Guild Wars 2

http://strawpoll.me/531810 Q: Should devs use this, Y/N?
Use it!

Some interesting points.

1. Agreed
2. Theres no make it work button? Thats the 1st thing Id develop.
3. We just see so much PvE content and we are jealous
4. Talk with US about all your ideas and stop giving dates if you don’t want to be held by them.
5. And I use the word players when Im using someone else points and most certainly use the word I when I want something.

Just a few key points.

I enjoy the (finally) more dev responses being posted.

But what I would love to see is explanations.

For example:

patch notes come out… Explain why what specific changes were made and why time was spent doing them. Even if its short and simple it’s better than the community guessing.

Monday streamer dev (maybe just have Karl and/or Izzy if they can make it) and can present your patch notes (with some explanation of changes) the monday before patch.

Would like to see more statistics that you’ve collected, such as Win rates with professions if you have em. Least taken utilities, most taken utilities. Number of lord kills in the month… I don’t really find them important on a “need to know” basis, but they’re fun(?) to keep in mind.

Also… would like to see more small changes in that every 2 weeks on average, there is more than some bug fixes. Feels like it’s a) a sizeable monthly patch or b) a lot of bug fixes with little in the middle of the month

I just want less smoke and mirrors and more timely or properly-implemented pvp updates; maybe we can’t have both but surely we can have one?

Maybe its my imagination but recently Im seeing what seems to be a focused effort from Anet posts to be professional constructive and friendly.

On topic, being open to feedback is the only thing required, easier said then done because we tend to ignore/dismiss ideas we don’t agree with even if they are supported by the majority.

Most players start constructive with feedback its takes a long time for it to devolve into the community as a whole being negative. Its actually a good sign when so many stick around to give feedback that means they like the game at its core.

Avoid implementing changes the players did not ask for that are in direct conflict/will kill popular activities. WvW bloodlust hurting lower population servers and GvGs comes to mind…

Things not related to nerf this class buff this class that get repeated over and over by multiple people from multiple servers for months might be something to move up the list.

Justin ODell.9517:

Hey guys, Josh (of SAB fame) offered some really good tips in another sub-forum. Since they were buried on page 20 I figured it would be a good idea to post a link to them here.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Collaborative-Development/page/20#post3007420

Does anyone else have any similar advice for us developers? What ways we can make collaborating easier for you? What things are we already doing that you enjoy? What would you like to see more of?

The list is fantastic, by the way. I hope that the community will strive to become better at communication. We often just shout (figuratively speaking) and figure that’s good enough.

Tell us everything.
You have to communicate internally somehow, so give us view-access to it.
Tell us of stray ideas, stuff you want in next patch, what you are working on.

If you add how likely stuff is to be implemented no one will be angry if it doesn´t happen. Tell us of progress made etcetcetc.

Cool idea would be to give everyone insight to your ideas and work and allow the community to vote a representative who gets access to more internal communication.
Someone engaged in the game can scan the forums, evaluate the communities opinion on your ideas and pass it on to you. Have six of these people, one wvwvw focused, one pvp focused and one pve focused split on EU/US.

If you are honest you wont have to edit the information passed to us so its just copy paste from internal notes.
And if you are honest about your progress no one will be angry if you are slow, because we know its slow and wont be in the patch before it hits.
PvE CONTENT should be 100% internal to prevent spoilers tho.
We don´t decide but give input which is up to date.

All we can do at the moment is Q.Q.
If you open up we can say “wait, that´s a bad idea” or “we would like it more this way” or “this might be a problem”.

Just give us ALL the info and channel it thru representative forum maniacs who give you direct intel.
Elected “ambassadors” shouldn´t be in place for more then one patch cycle because it is tons of work and no one will do it forever for free.
Elections can be 100% automated, just give us a tool to choose our ambassador of choice. Which says hello every month and allow us to apply for the position.

I think a lot of people would benefit from seeing objective information about what classes are being run in pvp.

Maybe a % chart of how often each class is run and their winning %.

I suspect its nowhere near as lopsided as some people think, but that information being available and updated over a period of time would help people see the big picture.

jmatb.6307:

I think a lot of people would benefit from seeing objective information about what classes are being run in pvp.

Maybe a % chart of how often each class is run and their winning %.

I suspect its nowhere near as lopsided as some people think, but that information being available and updated over a period of time would help people see the big picture.

Good idea! Problem would be IF things are so out of bounds people would use the chart to select the most broken thing available.

I would love if you posted polls, if you also reached out to people in game. You would be surprised how many people dont even know we have a forum, let alone know whats going.

Things I would like to see;

> Clarity:
Explaining the reasoning behind certain changes.

>PvP balance affecting PvE ad WvW:

Reaching people in-game. Some people find out when they log that their RtL got nerfed in PvE and dont understand why is it not working. Clarity as to why PvE is so heavily affected by PvP. This is one of my biggest gripe. As a mostly PvE player it hurts me knowing that all balance in the game is dictated by PvP. End result? You have endless horde of angry players ignored on their class forums who come here to bash the devs.

Possible solutions; Splitting skills, mildly at least, or at least let the players know in advance about those changes so they can adjust themselves little by little rather than having to buy an entire new set right off the bat.

Lastly but most importantly; Class balance:

Please for the love of whatever you believe, redirect more resources to the balancing team. If you are going to have an entire game class balance that WILL afffect PvE, PvP and WvW all together, the least you could do is have more than two poor overworked devs working on it. Not to mention the unaware bias that might result from them being humans.

Look at the recent competitions, example; eles had ZERO representation in MLG, thats a big telling of whats going on, then you have rangers which made up around 3x%, more than some classes combined. Stealth is out of control and not everyone is a ranger, nor runs that build. Spike is out of control (Im looking at backstab and scepter ele, yes, even though I know Im a fierce ele defender I admit their damage is not ok, but their lack of survavility is also very NOT ok, no one wants a kamikaze in their team who gives nothing to the team but a handicap, hence MLG). Eles suvavility is non-existent. Warriors healing signet is out of control. Conditions spamming is out of control, not even a cleansing heavy class can keep up, merely stall it once all 40-75 secs CD are blown.

Overall I think this game has a lot of potential but you gotta start checking class’s forums, or at least let them know you were there (a simple lie might just do).

Good job on such an amazing game, personally i dont care about new modes nor new maps nor new rewards, I believe the PvP is intrinsically fun already, so no need to get overly rewarded by it (though, it would be very welcomed!). Only complain I have is just that; class balancing.

A public test server would help a lot with most of Josh’s points…
I know that Dev’s extencivelly test stuf internaly but they also say that in live servers stuff happens that was not detected on the internal testing.
Let us help you guys test sensible stuff like WvWvW changes and balance changes for example, you can keep all the new stuff out of the PTS and let us test out ONY what you guys think it is important to be tested.

I assure you will have pages and pages of feedback that surely help you implement it in live servers more efficiently, less buggy and with a lower risk of it getting exploited like it happened a few times previously and it is still currently happening, SkyHammer that made all legit pvp players like myself with high rank feel common and trivial with nothing to show for their effort…

Off topic: I don’t know if it is possible but… IF you wanted, could you roll back all ranks gained in the last month?! so that ppl would have the same rank they had 1 month ago?!

Do your patch notes like this here. Post a small summary of the reasoning or rationale as to why certain changes are made. It’s more tedious for you to write these kinds of notes, yes, but it saves you from dealing with the forum’s mass (accusatory) speculation for months to come. Good investment in time to write more detailed patch notes.

PvP-specific Patch previews would be nice, too. It gets the community excited for the next patch when we can actually listen to the devs discuss their thoughts about the upcoming patch in a video format. The monthly State of the Game discussions featuring the devs have been a nice version of this, but I feel like a more succinct, streamlined video put out by ArenaNet themselves would be better.

The reason for having these patch previews is to communicate to the players the reasoning behind specific changes. It makes players feel like they’re on the same track as the devs. Notice how there is so much pessimistic speculation on these forums when the devs are silent and do not post for a long time; it’s because players are not understanding what’s going on in the devs’ brains.

Also, patches don’t have to be frequent, but communication DOES have to be frequent if you want the player-base to generate quality feedback and discussions. No one realistically expects devs to output patches every week, but majority of us do expect some form of communication…ANYTHING, on a relatively normal basis. Even just one post every few days is huge. The forum has gotten used to the devs not posting anything on the forum for months. MONTHS. This, in my opinion, is too long of a gap of non communication.

Krayiss.4926:

http://strawpoll.me/531810 Q: Should devs use this, Y/N?
Use it!

Some interesting points.

1. Agreed
2. Theres no make it work button? Thats the 1st thing Id develop.
3. We just see so much PvE content and we are jealous
4. Talk with US about all your ideas and stop giving dates if you don’t want to be held by them.
5. And I use the word players when Im using someone else points and most certainly use the word I when I want something.

Just a few key points.

strawpolls are only useful if a lot of people visit this forum, from the look of the average views per page, it doesn’t seem that way.

Pretty much that whatever poll you have will be extremely bias and represent a very very very very very very small subset of pvpers.

Please send a link to that thread to Devon.

Forgot to post the things I enjoy, though i did include some of it in my other post;

The PvP, it is fun, despite all the negative comments about only one mode, I dont feel this is the case for me, i enjoy it a lot since it gives room to fighting. The game is fluid love the hot join that can be done from across the map.

I find PvP enjoyable despite the obvious imbalances.

Things I would like to see improvement is how we get skins there, basically all the good skins I have came from the AP rewards.

I love skyhammer, bring more of those. I enjoy the kodan map, building where I can get to and snipe others. I enjoy the one with the orb, it has a nice open space in the bottom for fights and the map is nicely laid out.

1. Transparency and humbleness. Not that I’m accusing Anet of anything, but being as honest and humble as possible is definately by far my personal favorite trait amongst game devs when they communicate. Just something simple like :

Angry Player : “This is a joke this X problem is messing up Y and you caused this to happen when the hell are you gonna fix this BS?”

Dev : “You’re right, that was a bad call on our part and we’re going to be fixing/changing it very soon.”
———————————————————————————————————————-
2. Just be a regular forum poster. If you guys are peaking around in class forums out of curiosity looking up recent complaints or ideas or anything and feel like chiming in, DO SO! I can only assume you’re told not to, to avoid some kind of issues?

Player : “Engy Flamethrower is still garbage, here are some simple ideas I had to help it.”

Curious Dev : “I like the 2nd idea, we’ll be taking another little pass pretty soon, we’ll mark it on our list.”

Player : “Ranger pet AI is still garbage, and the health buff did nothing to help it survive one shots and massive aoe why is this still not fixed???”

Dev : “We’ve been thinking of a few simple solutions to this problem, here they are, tell us what you guys think”

Or

Dev : “Unfortunately we won’t be able to remedy this for awhile, for X reasons, we know it’s an issue and we’ll be trying some smaller bandaid fixes to help it along in the meantime.”

That’s all I could really ask of you guys, just pop in and post more often, even just to show that you’re watching, and that you’re paying attention. I can understand the risk of accidentally creating expectations on things you may discuss, but if you’re completely honest this shouldn’t be a huge problem.

Even if it’s bad news like “Sorry, but there’s no way we’ll be able to fix this for quite a long time”, I’d rather know straight up that be strung along wondering if it will be fixed or if you even know about it. Then hopefully have some other fixes/love in other areas to make up for it of course. =p

The recent surge of transparency is really refreshing though, I’m pretty happy.

If the player-base was given a better idea of ANET’s vision for pvp we can give better advice. This can help avoid deadends before they are implemented.

Thanks for the increase in responsiveness from you guys. We appreciate it.

Why should we give you constructive feedback? You never act on it. You completely ignore everything players tell you because you are 100% sure you know better than the people who actually play the game because of your magical metrics, despite how many times that has gone wrong for you.

Are we supposed to be impressed by these recent posts you guys have been making? Ya, no thanks. It’s just like when Sharp made his big ole post talking about how much anet cared and how much you are doing. I said then and I’ll say now, your words mean nothing. Results are what matter.

You want constructive feedback? Then do something that shows us there is actually a point to it, and that giving it to you isn’t just a waste of time. Not more empty posts. Actual changes to the game.

Point #4 is only an issue because the transparency is still not good enough.
You would say something, leave us in the dark while we’re still assuming that the change is being implemented, just to tell us it won’t happen a few days before the change was supposed to happen.
With more transparency this would not be a problem. What do I specifically refer to when saying transparency?
We want and need to have insight on the development process.
If you state that you’re trying something new (like PvP game-modes), we really need updates along the way. What issues are you experiencing? Why are you on the edge of abandoning the idea?
If you then decide not to implement the idea, we would’ve been in on the proces and might completely understand the decision. The playerbase might even be encouraging you to stop the development of a certain aspect or to rethink it, just like what would have happened with Skyhammer if we hadn’t been given the information last minute.
Skyhammer was essentially a waste of a developer-time, since it would require a rather large overhaul to be competitive. Note; I’m not trying to be disencouraging, I just don’t wrap my message in gift wrap, I believe the message is clearer if it’s direct.

I’m surprised they still need input honsestly.
I believe most things players need/want have already been regurgitated about a hundered times on the forum now.

But i guess we can make another list that will be deleted.

-WvW:
~ Fix skillag and other lag.
~ Add interesting maps that don’t promote zerging,
~ Commander-team system with bigger groups, more commander UI, More map UI
~ Bloodlust begone,
~ Add interesting mechanics (i mean everyone can stand still in a cirlce to cap) ,
~ Remove orb shrines or bring back the orb with non bigger population faceroll buffs
~ Fix all the glitches (If you don’t know what glitches, you should find a new job)
~Add interesting mechanics to cap a keep/tower/camp or open gates/waypoints
~ Add workers events to fix walls/doors.
~ Remove the skrit and horsies and implement something that actually requires some immagination to create,
~Remove Champions or add something that gives reason for Champs to be there in the first place.
~ Do something about the stale monotonous environement, you can create a exciting looking EB JP yet can’t even skin towers/camps/keeps to look a little different or have any of the mechanics a random PVE JP has??
(I mean so many things you can implement into wvw to make it interesting yet the only thing people tend to fight are obstacles that promote high numbers)
~ Stop towerlords dropping cheast and add chests for anyone helping with the capture of a tower/keep. since the current system promotes lord rushing and tagging.
~And for god sakes and everything that is holy let me kick my partymembers.
~Report for hacking button please.
~Add server alliances and let people guest on allied servers for free.
~Add stuff here..

PVP:

~More gamemodes/maps (just look at guildwars.. you know the game this current game is based on?)
~ PvE currency in pvp.
~Skillag
~CASTING BARS! since people have no clue as to how to discover what other people are playing, the animations of skills are poo add casting bars so i can actually time my interupt on something other then a tiny little hand doing a tiny little movement.
~ Did i mention balance yet?
~Remove skyhammer farming, or atleast the servers where it’s being done on..
Really it’s not hard to miss them the server has; XPFARMING~FOLLOW RULES !!!!!! in it’s title..
~ Fix instagib bug’s on necro
~ Fix combat logs
~ Fix utility reset delay upon leaving a transforation.
~ Fix Fixes
~Add re-targeting enemy upon leaving stealth or remove it.
~Fix op downed state skills or balance them
~Fix leaderboard for the over achievers
~Add a bank in the mists
~Add cooldown timers to skills when in transformed state.
~Progression of characters in general
~Stop implementing moba stuff untill pvp is healthy and enjoyable

Implement these things and i assure you communication between the dev team and players will be more friendly and enjoyable as a result.

Oh and stop talking in coorparative advertisment speak and be blunt.. very very blunt.

Don’t be stubborn. It’s easy to think you are not stubborn, but writing a mmorpg is like the most complex thing ever, and opinions change, perceptions change faster then you guys can keep up. However to get the game to the necessary place of ‘almost perfection’, you guys sometimes must snap out of ‘I put my mind on this method of implementing something, and wont see another option viable unless i’m ready or my boss tells me otherwise’-mindset. This is by no means offence. I would make the mistake too. Like atm you guys have the vision ‘current popular skills will not get any boost whatsoever’, if anything some will get a nerf. Step away from that vision please. This tunnel vision prevents you from seeing real issues with skills, that sometimes requires a boost. It also makes you forget that nerfing a skill = nerfing gameplay/fun in some cases. If you ask me, ‘when was the game most fun, now or when it started’. ‘when it started is the answer. Some nerfs were called for others were not, it’s time to revert a lot of unnecessary nerfs. If you however keep being stubborn, then we players are left with the feeling our game/profession doesn’t have much future.

Make an expansion. I have the feeling gw2 release was rushed, then you guys worked on stuff that could have been in release already, then living story came, and you guys are still catching your breath. Because of that living story is tempting as continuing that isn’t to hard, but starting right now from scratch to an expansion will take ages and scares you. The thing however is expansions bring people back. Expansions are permanent content, not to be scared of being taken away (like living story). On top of that many player simply won’t buy gems no matter what but will buy any shop game content item there is. (like me). I would even buy collector’s edition without a second though. However gems are out of the question, after bad experience with paying for an online game. What is an expansion? more personal/dungeon/heart quest stories. More lands to explore. New jumping puzzles. Etc.

Justin ODell.9517:

Hey guys, Josh (of SAB fame) offered some really good tips in another sub-forum. Since they were buried on page 20 I figured it would be a good idea to post a link to them here.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Collaborative-Development/page/20#post3007420

Does anyone else have any similar advice for us developers? What ways we can make collaborating easier for you? What things are we already doing that you enjoy? What would you like to see more of?

First, let me say I appreciate the level of discussion from reds on the forums right now, I really do. Having said that, it is really difficult for us, or at least me, to take any of this seriously. The game has been out for 14 months, we’ve given tens of thousands of words of feedback and suggestions only to hear, “we can’t talk about that” or “keep the ideas coming”. That’s not dialogue. That’s one party pouring their heart and soul into the void.

Secondly, and I know you don’t intend it this way, but it sounds as if the reds are now saying, “We need to teach you all how to give feedback because you haven’t been doing it right. We would have implemented some of you ideas if only it had been typed better”.

I don’t know if some higher-up in the office finally stepped into the PvP DEVS dungeon and said, “ok, we’re ready to do some things in your little area, go get us some feedback” but that’s what it feels like.

More than anything, I hope my cynicism is unjustified and you all aren’t just doing lip-service like the past year. I hope this is really the start of actual development in the only game mode that I care about, and the reason I bought this game.

Please takes lesson from WvWvW Bloodlust updated. That was one of the possibility of what could happened when a team of Dev worked in a bunker by themselves while thinking “This will be awesome when put it out.”

If you are going to make a new map/mode that players want to play then please come over here and talk to US, players. Please don’t be shy, just show us what game mode you are trying to do and then ask feedback from us.
“How is it?”
“What could have been done”
“What should have been done”
…etc.

And then take back those feedbacks and making change to that new map and then comeback again, keep doing that until both of us agree that this is the map we both want.

Please don’t waste your time in that bunker while thinking “Players are going to love this.” . It is not working 100% and history proved itself.

Actually Siva Mira, players do like it. You assume because you do not, or that a select few of the vocal minority make a complaint post, that it must be an unarguable fact that the entire player base is on board with your perspective. Not only is that not the case, but my personal experience with other players suggest it is quit the opposite.

coglin.1867:

Actually Siva Mira, players do like it. You assume because you do not, or that a select few of the vocal minority make a complaint post, that it must be an unarguable fact that the entire player base is on board with your perspective.

But you are also assuming players do like it, when that could be far from the case. Which is why I hate that argument, and I don’t like that a developer brought it up. All it does it turn discussions into the idiotic “You don’t represent all players” argument from both sides of the table.

Off course you don’t, no one does, everyone knows that. The fact that it was brought is just to minimize your opinion to say it doesn’t matter as much.

When Shimmerless above said “we really need as players transparency from the devs”, is he speaking for all players? No. It is just a general term. And to try and silence people from using that is stupid.

• The forums can represent a vocal minority.
• The forums can represent the majority of the player base.

We don’t know what they represent, and unless ANet has some extensive polling, no one does. That said, I do agree with Josh’s rules in 1,2,3,4.

Justin ODell.9517:

Does anyone else have any similar advice for us developers? What ways we can make collaborating easier for you? What things are we already doing that you enjoy? What would you like to see more of?

Two things that I really like to see in dev posts:

• Directness. In the linked thread, Chris was much more direct in his responses than in the opening post. Cloudy language, while true enough, takes away from the focus. This is perhaps perceived by many as just ‘PR’ fluff, even though it is an honest statement. And if it is perceived as just PR fluff, it can feel almost insulting, as if we’re not being taken seriously. It might feel as if we’re being ‘brushed off’…

• You asking for advice. It shows that you recognize there being a problem, that you are open to suggestions and it gives a direct feeling of communication. By writing this response I already have that feeling. Unlike if I were to post a thread of my own. If I don’t get a dev response on that thread, it would feel like there is no communication.

coglin.1867:

Actually Siva Mira, players do like it. You assume because you do not, or that a select few of the vocal minority make a complaint post, that it must be an unarguable fact that the entire player base is on board with your perspective. Not only is that not the case, but my personal experience with other players suggest it is quit the opposite.

Like it or not maybe not be the actually problem here. Just by looking at Tequatl the Sunless’s updated, do people like it? I am pretty sure people do like it. But what now? Sparkfly Fen is a ghost map.

Colaboration with the forums…

lakjsdgklsdagjklsgdakljsdgkla

Just get new devs, problem solved.
No matter what the forums say (and 90% of it is crap) the forums can’t make the game… it comes down to the devs… and the current ones have their mind completely set that GW2 is perfect short of balance tweaks….

The game is dead.
Like no one plays PVP, if the devs were right and all that the game needed is balance tweaks there would still be people, since that is such a small problem… there’d be actual esports teams playing the game if that were the case…
The game needs large consistent tweaking to be something even remotely popular and the current guys/company just isn’t up to it for one reason or another… and that’s the problem, the only problem.

I responded to Josh on that, but I’ll share my thoughts on this here as well because I feel like it’s something that all the developers need to be conscious of in their responses.

I feel that there are a lot of issues with negative feedback, community backlash, and customers being upset in general that could be mitigated, or avoided altogether by either providing more information, or ensuring that you fully understand the situation when responding to it (and if you’re not sure, ask questions! We do it often enough, don’t be afraid to ask us!)

Now what I mean by this is not to go into great and boring detail about every little aspect of every decision ever made, or every possible solution, or every thought that crosses your mind. That would be ridiculous. However, it’s important to remember that if you’re going to respond to something, think through your response and ask yourself, does this really answer what’s being asked?

When it’s possible, provide answers that tell us your reasoning behind a decision, elaborate! Tell us what worked, what didn’t, what you’re thinking as a potential solution to a problem the community is upset about, or remedying a decision the community had a negative reaction to.

Certainly this level of detail is not always possible, and when it’s not, simply tell us that. Be honest with us, say “We can’t tell you why right now,” but offer us something in response so that we know what’s going on. Communication is a two way street, we certainly tell you what we’re thinking, what we want, what we need… but we don’t hear back from you!

Furthermore, there’s a lot of decisions that players are unhappy with, or feel could have been better if you guys had opened up and talked to us about what you were doing before you did it. It’d sure save you a lot of time if you knew before you went through all the work of making something happen if your player base would have feedback to make it way better.

Perhaps an effective solution that has worked well in other gaming communities would be to elect a player council to help you guys with gathering feedback and representing the communities concerns. The reason this would help you guys is because you could have these players operate under an NDA and share with them more than what you can share on the public forums to help with development processes and get real player feedback on current design topics that you otherwise can’t get without a ‘round table’ of insiders.

Please note that a round table, or an insider group is not the ONLY solution to communication with your player base that you should implement. These other channels of open discussion, focus driven topics, asking us questions, sharing ideas, should all remain in place and be exercised frequently.

An example of something I feel should be done is that you are constantly given feedback on how the players feel the Living Story, and Personal Story are lacking in depth. A great way to help you guys get an idea for what kind of story the players are looking for would be to host a fan fiction contest. You could even reward some of the players by bringing the stories they write into the game through dynamic events revolving around the NPCs or characters they chose to write about.

This kind of direct impact on the game’s story environment and involving players in helping you not only choose the direction, but actually write the story would save you a lot of time and headache in figuring out what we want to see. It would also bring players closer to the developers and draw us into feeling like we have a personal investment in the game.

^+1

(~“)~ /15 ~(” ~)

If we’re honest when we read the forums, there really are threads where the players are selfish and unreasonable. I know I wouldn’t want to have the work I pour my heart and soul into picked apart the way some people do here. As there have been a few large updates recently, and large updates mean more potential for errors, and errors mean more complaints – I can see why we’re seeing an increase in posts from ArenaNet asking players to curb the venom and be more kind and constructive in our criticisms.

At the same time, I’ve seen threads where the angry responses from players are fueled by their frustration at the insufficiency in official communication from ArenaNet when there is an issue. There have been plenty of examples, but the most recent for me was a thread about magic find gear. After the update, people thought it was a bug that their gear was soulbound instead of account bound, and they posted on the forum to find out when it would be corrected. The response that they received from the developer was basically, “This is the way we’re doing it. Hope that clarifies things.” Though there were many posts that followed asking for more information, asking why the plan had changed, citing other ArenaNet sources contradicting this statement, no further official comments were ever made.

At the peak of this verbal riot, I sent an email voicing my concern. I suggested that, if the developers are expected to interface directly with the players in this way, that they need more support. I’m assuming that the developer intend to upset and then ignore the thread. I’ve seen other posts from him, and he seems like a genuinely nice guy. I’m sure he felt that his answer was adequate. The posters on that thread, however, expected more. We understand that things do not always turn out the way they are planned – that’s just life. His message did not acknowledge that there had been a change of plan, and did not offer any explanation or give any instruction on whether or not to expect any further action on the matter. That’s what those players were asking for, and they never received it. His response was quick and precise, but not what they really needed to resolve the issues being raised. The thread was finally closed.

I have to applaud the effort to have an open line of communication between developers and players. The idea of collaborative development is warm and fuzzy and beautiful. Using a public forum for crisis management, however, will only work well for you if you have the resources and the internal lines of communication to support it. A cross-functional crisis management team could be receiving reports on major bugs, investigating and passing information back to the developers so that they can post knowing that they have the buy-in of the entire process chain. I’ve worked in companies that do it this way, and it worked well. Players should be able to get a “Thank you for reporting this. We’re looking into it.” response fairly quickly. After that, it’s a matter of being able to say “here’s what happened and here’s what we can do about it” or “we’re not going to be able to reverse this but we’ve made x changes to make sure that this sort of thing doesn’t happen again”. In cases like the magic find gear, some of these bugs cost players items that they invested not just time, but also real-world currency into, so emotions run high, and silence made many of them very angry.

It seems like you’d have your project management structured this way already, but some of the odd communication gaps we can see on our side when people post from different departments at different times – it’s like the “right hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing” as they say.

I wouldn’t bother to write at all if I didn’t believe that the people who work for ArenaNet have integrity and believe in doing what is right. I really do think that this is more than a job for them, and I admire that. I’m one of those idealistic people who really believes in this company. I hope that this post is received in the spirit I intended and that something I’ve said is helpful.

Sondergaard.8469:

An example of something I feel should be done is that you are constantly given feedback on how the players feel the Living Story, and Personal Story are lacking in depth. A great way to help you guys get an idea for what kind of story the players are looking for would be to host a fan fiction contest. You could even reward some of the players by bringing the stories they write into the game through dynamic events revolving around the NPCs or characters they chose to write about.

I like this idea. It would be fun for the players to somehow be involved in choosing the winner, but at the same time, I like to be surprised by the story, so I wouldn’t want to know everything about the winners.

Every time there is a discussion on how to improve sPVP, posters ask for more modes and new maps. I’m a story sort of person – I’d like to have more stories in the PVP, as well, to go with the new maps. I don’t really like the fractals and missions that change my characters appearance, but maybe other players would like that in sPVP. If the match had a storyline to it of something in GW lore – maybe something more recent like Lionguard against the Aetherblades and the characters changed appearance based on which team you were on – or the Zephyrites against the Aetherblades and it could be in the sky…..? Do you think people would like that kind of thing?

@Sophianne.9204

Yes, personally i would love some story behind mists/pvp going together with some of the pve stories.

The thing that ticks me off is that i see so many cool mechanics in pve that remind me of Fort Aspen wood, or mechanics and gimmics that would really fit in WvW pvp.

I see map designs in gw2 that start off great (the maze in wvw/the underground routes leading to the EB JP/ The jumping puzzle itself.. that get a generic keep dumped on top.
So i find myself wondering: “This would really fit well in pvp, or i wish they would expendthis part of the map all the way to a capturepoint or gate”

I have seen modded dungeon designs turned inside out where a tower was modeled into a mountain with different well accesable routes who would wind in and out of the mountain who had enough space for large battles to ensue without the teams being able to come at melee distance due to large drops and other parts where melee would shine. the route inside the mounain was dark and you could get lost or jumped.
as the routes outside could lead to a quick death due to fall damage.

I believe they used the map for modded king of the hill pvp on a halflife engine.
This map was made by a kid who i think now gives modding lessons on twitch..

Anyway what im trying to say is that one doesn’t need a flat or symetric map/surface to create balance, the new bloodlust mapchanges tend to go that way. yet the mechanic that went with it didn’t live up to what most players wished.
I would say unleash a designer on a borderland map and trow map balance out the window, the borderlands should be a defensive map anyway.

(kinda went offtopic, but hey might as well trow it out there ^^)

@Merlin Dyfed Avalon.5046

I actually think you’re really on to something there. Besides, they’re asking for our input on how to improve PVP, so it doesn’t seem so off-topic to me. I do think we could together make the case that when they ask for suggestions in a forum thread they need to make the threads more targeted to the specific area of development they are working on. If you just open a thread that says “give us suggestions on PVP” it’s bound to get a wide variety of ideas of scattered ideas, whereas if they said “what are you looking for in modes?” “how can we make the maps more interesting?” “how do maps and balancing relate?” – that would narrow the discussion a little closer to what they’re actually looking for…..unless this is just the initial mining expedition.

Anyway, as for the relationship between maps and balance I do have a suggestion. People will have to bear with me here, because this is uber geeky, and it’s not easy to make the connection without seeing it.

Here’s my real world illustration: For a fair amount of time I worked in the test development industry for a company that creates standardized assessments that kids take in school. Every year there are new items on the test and every year there are multiple versions of the test, but the items and the combinations of those items have been tested and determined to be balanced as equal. They are not exactly the same test, but statistically, we worked it out to where each test should be about the same level of difficulty.

Already in game we have multiple classes that are theoretically supposed to be equal. I know we have raging debates on the forums about whether or not they are actually equal, and I know that introducing the idea of multiple maps that are somehow different but balanced in design is asking for the same kind of constant bickering. Map design, however, may be much more simple than trying to determine the subjective difficulty of an item on a test or trying to determine the deadliness of a character build that is also in some way dependent on the skill and playing style of the human controlling it. I have a thief. I haven’t developed the grace under pressure to roll people the way the super-thieves do. If all thieves were like mine, there would not be miles of threads dedicated to ways to kill them and calling for stealth and skill nerfs.

I’m saying – I think it’s theoretically possible to vary the maps in WvW without compromising the defensibly balance. I do think that even if the maps are balanced, the serve that is under-performing will claim that their map is somehow giving them a disadvantage. And I’m saying that as someone who is devoted to a server toward the bottom of the rankings.

For WvW, I’ve seen more issue with the fact that people are playing it like server level PVP, but it’s not really built to reward them that way. The objective on the design side is to capture and hold the points, but what I see mostly is zergs following each other around the map recapturing points. I’m not sure how you inspire people to use strategy when they really don’t want or need to.