't possible for the Devs to respond to every post, question, or issue players bring forward. There are just too many. Players get screaming as they assume they aren't being heard, the sky is falling, etc. and when the Devs do respond to an issue the ranting players assume it was their ranting that educated the Devs.

With the recent Merchant changes, I saw a change that got put on Test Center weeks prior to the go live date. Players *assumed* it was written in stone and proceeded to launch a holy war about how the change would destroy their business. The Merchant community worked together to come up with alternate proposals based on the problems the Devs were trying to solve with the change and several of the ideas were implemented. I don't see the success as something the people ranting did -- it was something the Merchant community did while the change was still on Test Center and fluid.

I'm sure I'll be accused of being a Dev clone by saying this, but I would ask those people to consider the alternative -- the Devs dream up some new, unwarranted change to torment players and after throwing it over the wall, all the players pledging to quit changed the Devs mind. For the conspiracy theorists, why would the Devs repeat this behavior over and over if they're in business to make money by charging customers that need to be kept happy or they'll leave?

I do think the Devs could communicate a *lot* better and I will reuse the Merchant change issue as an example. It would have been *loads* better if the Devs had put up an "In Concept" thread about the changes before they went on Test Center. I have a feeling it was more an issue with lack of cycles and the Devs allowed to post such things dropped the ball, but I don't think they intended to imply the change was written in stone and "live with it".

I hope that as time goes on, the Devs will leverage the Correspondants more initially to remove the sharp edges on things along with putting more stuff on the In Concept forum. I used to be a Merchant (haven't been for months) and the update notes on Test Center regarding the change surprised me. I think it was a "foot in mouth" moment that the Devs have hopefully learned a thing or two about and will communicate better in the future.

What does this mean for CH's? Well, I don't subscribe to a conspiracy theory that the Devs live to make us miserable. I think they aren't the best communicators (hopefully this will improve) and they have a *lot* of things they're working on and having to prioritize.

you know moons, I use to read these forums back before I ever posted under sadnebula. There was a good bit of useful stuff on them, not anymore. This is simply not a good place to be anymore with all the hate mail that comes from here. Perhaps it'll change again for the good one day, then it'll be a worth while place to post again. As it stands now,this is far to bitter a place for me to spend my time.
enjoy
cya
gone

Message Edited by sadnebula on 09-07-2004 09:25 PM