Merchant Archive

Regardless of the feedback you will go ahead with your plan... I'm sure it is being coded as we speak. You did the same thing regarding the T21 Rifle nerf.. you asked weaponsmiths how we felt about it... then toally ignored us.

Though you did cave a bit in the end... however our feedback was largely ignored.

I agree...I have not seen input from actual players seriously taken into account since waaaaaaay back in beta. Go ahead guys, turn more people away from the game... your precious database will have much more room in it.

Sorry about my tone, but this whole thing makes me so mad. The fact that you will destroy a proffession before even attempting to fix it

i think they do it so that we all vent and complain...and do in in mostly one thread...so that when they finally implement it we are all to tired to really raise a stink...Koster seems to like to where us down so we just accept what ever nonsense he comes up with..

asking for our input is an insult....the descision has already been made...if you read some posts from about 3 weeks ago from Koster he basically says they are going to implement what Q posted...so they planned this over a month ago...

Q'sthread was more of a warning than really wanting our opinions

I like to think the best of people. I'm professionally interested in and have connections to game development and developers. Nobody's an ogre.

But...yes, I'm starting to think that the more cynical interpretations of Koster's recent presentations are pretty much on the money, that he's moved from a model where dialogue, engagement and mutual respect are the fundamental presumptions that go into his approach to MMOG design and management to a model where cynical exercises in "containing" and "managing" players are the way to go.

Now it may be that he, or Q, or other devs, are captive to management dictates, and on a very short leash. I don't know, and since I can't go to GDC this year, I can't really pump people for the inside story. In any event, it doesn't really matter who is at fault, because the fact is that we're being managed, not listened to or respected. We're not even being treated as well as *customers* are by most businesses.

Look how communication flows around here. We get nothing for a long while, then we get sporadic break-throughs of really helpful, useful, productive communication like the BE and Ranger correspondents finally got, and then the taps get turned off because Koster's busy moving into his house or some such. That's no way to run the railroad. Is there seriously no one else with the authority or ability to communicate in the SWG front office? Are they seriously helpless until they hire someone to do that job? You're telling me that Q or Blair or someone couldn't step into the breach and TALK to us?

I'm sorry, but if things were running more or less smoothly, I'd settle for substantial information dumps once every two weeks. But they're not: the game is teetering on the edge of disaster, and most of the disasters appear to me to be unnecessary, non-technical, managerial MISTAKES. Things that don't have to happen. We get a thread where they drop a bomb that innumerable people object to strenuously, constructively, carefully, articulately, and NOBODY says boo about it, more than a day later. Not even, "We hear you" or "Please keep adding to this thread, we're reading it all carefully" or "Honestly, we really are trying to do this as a credit sink, but we can see why you don't think it will accomplish that: it's not about database management" or EVEN "it is about database management, and we're sorry, but we really do need to drive about 50% of the merchants and crafters out of business".

I think we're owed some straight talk. I think we're owed some TALK of some kind. Stop condescending to us. Stop "managing" us. If you want our feedback, great, indicate that you're prepared to act on it. When about 85% of the playerbase tells you, "This is a TERRIBLE idea", then you gotta listen and concede, and do it pretty quickly--that's what seeking feedback means. If you don't want our feedback, and it doesn't matter how many people think it's a dumb idea, or how good their reasoning might be, don't seek feedback. Just drop the bomb, grin and see what happens. Laugh at all the dummies who get upset and check the monthly bank account.

I cannot escape the overwhelming sense that most of the SWG development team either has active contempt for the players or doesn't give them a second thought.

Why can't you guys communicate with any consistency? Why do we lurch from a week of good, useful, helpful posts to smokescreen dropping of bombs and running away? It's schizophrenic.

well im am super cynical....i dont think they are evil bad people but.....

maybe Koster's days as a dungeon master or what ever they called the guys in those Pen and Paper games of yesteryear have never left his psyche...

he thinks he is still the puppet master...

It seems like it is a game to him....that we are basically a game he plays like we would play Splinter Cell...it isnt so much about creating a great game but rather running teh game...if you read his essays tehre isnt alot about peoples fun and enjoyment but rather as Khal says how they can be managed and manipulated.

We are just an ongoing experiment...

Can anyone name one change in the past two months that has actually made something MORE fun or More enjoyable?

The T21 nerf really made me cynical of the devs.

I was initially impressed when we were asked how we felt about the pending changes. I mean, who knows more about weapons than weaponsmiths... I dare say we know more than the riflemen do (since we get a lot of feedback from those folks)

We had pages of replies... with about 99.9% agreeing that the proposed nerfs would not be a good idea... and a general concensus on what would be a good change to the weapons.

Needless to say it was all ignored... though some of what we said might have gotten to them after they changed the nerf.

didnt blair say in his patch notes "The players where right, devs wrong"

I dont believe a dev ever stated that though

what i expect is this... when the new maintenance is integrated, we will not be told for 24-48 hrs in patch notes..

Slowly vendors will destroy themselves as some people had no idea the raise went into affect. Fact is, everyone wont check their vendor stats 5 times a day to keep up with this. I just pray we get fore-warning so we dont have a lot of vendors go KABOOM!

chances are csr would then label it as your fault though.....

I cant justify the payments etc when I lose 500k a week due to bugs, then spend another few hours tracking a csr down to help me get amends.......If had didnt lose so much due to bugs, then I wouldnt care about maintenance.

As for the shift in approaches you suggest, I could see many many examples to support your point (for vaugeness + speed I wont )

Hrm... looks like I might have been right about this one...

If this went live, without any warning whatsoever, Holocron just put the nail in his coffin.

How could ANY of us trust him to take ANYTHING we have or ever will suggest to heart?

The whole "What do you guys think we should do?" thread would have been a total scam to try and make himself look good, so he can come back later and say "We never really found any viable fixes" or some other cackamaimy lies.

Totally bogus if this went live. I almost thought they would reconsider before giving us the big F U.

Also of note, I have well over 400 items on hand at any given time...whats the point of keeping a well stocked store?

Sure I sell a lot, but the fact that I HAVE A LOT is part of the reason why I sell!

When someone walks in, they see that I have a fully stocked vendor, the remember that. They come back again later. As is, why would I even consider keeping a fully stocked vendor?

Do you guys have ANY idea how many items are on the furniture line alone?

Christ you people baffle me.

I am going to check my vendor now. If this has happenned, us DE's will truly suffer as there are many different varieties of droids. Many of which we do not sell much. So we must offer many so we get a better chance to sell.

Yes, we can special order, but then what does a vendor do for us?

If this went live without notice, I cannot even post on here for fear of being banned again because of my frustration!

Yeah... I sell variety too. I have several differnt kinds of droids for sale... all big ticket items too 15k ish... not to mention an ample supply or armor... lots of weapons to choose from.

I'd really like to know what crack they are smoking... isn't this what merchants are supposed to do? Run stores?