History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: bewhatever.2390

bewhatever.2390

Over the last 12 years, our tight 4 person guild has played 7 different MMOs.

In three of them, well intentioned and seemingly incremental changes by the live team in fact took away what most players had come to the game for and enjoyed most. While it took a year to play out, in each of those three cases the number of people paying to play the game declined significantly after those changes.

In each of those three cases, beta testers strongly recommeded that an expansion or patch they were testing be scrapped rather than be released. In each of those three cases I believe the company which owned the game would have been more profitable scrapping the expansion or patch, rather than dealing with the attrition (reduced revenue) it caused.

Since understanding your customers, and knowing how they will respond to a change, is a business basic, I am struggling to understand what breakdown is occurring in the management chains of game after game causing this alienation of players. I’d like to offer two hypotheses, and am genuinely interested in feedback as to which is more likely:

1. After release, the bean counters don’t understand that the game is focused on a subset of players, and while it’s financially interesting to know how many boxes sold, half of the players are guaranteed to attrit because they just bought the box to explore a game that doesn’t fit them. So when half the people who bought the game attrit after a few weeks, the bean counters panic, collect data on why people left, and tell the live team to change the game so it would have kept them. This would give us RIFT, which was about open world events that were hard and characters that were hard to spec — and was sold as an anti-WoW — suddenly nerfing the open world events and following WoW into trivializing character creation/speccing.

2. Until release, the game is in the hands of a lead developer who has in their head the target customers of the game and a set of principles — the contract with the players, as it were — and in a hands on way imposes that on the entire development process. At release the game is handed to a live team which, not having had enough contact with the original lead dev (or worse thinking he acted out of ego) have not internalized who the customers are that must be retained, and what principles must never be violated if those customers’ trust is to be maintained. External forces (those bean counters again) make suggestions to the live team, which makes intuitive changes to the very complex system of the game. For example, when DAoC was handed off to Mackey to develop the Trials of Atlantis expansion, Mackey did not understand that the gear based stat inflation he was putting in the game would break the ability of players to RvR for about 6 months, taking away the thing people loved about DAoC.

In recent days I have seen the GW2 live team attempt to introduce a feature which was likely well intentioned, to give big guilds something to do together and strive for. In the process, I’ve seen the unintended consequence where the social fabric of small guilds is now at risk of being torn apart the way the exclusive raid endgame of WoW tended to destroy guilds whose members wanted to raid. Yes, social fabrics which keep people in the game and make this home are being destroyed, as a side effect of an attempt to do something good.

Because the process broke down, or GW2 is too big to fit in someone’s head any more, or because the live team doesn’t have the level of ability the original dev team did. Oh, and this is about the fourth release in a row where this has happened in one way or another.

So:

Any guesses on my hypotheses?

and

Is ArenaNet better off with developers on the live team, or redirecting those resources elsewhere and not doing further damage to the game and its player community?

My vote is stop doing development until this is fixed.

Oh, and 25 years ago I took some training called “QFD” (the word by word translation from Japanese is Quality Function Deployment), from the auto industry. I highly recommend it.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: tigirius.9014

tigirius.9014

I think you’ve hit a nail on the head however it’s not just the new guild system that’s the problem. I too come from a background of multiple mmo’s and have watched the team on this title one by one ignore the basics of mmo history as-it-were.

Each update, each control mechanism introduced has already been tried and has already been shown to fail miserably. Some of the items they’ve introduced have even shut down whole companies because these companies were new, made a game, and decided to artificially restrict the loot and currency (DR). They too publically broadcasted that this was to prevent Gold Farmers from affecting the economy and I watched these games slowly die off and close shop because the Devs didn’t listen to the community and realize that it was them not the gold farmers that were destroying their in game economy thus killing the fun for many players and making them leave the game en masse. Most recently it happened in D3 however Blizzard caught it just in time and made the appropriate changes to keep the remaining players.

This is only one example of the problems with this game due to mismanagement of resources and restrictions.

The list of problems I’ve seen so far are:

  1. live team disregarding original manifesto and ignoring the quicker easier cheaper content infusion engine we heard about years prior to launch, the DE meta system.
  2. lack of proper quality control, ie no PTR to properly test bugs prior to patch launch
  3. serious lack of UI elements most mmo gamers find easily in just about every other mmo of any design or profit model (ie LFG tool[necessary now with their new dungeon focus], “last online” in guild roster, guildwide/personal calendar, egg timer, alarm clock, LFguild system, non-cosmetic guild gear [usually the biggest success because it provides a sense of pride and projects the guild works on to get the best gear in the game])
  4. lack of prelaunch promises kept (ie mobile app, web app, lottery, mini-games)
  5. allocation of resources necessary to completely squash the bugs in the weakest classes, enhance pet AI, and repair the design flaws of the weakest classes in the game.

We’ve asked multiple times what they’d do about these issues, really haven’t received very many answers which leads me to believe that they really aren’t concerned.

When the game launched I had a 3 full page post of ui enhancements they could have used in their suggestions forums to bring the ui of this game up to the current century and I was not alone in this others put out long lists of their own in the very same forums, but they were drowned out most likely by those who wanted yet another WoW like dungeon only lobby game element added to this title.

Balance Team: Please Fix Mine Toolbelt Positioning!

(edited by tigirius.9014)

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: morrolan.9608

morrolan.9608

2. Until release, the game is in the hands of a lead developer who has in their head the target customers of the game and a set of principles — the contract with the players, as it were — and in a hands on way imposes that on the entire development process. At release the game is handed to a live team which, not having had enough contact with the original lead dev (or worse thinking he acted out of ego) have not internalized who the customers are that must be retained, and what principles must never be violated if those customers’ trust is to be maintained.

Good analysis, in terms of the above it arguably happened with anet’s original manifesto and what the game has become. However it seems even the lead developers are now saying that the manifesto was never violated, its not just the live team.

Anet is kitten lucky that they’ve had a rather large window with very little competition unlike say swtor.

Jade Quarry [SoX]
Miranda Zero – Ele / Twitch Zero – Mes / Chargrin Soulboom – Engi
Aliera Zero – Guardian / Reaver Zero – Necro

(edited by morrolan.9608)

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: VidGhost.3215

VidGhost.3215

The requests of many outweigh those of the of the few. (some people want gear grind) I don’t but i DO really like the ascended stuff!
The stupid thing about that is the few are the people who play this game day in and day out and the many are the ones that will move onto the next big thing after 3-6 months.

We can look forward to server consolidation as the player base shrinks. But i do hope that the game becomes more popular and grows massive!.. i really do hope they move in the right direction for us to continue to enjoy this awesome game.

I HATE WOW more then anything i would never play a WOW clone

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Radio Isotope.3045

Radio Isotope.3045

This is a very good topic OP worded this amazingly. On that note though wait for ArenaNet to lock this thread in attempts to let it die out. Just like they did my thread where everyone wanted a simple high damage slow shooting rifle on their ranger with pet boon skills.

(TLE) The Legendary Eternum, Devona’s Rest
Guild Founder

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: TsukasaHiiragi.9730

TsukasaHiiragi.9730

+100 The problem is, no matter what will happen now. The damage is done, they have to live with all the fallout, all the people quitting and obviously, it is going to have a huge impact on the future of this game.

The problem is, the playerbase will not grow anymore, word of mouth will spread like wildfire, truely – I just hope for all the people who are going to continue playing is that enough population remains so everything can more or less function.

W3 will not be so epic when its like 10 vs 8 vs 3 now would it?

protest this travesty of a patch -
Get it taken down -
Do whatever it takes if you care about this game -

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: goldenwing.8473

goldenwing.8473

+100 The problem is, no matter what will happen now. The damage is done, they have to live with all the fallout, all the people quitting and obviously, it is going to have a huge impact on the future of this game.

The problem is, the playerbase will not grow anymore, word of mouth will spread like wildfire, truely – I just hope for all the people who are going to continue playing is that enough population remains so everything can more or less function.

W3 will not be so epic when its like 10 vs 8 vs 3 now would it?

While I agree one hundred percent with Bewhatever’s post, the attrition will probably not be as big as anyone predicts. There will be a large percentage of the player base that adapts (standard MMO player learned behavior), a large segment that gives up and joins a large guild (standard MMO play to the reward behavior) and probably a lot that just won’t bother with it once they figure out it’s not fun, doesn’t provide meaningful reward, feels like a grind, etcetera and demand new content (standard MMO jaded post-honeymoon behavior).

Yes, there will be a large number of large guilds that are motivated by “progression” that will embrace this new content. They are the targets of this new content.

So if the small guilds and other players attrit, other small guilds get pulled into the large guilds, then the result will actually verify ANet’s decision that large guilds ARE their target audience.

Self-fulfilling design.

Works everytime.

Drive off the customers the new content alienates, (who usually leaving silently), and continue to cater to the remaining vocals. Unfortunately, in GW2’s case, there is no mechanism in place to collect feedback as constituents leave.

As far as reputation goes, yes I agree. If the game becomes known as one that caters to large guilds, ANet will have wasted a lot of its early marketing resources reaching out to a diverse player base. On the other hand, based on feel, this game might just end up appealing to a lot of the players in games like EQ2, WoW and Rift. In which case, ANet is merely following the lead of their remaining players and pilfering from “other guilds”, (temporarily), not adding meaningful new numbers of players (e.g. merely shifting players back and forth between this shared pool of customers.)

This game already has a reputation for being too casual. The “pilfering” is unlikely to be permanent.

Good post Bewhatever, and good questions that need answers.

PS: Oh, and yes, QFD is still relevant.

BG: 52 alts, 29 lvl 80’s. They all look good, so I am done with the game: Oct 2014

(edited by goldenwing.8473)

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Soulstar.7812

Soulstar.7812

Hmmm…

OP brings up a point that I share as well…

My small guild wants to remain small, we all live in the same town.
Now we have to let in potential childish trolls and shift them all to see who remains active or who behaves?

I stop caring about the updates… my guild is already suggesting to move but I don’t know how I feel about it.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Raine.1394

Raine.1394

I particularly like the ‘golden goose’ allusion. GW2 as originally conceived was awesome. It was like to fail you would have to actively try to fail. Whatever hypothesis fits, it’s simply sad where ‘whoever’ has taken the game since 11/15.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Tweekon.2510

Tweekon.2510

Very long post.. Says exactly the same as all the others.

‘My small guild deserves to be able to do this new content. I will not change my playstyle to fit.’

EQ2 had guild levels. Hitting max guild level gave nice things. Small 2 person guilds whined it was harder for them to level than big raid guilds.

Dev response – so go join a raid guild, or recruit to your guild.

I hope the devs stick to their guns here. And wrap these inane entitlement posts up into one big thread.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Radio Isotope.3045

Radio Isotope.3045

Very long post.. Says exactly the same as all the others.

‘My small guild deserves to be able to do this new content. I will not change my playstyle to fit.’

EQ2 had guild levels. Hitting max guild level gave nice things. Small 2 person guilds whined it was harder for them to level than big raid guilds.

Dev response – so go join a raid guild, or recruit to your guild.

I hope the devs stick to their guns here. And wrap these inane entitlement posts up into one big thread.

The problem here is according to my polls. There are more people in the “Cost is crud category” than the “Cost is awesome category”

I tried to keep my polls out of this thread but, if you want to see the polls here they are. And from what I have read: Numbers don’t make a guild, people do.

If you don’t agree with the cost, post once in this poll
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Guild-mission-cost-is-crud-poll/first#post1523270
If you do agree with the cost, post once in this poll
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Guild-mission-cost-is-awesome-poll/first#post1523225

(TLE) The Legendary Eternum, Devona’s Rest
Guild Founder

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Adakar.7532

Adakar.7532

My 2 cents to the topic… sure Anet is catering to the large guilds, relatively alienating the smaller guilds (who typically work better together, know each other, and work together to achieve even the most impossible goals) But, it’s the mid-sized guilds that both sides of this arguement are ignoring. The fact is, the small guilds, over time, will accomplish the tasks provided. The big guilds will accomplish the tasks more quickly by throwing their shear numbers at it. The mid-sized guilds will either disband into their own cliques are join forces with other guilds. Anet needs to cut back to Guild Wars Factions and just give us Alliances already, it solves everyone’s problems with the new content. And, while they haven’t yet done that, we, the players of small and mid-sized guilds are already branching out to the other guilds to form alliances to work together and achieve the same thing as the larger guilds. During this process, we will form new friendships and new bonds. Effectively, we will be a large guild with the small guild feel. And, then Anet wins again.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Shonie.5297

Shonie.5297

One person takes an entry level college course on something marginally relevant and thinks they’re expert on game development.
Blah blah my small guild can’t do large scale content.
Nothing to see here.

~Tarnished Coast~

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: bewhatever.2390

bewhatever.2390

Very long post.. Says exactly the same as all the others.

‘My small guild deserves to be able to do this new content. I will not change my playstyle to fit.’

EQ2 had guild levels. Hitting max guild level gave nice things. Small 2 person guilds whined it was harder for them to level than big raid guilds.

Dev response – so go join a raid guild, or recruit to your guild.

I hope the devs stick to their guns here. And wrap these inane entitlement posts up into one big thread.

This is an incorrect interpretation of what I said.

Neither I, nor my guild, am entitled to anything. Games are not democracies, the developers make the rules.

Players (and intact guilds) do have the power to choose whether to remain in a game. This is the power my guild exercised when we left EQ2 the day they changed policy from supporting small guilds to discouraging them. We simply left. Devs got to continue making their rules, we got to continue playing with our tight knit group of four people.

There are three things I’m concerned about here:

1. Devs just sent a message that small guilds (4 in my case) are not intended to participate in the guild content of this game. this is a change from the message my guild and I received from development through playing the game to this point. I object to the change because it reduces the value of the time and money I have sunk into this game to date.
2. Devs just drove a wedge into the community, between the larger guilds and the smaller ones. Your attack here simply demonstrates that wedge. I would like to be part of a community where players, guilds, etc work together, not attack each other as Jeff Kaplan incited (raiders vs non raiders) in WoW. That was not just unpleasant, it was destructive. Any “have” vs “have not”, “first class citizen” vs “second class citizen”, “content is accessible to these playstyles” vs “content not accessible to those playstyles or lifestyles” brings back memories of Kaplan’s putdowns and other unpleasantness. Life is too short for that BS, particularly in something I play for fun.
3. The process by which devs choose what to implement, in light of ArenaNet’s business objectives, seems to have broken down. this is a concern because it does not bode well for the game I have invested time and money in. Those bank vault and bag slots across multiple 80s will be worthless if I choose to leave, and this game has cost me more money per account per month than any game I’ve ever played.

I wish you the best in your preferred playstyle in GW2. Do you wish the best for all others in the game in their preferred playstyles?

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: ScribeTheMad.7614

ScribeTheMad.7614

While I think both hypotheses are certainly possible (heck, it’s possible both are accurate), there’s another possibility.

I will direct you to this thread, from 18 days ago:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Guild-Quest-Update-concerns-me/first#post1523030

Specifically the official response, which starts with:
“The short answer is that new content is not going to drive people away from the game. There is absolutely no evidence to support that it would.”

They may simply believe they can do no wrong.

“The short answer is that new content is not going to drive people away from the game.
There is absolutely no evidence to support that it would.” -AnthonyOrdon

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: bewhatever.2390

bewhatever.2390

One person takes an entry level college course on something marginally relevant and thinks they’re expert on game development.
Blah blah my small guild can’t do large scale content.
Nothing to see here.

I’m not an expert on game development.

Just a customer.

A customer who has worked in high tech R&D for more decades than some posters here have likely been alive.

And a customer who knows what R&D does when there is no competent marketing or other customer engagement to guide the choice of what to do. You get product which actively drives customers away (remember “New Coke”? marketing noticed some people liked Pepsi better so reformulated Coke to taste like Pepsi. I thought it was awful. But Coke wised up after their loyal customers said “yuk” and brought out Coke Classic (meaning went back to the old product).

Game developers don’t seem to be that smart. Game after game is destroyed because the developers make changes which drive away their core customers…

Just dumb.

About 25 years ago my boss brought our entire R&D management team to a class from the auto industry, based on the process Toyota etc had just used to design products that blew GM, Ford, etc off their perch. The U.S. auto companies had become political, making product choices based on executive ego and intuition. The Japanese beat them by clearly understanding what customers wanted, and carefully tying every R&D feature decision to a customer need (which could be stated, unstated, or an opportunity to wow them in a way they couldn’t predict). The class is called QFD for Quality Function Deployment, and last I heard it was still taught by some probably by now grey haired consultant out of Detroit. Takes less than a week. I highly recommend it if you have no clue whatsoever what designing products to serve customers instead of developer egos is about. (NFI)

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: damny.9342

damny.9342

Specifically the official response, which starts with:
“The short answer is that new content is not going to drive people away from the game. There is absolutely no evidence to support that it would.”

They may simply believe they can do no wrong.

The thing is, they would be right if it was only new content. But their new content so far has both been gated, and offered unique best-in-slot gear. Fractals being the big one, dailies to some extent with laurels (improved now but still bad), and now guild missions. Content alone is never going to drive away players, but herding them into specific play styles like this absolutely will as it obviously changes the game’s target audience.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Xavori.3768

Xavori.3768

Very long post.. Says exactly the same as all the others.

‘My small guild deserves to be able to do this new content. I will not change my playstyle to fit.’

EQ2 had guild levels. Hitting max guild level gave nice things. Small 2 person guilds whined it was harder for them to level than big raid guilds.

Dev response – so go join a raid guild, or recruit to your guild.

I hope the devs stick to their guns here. And wrap these inane entitlement posts up into one big thread.

So how’s EQ2’s playerbase looking these days?

Hell, how are any of games built around TheVision™ doing anymore

You don’t succeed by starting with a broad base of potential customers and then excluding more and more of them over time. You succeed by looking at your entire customer and making sure whatever changes you do will appeal to as many of them as possible.

Sure, it’s possible to build a niche game and make some money at it. However, GW2 isn’t intended to be a niche game. They started out with a game that had appeal to broad swaths of customers…explorers, socializers, achievers, PvP, WvW, dungeons, etc. Their goal should be to keep all that viable.

The new changes exclude what is likely the larger segment of their player base: players that are active in smaller guilds. Sure, there might be tens of thousands of players in the 500 man guilds. But there are so very many more in the so very many more smaller guilds.

Hey I just met you – And this is crazy –
But here’s my body – So rez me maybe?

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Chuo.4238

Chuo.4238

The requests of many outweigh those of the of the few. (some people want gear grind) I don’t but i DO really like the ascended stuff!
The stupid thing about that is the few are the people who play this game day in and day out and the many are the ones that will move onto the next big thing after 3-6 months.

We can look forward to server consolidation as the player base shrinks. But i do hope that the game becomes more popular and grows massive!.. i really do hope they move in the right direction for us to continue to enjoy this awesome game.

I HATE WOW more then anything i would never play a WOW clone

I’d agree, except all I see are people hating gear grind…I don’t see people asking for it.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Bloodstealer.5978

Bloodstealer.5978

One person takes an entry level college course on something marginally relevant and thinks they’re expert on game development.
Blah blah my small guild can’t do large scale content.
Nothing to see here.

I would maybe say its you who took some form of entry level college course on something marginally relevant but found it too taxing and bailed out before the bell for fist break sounded. Shame really as public speaking and open dicussion obviously passed you by as well somewhere down the track….
I dont like to assume anything in life but just this once I’ll bite and take a stab that you sit on your PC chair in your bedroom 12-18 hrs a day (more somedays) to play out a game as if it were your calling in RL.. all hail to you but many others dont share your same ideals.

L2Discuss topics you obviously have no real grasp of before engaging the global community with your narrow minded infantile responses….

OP, well worded opinions, far better than I could of done +1 to you

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: cherrie.8907

cherrie.8907

What I find the most upsetting is that ANet seems to be refusing to learn on mistakes.
Many features they now introduce have been tried out in other games already (gear gating, guild missions that favor big guilds) and were deemed by majority of players everywhere as destructive for the fabric of the game.

Especially the guild missions now go against how many people play.
They seem to cater only to very big guilds.

“Otherwise, your MMO becomes all about grinding to get the best gear. We don’t make grindy games.”
-Mike Obrien
“We don’t need to make mandatory gear treadmills” -Colin Johanson

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Arcanorum Ignis.9218

Arcanorum Ignis.9218

#’Caution!: Ninja kitten mod detected. Thread closure imminent!’#

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Zach.2618

Zach.2618

yay what i was looking for:D

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: nalenb.1425

nalenb.1425

Excellent post by OP

~ Abbish – Dragonbrand

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: ZudetGambeous.9573

ZudetGambeous.9573

People have been asking for large scale group content over and over and over since the game launched.

Anet is simply granting player requests. If you don’t like it then take it up with the millions of players in large guilds who asked for this.

The total posts in every thread complaining about small guilds equals the number of people in my ONE guild who like these changes. Considering there are dozens if not hundreds of these large guilds I think it is safe to say they are doing what the majority of players want.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Chuo.4238

Chuo.4238

I agree. My longtime gaming friends are about to leave and play something else. ArenaNet has a very, very short time in which to respond and take a stance, for a chance to keep us, and people like us around. Ever since November, it’s been one thing after another.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Tobias Trueflight.8350

Tobias Trueflight.8350

I started out writing a longer post in response to this thread . . .

But then I probably realized if at any time I tried to offer my opinion I’d be told how wrong I am for not joining people wanting to escort some dev to the gallows.

I enjoyed reading the first post, but I think it’s a narrow and constrained look which winds up painting the dev team either incompetent or powerless. I don’t like the sentiment, but as I said . . . I know it’s popular enough that it’s pointless to say otherwise.

Seeking assistants for the Asuran Catapult Project. Applicants will be tested for aerodynamics.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: arcaid.6983

arcaid.6983

I really don’t understand this line of thinking. If you want the better loot join a bigger guild, it really is that simple. If your need for the better loot is more then your need to be in a guild with your friends, that is a you problem not a game problem. I am in a relatively small guild(it’s just me if your wandering, created it so I would stop getting random guild invites), and am currently working on leveling all the classes before I join a more permanant home. I can do all the content in the game, with the exception of guild missions and I am fine with it. I can do all the content in this game without top end loot as well. This self imposed need for shinies is once again a you problem not a game problem. Play the game, have fun, get the gear when you can and most of all relax. No matter what arena net does someone will always have better stuff then you. Deal with it and just have a good time.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Silvery Shadow.5036

Silvery Shadow.5036

To OP….well said…excellent post

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: bewhatever.2390

bewhatever.2390

I started out writing a longer post in response to this thread . . .

But then I probably realized if at any time I tried to offer my opinion I’d be told how wrong I am for not joining people wanting to escort some dev to the gallows.

I enjoyed reading the first post, but I think it’s a narrow and constrained look which winds up painting the dev team either incompetent or powerless. I don’t like the sentiment, but as I said . . . I know it’s popular enough that it’s pointless to say otherwise.

In the larger scheme of things, ArenaNet is an awesome team of people who over a period of many years put together a game which I have enjoyed a great deal and which has challenged me to improve my skills as a player.

It would be sad if one blind spot in one corner of that awesome team caused the player base to drop by half in a matter of months. This is a pattern I recognize from 3 other games: something has broken down in the management process by which new content for the game is chosen for development.

The purpose of the original post is to shine a very bright light on that breakdown.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: bewhatever.2390

bewhatever.2390

I really don’t understand this line of thinking. If you want the better loot join a bigger guild, it really is that simple. If your need for the better loot is more then your need to be in a guild with your friends, that is a you problem not a game problem. I am in a relatively small guild(it’s just me if your wandering, created it so I would stop getting random guild invites), and am currently working on leveling all the classes before I join a more permanant home. I can do all the content in the game, with the exception of guild missions and I am fine with it. I can do all the content in this game without top end loot as well. This self imposed need for shinies is once again a you problem not a game problem. Play the game, have fun, get the gear when you can and most of all relax. No matter what arena net does someone will always have better stuff then you. Deal with it and just have a good time.

It’s not about the shinies.

It’s about the community being collaborative and supportive rather than divisive and adversarial.

It’s about equality of opportunity (not equality of outcomes, I’m not looking for, what were they called, welfare epics).

It’s about supporting, and absolutely not disrupting, the social fabric of guilds which are one of the anchors retaining players in a game.

And it’s about all of us being players in GW2, without, how did the guy in chat yesterday put it, the concept of the “elite” who had just launched a guild event and the “peons” who were invited to come watch. Ever see the “there’s no second class on Southern” TV ads 30 years ago? (Southern was a regional jet airline which did not have a first class cabin on its 737 jets, their commercials had you walking through the usual first class cabin of that era with all the people in the wide seats looking down at you.) That feeling has no place in GW2.

Jeff Kaplan drove that caste system into the WoW playerbase based on his own experience as a raid leader in EQ1. He was trying to shame people into raiding. What he accomplished was to tell 90% of Blizzard’s customers he didn’t want them, and cause maybe 1% of customers to “grief” the rest of the player base by acting entitled in many antisocial ways. As a business person I think that was a really, really, extraordinarily stupid business move. Gaming is an entertainment business which delivers an emotional experience, in the end. Why, if your livelihood depends on people staying in your game, would you set out to damage the emotional experience of the vast majority of them? Can you imagine Mickey Mouse walking down the street in Disneyland shaming some little kid? Or the staff on a cruise ship or in a resort? Or even the proprietor of a local restaurant? Even the kid behind the counter at the local McDonalds knows better.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: goldenwing.8473

goldenwing.8473

I’m not here for the shinies either.

Actually, I will issue the following statement: I have absolutely NO interest in doing ANY of the new guild mission content.

And I absolutely agree that new content was needed for large guilds or ANet would have attrited a section of their playerbase.

I do not have a problem with the concept of the content itself. And take full responsibility for not wanting to pursue it, understanding I may be missing a few rewards that might be BIS. And yes, I am a hardcore min/max type of player.

Having said, I will state that I do have a problem with how the content was implemented.

I care about this game. I care about the obvious impact the new content has had on the overall feel of the game. I posted about that on the massive thread about guild missions (page 3) even before the content was released. It was such an obvious outcome to anyone who has studied social science or uses pattern thinking regarding social environments. And I really really wish that ANet could afford to hire a social scientist and have them on their staff working with an economist. Sadly, most of of the ones I know are consulting with large universities world wide, and headed to major capitals across the world, including Washington D.C. (And they are very needed there!)

I digress.

What I stated days ago was concern about a growing dichotomy between the “haves” and “have nots”. And in horror, I’m seeing that play out on the forum and more importantly in game. The content had not been live more than 30 mins before I saw players at each others throats in map chat over guild recruiting. And I’m seeing more of it.

This is not a positive trend for a game that differentiated itself before release. That differentiation is now devolving rapidly to the point where it is close to joining at least 4 other MMO’s that foster a negative customer experience based on a “haves” and “have not” dichotomy.

My guild deliberately, carefully researched this game and joined only because it offered hope of a “real” community feel in its marketing messages and in the experience we had during BWEs. We have played in games that actually had that, that fostered community-building with game mechanics.

So, back to the essence of the questions asked by the OP: why did that change?

Because if it was simply an “oops”, we didn’t catch that, or “wow, we never expected our customers to react that way” the following axiom regarding software has held for at least the last 30 years that I have been involved in the industry:

Customers will never use your software the way you intended or expected.

Hence the need for focus-group testing to broaden the developer’s perspective.

And keeping an open mind, and a listening ear when players, en masse, provide feedback.

BG: 52 alts, 29 lvl 80’s. They all look good, so I am done with the game: Oct 2014

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Bekkr.6192

Bekkr.6192

I’d just like to thank the contributors to this thread for helping make my decision of whether to come back and try the game again or not an easy one.

I am disappoint.

The problem with the youth of today is that one is no longer part of it.
-Salvador Dali

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: emikochan.8504

emikochan.8504

you don’t need 500 people to get guild missions. We’re well on the way to them with just 10.

Welcome to my world – http://emikochan13.wordpress.com

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Erick Alastor.3917

Erick Alastor.3917

I’m putting my characters in standby mode.
My only hope is that, when new asian graphically awesome mmorpgs will be released, grinders will fly over there, freeing devs from pleasing mainly this kind of target, and giving their player base the game which they talked about for years.

Edit: about guild missions, one word: Alliances.

“Otherwise, your MMO becomes all about grinding to get the best gear. We don’t make grindy games.”
- Mike Obrien

(edited by Erick Alastor.3917)

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: thisolderhead.5127

thisolderhead.5127

Instead of 25 year old “QFD” frameworks shoehorned in from over the automotive side of the sea (along of CORBA and a host of other “great” innovations) they probably use some Agile based framework in an under resourced way…

So lets just get the Scrum-Master directly with the torches as pitchforks, artists and good code monkeys are hard to find – team leaders are bloody well everywhere!

Feeling bad due to my response does not mean it was a personal attack.
It may just be that your original statement was wrong.
Please try again.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Tobias Trueflight.8350

Tobias Trueflight.8350

So lets just get the Scrum-Master directly with the torches as pitchforks, artists and good code monkeys are hard to find – team leaders are bloody well everywhere!

. . . and this is why I resisted, and laughed off, supervisors who wanted to make me shift manager at at least one job :P It’s such a thankless position, leading.

Seeking assistants for the Asuran Catapult Project. Applicants will be tested for aerodynamics.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Ojimaru.8970

Ojimaru.8970

It’s about equality of opportunity (not equality of outcomes, I’m not looking for, what were they called, welfare epics).

I fail to see how the system literally prevents your 4-man guild the opportunity of obtaining and completing the guild missions, especially the lower-tier missions. Yes, you will gain access to these much slower than bigger guilds, but that’s normal and acceptable in my books.

I also do not understand why small guild like to portray themselves as utter xenophobes when asked to become part of bigger guilds. Dilution? Fear of adolescent children? Commitment? Are these really your complaints?

But Guild Missions isn’t the topic of this post, just an example, is it?

Hypotheses 1: It’s the “bean counters’ fault”.
I don’t think these push for new content is due to attrition. NCSoft and ANet are companies who both have past experiences with MMOs, so it’s likely they will recognise that the sharp drop in active players is absolutely normal and expected, especially for a game without subscriptions.

However, the business model of Guild Wars 2 plays on two income sources: game (and expansion) purchase and micro-transactions. With the MMO scene so crowded with competitors, ANet has to be ready to provide a steady stream of new content and goals for players to keep them interested. Failure to do so leads to player boredom and dip in activity. While this has less effect on game sales, it affects Gem sales.

Does this mean that ANet should focus their resource on content creation, from art to coding, over bug fixes? As a gamer, I’d say “NO”. As a business owner, “Yes” (Besides game-breaking bugs, new players don’t care for them; existing players are tolerant towards bugs and are constantly interested in new content anyway). As an exhibit engineer, “Let’s slow down content for a bit and spend the next 2 months head down on bug fixes.”

Hypotheses 2: It’s the lead developer’s fault.
It’s easy as peas for consumers to point the blame at the leader, as it is easy for the leader to point the blame to others. It’s a silly game, especially as we, outsiders, do not fully understand the company’s culture or its interaction with stakeholders.

Is ArenaNet better off with developers on the live team, or redirecting those resources elsewhere and not doing further damage to the game and its player community?

The division between the community is always a conflict between the haves and have-nots. There are those who have thousands upon thousands of gold, there are those who have never seen one. There are those in full Exotics, there are those who are stuck in Greens. There are Dungeon Masters, there are those who struggle in COF P1. There are those with 35 AR, there are those with none. There are those who have a guild with a fantastic community, there are those who are alone.

There are those who could afford to buy this game, and those that could not.

The moment ANet overextends and tries to accommodate for absolutely everybody is when they will fail, as evidenced by history. Unintended consequences are usually unpredictable by the development team, just as some bugs and imbalances always slip by the most vigilant testers. I know this for a fact because I design and create interactive exhibits for the public. No amount of internal testing will match the mysterious power of a child’s ten fingers to destroy a program ten engineers could not. The only correct response is to /facepalm and get working on a fix.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: bewhatever.2390

bewhatever.2390

Instead of 25 year old “QFD” frameworks shoehorned in from over the automotive side of the sea (along of CORBA and a host of other “great” innovations) they probably use some Agile based framework in an under resourced way…

So lets just get the Scrum-Master directly with the torches as pitchforks, artists and good code monkeys are hard to find – team leaders are bloody well everywhere!

This is Waterfall, not Agile. It’s coming out in discrete patches at long intervals, and there aren’t users (beta testers) seeing these features evolve at weekly intervals the way they would in Agile. At least the waterfall cycle is measured in months and not years

If it were Agile, this feature would have been sent back to the drawing board after the first Scrum cycle.

Besides, QFD isn’t about doing it, it’s about choosing what to do at a detailed feature level. Even after 25 years I still remember how the instructor opened the first day of the class: “How many of you prefer deep dish pizza? How many of you prefer New York style pizza? Now how many of you like something halfway between the two? That’s what I thought. Remember that, don’t ever develop to the average of your customer input.”

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Slayd.2871

Slayd.2871

A 4 man guild……that’s not even considered a party.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: bewhatever.2390

bewhatever.2390

I fail to see how the system literally prevents your 4-man guild the opportunity of obtaining and completing the guild missions, especially the lower-tier missions. Yes, you will gain access to these much slower than bigger guilds, but that’s normal and acceptable in my books.

I do not have first hand information here. Anecdotally the lowest level missions take about 15 people, which I translate as 10 capable people, but unachievable by 4 or 5.

I also do not understand why small guild like to portray themselves as utter xenophobes when asked to become part of bigger guilds. Dilution? Fear of adolescent children? Commitment? Are these really your complaints?

My game time is a large fraction of the time I get to spend with these 3 other people. I have made a choice to spend it that way, and despite there being lots of other wonderful people in GW2 there is a RL reason for spending it with these 3.

But Guild Missions isn’t the topic of this post, just an example, is it?

Hypotheses 1: It’s the “bean counters’ fault”.
I don’t think these push for new content is due to attrition. NCSoft and ANet are companies who both have past experiences with MMOs, so it’s likely they will recognise that the sharp drop in active players is absolutely normal and expected, especially for a game without subscriptions.

Several things happened in RIFT which led me to the conclusion that changes were in fact responding to causes of attrition, and to be able to attract players in an Asian country.

Does this mean that ANet should focus their resource on content creation, from art to coding, over bug fixes? As a gamer, I’d say “NO”. As a business owner, “Yes” (Besides game-breaking bugs, new players don’t care for them; existing players are tolerant towards bugs and are constantly interested in new content anyway). As an exhibit engineer, “Let’s slow down content for a bit and spend the next 2 months head down on bug fixes.”

I could see this both ways. In the latter days of DAoC ToA when we were farming Aerus City, the problem of people falling through the floor to their death during the ToA-flagship Phoenix open world raid encounter went beyond annoying. Mythic chose not to address this problem.

Hypotheses 2: It’s the lead developer’s fault.
It’s easy as peas for consumers to point the blame at the leader, as it is easy for the leader to point the blame to others. It’s a silly game, especially as we, outsiders, do not fully understand the company’s culture or its interaction with stakeholders.

If the company’s process is to give the lead dev absolute power and count only on their judgment in understanding all the stakeholders, knowing what they want, knowing what will alienate them, and then making development choices which will optimize player satisfaction — which is a very big job that I would expect would pay at least $200K/year in a low cost of living area — then yes, not knowing that a feature would alienate a large part of the player base is unsatisfactory job performance. Period.

The division between the community is always a conflict between the haves and have-nots. There are those who have thousands upon thousands of gold, there are those who have never seen one. There are those in full Exotics, there are those who are stuck in Greens. There are Dungeon Masters, there are those who struggle in COF P1. There are those with 35 AR, there are those with none. There are those who have a guild with a fantastic community, there are those who are alone.

There are those who could afford to buy this game, and those that could not.

The moment ANet overextends and tries to accommodate for absolutely everybody is when they will fail, …

In the case of DAoC, the decision to proceed with the ToA expansion, which took away the loyal DAoC players’ fun in RvR and put them on a mandatory-to-compete 6 month PvE treadmill, was the direct result of “Mackey” incorrectly convincing Mythic founder Mark Jacobs that his ToA gear wouldn’t affect RvR when in fact it caused runaway stat inflation from a previously (reasonably) balanced situation.

I say all this to clarify my final point: financially, a game is better off cancelling an expansion pack if it will alienate and drive away more $$ of revenue than the $$ from the expansion and $$ from players staying who would otherwise have become bored and left. GW2’s last 4 content patches have each alienated significant groups of players. This means the process is out of control.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Tobias Trueflight.8350

Tobias Trueflight.8350

I say all this to clarify my final point: financially, a game is better off cancelling an expansion pack if it will alienate and drive away more $$ of revenue than the $$ from the expansion and $$ from players staying who would otherwise have become bored and left. GW2’s last 4 content patches have each alienated significant groups of players. This means the process is out of control.

This would make a lot of sense to apply here if it weren’t for a couple details:

- Guild Wars 2 does not charge a subscription fee, and I understand DAoC did? Therefore, only new sales or gem purchases actively add new money into revenue.
- If a player gets bored and leaves, the money from the initial purchase usually is still there.
- There is never a guarantee a player who claims to “have been planning on spending $$$ in the gem store” actually was going to follow through with it.

In short, it’s a very different model which needs to be looked at. And I’m not sure if it’s more vital to retain players (who may or may not be spending on gems) or to try to put new things into the game to try to grab more new players.

Seeking assistants for the Asuran Catapult Project. Applicants will be tested for aerodynamics.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Ojimaru.8970

Ojimaru.8970

I do not have first hand information here. Anecdotally the lowest level missions take about 15 people, which I translate as 10 capable people, but unachievable by 4 or 5.

But it’s still too early for either of us to outright say that the lowest tier is not achievable with x number of players. Let us reserve judgement until then.

My game time is a large fraction of the time I get to spend with these 3 other people. I have made a choice to spend it that way, and despite there being lots of other wonderful people in GW2 there is a RL reason for spending it with these 3.

Yes, but you still can choose to hang out with your three friends just as much in a bigger guild, no?

I say all this to clarify my final point: financially, a game is better off cancelling an expansion pack if it will alienate and drive away more $$ of revenue than the $$ from the expansion and $$ from players staying who would otherwise have become bored and left. GW2’s last 4 content patches have each alienated significant groups of players. This means the process is out of control.

But you don’t have concrete proof that these new content, which you include Shadow of the Mad King and Wintersday, alienated “significant groups” of players. All we have are sporadic outcry from vocal forum goers, with positive counterpoints. Are one side’s opinions more valid than the other?

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Chuo.4238

Chuo.4238

But you don’t have concrete proof that these new content, which you include Shadow of the Mad King and Wintersday, alienated “significant groups” of players. All we have are sporadic outcry from vocal forum goers, with positive counterpoints. Are one side’s opinions more valid than the other?

You can kind of tell when the forums are just a low buzz of people QQ-ing over this or that, and when a large number of people are actually upset about something. There’s a difference.

I’m pretty sure that ArenaNet has their head in the sand over it, though. I bet they are still wondering why a large chunk of their playerbase left back in November…

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Tobias Trueflight.8350

Tobias Trueflight.8350

I’m pretty sure that ArenaNet has their head in the sand over it, though. I bet they are still wondering why a large chunk of their playerbase left back in November…

I don’t think they’re wondering about that, I think they’re more going “this seemed like a good idea, why didn’t this work? And now what do we do with the rest of this stuff, should we just leave it half done . . . ?”

Seeking assistants for the Asuran Catapult Project. Applicants will be tested for aerodynamics.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Chuo.4238

Chuo.4238

I’m pretty sure that ArenaNet has their head in the sand over it, though. I bet they are still wondering why a large chunk of their playerbase left back in November…

I don’t think they’re wondering about that, I think they’re more going “this seemed like a good idea, why didn’t this work? And now what do we do with the rest of this stuff, should we just leave it half done . . . ?”

Well, fundamentally what they keep doing is forcing people to play in certain ways, and then taking the fun out of playing in those ways. They really need to step back and look at the big picture.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Tobias Trueflight.8350

Tobias Trueflight.8350

I’m pretty sure that ArenaNet has their head in the sand over it, though. I bet they are still wondering why a large chunk of their playerbase left back in November…

I don’t think they’re wondering about that, I think they’re more going “this seemed like a good idea, why didn’t this work? And now what do we do with the rest of this stuff, should we just leave it half done . . . ?”

Well, fundamentally what they keep doing is forcing people to play in certain ways, and then taking the fun out of playing in those ways. They really need to step back and look at the big picture.

I’m not entirely convinced you’re correct, and I rather think they’re trying to play for a longer path than instant fixes.

Seeking assistants for the Asuran Catapult Project. Applicants will be tested for aerodynamics.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Eliyahu.1467

Eliyahu.1467

But you don’t have concrete proof that these new content, which you include Shadow of the Mad King and Wintersday, alienated “significant groups” of players. All we have are sporadic outcry from vocal forum goers, with positive counterpoints. Are one side’s opinions more valid than the other?

You can kind of tell when the forums are just a low buzz of people QQ-ing over this or that, and when a large number of people are actually upset about something. There’s a difference.

I’m pretty sure that ArenaNet has their head in the sand over it, though. I bet they are still wondering why a large chunk of their playerbase left back in November…

The forums for every game released in recent years is full of pointless whining. The people that enjoy the game spend their time playing the game. The people who enjoy whining post on the forums.

The real tragedy is that the legitimate criticism gets totally drowned out by asinine complaining. I honestly wish the mods would do more thread mergers here. Far too many topics on the front page of these forums are all about the same topics because everyone who has a problem with something like dailies or guild missions feel like they need their own personal soapbox.

In this specific case, OP should have posted here:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/New-guild-missions-opinions-concerns/first

(edited by Eliyahu.1467)

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: bewhatever.2390

bewhatever.2390

I say all this to clarify my final point: financially, a game is better off cancelling an expansion pack if it will alienate and drive away more $$ of revenue than the $$ from the expansion and $$ from players staying who would otherwise have become bored and left. GW2’s last 4 content patches have each alienated significant groups of players. This means the process is out of control.

This would make a lot of sense to apply here if it weren’t for a couple details:

- Guild Wars 2 does not charge a subscription fee, and I understand DAoC did? Therefore, only new sales or gem purchases actively add new money into revenue.
- If a player gets bored and leaves, the money from the initial purchase usually is still there.
- There is never a guarantee a player who claims to “have been planning on spending $$$ in the gem store” actually was going to follow through with it.

In short, it’s a very different model which needs to be looked at. And I’m not sure if it’s more vital to retain players (who may or may not be spending on gems) or to try to put new things into the game to try to grab more new players.

Interesting point, I’m used to the subscription model which makes it a lot easier (noting that WoW goosed their sub numbers by attracting large numbers of players in Asian countries who pay by the hour in internet cafes, not by the month). And you are correct, DAoC was about $10/month per account, with many players having two accounts (one to play plus a buff bot, which if you were good was your pocket healer).

However, the change to the dailies in the last 2 patches caused a number of 80s to go into the starter zones at 4pm pst every day. My wife was levelling an alt and discovered that in effect she could not progress, with entire heart areas wiped out of the mobs for the heart, and events (even the zone bosses) inaccessible to at level players because they went down at speed-clear speeds. These intuitive changes have rendered starter zones (and other places) unplayable by at level players. This is extremely inhospitable to new players and likely to attrit them immediately.

Although we have a trickle of (obviously) WoW players coming in, for the most part the 80s overrunning Queensdale etc has not been noticed, so I suspect there is a negligible number of new players coming into the game. Anecdotal, I might just be on a high pop server and not realize it.

So my assumption is that the purpose of new content is to keep the existing playerbase busy, trusting that a fraction of them will continue to periodically buy gems. They’ve obviously been testing price elasticity on bags, vault slots, makeover kits, etc in the recent "sale"s, trying to optimize the revenue from people like me who treat any gem purchase as a cash sale. You are correct, there’s no transparency on who is and is not buying what, and whether ANet’s gem sales are largely driven by a handful of players buying their way to legendaries, a much larger set of players buying their way to crafted gear, or just random bag and bank slot and fluff item purchases over most of the player base.

But you are correct, we don’t know.

History Repeats (killing the golden goose?)

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: bewhatever.2390

bewhatever.2390

I’m pretty sure that ArenaNet has their head in the sand over it, though. I bet they are still wondering why a large chunk of their playerbase left back in November…

I don’t think they’re wondering about that, I think they’re more going “this seemed like a good idea, why didn’t this work? And now what do we do with the rest of this stuff, should we just leave it half done . . . ?”

Well, fundamentally what they keep doing is forcing people to play in certain ways, and then taking the fun out of playing in those ways. They really need to step back and look at the big picture.

I’m not entirely convinced you’re correct, and I rather think they’re trying to play for a longer path than instant fixes.

It looks to me like people are being sent off to address individual problems (for example, create something large guilds can do together), are being successful on the individual problem, but fall prey to the old adage “Any intuitive change to a complex system will inevitably leave that system worse off”, by enabling exploits, griefing, or causing 80s to overrun lowbie zones to get dailies done. Or, in the case of the guild missions, by having unintended consequences on the social fabric of the game and hence player retention, or again in the current case by unintentionally sending a message to players with a certain play/social style that the game has chosen to focus elsewhere. But that’s where this thread started