Guild Wars 2

It might be helpful for some members of the Anet staff to read this :http://www.raphkoster.com/2013/10/14/on-getting-criticism/

They already know all that.

Out of that whole article THIS is the thing they have to understand the most IMO:
“People who tell you you’re awesome are useless. No, dangerous.
They are worse than useless because you want to believe them. They will defend you against critiques that are valid. They will seduce you into believing you are done learning, or into thinking that your work is better than it actually is. Especially watch out for the ones who tell you that nobody understands your genius.
Honestly, this is going to sound horrible, but self-doubt is one of your most powerful tools for craftsmanship. None of the designers you admire feel self-confident about their work in that way. None of them think that they are awesome. They all suffer from impostor complexes the size of the Titanic.
I am not saying that you need to lack confidence in yourself. (Heck, you’ll never put anything out if that’s the case! You need to have the arrogance to assume anyone will care in the first place). I am saying that nobody is ever done learning, and people who tell you you have arrived will give you a sense of complacency. You should never be complacent about your art.”

Edit: I actually think I’m going to save that article and quote this every time some rabid fanboy freaks out on someone’s good ideas.

The post is Awesome!! Brilliant indeed!
I wish many many ppl could just realize how true this is!!
Thank you very much for sharing!

The OP is making the assumption Anet doesn’t understand criticism. It boggles the mind how the OP has come to this conclusion.

By the same token, not every bit of criticism is valid or even accurate. Sorting out the valid criticism from people who don’t really have a clue is an important part of the job.

I don’t think Anet is sitting there preening their feathers thinking about how great they are. I think Anet is scared to say stuff because the community is so rabid. Which is very different than someone who doesn’t listen to criticism.

Vayne.8563:

I don’t think Anet is sitting there preening their feathers thinking about how great they are. I think Anet is scared to say stuff because the community is so rabid. Which is very different than someone who doesn’t listen to criticism.

This

Vayne.8563:

I don’t think Anet is sitting there preening their feathers thinking about how great they are. I think Anet is scared to say stuff because the community is so rabid. Which is very different than someone who doesn’t listen to criticism.

When you burn away all the good will you built up from your previous game in record time and blatantly lie about the game, I guess you should expect criticism.

All of my experience, interactions and witnessings of ArenaNet’s actions tell me they would do well to read the article and learn from it. It’s not hard to sort the people who don’t have a clue. It is hard to resist flattery.

Anet needs to learn the difference between ad hominems and urgent criticisms. The tone of the criticism has absolutely nothing to do with its validity.

Relentliss.2170:

Vayne.8563:

I don’t think Anet is sitting there preening their feathers thinking about how great they are. I think Anet is scared to say stuff because the community is so rabid. Which is very different than someone who doesn’t listen to criticism.

When you burn away all the good will you built up from your previous game in record time and blatantly lie about the game, I guess you should expect criticism.

When the fanbase can’t see the difference between a lie and a change of direction based on observation and necessity, the fanbase is rabid.

Some of us understand why certain changes were made, whether we like it or not.

Arena net can’t handle anything right.

xephire.8324:

Arena net can’t handle anything right.

I’d question the accuracy of this statement. They’ve probably handled hundreds of things right. It’s just that some people only want to focus on what isn’t right.

Vayne.8563:

Relentliss.2170:

Vayne.8563:

I don’t think Anet is sitting there preening their feathers thinking about how great they are. I think Anet is scared to say stuff because the community is so rabid. Which is very different than someone who doesn’t listen to criticism.

When you burn away all the good will you built up from your previous game in record time and blatantly lie about the game, I guess you should expect criticism.

When the fanbase can’t see the difference between a lie and a change of direction based on observation and necessity, the fanbase is rabid.

Some of us understand why certain changes were made, whether we like it or not.

-

“People who tell you you’re awesome are useless. No, dangerous.
They are worse than useless because you want to believe them. They will defend you against critiques that are valid. They will seduce you into believing you are done learning, or into thinking that your work is better than it actually is. Especially watch out for the ones who tell you that nobody understands your genius.

That is you, whether you see it or not that quote is you to the letter.

Here’s my rebuttal: http://www.empoweringparents.com/arguing-with-your-opinionated-child.php

It’s all in the delivery. If you can’t make your point in an adult, educated manner, then Anet is more often then not just going to ignore it. Acting like a child and throwing a tantrum when things don’t go your way is no way to win any arguments. The problem here is that a very large portion of the forum community can not produce an intelligent critique without sounding like an entitled child.

You are correct; praise can be just as harmful as a toxic post, but that does not mean that Anet cherry picks all forms of the prior and lumps all critiques into the latter.

Also, Just because your complaint is not directly addressed does NOT and I can’t stress this enough here, NOT mean they are not listening. There are things going on behind the scenes that we have no idea about. They try to keep us in the loop as best as they can, but they can’t inform us about every single meeting they have with their staff over how the game will develop. Such a task would require more manpower then necessary and would only slow down their own process ultimately damaging the game in the long run.

Conner.4702:

Vayne.8563:

Relentliss.2170:

Vayne.8563:

I don’t think Anet is sitting there preening their feathers thinking about how great they are. I think Anet is scared to say stuff because the community is so rabid. Which is very different than someone who doesn’t listen to criticism.

When you burn away all the good will you built up from your previous game in record time and blatantly lie about the game, I guess you should expect criticism.

When the fanbase can’t see the difference between a lie and a change of direction based on observation and necessity, the fanbase is rabid.

Some of us understand why certain changes were made, whether we like it or not.

-

“People who tell you you’re awesome are useless. No, dangerous.
They are worse than useless because you want to believe them. They will defend you against critiques that are valid. They will seduce you into believing you are done learning, or into thinking that your work is better than it actually is. Especially watch out for the ones who tell you that nobody understands your genius.

That is you, whether you see it or not that quote is you to the letter.

Why do some people, including you, ignore the stuff that I say is wrong with the game?

Vayne.8563:

It’s just that some people only want to focus on what isn’t right.

Which is exactly what the article points out as being the only useful feedback.

I was going to post a link to it myself because, like I’m sure so many others felt as they were reading it, it was perfectly applicable to GW2. Almost as if Mr. Koster was addressing Anet directly. (He’s also an MMO dev.)

Over the past couple of months my personal opinion of the game has plummeted. I used to be the type of player doing dailies every day and finishing monthlies in the first week, and now I find it a struggle to want to log in (last month I’m not sure I got any of the monthly achievements). I’m 2/10 on the Twilight Assault one, after 2 weeks. It’s just not worth it anymore to keep up. The idea of having to earn BiS gear through one of the worst parts of the game (crafting) utterly disgusts me. And meanwhile Anet continues to push temporary content/events/achievements over letting players approach the game on their own schedule, while continuing to decrease the rewards for playing. Each new ‘reward’ in fact feels like a penalty as it’s something that you either have to keep paying to use (transmutation) or to keep in storage (bank slots). They even nerfed karma which was already next to useless, and at the same time they continually introduce new item-based currencies. This game does not respect my time or inventory space. This is why I stopped playing other MMOs. Sad to see GW degenerating into just another one.

Leablo.2651:

Vayne.8563:

It’s just that some people only want to focus on what isn’t right.

Which is exactly what the article points out as being the only useful feedback.

I was going to post a link to it myself because, like I’m sure so many others felt as they were reading it, it was perfectly applicable to GW2. Almost as if Mr. Koster was addressing Anet directly. (He’s also an MMO dev.)

Over the past couple of months my personal opinion of the game has plummeted. I used to be the type of player doing dailies every day and finishing monthlies in the first week, and now I find it a struggle to want to log in (last month I’m not sure I got any of the monthly achievements). I’m 2/10 on the Twilight Assault one, after 2 weeks. It’s just not worth it anymore to keep up. The idea of having to earn BiS gear through one of the worst parts of the game (crafting) utterly disgusts me. And meanwhile Anet continues to push temporary content/events/achievements over letting players approach the game on their own schedule, while continuing to decrease the rewards for playing. Each new ‘reward’ in fact feels like a penalty as it’s something that you either have to keep paying to use (transmutation) or to keep in storage (bank slots). They even nerfed karma which was already next to useless, and at the same time they continually introduce new item-based currencies. This game does not respect my time or inventory space. This is why I stopped playing other MMOs. Sad to see GW degenerating into just another one.

The achievements for Twilight Arbor are actually permanent. You’d miss 25 achievement points and a back item (because you don’t have enough back items), if you don’t get the temporary meta. However, all the achievements remain in the game and if you get them, you get a mini. It’s called a compromise and it’s a pretty good one.

Those who want to keep up can, those who don’t can still do all the achievements. You can find them in the dungeon section.

The problem is, people are not realisitic in their expectations. They think everything can be done now. They think implementing their ideas won’t lead to a sea of complaints from other people. It’s not realistic.

To be sure there are some very good suggestions in these forums. But there are also some terrible ones.

Anet has responded to criticism in the past. I’m not sure why anyone thinks they think they’re somehow above criticism.

I don’t think the GW2 community became this harsh by chance. I think ArenaNet did some serious screwing up to instill such bitterness and mistrust in the community.

Truly, they have only themselves to blame. As the de facto leaders of this community, they set the meaning and tone of the environment. And they’ve kittened off a lot of would-be hardcore fans (and longime GW fans). Probably not intentionally, but I think much of it was also stupid blundering that could have been avoided (how many people came on these forums when Ascended was announced and said “bad idea, don’t do it?”).

I suspect that recently they’re waking up to this, and trying to make amends, and change the toxic wasteland that this community is becoming. Kudos to them for the effort. Of course, they’re stuck with GW2 – any player can walk away at any time.

I wonder if it’s too little, too late. Time will tell. I’m certainly not ready to log back in.

We shall see…

LinkR.6190:

Here’s my rebuttal: http://www.empoweringparents.com/arguing-with-your-opinionated-child.php

It’s all in the delivery. If you can’t make your point in an adult, educated manner, then Anet is more often then not just going to ignore it. Acting like a child and throwing a tantrum when things don’t go your way is no way to win any arguments. The problem here is that a very large portion of the forum community can not produce an intelligent critique without sounding like an entitled child.

You are correct; praise can be just as harmful as a toxic post, but that does not mean that Anet cherry picks all forms of the prior and lumps all critiques into the latter.

Also, Just because your complaint is not directly addressed does NOT and I can’t stress this enough here, NOT mean they are not listening. There are things going on behind the scenes that we have no idea about. They try to keep us in the loop as best as they can, but they can’t inform us about every single meeting they have with their staff over how the game will develop. Such a task would require more manpower then necessary and would only slow down their own process ultimately damaging the game in the long run.

I’ve seen very few posts that don’t have valid criticism.

There have been heated posts by players (who probably in the moment were irritated because they just experienced the situation and are now posting about it), who have had very valid criticism and even suggestions despite the post itself being slightly hostile.

I understand wanting to encourage well behaved posts/criticism, but you shouldn’t just brush off and completely ignore criticism like that.

Unless the post is completely useless and pathetic like “KITTEN YOU ANET KITTEN KITTEN KITTEN R-kitten KITTEN BALANCE ISSUE KITTEN!”, then Mod’s should just warn/infract and edit posts to tone it down instead of just deleting them outright.

TBH, the most useless posts I see in a lot of threads with valid criticism are people who only come to post to instigate a flame war.

Example :

Irritated Player “This is ridiculous, I got an Ascended weapon drop, but the stat/weapon type is completely useless for me and it’s soulbound, are you kidding me Anet? Why can’t we just choose the weapon type, or stat type, or atleast make it account bound? How hard is that???” (Heated, but valid criticism/suggestion)

Derailer “Wow first world problems much? Get over it, you can craft the weapon you want, Anet is teh awesomes.” (Useless post)

Cue the rage post bickering

Better yet :

Ex-Derailer “That would be frustrating, but it’s not that big of a deal, you can always craft the weapon you want. I personally don’t think they should let you choose the weapon type, but maybe the stat type or make it account bound.” (Much better)

You people should have been around in 2006/2007 when Guild Wars 1 was deemed to be rubbish, dead, useless etc. etc. It’s funny to see people here harping on about how good GW1 was and then spewing the same vitriol that I read 6-7 years ago.

And LinkR got the reply spot on. Upvote for you sir.

Knote.2904:

LinkR.6190:

Here’s my rebuttal: http://www.empoweringparents.com/arguing-with-your-opinionated-child.php

It’s all in the delivery. If you can’t make your point in an adult, educated manner, then Anet is more often then not just going to ignore it. Acting like a child and throwing a tantrum when things don’t go your way is no way to win any arguments. The problem here is that a very large portion of the forum community can not produce an intelligent critique without sounding like an entitled child.

You are correct; praise can be just as harmful as a toxic post, but that does not mean that Anet cherry picks all forms of the prior and lumps all critiques into the latter.

Also, Just because your complaint is not directly addressed does NOT and I can’t stress this enough here, NOT mean they are not listening. There are things going on behind the scenes that we have no idea about. They try to keep us in the loop as best as they can, but they can’t inform us about every single meeting they have with their staff over how the game will develop. Such a task would require more manpower then necessary and would only slow down their own process ultimately damaging the game in the long run.

I’ve seen very few posts that don’t have valid criticism.

There have been heated posts by players (who probably in the moment were irritated because they just experienced the situation and are now posting about it), who have had very valid criticism and even suggestions despite the post itself being slightly hostile.

I understand wanting to encourage well behaved posts/criticism, but you shouldn’t just brush off and completely ignore criticism like that.

Unless the post is completely useless and pathetic like “KITTEN YOU ANET KITTEN KITTEN KITTEN R-kitten KITTEN BALANCE ISSUE KITTEN!”, then Mod’s should just warn/infract and edit posts to tone it down instead of just deleting them outright.

TBH, the most useless posts I see in a lot of threads with valid criticism are people who only come to post to instigate a flame war.

Example :

Irritated Player “This is ridiculous, I got an Ascended weapon drop, but the stat/weapon type is completely useless for me and it’s soulbound, are you kidding me Anet? Why can’t we just choose the weapon type, or stat type, or atleast make it account bound? How hard is that???” (Heated, but valid criticism/suggestion)

Derailer “Wow first world problems much? Get over it, you can craft the weapon you want, Anet is teh awesomes.” (Useless post)

Cue the rage post bickering

Better yet :

Ex-Derailer “That would be frustrating, but it’s not that big of a deal, you can always craft the weapon you want. I personally don’t think they should let you choose the weapon type, but maybe the stat type or make it account bound.” (Much better)

By giving a single valid example, doesn’t mean all, or even the bulk of examples are valid.

You should try the profession forums to see some spectacularly bad suggestions.

I’ve also seen suggestions that all server transfers should be free…but when we had free server transfers, the WvW people were completely up in arms.

I’ve seen suggestions the game should be made harder and others that the game should be made easier. Are both suggestions valid?

I’ve seen suggestions that Anet needs to introduce raids, more gear grind and mounts…is all of that valid.

Most suggestions are just opinions…often from people who have never designed a game in their lives. Professional game developers often do things for reasons, such as the overall good of the game, or to make the game sustainable financially. I’m pretty sure the average forum poster is only looking at the game from their point of view. My profession is underpowered, my profession is OP.

All criticism isn’t going to be valid, because different factions of people can’t even agree on basic things.

Let me offer up an example of how to offer constructive criticism. It’s based on a positive attutide system called praise —> correct the issue —> praise again. It starts off being a positive introduction so as to not get them on the wrong foot, evaluates and offers correction to the problem or issue at hand, then praises them again to continue their efforts to correcting the issue.

Destructive criticism, by contrast, is precisely the opposite… and will see the biggest wall of defence put up so that nothing is said that can impact a person’s decision to change something (for better or worse) can get through.

The forums are largely the latter.

Having said this, I’ll provide an example of why Anet needs to listen more attentively to it’s playerbase than what it does. Say there’s an RNG issue or a particular in-game mechanic that needs to be dealt with, when someone on the forums creates a topic and arcs up about it, and the following 9-10 posters all agree that something needs to be done about it, with minimal resistance or fact bias to the counter, then by all means Anet should pay heed and correct it.

However, often is the case that someone is criticised of qq’ing on the forums, and the message of the OP is lost in a wall of confusion by some supporting and others opposing the OP’s viewpoint. This is where Anet gets lost and deems this topic and it’s respective issue to be thrown into the too-hard basket forever more, and the thread is lost in the annals of the forums.

Bringing up an issue on the forums would be more well-received if it were delivered with a constructive criticism method than just open up with a bunch of flaming, either from the OP or the respondants to the thread. This might even actually get a dev to respond directly to the topic at hand.

That’s why I thought when that Anet guy posted a post basically saying if you’re not positive (attitude) with your feedback, we’re not going to look into it, it felt extremely extremely unprofessional. Sure, you’re not obliged to reply to negative feedback but you, as a company, as a professional, should be able to look past the negative aspects and extract the useful information from it and move on. To ignore negative feedback is ignoring feedback completely because you can’t always sugarcoat everything in life. When I get manuscripts back, the comments surely aren’t sweetened up, they dont’ go … oh yea… great job… but u know that one part, you should kinda change it to maybe this…not saying it’s bad and all but… They straight up say, this feels unfinished or irrelevant. Most of the time they even speak their mind about how they felt this piece of work was compiled if it was particularly displeasing. How do I deal with it?, I read through all the feedback critically, make the changes that I agree in accordance to the reviewers suggestions and become a more experienced researcher for it.

Sure some people are kinder than others, I find it hard to give negative feedback to someone directly, even if it is on paper, but not everyone is made like that. Some people have been through this over and over again and they’ve got no more patience left to sugarcoat everything. Obviously, in this scenario, perhaps many players feel they’ve experienced this kind of poor experience from other games and have been just about fed up with it, some people are just plain overreacting. But to simply ask for only constructive feedback just shows how thin your skin is.

sirflamesword.3896:

Out of that whole article THIS is the thing they have to understand the most IMO:
“People who tell you you’re awesome are useless. No, dangerous.
They are worse than useless because you want to believe them. They will defend you against critiques that are valid. They will seduce you into believing you are done learning, or into thinking that your work is better than it actually is. Especially watch out for the ones who tell you that nobody understands your genius.
Honestly, this is going to sound horrible, but self-doubt is one of your most powerful tools for craftsmanship. None of the designers you admire feel self-confident about their work in that way. None of them think that they are awesome. They all suffer from impostor complexes the size of the Titanic.
I am not saying that you need to lack confidence in yourself. (Heck, you’ll never put anything out if that’s the case! You need to have the arrogance to assume anyone will care in the first place). I am saying that nobody is ever done learning, and people who tell you you have arrived will give you a sense of complacency. You should never be complacent about your art.”

Edit: I actually think I’m going to save that article and quote this every time some rabid fanboy freaks out on someone’s good ideas.

This is completely wrong and backwards. If you don’t have people telling you when you’re doing an awesome job, you’ll mess it all up. Look at SWG. Basically, one patch ruined the entire thing. If more people had spoke up and told them they liked things the way they were, SWG might still be alive and kicking today.

I’m sorry, this is so wrong and quite insulting. The people who tell you you’re “awesome” are just as right as the people that say there’s something wrong with the game. This guy defeats himself when he says that everyone who dislikes your game is right. If that is true, then the reverse is equally true.

Lafiel.9372:

That’s why I thought when that Anet guy posted a post basically saying if you’re not positive (attitude) with your feedback, we’re not going to look into it, it felt extremely extremely unprofessional. Sure, you’re not obliged to reply to negative feedback but you, as a company, as a professional, should be able to look past the negative aspects and extract the useful information from it and move on. To ignore negative feedback is ignoring feedback completely because you can’t always sugarcoat everything in life. When I get manuscripts back, the comments surely aren’t sweetened up, they dont’ go … oh yea… great job… but u know that one part, you should kinda change it to maybe this…not saying it’s bad and all but… They straight up say, this feels unfinished or irrelevant. Most of the time they even speak their mind about how they felt this piece of work was compiled if it was particularly displeasing. How do I deal with it?, I read through all the feedback critically, make the changes that I agree in accordance to the reviewers suggestions and become a more experienced researcher for it.

Sure some people are kinder than others, I find it hard to give negative feedback to someone directly, even if it is on paper, but not everyone is made like that. Some people have been through this over and over again and they’ve got no more patience left to sugarcoat everything. Obviously, in this scenario, perhaps many players feel they’ve experienced this kind of poor experience from other games and have been just about fed up with it, some people are just plain overreacting. But to simply ask for only constructive feedback just shows how thin your skin is.

He didn’t say if you’re not positive with your feedback we won’t look into it. He said that if you’re abusive with your feedback we’re not going to be less likely to pay attention to you, which is pretty much common sense.

I used to run a business. One customer comes in nice and friendly, asks me if I can get to his computer soon because he uses it for work. Another person comes in and rudely suggests that we shouldn’t be lazy and we should fix his machine ASAP. Which of those machines do you think will get fixed first.

He wasn’t saying don’t offer valid criticism. He was saying don’t be rude and obnoxious. There’s a big, big difference.

Vayne.8563:

By giving a single valid example, doesn’t mean all, or even the bulk of examples are valid.

You should try the profession forums to see some spectacularly bad suggestions.

I’ve also seen suggestions that all server transfers should be free…but when we had free server transfers, the WvW people were completely up in arms.

I’ve seen suggestions the game should be made harder and others that the game should be made easier. Are both suggestions valid?

I’ve seen suggestions that Anet needs to introduce raids, more gear grind and mounts…is all of that valid.

Most suggestions are just opinions…often from people who have never designed a game in their lives. Professional game developers often do things for reasons, such as the overall good of the game, or to make the game sustainable financially. I’m pretty sure the average forum poster is only looking at the game from their point of view. My profession is underpowered, my profession is OP.

All criticism isn’t going to be valid, because different factions of people can’t even agree on basic things.

Of course it’s valid, it doesn’t mean the suggestion is good, or should be used. I’m sure Anet Devs are competent enough to figure that out, but that doesn’t mean Anet should stop looking at suggestions just because there’s bad ones out there.

Even if a person who doesn’t see the whole picture and has a terrible/biased/greedy suggestion about something can still be useful.

I could make ridiculous overpowered suggestions to buff Flamethrower for Engineers, but that still can show whoever reads it that perhaps Flamethrowers need some love (which they do =p), and make their own changes that fix the problem, or even be inspired by suggestions by a poster.

Someone could also make a ridiculous overpowered suggestion for something that’s already balanced, or even already overpowered, someone who knows what they’re doing will be able to see it’s a bad suggestion and just dismiss it.

So yes, all suggestions/critique are valid.

A new player to the game could come in and complain about how boring the first 20 minutes of the game is. You could argue they haven’t played enough to give it a fair enough judgement, that’s true, but a good dev would still take that players criticism as valuable criticism. First impressions are very important for games, and if there is an issue or lack of interest in the start of the game, even if it’s a small issue, it’s something that can be improved.

That’s not to say, you should turn the game into WoW for a new player who happens to be a huge WoW player that’s complaining about the game, but even that is useful information.

On topic of raids/mounts, I don’t agree with the suggestions (which are basically, implement the exact same thing as other MMO’s), but personally gw2 could easily have it’s own versions of these things.

Mounts = Could just be a bundle item that gives you unique abilities like swiftness, or leaps, or other fun ways to get around (floating/gliding, ice skating movement, double jump etc). And it would also have a “mount” sprite obviously, like say a Jetpack “mount” or even the Halloween Broomstick “mount”. These would be useable only in PvE obviously. But there’s a balanced GW2 spin on mounts.

What would the suggestions for these things show Anet? Demand for said features, and Anet could create their own versions of these sort of things looking at why they are wanted, if they feel it would be beneficial.

What would “mount bundles/mounts” give players? And why do they want it? More cosmetic options/collectibles, as well as normalized movement across classes, such as Mesmers being less mobile for PvE (nothing unbalanced about normalizing it in PvE only). In turn, Anet gets more gem sales for implementing said feature.

Raiding could also have it’s own spin, just a combination of the revamped World Bosses (Tequatl) and Guild Missions, there is no gear treadmill, it wouldn’t be giving any exclusive gear or anything, so why would there be resistance? Aside from it being guild exclusive?

Again, just because a suggestion is bad doesn’t make it useless for Anet.

Valandil Dragonhart.2371:

Let me offer up an example of how to offer constructive criticism. It’s based on a positive attutide system called praise —> correct the issue --> praise again. It starts off being a positive introduction so as to not get them on the wrong foot, evaluates and offers correction to the problem or issue at hand, then praises them again to continue their efforts to correcting the issue.

Destructive criticism, by contrast, is precisely the opposite… and will see the biggest wall of defence put up so that nothing is said that can impact a person’s decision to change something (for better or worse) can get through.

The forums are largely the latter.

Having said this, I’ll provide an example of why Anet needs to listen more attentively to it’s playerbase than what it does. Say there’s an RNG issue or a particular in-game mechanic that needs to be dealt with, when someone on the forums creates a topic and arcs up about it, and the following 9-10 posters all agree that something needs to be done about it, with minimal resistance or fact bias to the counter, then by all means Anet should pay heed and correct it.

However, often is the case that someone is criticised of qq’ing on the forums, and the message of the OP is lost in a wall of confusion by some supporting and others opposing the OP’s viewpoint. This is where Anet gets lost and deems this topic and it’s respective issue to be thrown into the too-hard basket forever more, and the thread is lost in the annals of the forums.

Bringing up an issue on the forums would be more well-received if it were delivered with a constructive criticism method than just open up with a bunch of flaming, either from the OP or the respondants to the thread. This might even actually get a dev to respond directly to the topic at hand.

This exactly, this is what I’m talking about.

Both parties are guilty of this, arguable the complainers even less so.

Threads get derailed so often because of this.

Vayne.8563:

Lafiel.9372:

That’s why I thought when that Anet guy posted a post basically saying if you’re not positive (attitude) with your feedback, we’re not going to look into it, it felt extremely extremely unprofessional. Sure, you’re not obliged to reply to negative feedback but you, as a company, as a professional, should be able to look past the negative aspects and extract the useful information from it and move on. To ignore negative feedback is ignoring feedback completely because you can’t always sugarcoat everything in life. When I get manuscripts back, the comments surely aren’t sweetened up, they dont’ go … oh yea… great job… but u know that one part, you should kinda change it to maybe this…not saying it’s bad and all but… They straight up say, this feels unfinished or irrelevant. Most of the time they even speak their mind about how they felt this piece of work was compiled if it was particularly displeasing. How do I deal with it?, I read through all the feedback critically, make the changes that I agree in accordance to the reviewers suggestions and become a more experienced researcher for it.

Sure some people are kinder than others, I find it hard to give negative feedback to someone directly, even if it is on paper, but not everyone is made like that. Some people have been through this over and over again and they’ve got no more patience left to sugarcoat everything. Obviously, in this scenario, perhaps many players feel they’ve experienced this kind of poor experience from other games and have been just about fed up with it, some people are just plain overreacting. But to simply ask for only constructive feedback just shows how thin your skin is.

He didn’t say if you’re not positive with your feedback we won’t look into it. He said that if you’re abusive with your feedback we’re not going to be less likely to pay attention to you, which is pretty much common sense.

I used to run a business. One customer comes in nice and friendly, asks me if I can get to his computer soon because he uses it for work. Another person comes in and rudely suggests that we shouldn’t be lazy and we should fix his machine ASAP. Which of those machines do you think will get fixed first.

He wasn’t saying don’t offer valid criticism. He was saying don’t be rude and obnoxious. There’s a big, big difference.

I quote “we pay little, to no, attention to posts that are disrespectful to other members of our community or our development team”. That doesn’t sound anything like they’re less likely to pay attention to you. That sounds more like if you don’t sugarcoat your feedback, we will “pay little to no attention to” that post.

Also, in your business, if you fixed the other guy who asked nicely over another who was in front on his queue (if he was), then that is pretty bad business practice lol.

Lafiel.9372:

That’s why I thought when that Anet guy posted a post basically saying if you’re not positive (attitude) with your feedback, we’re not going to look into it, it felt extremely extremely unprofessional. Sure, you’re not obliged to reply to negative feedback but you, as a company, as a professional, should be able to look past the negative aspects and extract the useful information from it and move on. To ignore negative feedback is ignoring feedback completely because you can’t always sugarcoat everything in life. When I get manuscripts back, the comments surely aren’t sweetened up, they dont’ go … oh yea… great job… but u know that one part, you should kinda change it to maybe this…not saying it’s bad and all but… They straight up say, this feels unfinished or irrelevant. Most of the time they even speak their mind about how they felt this piece of work was compiled if it was particularly displeasing. How do I deal with it?, I read through all the feedback critically, make the changes that I agree in accordance to the reviewers suggestions and become a more experienced researcher for it.

Sure some people are kinder than others, I find it hard to give negative feedback to someone directly, even if it is on paper, but not everyone is made like that. Some people have been through this over and over again and they’ve got no more patience left to sugarcoat everything. Obviously, in this scenario, perhaps many players feel they’ve experienced this kind of poor experience from other games and have been just about fed up with it, some people are just plain overreacting. But to simply ask for only constructive feedback just shows how thin your skin is.

Sugarcoating has nothing to do with it.

There’s one person that basically keeps making exactly the same post every time he replies to something. The words change a bit, but the meaning is always “your game sucks and you suck”. That’s not feedback, and it’s not criticism.

You don’t have to kiss anyone’s butt, you just need to post something usable.

AntiGw.9367:

Lafiel.9372:

That’s why I thought when that Anet guy posted a post basically saying if you’re not positive (attitude) with your feedback, we’re not going to look into it, it felt extremely extremely unprofessional. Sure, you’re not obliged to reply to negative feedback but you, as a company, as a professional, should be able to look past the negative aspects and extract the useful information from it and move on. To ignore negative feedback is ignoring feedback completely because you can’t always sugarcoat everything in life. When I get manuscripts back, the comments surely aren’t sweetened up, they dont’ go … oh yea… great job… but u know that one part, you should kinda change it to maybe this…not saying it’s bad and all but… They straight up say, this feels unfinished or irrelevant. Most of the time they even speak their mind about how they felt this piece of work was compiled if it was particularly displeasing. How do I deal with it?, I read through all the feedback critically, make the changes that I agree in accordance to the reviewers suggestions and become a more experienced researcher for it.

Sure some people are kinder than others, I find it hard to give negative feedback to someone directly, even if it is on paper, but not everyone is made like that. Some people have been through this over and over again and they’ve got no more patience left to sugarcoat everything. Obviously, in this scenario, perhaps many players feel they’ve experienced this kind of poor experience from other games and have been just about fed up with it, some people are just plain overreacting. But to simply ask for only constructive feedback just shows how thin your skin is.

Sugarcoating has nothing to do with it.

There’s one person that basically keeps making exactly the same post every time he replies to something. The words change a bit, but the meaning is always “your game sucks and you suck”. That’s not feedback, and it’s not criticism.

You don’t have to kiss anyone’s butt, you just need to post something usable.

I don’t know about that but a lot of the time people express their reasons at the same time as writing their abusive post. However abusive it may be, the reasons should be considered professionally without being thrown into the trash because they were not written constructively. Like I said, some people just don’t have patience left. Ever been jerked around by customer support so much that you just get reallllly realllly kitten ed off? Try ringing your internet service provider? “yes sir, we have put that order in for you, a technician is scheduled to come to your place in the next 2-3 days”, ring back 4 days later, new guy says, there is no such order placed under your account. Ha ha ha…

You get what i’m saying? I don’t promote abusive feedback, I’m just saying, don’t ignore it, don’t fight it, extract what’s useful and move on.

The thing about the devs you have to understand, is that they’re human beings. Show a little empathy. Sugar coating things might feel like an unnecessary hoop to jump through, but put yourself in their shoes. How would you feel if somebody walked up to you and critiqued something you created? If its productive and positive, your reaction is going to be different than if its rude and condescending. This isn’t rocket science, people.

Lafiel.9372:

I don’t know about that but a lot of the time people express their reasons at the same time as writing their abusive post. However abusive it may be, the reasons should be considered professionally without being thrown into the trash because they were not written constructively. Like I said, some people just don’t have patience left. Ever been jerked around by customer support so much that you just get reallllly realllly kitten ed off? Try ringing your internet service provider? “yes sir, we have put that order in for you, a technician is scheduled to come to your place in the next 2-3 days”, ring back 4 days later, new guy says, there is no such order placed under your account. Ha ha ha…

You get what i’m saying? I don’t promote abusive feedback, I’m just saying, don’t ignore it, don’t fight it, extract what’s useful and move on.

Why would anyone spend time extracting stuff from rants, when there are plenty of perfectly well-written posts to read? Time is a limited commodity.

Tagus Eleuthera.7305:

The thing about the devs you have to understand, is that they’re human beings. Show a little empathy. Sugar coating things might feel like an unnecessary hoop to jump through, but put yourself in their shoes. How would you feel if somebody walked up to you and critiqued something you created? If its productive and positive, your reaction is going to be different than if its rude and condescending. This isn’t rocket science, people.

Yes, we get that.

I definately get that, I always utilize empathy with 99% of my posts to the devs. But that goes both ways. Devs should be able to understand why a player is frustrated and why they’re lashing out, which is something Riot devs used to describe a lot.

“We understand our players frustrations, and we feel the same about said issue, and it shows how passionate our players are about our game.” I’ve seen Riot devs say something like that quite a few times in the past, they get it.

Anet has shown this too of course, I’m not accusing anyone of anything here, just posting it as an example.

Maybe I’m different, but when I receive criticism for something I care about improving, I don’t want BS, I want honesty and can take criticism. Then again I’m the kind of person that used to actually ENJOY dealing with angry customers as customer service lol.

AntiGw.9367:

Lafiel.9372:

I don’t know about that but a lot of the time people express their reasons at the same time as writing their abusive post. However abusive it may be, the reasons should be considered professionally without being thrown into the trash because they were not written constructively. Like I said, some people just don’t have patience left. Ever been jerked around by customer support so much that you just get reallllly realllly kitten ed off? Try ringing your internet service provider? “yes sir, we have put that order in for you, a technician is scheduled to come to your place in the next 2-3 days”, ring back 4 days later, new guy says, there is no such order placed under your account. Ha ha ha…

You get what i’m saying? I don’t promote abusive feedback, I’m just saying, don’t ignore it, don’t fight it, extract what’s useful and move on.

Why would anyone spend time extracting stuff from rants, when there are plenty of perfectly well-written posts to read? Time is a limited commodity.

By saying that, you’re being selective with your feedback. If you select only good specimens out of a random sample size, then it’s not going to be very valid is it? Also, there could be extremely good reasoning beneath the fury of a poster (since there was obviously enough reason for him to be so angry about it in the first place). To shake them off as the angry spoiled child is not professional at all. All feedback should be considered critically and fairly.

Personally, when I receive feedback on anything, sure i’m happy when it’s all rainbows and praises, but what i’m really interested in is the flaws! If someone went so far as to be angry about my work, then I really want to understand what caused such fury. Is it something reasonable? is so, how can I rectify it. By ignoring that feedback because it was abusive, you’re losing out on KEY information that could have made your game better.

AntiGw.9367:

Sugarcoating has nothing to do with it.

There’s one person that basically keeps making exactly the same post every time he replies to something. The words change a bit, but the meaning is always “your game sucks and you suck”. That’s not feedback, and it’s not criticism.

You don’t have to kiss anyone’s butt, you just need to post something usable.

just few facts look at my signature…

Anet has a long story of political and damage control posts that were followed by action doing the exact opposite they stated in few days.

Its quite understandable people is upset….

I bet they won t change almost anything in their ascended plan…..despite this last days feedback was clear.

If we will see in a near patch, craftable ascended armor handled in a similar way to ascended weapons will be clear Anet once again doesn t care, and last posts have a different purpose like damage control or similar.

AntiGw.9367:

Lafiel.9372:

I don’t know about that but a lot of the time people express their reasons at the same time as writing their abusive post. However abusive it may be, the reasons should be considered professionally without being thrown into the trash because they were not written constructively. Like I said, some people just don’t have patience left. Ever been jerked around by customer support so much that you just get reallllly realllly kitten ed off? Try ringing your internet service provider? “yes sir, we have put that order in for you, a technician is scheduled to come to your place in the next 2-3 days”, ring back 4 days later, new guy says, there is no such order placed under your account. Ha ha ha…

You get what i’m saying? I don’t promote abusive feedback, I’m just saying, don’t ignore it, don’t fight it, extract what’s useful and move on.

Why would anyone spend time extracting stuff from rants, when there are plenty of perfectly well-written posts to read? Time is a limited commodity.

If the rants had good criticism/suggestions, and the perfectly well-written posts had terrible criticism/suggestions, then that would be bad for the game. It’s pretty much a lose/lose situation for everyone really, everyone is guilty in that case.

Lafiel.9372:

Vayne.8563:

Lafiel.9372:

That’s why I thought when that Anet guy posted a post basically saying if you’re not positive (attitude) with your feedback, we’re not going to look into it, it felt extremely extremely unprofessional. Sure, you’re not obliged to reply to negative feedback but you, as a company, as a professional, should be able to look past the negative aspects and extract the useful information from it and move on. To ignore negative feedback is ignoring feedback completely because you can’t always sugarcoat everything in life. When I get manuscripts back, the comments surely aren’t sweetened up, they dont’ go … oh yea… great job… but u know that one part, you should kinda change it to maybe this…not saying it’s bad and all but… They straight up say, this feels unfinished or irrelevant. Most of the time they even speak their mind about how they felt this piece of work was compiled if it was particularly displeasing. How do I deal with it?, I read through all the feedback critically, make the changes that I agree in accordance to the reviewers suggestions and become a more experienced researcher for it.

Sure some people are kinder than others, I find it hard to give negative feedback to someone directly, even if it is on paper, but not everyone is made like that. Some people have been through this over and over again and they’ve got no more patience left to sugarcoat everything. Obviously, in this scenario, perhaps many players feel they’ve experienced this kind of poor experience from other games and have been just about fed up with it, some people are just plain overreacting. But to simply ask for only constructive feedback just shows how thin your skin is.

He didn’t say if you’re not positive with your feedback we won’t look into it. He said that if you’re abusive with your feedback we’re not going to be less likely to pay attention to you, which is pretty much common sense.

I used to run a business. One customer comes in nice and friendly, asks me if I can get to his computer soon because he uses it for work. Another person comes in and rudely suggests that we shouldn’t be lazy and we should fix his machine ASAP. Which of those machines do you think will get fixed first.

He wasn’t saying don’t offer valid criticism. He was saying don’t be rude and obnoxious. There’s a big, big difference.

I quote “we pay little, to no, attention to posts that are disrespectful to other members of our community or our development team”. That doesn’t sound anything like they’re less likely to pay attention to you. That sounds more like if you don’t sugarcoat your feedback, we will “pay little to no attention to” that post.

Also, in your business, if you fixed the other guy who asked nicely over another who was in front on his queue (if he was), then that is pretty bad business practice lol.

Right…key word…disrepectful.

So calling Anet liars…that’s disrespectful. Saying that a mistake has been made (as I said about the Karma nerf) isn’t disrespectful.

It’s one thing to be personal and insulting and another to critique the game. I’m not sure some people know the difference.

Lafiel.9372:

AntiGw.9367:

Lafiel.9372:

I don’t know about that but a lot of the time people express their reasons at the same time as writing their abusive post. However abusive it may be, the reasons should be considered professionally without being thrown into the trash because they were not written constructively. Like I said, some people just don’t have patience left. Ever been jerked around by customer support so much that you just get reallllly realllly kitten ed off? Try ringing your internet service provider? “yes sir, we have put that order in for you, a technician is scheduled to come to your place in the next 2-3 days”, ring back 4 days later, new guy says, there is no such order placed under your account. Ha ha ha…

You get what i’m saying? I don’t promote abusive feedback, I’m just saying, don’t ignore it, don’t fight it, extract what’s useful and move on.

Why would anyone spend time extracting stuff from rants, when there are plenty of perfectly well-written posts to read? Time is a limited commodity.

By saying that, you’re being selective with your feedback. If you select only good specimens out of a random sample size, then it’s not going to be very valid is it? Also, there could be extremely good reasoning beneath the fury of a poster (since there was obviously enough reason for him to be so angry about it in the first place). To shake them off as the angry spoiled child is not professional at all. All feedback should be considered critically and fairly.

Personally, when I receive feedback on anything, sure i’m happy when it’s all rainbows and praises, but what i’m really interested in is the flaws! If someone went so far as to be angry about my work, then I really want to understand what caused such fury. Is it something reasonable? is so, how can I rectify it. By ignoring that feedback because it was abusive, you’re losing out on KEY information that could have made your game better.

You misunderstood what Chris Whiteside said they pay little attention to. There’s a big difference between a post that is simply angry, and a rant.

There’s rarely anything of value in rants, and you are never missing any KEY information that can’t be found simultaneously in a nearby well-written post. Simply put, if there’s a legitimate problem, someone will spend time to make a decent post about it.

AntiGw.9367:

Lafiel.9372:

AntiGw.9367:

Lafiel.9372:

I don’t know about that but a lot of the time people express their reasons at the same time as writing their abusive post. However abusive it may be, the reasons should be considered professionally without being thrown into the trash because they were not written constructively. Like I said, some people just don’t have patience left. Ever been jerked around by customer support so much that you just get reallllly realllly kitten ed off? Try ringing your internet service provider? “yes sir, we have put that order in for you, a technician is scheduled to come to your place in the next 2-3 days”, ring back 4 days later, new guy says, there is no such order placed under your account. Ha ha ha…

You get what i’m saying? I don’t promote abusive feedback, I’m just saying, don’t ignore it, don’t fight it, extract what’s useful and move on.

Why would anyone spend time extracting stuff from rants, when there are plenty of perfectly well-written posts to read? Time is a limited commodity.

By saying that, you’re being selective with your feedback. If you select only good specimens out of a random sample size, then it’s not going to be very valid is it? Also, there could be extremely good reasoning beneath the fury of a poster (since there was obviously enough reason for him to be so angry about it in the first place). To shake them off as the angry spoiled child is not professional at all. All feedback should be considered critically and fairly.

Personally, when I receive feedback on anything, sure i’m happy when it’s all rainbows and praises, but what i’m really interested in is the flaws! If someone went so far as to be angry about my work, then I really want to understand what caused such fury. Is it something reasonable? is so, how can I rectify it. By ignoring that feedback because it was abusive, you’re losing out on KEY information that could have made your game better.

You misunderstood what Chris Whiteside said they pay little attention to. There’s a big difference between a post that is simply angry, and a rant.

There’s rarely anything of value in rants, and you are never missing any KEY information that can’t be found simultaneously in a nearby well-written post. Simply put, if there’s a legitimate problem, someone will spend time to make a decent post about it.

Both of you are making the assumption that abusive, disrespectful post have nothing to learn from.

Lafiel.9372:

Both of you are making the assumption that abusive, disrespectful post have nothing to learn from.

Nobody is making that assumption.

The point is that well-written posts have more to learn from, and are more worth reading most of the time. Rants are written to vent frustration, not to open a dialogue that you can learn from.

Vayne,

In all honesty and with all due respect, the reason you get pushback from other players is because you try to make ArenaNet out to be the “White Knight” so to speak.

They are not terrible, far from it actually. They do try and collaborate with players as much as possible, hence the “Collaborative Development” movment currently happening. They are actually spending money on this, which I see as a really good thing, because money that I put into the game, is coming back around to benefit us, the players.

But they are not perfect, noone is. They make mistakes, we make mistakes, blog writers make mistakes, everyone does.

The issue I’ve seen in regards to ArenaNet and why some players get frustrated or even angry, is sometimes you can read into a remark, and it appears personal to them. Understandable as well, since they probably put in a lot of hard work and lack of sleep into their project, only to get smeared by players not satisified.

It’s a fine line, and a hard line to stay on for both sides, players and “developer”.

In order to make this game the best that it can be, I believe both sides have to work together and leave personal feelings out of the situation. Negative feedback should be to help the overall game, not hurt it.

If one person can take good out of this, than it’s a good day.

This is such garbage it’s awesome. “Say something with confidence and people will eat it up; no matter how stupid”.

The advice is … always assume the bad things people say are right and the good things they say are wrong? You’d have alotta empty art museums – and some really tiny book stores – if that’s the way it worked.

What ya do is listen to everyone’s opinions – ignore the people what can’t offer anything without being abusive, because their opinions are almost never constructive and when they are you can bet someone else is saying it better – and take a long hard look at your art with alla that in mind.

“More people are sayin’ this is good than are saying it’s bad.”
“More people are sayin’ this is bad than are saying it’s good.”

Now let’s see what we can do about that.

Anet’s problem ain’t that they never listen; it’s that every time they have listened and changed stuff it’s caused more anger than not.

“We want some kind of grind!” Enter endless dungeon – people scream that it’s an endless grind.

“We want another tear ah weapons!” Enter new tear of weapons – people scream the sky is falling and Anet has burned the manifesto.

The only way Anet is gonna do anything right is by taking all that criticism, and alla that praise, and weighing it out – seeing what is working best and what isn’t. Ain’t no way they’ll make everyone happy no how – so they gotta try to make the most people happy with each new thing. Listening only to the complaints isn’t gonna make that happen.

Jack of Tears.9458:

This is such garbage it’s awesome. “Say something with confidence and people will eat it up; no matter how stupid”.

The advice is … always assume the bad things people say are right and the good things they say are wrong? You’d have alotta empty art museums – and some really tiny book stores – if that’s the way it worked.

What ya do is listen to everyone’s opinions – ignore the people what can’t offer anything without being abusive, because their opinions are almost never constructive and when they are you can bet someone else is saying it better – and take a long hard look at your art with alla that in mind.

“More people are sayin’ this is good than are saying it’s bad.”
“More people are sayin’ this is bad than are saying it’s good.”

Now let’s see what we can do about that.

Anet’s problem ain’t that they never listen; it’s that every time they have listened and changed stuff it’s caused more anger than not.

“We want some kind of grind!” Enter endless dungeon – people scream that it’s an endless grind.

“We want another tear ah weapons!” Enter new tear of weapons – people scream the sky is falling and Anet has burned the manifesto.

The only way Anet is gonna do anything right is by taking all that criticism, and alla that praise, and weighing it out – seeing what is working best and what isn’t. Ain’t no way they’ll make everyone happy no how – so they gotta try to make the most people happy with each new thing. Listening only to the complaints isn’t gonna make that happen.

That’s why they say “We only take the forums with a grain of salt”.

The forums will never be perfect, between age differences, lifestyles, influences, personal preferences, the type of feedback stretches across the world.

I do hope they can push to be more transparrent in their projects though. Good to know some of the plans, even if they are not set in stone.

And please, fix my Ghastly Longbow !!

AntiGw.9367:

Lafiel.9372:

Both of you are making the assumption that abusive, disrespectful post have nothing to learn from.

Nobody is making that assumption.

Hell with that, I’ll come right out an’ say it. There’s nothing to learn from abusive, disrespectful posts other than the writer is abusive and disrespectful. A person with a valid complaint doesn’t need ta be either one. All that kind of anger does is try to hide the fact that the poster is scared and insecure and is pretty darned sure they don’t know what they’re talking about … so they’ll dress it up in dirty clothing to make it intimidating instead.

Jack of Tears.9458:

AntiGw.9367:

Lafiel.9372:

Both of you are making the assumption that abusive, disrespectful post have nothing to learn from.

Nobody is making that assumption.

Hell with that, I’ll come right out an’ say it. There’s nothing to learn from abusive, disrespectful posts other than the writer is abusive and disrespectful. A person with a valid complaint doesn’t need ta be either one. All that kind of anger does is try to hide the fact that the poster is scared and insecure and is pretty darned sure they don’t know what they’re talking about … so they’ll dress it up in dirty clothing to make it intimidating instead.

Please don’t derail this post. I respect your opinion but the above post may start a trainwreck.

Vayne.8563:

Relentliss.2170:

Vayne.8563:

I don’t think Anet is sitting there preening their feathers thinking about how great they are. I think Anet is scared to say stuff because the community is so rabid. Which is very different than someone who doesn’t listen to criticism.

When you burn away all the good will you built up from your previous game in record time and blatantly lie about the game, I guess you should expect criticism.

When the fanbase can’t see the difference between a lie and a change of direction based on observation and necessity, the fanbase is rabid.

Some of us understand why certain changes were made, whether we like it or not.

When you sell a game as having horizontal progression, like its prdecessor, and don’t have any. Then switch to vertical. Yeah I call that lying.

When you say this game is going to be an esport and you ship with it missing 90% of the features to make it so. Yeah I call that lying.

When you say you are going to make all types of play rewarding but you have crap rewards in WvW and filter people into fractals. Yeah I call that lying.

When you make a game that has none of the soul or sophistication of its predecessors. Yeah I call that dodgy.

I could go on, but Yes-men like you are the ones who have let Anet ruin this game by giving them poor feedback.

Jack of Tears.9458:

This is such garbage it’s awesome. “Say something with confidence and people will eat it up; no matter how stupid”.

The advice is … always assume the bad things people say are right and the good things they say are wrong? You’d have alotta empty art museums – and some really tiny book stores – if that’s the way it worked.

What ya do is listen to everyone’s opinions – ignore the people what can’t offer anything without being abusive, because their opinions are almost never constructive and when they are you can bet someone else is saying it better – and take a long hard look at your art with alla that in mind.

“More people are sayin’ this is good than are saying it’s bad.”
“More people are sayin’ this is bad than are saying it’s good.”

Now let’s see what we can do about that.

Anet’s problem ain’t that they never listen; it’s that every time they have listened and changed stuff it’s caused more anger than not.

“We want some kind of grind!” Enter endless dungeon – people scream that it’s an endless grind.

“We want another tear ah weapons!” Enter new tear of weapons – people scream the sky is falling and Anet has burned the manifesto.

The only way Anet is gonna do anything right is by taking all that criticism, and alla that praise, and weighing it out – seeing what is working best and what isn’t. Ain’t no way they’ll make everyone happy no how – so they gotta try to make the most people happy with each new thing. Listening only to the complaints isn’t gonna make that happen.

I echo this sentiment completely. No way they can appease everyone, they can only improvise gradually as best as they can without breaking the entire game and trying to keep the general gaming populace happy or relatively content.

The forums are often times a horrible place to come to. I’m not a part of the dev team and I can feel the serious burn that comes from the many cynics that come and post their core hatred for the company, for even the most trivial of reasons. Imagine what it’s like if you’re a part of that team.

And don’t use the pretext of “But I’ve paid my $60, so I’m an entitled customer” because chances are, you’ve played this game, enjoyed every bit of the very best a modern MMORPG has to offer and then some. I appreciate the fact that there’s plenty of forum feedback which shows that the player base truly does care about where GW2 will be headed to, but at the same time, there’s so much unnecessary and incessant whining too.

A gaming company of this age, and capable of producing games of AAA grade in one of the most challenging genres (MMO’s) in gaming, would you not think they’d consistently evaluate feedback, criticism and opinions from the very players that drive their game forward? What’s more, they would have to, at the same time, assess* what is relevant, what is not; what could drive it forward and what could ruin it; what could please the community and what would have them suddenly take up arms in anger and also allocate manpower and resources to expand the game with LS, hot-fixes and constant maintenance to keep the game performing at it’s optimal level.

Put yourself in their shoes for a moment, know that it is anything but easy. Realize that what we’ve been given, is a splendid game that ranks among the very best in MMO gaming today. And I am thankful for that. Met lots of really nice people and having a great time everytime I log in.

Don’t slack off though ANet! We’re still looking forward to more from you guys.

Edit: Without the asterisk, there’s a censor for the word assess*

I’m losing faith in this company after they said precursor crafting probably STILL won’t happen by the end of this year, and instead they’re probably adding ascended armor.

So something people have been asking for, for +7 and ongoing months is taking a backseat to something nobody asked for.

There’s no explanation for that. It’s incompetence and they don’t listen to the players.

AntiGw.9367:

Lafiel.9372:

Both of you are making the assumption that abusive, disrespectful post have nothing to learn from.

Nobody is making that assumption.

The point is that well-written posts have more to learn from, and are more worth reading most of the time. Rants are written to vent frustration, not to open a dialogue that you can learn from.

Again, you’re making the assumption that only well written respectful post have the most to learn from and the disrespectful post which are “rants written to vent frustration” have nothing to learn from? I used the word nothing because it’s either you agree that there is nothing and stand by this point thus making all disrespectful post useless in your eyes, or you agree there is something to learn from them but you see them as mostly useless because they’re hard to swallow.

Pick one or the other, because the latter means there is something to learn from but Anet isn’t professional enough to handle severe negative feedback thus coming back to the sugarcoating point.

In my eyes, you can learn something from everything. Even in the most vulgar and disrespectful post, there is always a reason tied to it. No one really vents frustration without any sort of explanation. There is almost always a reason. e.g. kitten kitten kitten, why is this game such a grind fest, kitten kitten kitten. No one just says, kitten kitten kitten and leave it at that.

Do you believe that everyone who sees a problem understands what the problem is? If not do you believe that the ones that are vulgar and toxic have an equal (or better) understanding than those who cooled off before posting?

Being extremely angry is informative, yes. You learned that they are extremely angry. That is useful information but hardly informative if that is all the person posts (you probably don’t need a constant update on the person’s anger).

PS: I think Anet stated their point rather poorly, probably because they too are frustrated.