Smuggler Archive
Thread: Tuesday Tip
I am not saying they should disclose their company secrets.
Just reasonable information.
LIKE (and if i remember correctly this was said by TH or Tiggs)
"The Smuggler revamp wont be in one publish but it will be pushed out over a few pubs."
So Bantha, all we ask, is (in this case) "WHAT IS COMING?" it is obviously designed, and scheduled.
Yet they say NOTHING. Go check. No future plans. Nothing. They drop some CAP ship video on us. No comment what so ever. Am I supposed to get all giddy, when WE KNOW that things can take up to TWO YEARS until they are implemented.
Get real.
Magnum
Tiggs wrote:
Except last we heard we WERE almost out on Test Center a couple of times. Tiggs, there needs to be a serious dialogue between the team and this community. One in which we need to not be inflamatory and where your side speaks honestly, one that actually involves respect from both sides.
SmugglinZane wrote:
I don't recall posting that anything other then slicing changes was ready for Test Center.
We have had players get banned from the forums for discussing what we consider a bug.
Posting bugs will not get people banned (unless it is considered an exploit and you continue to repost the information). Breaking forum rules will get you suspended or ultimately banned.
Thanks for replying Tiggs, but here's the problem I was talking about.
1. Players who I trust more than, well let's just say players I trust have said they were told at FanFest that smuggling was just missing some dialogue in the quests and would be finished shortly. It was supposed to be withing a couple weeks of the slicing changes. Just because you didn't say it, doesn't mean it wasn't said. Now if you want to say it was pulled because of problems or you wanted to go over the system again to make it more in depth, I'll be thrilled. Just please say something.
2. Posting that Smugglers cannot smuggle is a bug DOES get players banned from the forums. Just because you don't know about it doesn't mean it's not happening. I'm not blaming you, butthis is anotherexample of how you, as CR have no controlover the people actually dealing with the players one on one. Maybe it's time the mods and the CSRs got a review to make sure they're not overzealous or flat out ignorant as to what's going on.
As I said above, this is a fundamental problem between the way you guys (and your mods) view things, and the way we do. This NEEDS to be discussed so we know where it's going. I don't care if it's only what your intentions are. Tell us. And if it falls through, tell us who or what is responsible for that. You and some of your cohorts take a beating when we know it's the fault of the producers. I know you can't say that, just tell us it got pulled for reasons beyond your control so we can take the fight to them.
Once again, thanks for posting a reply and I hope we can continue this way so that things can be resolved better now and in the future.
Tiggs wrote:
Tralita_tusnami,
In reply to your post..
TH and I have no way of knowing you are suspended or banned unless we do an account check. The admins handle everything on the forums as far as violations of the TOS or guidelines goes.
We have a big issue there and it will take long time to come back to real communication between SOE and Players.
In all players mind the first who broke the communication channel is you : SOE.
Not so long ago you stated and acted like YOU where designing the game, which is true, but you also clearly made the players feel you did not care about what they wanted.
This was the time of petitions and mass gathering of players on certain servers.
Your way of communication and way to design the gameplay disgusted most oldtimers...
Actually the players are worried forupdates and I can say some people are even afraid of SOE designers to "fix" their professions. They'd rather have a broken profession than a "fixed" one, who they know will be worse.
As recentexample, I can point to Smugglers who never wanted their slicing components replaced by non stackable rare looted items. (Have a look at the posts and polls on various forums...)
Now the player issue is, each time you announce something, they are waiting for it.
So, if you don't giveit to them,they troll the forums and are sad, mad, disguted,... . (look at 2 years veteran rewards)
I would tell the biggest issue nowisn't the bug thingbut, it's the way of managing and prioritizing the development.
All players see your way of working is to first "nerf" something BEFORE fixing the gameplay.
As example let me pull an old NERF :
Long ago crafters where able to colorize the name of crafted items.
Suddenly without implementing a way to do the same thing you removed it for all players.
Yes you told you would implement it in the premium auction system and we are still waiting.
A good process management would have been to let it run as is and when the premium auction is ready, transfert it, not remove it before fixing it.
The most important idea there is the players where enjoying colorizing the items and it wasn't hurting any gameplay nor any game mechanics.
Another example is the multiplayer vehicle : why adding constraints to offer ride to others players?
The multiplayers vehicles where great, even if really slow,now they are pretty useless.
Now about the FUN thing.
It seems there is a huge gap between what players think is fun and SOE devs ideo on the subject.
When a player look at SOE game design on 2 years of SWG hecan see SWG is a time consuming game where you can't enjoy full content without beeing a power gamer. And even worse NERFS await us all...
For example it isn't fun to be obliged to pvpto be a master pilot or be a Jedi Knight.
New content, aka pseudo adventures in caves isn't fun, its not even Starwarsy.
Beeing obliged to have houses filled of resources isn't fun nor being limited to drop item in houses on a structure basis not a player capacity one.
Waiting 15s for a MCH to pull a pet or obliging him to use a camp to pull them isn't either funny.
So in regard of us all players I would ask you to :
- stop nerfing before fixing
- start thinking about fun and not time consuming
- start thinking we are just players wanting to have fun and not a new work (already have my part of work in RL...)
Last note OK we know you rule this game but at least make it fun and make it feel StarWarsy
Warryyr wrote:
It's called proprietary knowledge, and it's what keeps a business ahead of the competition. Sure, some bits and pieces *might* get devulged, but in general businesses competing with other businesses don't want to give out all of their secrets - or a competitor might say, dang we need to steal their thunder - we need something BIGGER and BETTER!
Instead, the competition says, oh dang - they just did this, we need to step up!
Pardon me for observing this, but who, exactly, is the competition? Is there another Star Wars MMO out there that I haven't heard about? Perhaps I should be playing that one...
If you're talking about other MMOs in general, we have prima facie evidence that SOE's current method of community relations is helping the competition - every player who quits in disgust after being lied to and kept in the dark is spending their money on someone else's game.
Shaan'ti Hokai (Kauri) 
wildcat84 wrote:
Tiggs wrote:
Direction of games change every day due to various reasons. That is why there is nothing definite being posted until it is almost out on Test Center.
Not to be nitpicky here, Tiggs, but this sort of thing is a huge problem of perception that you, as community relations director really needs to work on.
It actually DOES seem that the DEvs/production really DONT have any sort of focus or direction, or plan, and it irritates myself and I'm sure others that the game's direction shows little consistency. I mean, it's not at all uncommon to see whole core systems take a sudden 180 degree turn. To we, who only see what goes into the game, and only hears what you all post here, this doesn't inspire much conficence, as it appears to us that you guys are just flailing away without any plan, roadmap, or vision of any sort of "big picture". The frequency that "the rules" get rewritten makes it almost impossible for anyone but powergamers to EVER get anything done in this game before suddenly you all change your minds and go in the opposite direction.
This sort of thing has got to stop, if you want to (as you have stated) improve the accesibility of this game to a larger audidence.
Communication. Consistency. Quality.
Those thee things are what I believe the community most wants from the staff and management of SWG.
Message Edited by DarthSillyPants on 08-10-2005 02:20 PM
Here is my Tuesday Tip:
Good communication goes two ways. If you want someone to cooperate with you, don't flame them. And if what you want is good communication... eh...really try not to flame them.
I suppose it's not surprising that Smugglers can't smuggle...
Community Relations Directors can't relate to the community either.
It would seem that the mislabelling of professions goes beyond the game itself.
TashunkaSapa wrote:I suppose it's not surprising that Smugglers can't smuggle...
Community Relations Directors can't relate to the community either.
It would seem that the mislabelling of professions goes beyond the game itself.
ROFL!
I needed that one.
Thanks
Magnum
Tiggs wrote:
TashunkaSapa wrote:
Tiggs wrote:
Direction of games change every day due to various reasons. That is why there is nothing definite being posted until it is almost out on Test Center.
Game design requires planning - and the problem seems to be, you guys don't even have a plan. The problem isn't that the "direction" changes every day, the problem is that the company line changes every day.
We make a commitment to you each month, it's not unreasonable to expect one in return. Show us that you care about your customers, decide what you need to do to satisfy them, tell us what you've got planned and then MAKE IT HAPPEN.
Stop making excuses and start making progress.
We have many unannounced plans that one day soon will be public knowledge. Until we receive the go-ahead nothing will be said, sorry.
Progress can be shown without telling us about your unannounced plans that one day soon (soon-roflmfao) to be public knowledge.
You know actions speak louder than words.
TashunkaSapa wrote:
Warryyr wrote:
It's called proprietary knowledge, and it's what keeps a business ahead of the competition. Sure, some bits and pieces *might* get devulged, but in general businesses competing with other businesses don't want to give out all of their secrets - or a competitor might say, dang we need to steal their thunder - we need something BIGGER and BETTER!
Instead, the competition says, oh dang - they just did this, we need to step up!
Pardon me for observing this, but who, exactly, is the competition? Is there another Star Wars MMO out there that I haven't heard about? Perhaps I should be playing that one...
If you're talking about other MMOs in general, we have prima facie evidence that SOE's current method of community relations is helping the competition - every player who quits in disgust after being lied to and kept in the dark is spending their money on someone else's game.
Thank you for saving me time to write exactly that.
Was Thinking exactly the samething.
so
QFE
It's not SOE's fault for not telling us anything. It's the playerbase for yelling at them for everything they do. Good or bad.