Droid Engineer Archive

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Reaperss wrote:

Could anyone please tell me what we've gotten in the last 3-4 months by doing things the correct way? Drashk you yourself know very well what it's like to be ignored by TH. How many different ways did we tell them what we thought about DH? We all saw your correspondent forum post to the Devs. THey still tried to do what they wanted. We don't owe the Devs anything , including respect. F them.

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Here's the thing. It's not a matter of our individual profession benifiting from having a correspondent. That's not how things work.

The correspondents represent the player base. Not the profession.

They're chosen based on profession and subject because that's a nice way of both limiting their numbers, and getting a good cross section of knowledge.

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Jenden wrote:

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Reaperss wrote:

Could anyone please tell me what we've gotten in the last 3-4 months by doing things the correct way? Drashk you yourself know very well what it's like to be ignored by TH. How many different ways did we tell them what we thought about DH? We all saw your correspondent forum post to the Devs. THey still tried to do what they wanted. We don't owe the Devs anything , including respect. F them.

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While I can only vouch for the past 2 months or so, I can say that yes, we have made a difference by doing things the correct way. I have seen a number of large changes to proposals and plands due to correspondent feedback. It doesn't always happen, but the only time it every happens is when we're productive/constructive.

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I meant WE as in DE's...

But ok, I'll take your word for it and back off.

Its not about Correspondents, or player opinions, or what makes the game better. Its about subscriptions, plain and simple.

If it was something else, if SOE valued what we thought, wanted to fix this game, it'd of been done a year ago.

Whether a Correspondent fights to the bitter end, or takes it up the ass gladdly, it's pretty irrelevant. Short of a miracle, once the changes are made, they're done. Honestly, how many times have we seen SOE reverse a decision? Not many? How many times has SOE ignored the changes we've wanted for over a year? Alot.

I don't hold it against any Correspondent for what occurs to a profession. The difference between a Correspondent and a regular player is that the Correspondent simply gets to be disappointed first. This is exactly why I've never applied for the role of Pikeman Correspondent, despite my love of the profession. I'd go insane having the suggestions and concerns of my profession simply dismissed or dodged. The only feedback we can give SOE that they will always listen to is the "Cancel Subscription" button.

No, the real problem isn't Yes-men Correspondents or the opposite, the biggest danger to any profession is Yes-men players. People who regardless, will take the changes laying down, who's only response is "Well it must be for the good of the game!" It's those people, the brainwashed masses, the ones who will never cancel regardless of what SOE does that are the problem.

Just remember guys, it's not the Correspondent's fault when things go wrong. It takes alot of gall to play a profession that's been basically nothing but pissed on the entire game like DE. I know, I've been a Pikeman since 7/24/03. However, it takes even more to voluntarily place yourself in a position that is ripe for disappointment. Whether it be a Correspondent past or present, for any profession, they've all tried, and that's the best really any of us can do.

I think the problem is that most players don't realize that in fact the correspondents really have changed the coarse of the game on multiple occasions. Off the top of my head I can think of 2 major proposals from the devs that got seriously reworked after Corr. input. Now, the things that get reworked you never hear about and just happen, the things that don't get tons of attention, hence why it seems to everyone like no one is listening. The fact is they are, they just can't follow through on everything thats suggested (whether that be because of orders from above, technical reasons, or whatever).

What chafes me about this whole thing is that the Community Relations people are saying that it's a punishable offense to contact them directly. WTF? It's unimaginable to me that any business in this modern world would be able to tell it's customers that they have customer relations people, but you can't e-mail them or contact them directly.

Whether or not a correspondent is being a pain to the devs (Okram) or a fan boi (Jenden), nothing should impede a paying customer's right to make suggestions or log a complaint with the company's customer relations wing. That is what they are paid to do!

It is more than disheartening to hear our current and former correspondents equating a deluge of e-mail to the company as "a riot". I agree that mass protests on live servers are rightly taboo, but a community relations rep complaining about too much to read should go with the turf. Instead of banning correspondents and deleting threads, perhaps they should hire an assistant or intern to read and log these complaints.

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Cianhydle wrote:

So am I. It means that Droid Engineer has a Correspondent that is level headed and is able to be a voice for the community, when it is needed the most.

Exactly how will this help the DE community? Furthermore, how has it helped the DE community in the past? The DE correspondent obviously hasaccepted the version presented by the developers; those who were part of the "rioting mob" see it much differently. To be completely honest, neither the original poster nor the DE correspondent have accurately summarized the incident. All that matters is Oa'kron was a good correspondent who is very respected by our (AS) community.

Renea,

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I dont really think Jenden "accepted" allot of the CU changes. Knowing his usual manner he probably made a professional and concise list of all the forseeable problems with CU and let the dev team know about them as quickly as possible. Give how the changes will hit DE i doubt seriously if Jenden "accepts" the situation but he isnt going to get mad about it he is going to try and think of ways to help the profession. I dont like that the AS rep was canned. He felt he was accurately representing the AS in general and he probably was. Unfortunatly that wasnt done in a way the devs wanted or accepted and we have a publish coming out that many if not most AS dont accept :/

What would change the devs/execs minds? Unfortunely nothing less then a mass exodus of the AS community as subscribers. Im not suggesting you quit SWG im just saying realistically what would make them change they're minds. I dont like the idea of extreme measures but unfortuantly that is life when you have larger (corporate)agendas overriding smaller (player groups)ones.

Ive always hated sitatuations like this, the devs are here to make a game for us, that is fun. Unfortuantly "Us" isnt everyone or every profession. Some changes are always going to affect a minority in a bad way. As that minority you have few tools to make your voice heard, you can do something within system, do something outside the system or just leave the minority group itself. That is why i dislike politics.

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DarthRoe wrote:
What chafes me about this whole thing is that the Community Relations people are saying that it's a punishable offense to contact them directly. WTF? It's unimaginable to me that any business in this modern world would be able to tell it's customers that they have customer relations people, but you can't e-mail them or contact them directly.

Whether or not a correspondent is being a pain to the devs (Okram) or a fan boi (Jenden), nothing should impede a paying customer's right to make suggestions or log a complaint with the company's customer relations wing. That is what they are paid to do!

It is more than disheartening to hear our current and former correspondents equating a deluge of e-mail to the company as "a riot". I agree that mass protests on live servers are rightly taboo, but a community relations rep complaining about too much to read should go with the turf. Instead of banning correspondents and deleting threads, perhaps they should hire an assistant or intern to read and log these complaints.

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There's nothing wrong with a customer complaining and sending an email. However, PM's are the worst way possible to get ahold of the devs (and the most annoying, even the correspondents aren't really supposed to PM unless its an exploit, email or forum posts are much better). Besides which, he didn't tell them to PM tiggs, he told them to PM one of the actual DEVS, not community relations (from what I remember, granted I didn't see the whole thing, but as I recall thats what he recommended in his post). I'm not trying to say that the devs are infallible and everything they do is right, but purposefully stirring up trouble (telling your community to all PM the devs would be considered stirring up trouble in my book) just hurts everyone and doesn't help anything.

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Cianhydle wrote:

So am I. It means that Droid Engineer has a Correspondent that is level headed and is able to be a voice for the community, when it is needed the most.

Exactly how will this help the DE community? Furthermore, how has it helped the DE community in the past? The DE correspondent obviously hasaccepted the version presented by the developers; those who were part of the "rioting mob" see it much differently. To be completely honest, neither the original poster nor the DE correspondent have accurately summarized the incident. All that matters is Oa'kron was a good correspondent who is very respected by our (AS) community.

Renea,

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Nobody is saying that Oa'kron was a bad correspondant or that he wasn't a good guy. He DID make a mistake though in violating the rules. A corr is bound by rules that we are not.

Do I think he sould have been fired? No. Should he have been reprimended? Yes.

I think he just made the mistake of being frustrated, caring to much, and posting without thinking. I don't hold that against him, but obviously SOE does.

You coming here and expecting our Correspondant to make the same mistakes jsut doesn't make any sense.

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Jenden wrote:

There's nothing wrong with a customer complaining and sending an email. However, PM's are the worst way possible to get ahold of the devs (and the most annoying, even the correspondents aren't really supposed to PM unless its an exploit, email or forum posts are much better). Besides which, he didn't tell them to PM tiggs, he told them to PM one of the actual DEVS, not community relations (from what I remember, granted I didn't see the whole thing, but as I recall thats what he recommended in his post). I'm not trying to say that the devs are infallible and everything they do is right, but purposefully stirring up trouble (telling your community to all PM the devs would be considered stirring up trouble in my book) just hurts everyone and doesn't help anything.

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I based what I know anout the situation on Tiggs' post last night, where she definitely seems to be referring to PMs to community relations (emphasis mine):

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Tiggs wrote:

A correspondent's position is to bring to the Dev team the issues their profession is currently having or foresee. It is not to rally up the troops and spam in private message tells to the devs, just to be heard. The correspondents have direct access to our email addresses and to the correspondent forum. Unfortunately there are times when TH and I get very busy and we need to concentrate on the other duties we have.

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We don't have the dev e-mail addresses, and a post in the forums is buried deeply and quickly. PMs are the only means of directly contacting a member of SOE that they have made available. I don't care if they don't want to read a bunch of PMs, it is the customer's right to be heard.