Pikeman Archive

Now is the Winter of our Discontent. Made glorious Summer by this SOE of Yorke

...so I am sitting here in freakish cold Norway, counting like -30 degrees Farenheit, and I can't stop thinking about SOE and their many issues with developing our profession.

For a long time this profession and many others were suffering from a system where the DEVs would focus on the forums who had, and still have the largest group of supporters. We know these as blastmonkeys and crafters, and Lord knows they got attention, hotfixes, response, etc... The loosing faction to this system, PikeMan, DEs, etc. would get some small posts every now and then telling them how they were not forgotten and that they were also beeing worked on. One would recognize this situation as one of the many useless companies that keeps insisting they're working on a project and in the end ends up cancelling or selling it away to the highest bidder. In our case, they sold us away to the Correspondent system.

The Correspondents function is to act as a keyperson from which the DEVs will pull information concerning the important issues at hand. Needless to say, this gave the DEVs more time to work on other project, and the forums got a more dynamic "feeling". The whole idea behind the Correspondent system is great, however at the moment it lacks one precious quality that gives the communities the motivation to keep playing this wonderful MMPORPG. This quality is wellknown to the PikeMan as the real feedback we never get. The lack of feedback from the top, the DEVs is disruptive for the feeling of belongingness, thus the motivation for playing this game is suffering. If someone is uncertain on how motivation is affected by the lack of feedback from the Leadership there has been made several sudies on this; one of the well-known beeing Mazlow.

Solutions to the systems flaws are most likely several hundreds, and I am sure the DEVs are working as hard as they can to create a feedback system where there will not only be a Correspondent, but also regular updates from the DEVs themselves. The correspondent system is a step in the correct direction, let's just hope they don't stop walking

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Braglor wrote:

Solutions to the systems flaws are most likely several hundreds, and I am sure the DEVs are working as hard as they can to create a feedback system where there will not only be a Correspondent, but also regular updates from the DEVs themselves. The correspondent system is a step in the correct direction, let's just hope they don't stop walking

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imfartoo pessimistic to see the correspondant system changing for the better but it'd rock if it does.

Hummm, Q-3PO made a post which warms my hearth and I quote:

"To improve the community feedback loop and atmosphereso that we set the bar for community relations for an MMO."

Perhaps we'll see some actions around after all? *awaiting changes*

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Braglor wrote:

...so I am sitting here in freakish cold Norway,

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Hehe, I just got back from Rio myself. Not freakishly cold there at all.

You're right in that the major flaw that prevents the Correspondent's program from working is the flow of information, useful information, from the devs to the correspondents. I do not count a dev popping in once a month or once every 2-3 months to say "hi, we know you exist" to be constructive feedback at all. Hopefully Q-3PO will hold to his resolution to improve the situation and we can get the "real feedback" we're needing.

antares
master pikeman

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antares_Kauri wrote:

Hehe, I just got back from Rio myself. Not freakishly cold there at all.

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ThunderHearth has posted a new post welcoming us all to the new year and proclaims: "First on the list is to change the community forums to accommodate the new Community Development Process and improve communication channels." Indeed this is more of thealready statedwould come to be changes that Q-3PO so elegant placed in his new year resolution, and I hope we get to see this new communication system soon. This is indeed some more good news.

Now, all that remains to be seen is some action regarding the issue

Alright, more that warms my hearth!I like these two statements:

"The first step is to create clear channels of communication from the development team to the community."

"The next step is to create clear channels of communication from the community to the development team."

*awaits changes*