Chris, reading from your posts it seems like the biggest problem of CDI’s is time. Which translates into the amount of words you have to read, mostly.
Here are some suggestions for better organizing those threads. Key would be to heavily involve the community to tackle the chores in the initial phases of the CDI so you could focus on feedback from streamlined summaries.
Get 1-2 MVPs per CDI. Regina mentioned DigitalKirin and Lilith Ajit, ask those kind of players for help and many would offer their assistance.
Create several CDI’s per topic to keep things tight. Or clarify stages within the CDI.
Create one for initial feedback that gets sorted & analyzed by mvps. Try to get similar wordings or buzzwords for topics and ideas that appear the most. This way you can easily gauge quantity.
After you closed the first, open another one for reiteration, basically summaries from mvps and revised feedback from anybody else. based on all the other ideas that came after ones initial one. Here is where devs jump in more frequently. Players leave out information not essential to keep posts short.
In the final thread you’d start with the issues you have found to be addressed best/first and possibly could explain why. So players get a feel of what areas might need improved but cannot due to time restraints or technical issues.
Thank you for taking your time, a CDI for creating great CDIs sounds like a great plan.
Do you think it would be possible to get written or numeric feedback from a wider player base ingame? With the forums only representing a small portion of the player base, do you think it’s a good enough average of opinion?
Have a great sunday!
Thanks for the feedback Michael. Note your step plan is roughly how i have run my CDIs in the past. Some good ideas there.
So if adding new dungeons into the game and helping add to the already limited replay value of the game is too much work (dungeons/pvp/wvw). Could we at least have the rewards for dungeons/fractals increased?
This is something we have discussed many times and that I would like us to do.
So if adding new dungeons into the game and helping add to the already limited replay value of the game is too much work (dungeons/pvp/wvw). Could we at least have the rewards for dungeons/fractals increased?
This is something we have discussed many times and that I would like us to do.
Chris
Woo! There’s a nice thread on Reddit and in the dungeon forums about the imbalances/RNG nature of fractals if you want inspiration.
What that folks who don’t see value in something are probably better of not partaking in it?
I think that’s a pretty reasonable statement isn’t it that applies to many things. here is an example I don’t like getting involved in political discussions but I don’t berate or judge folks for doing so.
Kudos for your attempt at sharp wit though (-:
Chris
It was more a comment on the fact that it was imo a legitimate concern that was dismissed outright.
The CDI produced a number of good ideas. There was 8 months of development time and all that we got out of it was a switch from the word “soul bound” to “account bound” and a palette swap. That is something even a novice programmer could do over his lunch break on a Friday afternoon, yet it is all we are being given after 8 months of waiting.
Imo a more appropriate response would have been any of the following:
1. I’m not sure why this took so long I will find out and get back to you (and actually get back to him)
2. We couldn’t do any of those things because of x, but they aren’t off the table if we can get them to work.
and a less appealing response but still better:
3. We can’t go into details about that and it probably isn’t something that will happen
4. We can’t go into details about that but something is in the works.
The CDI worked in the the sense that it produced many good, feasible ideas to take to the devs. It worked in the fact that the first time around you did a very good job of communicating. But something happened. Only the very easiest, simple to code suggestions were brought to us. The rest got lost in the void somewhere. We have heard nothing for 8+ months, we are anxious and worried about the game.
The LS was a huge improvement over season 1, and I think that was in fact partly due to the CDI and player feedback. But it seems that ONLY things related to the LS or the gemstore are being taken into consideration. Any suggestion for other parts of the game are simply being thrown away, at least from my point of view. And it simply isn’t very helpful to the attitudes and frustration of players to tell them to just not participate if they don’t like the results.
The feedback on the results of round 1 is just as important as the feedback itself.
I was replying to the unnecessary final sentence
Regarding discussion of how time has been appropriated that is not something I am not going to discuss I am afraid. We will not be discussing schedules. So to be fair I had said that many times before and also in this thread, so to save myself repeating again and sounding like a broken record (seriously must be close to 50 times now in the last year) I did not discuss that portion of the commentary.
We take a huge amount into consideration but consideration doesn’t equal light speed execution or even that points discussed or considered will be implemented.
We also need to consolidate the channels in which we communicate so we can connect better in discussions and even let folks know we are reading ideas, concerns and discussions. This is mentioned earlier in this thread if you want to see more detail.
Thank you very much for your feedback and your points. They are well made.
So if adding new dungeons into the game and helping add to the already limited replay value of the game is too much work (dungeons/pvp/wvw). Could we at least have the rewards for dungeons/fractals increased?
This is something we have discussed many times and that I would like us to do.
Do you remember the Commander CDI 1 year ago? Why we got only 3 more colors out of it? I love the idea of CDI, but after this I wonder if the community’s time and effort are wasted…
Or maybe the big improvements to the commander system are yet to come?
Do you?
The main things that came out of that CDI was different colors for tags and account-bound tags.
Commander Visibility
More options for the Color/Shape of the tag itself. This could be tied to functionality or rank of commanders but mainly targeted around organization.
Removal of buff display to enemies. As well as we should avoid doing skills/abilities that highlight the commander to enemies.
Ability to limit visibility to a sub group, party, guild, ect..
Tag sizing. (I debate this a bit as when you auto size the tag you can often lose the ability to see how far away something is but it was brought up a lot so listing it here)
Add squads to LFG system.
Commander Tools
More detailed supply info that’s always up. (Increased radius)
Ability to create sub roles within a squad.
Current squad tools are rarely used.
Seems to be some debates on buffs to followers, but there is a lot of good examples of ways to do that.
Squad size needs to be increased.
Ability to group up parties or other commanders to form different squad organization.
Improved chat suppression for commanders
Commander announcements (yellow text across the screen)
Open/Closing Squad tools
Commander gating
Current 100g gate isn’t the cleanest gate. (Whole goal behind a gate is to limit the number of commanders out there.
Gating using WvW abilities seems to have some debate to it, but seems like something we should avoid.
Account bound commander tags vs character bound.
This wasn’t even half of the suggestions in that thread either. The fact that Anet paid it’s WvW team (if there is one anymore) for 8+ months to add different colors to Commander Tags and make them Account-Bound is baffling. Yes, i know, they also worked on EotM, and Golem Mastery, and Siege Disabler, but EotM came out in February 2014. That’s 7 months for Golem Mastery and Siege Disabler?
So yes, i agree with Chris Whiteside, and it’s not worth the frustration when player’s suggestions are ignored. And yes, they were ignored and weren’t implemented.
Hi Nexxe,
My advice to you then would be to not get involved in the next round of CDIs.
Chris
Well that pretty much sums up Anet doesn’t it lol.
What that folks who don’t see value in something are probably better of not partaking in it?
I think that’s a pretty reasonable statement isn’t it that applies to many things. here is an example I don’t like getting involved in political discussions but I don’t berate or judge folks for doing so.
Dear Chris, I would take all these raging with a distant note. Many of the ragers and trolls around here are actively working on casting a dark shadow upon GW2 because a new, soon to be released game needs more people and this is one way to attract them.
Some of the concern in the community are on the spot, but having major hysteria over not including different commander shapes along the colors (an example) is just hilarious.
Just want to put out there that not all of these ragers have a pure intent to make GW2 better. Keep on the good work!
I have always wondered about this topic (-: Have also seen it mentioned on websites.
That said I can understand why some folks are frustrated (I am to sometimes) but we have three golden rules on the design team that I tend to live by outside of work:
1: Don’t be frightened of problems they lead to opportunity.
2: Collaboration is king.
3: Always show respect to those around you.
@Chris Whiteside
I think you should look into making the CDI’s a two step process.
Step 1: Isolate the “problem area” of the topic by discussing what players find unsatisfying or lacking in quality.
Step 2: Choose the problems most commonly raised then start to discuss solutions for said problems in a separate thread with strict guidelines as to what is considered a fix (reasonable amount of work) and what would be a redesign (massive amount of work that must warrant a massive core issue).
Currently the CDI topics has been a mess where problems and solutions are brought up indiscriminately, causing a major headache as to who and how to reply to the topic itself. By isolating the more “pressing” topics from the background noise the whole discussion will be a lot more streamlined and focused, and focus is what has been lacking from previous CDI’s.
A good example was the ranger CDI, where are one point the pet aspect idea + 4-5 other major ideas were being discussed at the same time with replies being made to huge walls of text every few minutes.
That sort of information landslide will never be possible to manage nor stay up to date with. It will overwhelm you and dishearten you.
That being said, as time passes the initial game issues are slowly being fixed and we encounter new issues. At some point there should be a statement whether you wish for a CDI to be relevant to past or present matters.
Players just got to realize that some things will, due to the complexity of the task, take so much time to fix that crying their ears off will not solve the solution anytime soon.
Chris, just wanted to say thanks for the communication, it is really long overdue and please don’t let the negativity by some people turn in to another 6 months of silence. I noticed in the dungeon forum that when Regina posted in a thread, people were like too late, the damage is already done, blah, blah, blah. You can’t please everyone but I’m happy to see you guys opening up and I hope it continues.
Cheers Robert I appreciate you taking the time to post this.
I have been wondering for a while, since you said that many of you like to converse with us and share feedback and such, why doesn’t any of the devs or maybe staff at Anet talk with us in their free time, at home or on break, i know you all have other things to focus on but is it a policy type thing or do you just not like coming on to talk with us even if it doesn’t have to relate to what they do in their job such as; commenting in a thread about your favourite dungeon or event, versus threads asking about content being worked on.
I guess employees have to treat their own forums like their own job but seeing them converse on average player topics like another fake example; ‘need help on ele build!’
I believe (although probably wrong) that if you talked more often then every word you say wouldn’t be taken like a final confirmation or solid answer, but more like “hey that’s cool news i hope it gets implemented” or “great idea Anet!”.
Because right now anything that gets said or announced we think its definite and “omg x is being worked on!!!” although that has slipped since lack of faith.
I just want to let you know I completely appreciate the effort and honesty. It’s really refreshing. Thanks man. I could be completely wrong but it feels like there has been a mgmt. change of heart over there and it’s leading to changes. I hope it’s for the good, but that notwithstanding, Thanks. You rock dude.
Many Thanks Iason. Like i have been saying and Mo said. Communication hasn’t been good enough and we aim to correct that.
That doesn’t mean we haven’t been reading feedback. It does however mean we have lost our connection and honestly a lot of the team who care deeply about Arena and the community are to scared to post because let’s be honest forums in general can be quite toxic.
Many of them however play a lot, are in guilds and communicate in game where funnily enough due to ‘real time’ communication and less anonymity the conversations tend to be a lot less abrasive and more valuable to them.
Anyway I digress. Huzzah for the CDI starting up again and it is great to reconnect with so many folks who have been part of the CDI in the past and old friends.
Do you remember the Commander CDI 1 year ago? Why we got only 3 more colors out of it? I love the idea of CDI, but after this I wonder if the community’s time and effort are wasted…
Or maybe the big improvements to the commander system are yet to come?
Do you?
The main things that came out of that CDI was different colors for tags and account-bound tags.
Commander Visibility
More options for the Color/Shape of the tag itself. This could be tied to functionality or rank of commanders but mainly targeted around organization.
Removal of buff display to enemies. As well as we should avoid doing skills/abilities that highlight the commander to enemies.
Ability to limit visibility to a sub group, party, guild, ect..
Tag sizing. (I debate this a bit as when you auto size the tag you can often lose the ability to see how far away something is but it was brought up a lot so listing it here)
Add squads to LFG system.
Commander Tools
More detailed supply info that’s always up. (Increased radius)
Ability to create sub roles within a squad.
Current squad tools are rarely used.
Seems to be some debates on buffs to followers, but there is a lot of good examples of ways to do that.
Squad size needs to be increased.
Ability to group up parties or other commanders to form different squad organization.
Improved chat suppression for commanders
Commander announcements (yellow text across the screen)
Open/Closing Squad tools
Commander gating
Current 100g gate isn’t the cleanest gate. (Whole goal behind a gate is to limit the number of commanders out there.
Gating using WvW abilities seems to have some debate to it, but seems like something we should avoid.
Account bound commander tags vs character bound.
This wasn’t even half of the suggestions in that thread either. The fact that Anet paid it’s WvW team (if there is one anymore) for 8+ months to add different colors to Commander Tags and make them Account-Bound is baffling. Yes, i know, they also worked on EotM, and Golem Mastery, and Siege Disabler, but EotM came out in February 2014. That’s 7 months for Golem Mastery and Siege Disabler?
So yes, i agree with Chris Whiteside, and it’s not worth the frustration when player’s suggestions are ignored. And yes, they were ignored and weren’t implemented.
Hi Nexxe,
My advice to you then would be to not get involved in the next round of CDIs.
Chris
Ask for feedback.
Ignore feedback.
Realise this is pointless and tell people not to bother with feedback any more.
Sweet, sweet progress.
My point is simple to understand so please respect that i am allowed an opinion.
Which is, in even more simple terms:
If you think the CDI is pointless then don’t partake in it.
And whilst we are on the subject. if you think everything mentioned in a CDI is going to be agreed upon and magically created overnight then your expectations are perhaps a little bit high.
Chris please smack Mike O’Brien upside the head to wake him up out of his fantasy world. His entire post illustrates the problem that a large part of the community has with Anets communications. Instead of actually communicating he made a PR statement and left. This is the core of the problem. Something is thrown out there without any actual discussion one way or the other. What you’ve been doing is what Mike should have been doing after making this thread and that is interact with the community.
Of course I completely disagree with his statement that “If we make optimistic promises and then can’t deliver on them, everyone suffers”. I pretty much convinced that what has been happening for the last year, the non-communicative nature, has damaged the game far more than a few unkept promises could ever have done. While I don’t have the numbers, I feel confident that the game really isn’t in that good of a condition overall.
The living Story, WvW, Dungeons, SPvP all have problems that only a massive overhaul can fix. An overhaul that can only be accomplished with the help of the community, but only a community that wants to help. You have lost a good portion of the forum community. Personally I don’t think much will change, because I lack faith that management will make it happen. I’m still willing to try, but Anet needs to completely change their tune if they/you want to succeed. The name Arenanet was always positive, but it has been thrown into the wind.
I will not be smacking Mo and please note I am part of the Studio Management Team. We are doing our best to reconnect (all of us). I have explained in the thread what the issues have been and why it is important that we have our stance.
I am not going to explain the points again and note that I am not going to be responding to nonconstructive posts. This way I can stay focused on the task at hand which is starting the CDI again and having some awesome conversation and design discussion.
Chris
P.S: If you want to see some of my answers to your points that I have made please look at my post history on this thread. if you are still unhappy then i doubt there is anything I can do or say to change your mind.
I think this is the problem right here. You/Arenanet thinks that holding onto that stance so rigidly is correct, while from my point of view it the cause of all the problems that keep getting blown up bigger and bigger. You as a whole are convinced that your reasons for not straying are correct, while my experiences tell me differently. Let loose of that rigidness and you’ll find that you can tell things without going into specifics. You can not let fear of disappointment guide you. Fear is always a bad motivator and it is fear that is the basis of that stance.
Personally I think we (I) could give a better sense of future goals in the upcoming CDIs. But no specifics.
I am definitely going to try to be more inclusive in terms of high levels road map for features etc.
Do you remember the Commander CDI 1 year ago? Why we got only 3 more colors out of it? I love the idea of CDI, but after this I wonder if the community’s time and effort are wasted…
Or maybe the big improvements to the commander system are yet to come?
Do you?
The main things that came out of that CDI was different colors for tags and account-bound tags.
Commander Visibility
More options for the Color/Shape of the tag itself. This could be tied to functionality or rank of commanders but mainly targeted around organization.
Removal of buff display to enemies. As well as we should avoid doing skills/abilities that highlight the commander to enemies.
Ability to limit visibility to a sub group, party, guild, ect..
Tag sizing. (I debate this a bit as when you auto size the tag you can often lose the ability to see how far away something is but it was brought up a lot so listing it here)
Add squads to LFG system.
Commander Tools
More detailed supply info that’s always up. (Increased radius)
Ability to create sub roles within a squad.
Current squad tools are rarely used.
Seems to be some debates on buffs to followers, but there is a lot of good examples of ways to do that.
Squad size needs to be increased.
Ability to group up parties or other commanders to form different squad organization.
Improved chat suppression for commanders
Commander announcements (yellow text across the screen)
Open/Closing Squad tools
Commander gating
Current 100g gate isn’t the cleanest gate. (Whole goal behind a gate is to limit the number of commanders out there.
Gating using WvW abilities seems to have some debate to it, but seems like something we should avoid.
Account bound commander tags vs character bound.
This wasn’t even half of the suggestions in that thread either. The fact that Anet paid it’s WvW team (if there is one anymore) for 8+ months to add different colors to Commander Tags and make them Account-Bound is baffling. Yes, i know, they also worked on EotM, and Golem Mastery, and Siege Disabler, but EotM came out in February 2014. That’s 7 months for Golem Mastery and Siege Disabler?
So yes, i agree with Chris Whiteside, and it’s not worth the frustration when player’s suggestions are ignored. And yes, they were ignored and weren’t implemented.
Hi Nexxe,
My advice to you then would be to not get involved in the next round of CDIs.
You asked me to be honest so I am going to be. I am starting to feel like doing another CDI just isn’t worth the frustration, huge amount of time and heartache.
No kitten Chris. If I had to deal with clients who behave like the worst in this forum (including myself at times), treating a product I’ve poured my soul into so poorly, I’d have given up long ago.
You’re a developer. You don’t need to be dealing with all of this crap. Your company needs to hire some dedicated people to take care of communication. Not more marketing people to deliver slick hype designed to sell gems/accounts, but folks to honestly communicate with players and sift through the heartwrenching bullkitten that won’t hit home personally.
I just wanted to throw another voice in saying thank you, and that we do appreciate what you’re trying to do here. But you’re just one man, with a lot of pre-existing responsibilities.
Go kick your boss in the kitten and tell him to give you a raise or (and?) hire some people to take on what you’ve been doing. You can’t save this company alone.
Hi Dlonie,
I absolutely agree we need more Community personnel presence and we are working toward that right now. I do though want to continue to push the CDI forward and really it is a development tool and this requires developers. I really value it a lot, i think a lot of people know this. If we can just find a balance in which myself and the team can reach a good development vs CDI balance then i will be super happy.
Sadly though I am not a trained Community specialist and so things can get pretty frustrating because I am very passionate about the team, Arenanet and the community. So I am just going to ignore unproductive posts…simple as that.
Note I am not referring to your post and I really appreciate your feedback.
Chris
P.S: In regard to more manpower toward communication we are working on that (-: and I would rather not kick anyone in the balls much less Mo who is a friend (-:
Chris please smack Mike O’Brien upside the head to wake him up out of his fantasy world. His entire post illustrates the problem that a large part of the community has with Anets communications. Instead of actually communicating he made a PR statement and left. This is the core of the problem. Something is thrown out there without any actual discussion one way or the other. What you’ve been doing is what Mike should have been doing after making this thread and that is interact with the community.
Of course I completely disagree with his statement that “If we make optimistic promises and then can’t deliver on them, everyone suffers”. I pretty much convinced that what has been happening for the last year, the non-communicative nature, has damaged the game far more than a few unkept promises could ever have done. While I don’t have the numbers, I feel confident that the game really isn’t in that good of a condition overall.
The living Story, WvW, Dungeons, SPvP all have problems that only a massive overhaul can fix. An overhaul that can only be accomplished with the help of the community, but only a community that wants to help. You have lost a good portion of the forum community. Personally I don’t think much will change, because I lack faith that management will make it happen. I’m still willing to try, but Anet needs to completely change their tune if they/you want to succeed. The name Arenanet was always positive, but it has been thrown into the wind.
I will not be smacking Mo and please note I am part of the Studio Management Team. We are doing our best to reconnect (all of us). I have explained in the thread what the issues have been and why it is important that we have our stance.
I am not going to explain the points again and note that I am not going to be responding to nonconstructive posts. This way I can stay focused on the task at hand which is starting the CDI again and having some awesome conversation and design discussion.
Chris
P.S: If you want to see some of my answers to your points that I have made please look at my post history on this thread. if you are still unhappy then i doubt there is anything I can do or say to change your mind.
Creating a CDI about communication is like forming a committee to discuss how to form committees.
Morning All,
You asked me to be honest so I am going to be. I am starting to feel like doing another CDI just isn’t worth the frustration, huge amount of time and heartache.
As i have said many many times before getting the logistics around communication right is extremely important. Time is precious and anything that can be done to make every second more valuable is paramount. Any time a developer spends on CDI is time away from the game. The benefit however is huge in terms of the products evolution so it is an extremely difficult balancing act.
Chris
I can understand the frustration in dealing with certain individuals on these forums, and cannot in conscience recommend you interact with them. It’s y’all’s call. We cannot evaluate the value inherent to CDI’s since we don’t have the full range of information that ANet has.
If you do decide to go ahead with the CDI’s, you may have to ignore some comments that are rooted in disappointment. It’s nice to be invested in one’s work to the point that you care about it. If it helps, some of us appreciate your efforts.
P.S. I did suggest you take the weekend off…
Hehe Indigo perhaps I should have done (-:
I am going write a post on the impact of CDI thus far and then open a preliminary discussion about topics we could discuss in the CDI next week.
Creating a CDI about communication is like forming a committee to discuss how to form committees.
Morning All,
You asked me to be honest so I am going to be. I am starting to feel like doing another CDI just isn’t worth the frustration, huge amount of time and heartache.
As i have said many many times before getting the logistics around communication right is extremely important. Time is precious and anything that can be done to make every second more valuable is paramount. Any time a developer spends on CDI is time away from the game. The benefit however is huge in terms of the products evolution so it is an extremely difficult balancing act.
You don’t have to look up any posts. I’m sure the forum-users will be all over that. Lol. Who wouldn’t want to take credit for a great idea! Just a list of things that were influenced by/implemented because of the CDIs. =)
Exactly, we don’t need a point by point presentation of every single small sniff of CDI that rubbed off into the game.
Just maybe the most meaningful things you can recall (top10?)
You don’t have to look up any posts. I’m sure the forum-users will be all over that. Lol. Who wouldn’t want to take credit for a great idea! Just a list of things that were influenced by/implemented because of the CDIs. =)
Chris, you have mentioned many times (or, at least, a few times) in the past CDIs that you (the Devs/ArenaNet) would communicate to us what ideas or implementation discussions were placed into the game. In other words, what feedback you took from the CDIs and implemented, in some form or other, into the game.
Considering how often it is commented on the forums how ArenaNet never listens, never uses anything from the CDIs (or any other feedback), I think it would be great if you (ArenaNet) could post a list of things that were either implemented, or influenced and found their way into, the game.
Could you perhaps do that this time? Soon-ish? I would be really interested, and it might make many players feel connected to see something they contributed to found its way into the game (in some form, anyway).
Thank you in advance. =)
Yeah I need to do this.
It will take up a lot of time however and remember I am a dev on the design team.
However what I can do is list the specific areas but not link them back to posts which is what I would ideally like to do.
So i was thinking maybe we could have a CDI next week about the logistics (Methods, format, etc etc) of better communication on both sides?
thoughts?
Chris
People seem to be of the opinion that CDIs never really did what they were supposed to do. If your solution to the communication problems (including CDIs) is to have a CDI on it, then you’re pretty much shooting yourself in the foot.
Forget the format for this one, and try just talking. Yes, you’ll get a lot of static and noise, but you get that in a CDI, too. And don’t talk about just the big game stuff. You’re human, talk like it. Act like it. You guys come across as faces and names without any souls or humor. Relax a little. You’ll get more understanding as a person than as a job title and a name.
I am sorry if I come across as inhuman. It is because i am from the UK and speak a different language (-:
But seriously this is how I talk and it entertains the guys at work so who am I to take away their fun!
So i was thinking maybe we could have a CDI next week about the logistics (Methods, format, etc etc) of better communication on both sides?
thoughts?
Chris
Is a roadmap of sorts off the table for this? (i.e. give us the outline of the plans for the coming 3/6/whatever months)
I personally don’t think a lot of direct contact is needed when we are having ’’constant’’ updates on certain things. But they have been severely lacking.
I do think you can take a look at how other companies/structures are being handled.
For instance you could take from reddit how to make topics more structured. Each reply pretty much is it’s own ‘’sub-topic’’ inside of a post. This lets you reply to eachother regarding the same responses. I think that’d work nicely for this forum, in a more aesthatically pleasing way.
It also has to be made easier to find ‘’Dev Posts’’ inside of a topic. People care deeply for what you guys have to say, and currently the only way to easily find it is the Dev Tracker. But it’s still a hassle. Simply turn the Anet text bubble into a button that takes you to the post(s).
I loved the way the ‘’Mind Stab’’ discussion was handled for the mesmer.
IIRC someone at Anet mentioned we don’t like how it is now, we’re working on changing it. How would you like it being changed within it’s current function?
Debate happened. And now some time later we see a change.
Also, how open are you guys to debating every single skill/ability in the game? (More in the sense of, would this be useful to try and debate? I did something similar in a smaller way during the beta stage for the guardian, I didn’t seem to get anything out of that)
Think I’m already getting ahead of myself, sorry.
I think we should talk about options for discussion around road map but please understand if we do it will be theoretical design decisions on improving existing parts of the game as well as discussing potential evolutions.
So i was thinking maybe we could have a CDI next week about the logistics (Methods, format, etc etc) of better communication on both sides?
thoughts?
Chris
I feel as though, from past CDI’s, there should already be an abundance of resources and insight into what this community wants. Looking back, reflecting on these things… in some ways, seems better than opening up a number of “new” CDI’s that will likely result in wires being crossed.
I’m in the design industry, unrelated to gaming, but design regardless.
From my perspective… CDI’s are essentially like the “interview” process we have with our clients. From here, we receive a brief. (i.e. key points of contention, requirements for the job to come into fruition, a basis to work from)
We develop a “program”. This covers everything from who will be on the job, “expected” time taken, detailing the different stages of design from conceptual & design development, to practical completion. Order dates, expected delays… you get the point.
My point is, it feels like we’ve been ramming our heads against the wall “briefing” the “deisgner” for months… and months. It’s almost as if we’ve given you the brief, (CDI’s) you’ve said yep, great. We’ll take this on board and be working toward improving ____x feature__.
Monday morning, 8:45 AM. We’re the disgruntled client yelling at you over the phone, asking where our schematic designs are. You’re telling us you require another meeting before you can get started.
I respectfully disagree.
I concede that some CDIs were more valuable and collaborative than others but I will have to ask you to trust that it wasn’t through lack of trying.
However a number of CDIs have had a major impact on the game from Living World Post Marionette to Feature Packs. We aren’t going to go into specifics of development schedule and I am sorry that this is tough.
It is tough for us to, but please understand that we don’t want to disappoint, we have made mistakes like this before in premature delivery of info and that isn’t fun for the community either.
This said I intend for the CDI’s moving forward to have more focused and specific discussions and we will go from there. Our communication or presence for want of a more suitable description has been below par and we are going to work to correct this.
A connection to the community is of huge importance and we aim to rebuild the bridge.
So i was thinking maybe we could have a CDI next week about the logistics (Methods, format, etc etc) of better communication on both sides?
thoughts?
Chris
I think that would be great! Just being able to do THIS is a step in the right direction. Maybe setting a specific time 1hr or so would help I don’t know if that is the current format but just like guild events if we can coordinate the timing maybe that will help get everyone on the same page and won’t feel that we are being “left in the dark”. Fellow Tyrians we also have to show respect I agree we don’t have to have the same point of views but we still have to respect each other and the staff working together benefits us ALL.
That’s a cool idea. I will announce the day and time a few days in advance and then when I am afk I will say so in the thread.
Sorry, to clarify in regard to ‘Streamline’ I mean consolidate the number of channels of communication so we are able parse the flow of information better and in so doing connect more easily.
Chris
Could you kindly elucidate? What does this mean in practical terms? Without meaning to sound rude, your post seems like business jargon.
Please don’t infract this: It is a genuine enquiry.
Translated, they chat in a lot of different forums and media. The players never get the full sense of what’s being communicated and the developers have trouble keeping track of what’s being said where. They’d like to focus their efforts more.
Exactly. We will be looking out our forums as well as other options to ensure that we can spend our time effectively and not miss stuff.
I know you’re busy – probably far more than most forum users realize, and that sucks; you shouldn’t have to shoulder the entire burden of communicating with players gratis on your free time. It should really be sponsored more by the company itself rather than merely condoned.
The one piece of advice I’d give is don’t streamline too much. A lot of people are looking for much less formal interaction – off the cuff stuff.
I realize this might not be kosher to link another mmo’s discussion forums, but seriously take a look at (link removed, just in case…) – and yeah, that’s just one thread, but entirely typical of Blizzard communication.
You get something like that.. even if you as a player don’t agree, you can at least say “Yeah, okay, I’ll go with it cuz they got a bit of a reason”. You become a lot more willing to give changes a shot, and more able to provide feedback vis a vis the intended effects of the change versus the reality.
Oh wow. That’s the sort of discussion I’d like to see for this game. If you asked me “What one thing would restore enough of your confidence in GW2’s future that you’d start buying gems again?”, this would be my answer. Players and the company sitting down and discussing things, human to human, no bullkitten.
Everything else in the post above is spot on, too. Very true.
One thing that’s really surprised me about the silence on the forums is the business aspect of it. For a game with a F2P business model, you really need to let your players know that you’re listening and care about the things that matter to them. We don’t want to buy gems to support a company that appears to be ignoring whatever part of the game we love. You can tempt us with items in the store, but the money will flow more easily when there’s a layer of trust that the money is really going into making the game more fun. At the end of the day, every armor set in the store is just shiner pixels. I’d rather invest in the game’s future, but I need to know that they’re interested in providing the sorts of experiences I come here for.
I suspect that a lot of the fixes and features we’ve been asking for are in the works. I suspect some of them were in development and were discovered to be impractical to finish. I suspect some are just not at all a priority in light of more pressing issues. But I can’t understand why this information isn’t shared? What’s the harm in letting us know “We can’t handle this”, “This isn’t going to happen”, or “This is on the way, but we’re still designing how it will all work”?
These sorts of posts used to happen. Skim through former employee Robert Hrouda’s posting history; he was our “contact” from the dungeon forum and provides quite a few wonderful example of the sorts of interactions that show the company cares. Those need to return in order to restore my confidence in the company, and I’m sure I’m not alone.
tl;dr We will buy more gems if you talk to us, because we’ll know we’re supporting a company we can trust.
We just want to build a better connection. Gems really isn’t the goal.
We knew that we needed to do more for communication. This has only been even more obvious this week. This has nothing to do with PR and everything to do with doing a better job with the connection with the community.
Not to continually jump on you, or anything, but, again; this isn’t the first time you’ve said such things.
So in order to do more than just jump up and down and proclaim “you already said that!” a million times, I’d like to ask a serious question of you, if I might, Chris;
You’ve now stated that you know that better communication is needed, and that it’s even more obvious as of this passing week. So my question is this:
What are you guys going to actually do about it? What is going to occur in order to foster this discourse?
Personally I am looking forward to building a better bridge.
Before one can build a bridge, they must build a solid foundation for said bridge.
We are going to streamline our methods of communication and put more manpower toward communication.
I know I have said that I have wanted a better bridge in the past but I am a developer and I just cannot absolutely commit to 100% CDI/Communication problem solving due to responsibilities elsewhere. Therefore we are as Mo has stated focusing on this from a company perspective now.
Thanks for your feedback.
Chris
I know you’re busy – probably far more than most forum users realize, and that sucks; you shouldn’t have to shoulder the entire burden of communicating with players gratis on your free time. It should really be sponsored more by the company itself rather than merely condoned.
The one piece of advice I’d give is don’t streamline too much. A lot of people are looking for much less formal interaction – off the cuff stuff.
You get something like that.. even if you as a player don’t agree, you can at least say “Yeah, okay, I’ll go with it cuz they got a bit of a reason”. You become a lot more willing to give changes a shot, and more able to provide feedback vis a vis the intended effects of the change versus the reality.
Hi,
Sorry, to clarify in regard to ‘Streamline’ I mean consolidate the number of channels of communication so we are able parse the flow of information better and in so doing connect more easily.
We knew that we needed to do more for communication. This has only been even more obvious this week. This has nothing to do with PR and everything to do with doing a better job with the connection with the community.
Not to continually jump on you, or anything, but, again; this isn’t the first time you’ve said such things.
So in order to do more than just jump up and down and proclaim “you already said that!” a million times, I’d like to ask a serious question of you, if I might, Chris;
You’ve now stated that you know that better communication is needed, and that it’s even more obvious as of this passing week. So my question is this:
What are you guys going to actually do about it? What is going to occur in order to foster this discourse?
Personally I am looking forward to building a better bridge.
Before one can build a bridge, they must build a solid foundation for said bridge.
We are going to streamline our methods of communication and put more manpower toward communication.
I know I have said that I have wanted a better bridge in the past but I am a developer and I just cannot absolutely commit to 100% CDI/Communication problem solving due to responsibilities elsewhere. Therefore we are as Mo has stated focusing on this from a company perspective now.
Thank you, but don’t care as it’s too little too late. The only reason for any of this is because the tag issue went viral. Now that it’s a public issue, Anet did a 180 for good PR. Nothing more, nothing less.
You had plenty of chances to communicate with the players before this and say the exact same thing. It took bad press for you to finally do anything.
We knew that we needed to do more for communication. This has only been even more obvious this week. This has nothing to do with PR and everything to do with doing a better job with the connection with the community.
Regarding CDI there shouldn’t have been such a long break and honestly I saw it very much as a development tool and I didn’t realize how much members of the initiative enjoyed it just from a pure communication perspective. I won’t make that mistake again.
Sorry to hear it is to little to late for you.
Personally I am looking forward to building a better bridge.
chris its nice to se you back i figured we tired you out on the cdis. its great to know they are coming back i was worried they might never return and some of us do appreciate the work youve put into them. i understand the cdis were all extra time on your part its one of the bright point of the communication betweens us and anet. my thoughts are when your passionate about something you give too much of yourself. i personally like to see someone not a dev specifically who might run it keep everyone in line and be a go between the dev and us. thanks again chris for your time and effort
Thanks Ricky,
I agree we need to work together to get better coverage and we are actively looking into this now. It is worth noting that the CDI is a dev initiative so I am always going to be involved for those reasons and also that 9/10 i really enjoy the conversations (-:
To have Mike pop on and say Hi is a nice treat but considering the current moral of the community and the toxic threads below that have been the norm of late , a ban-aid isn’t quiet the solution when a defibrillator is required.
I understand that your time is of immense value and limited but there is a growing need for some questions to be answered and not just browsed over ,as the passion of this community is one that has been built over the last 8 years.
Players are getting frustrated at the simple things that were done so well in GW1, that we know you guys can deliver, that are simply put on the back burner for the LS( note I do love this season alot more then the last).
Chris you seam to draw the short straw mate, so thank you for again stepping up when the padded cells are full, you will need a drink before the nite is done ill say.I haven’t gotten into the CDI format of things as it always seams to go wayward for my likings ,bit old school here .
anyway is nice to see some talking from you all cheers
Hi Phabby,
I didn’t get the short straw, I really enjoy working with you all on CDIs but to be fair I was a little burned out after the last set. This said it is my fault that there has been such a long gap in CDIs and no one elses. Glad to see so much excitement about the return of the initiative.
I don’t want to want to derail the thread, but yes absolutely we have discussed player feedback about these areas of the game.
This right here is the start players have been asking for. I’m not going to say something like this is a perfect answer, because it still leaves the who, the when, and the how completely ambiguous, but it’s at least a confirmation that ‘yes, we’ve seen it’.
As a roleplayer you have no idea what an absolute sigh of relief it is to hear it’s been discussed. For that area, and many others, it would be a much greater relief if someone came in an talked explicitly about the discussions, but as a start, just being acknowledged is so much a step beyond the silence.
Hi,
We read many forums all the time, we just need to do a better job of communicating that and working to discuss topics.
In retrospect the CDI break has probably been to long as well (That’s my fault).
Chris
First new CDI topic, how to improve communication between devs and community :p
That is the first thing we will discuss. Specifically logistics around CDI being hard to follow due to the size of the threads and how to choose topics.
We left of last with the general consensus being that Arena chooses but we should revisit that to see what current opinion.
Thanks for the welcome back to the CDI all. We are looking forward to it to.
Chris
Hey Chris!
Not want to be impatient but can you speed things up a bit this time? Like only one week to discuss what to discuss and continue with the actual topic(s) the next week? Or something like that.
ps: Send some cookies at least to the dungeon forums. :C
Hi Dalanor,
I get where you are coming from, however as you know sometimes problem solving and discussion can drill quite deep and it is important to us to get to a point where we have a full understanding of the idea/s.
So i think your goal is spot on but I think we need to look at ways of making the discussion more accessible in other areas.
I don’t want to want to derail the thread, but yes absolutely we have discussed player feedback about these areas of the game.
This right here is the start players have been asking for. I’m not going to say something like this is a perfect answer, because it still leaves the who, the when, and the how completely ambiguous, but it’s at least a confirmation that ‘yes, we’ve seen it’.
As a roleplayer you have no idea what an absolute sigh of relief it is to hear it’s been discussed. For that area, and many others, it would be a much greater relief if someone came in an talked explicitly about the discussions, but as a start, just being acknowledged is so much a step beyond the silence.
Hi,
We read many forums all the time, we just need to do a better job of communicating that and working to discuss topics.
In retrospect the CDI break has probably been to long as well (That’s my fault).
This has probably been mentioned already, but since I saw no response for it repetition can’t hurt.
Ages ago, in one of the older Ready Up streams, after the last WvW tournament, a CDI regarding WvW seasons/tournaments was mentioned to be “coming within a week” I don’t think I would have missed it if it did. So whatever happened to that?
Hi Crise,
i will double check. That seems like eons ago so please forgive me for my weak memory (-:
Oh you’ve got to be kidding me! Did you really just say nothing about saying nothing?!
I can’t believe the acolytes here that are lavishing praises on Anet, as if minions groveling at the feet of their masters. The interview (which I’m sure this is in reference to) was not just one wrong, it was a proverbial straw on an overburdened camel’s back! One apology isn’t going to fix this for you, Anet. One right isn’t going to resolve it. You’ve lost a lot of players because your responses and your “listening” has been lackluster.
I’m sure there are going to be zealots lashing out at me for this post, but this is my opinion and I have a right to express it as a consumer: I am not pleased with Anet’s idea of what they think the players want.
Oh stop. He has a life too. It’s 7pm where he is let him relax with his family.
Thanks again Chris for dealing with us. Flashbacks of you working through Christmas happening right now.
Christmas was awesome. We were talking about that today.
That is the first thing we will discuss. Specifically logistics around CDI being hard to follow due to the size of the threads and how to choose topics.
We left of last with the general consensus being that Arena chooses but we should revisit that to see what current opinion.
Thanks for the welcome back to the CDI all. We are looking forward to it to.
There have been a number of questions about when the CDI will spin up again.
The answer is shortly after our next Feature Pack is released.
Looking forward to collaborating with you all and having some awesome discussions.
Chris
Omg Chris, we’ve missed you! Please come back soon and chat! Bring josh too if you want! But please you are the only one (other than smith and gaile) that tries to pay attention to us and we miss it :’(
We missed you all to. Josh will definitely be part of the CDIs.
The timing is right to spin up CDIs again now. A lot of everyone’s hard work and suggestions have gone into our work on Living World, and Feature Pack etc and so it makes sense to spin the CDI up following the release of the Feature Pack.
Chris
P.S: Going to head home and will jump back on when I get settled and haven given the kids a big hug.
What about communicating with yourselves? From what I’ve read, especially on glassdoor.com, it seems that communication between the upper management and the lower level employees, and understanding between upper management and the players, is severely lacking. I’d personally rather see something done to improve ArenaNet as a whole than increased communication with the players. Communication with the players is worthless if the company can’t run efficiently and produce good content, and players have noticed for a while now how badly prioritized and managed content creation has been.
What about communicating with yourselves? From what I’ve read, especially on glassdoor.com, it seems that communication between the upper management and the lower level employees, and understanding between upper management and the players, is severely lacking. I’d personally rather see something done to improve ArenaNet as a whole than increased communication with the players. Communication with the players is worthless if the company can’t run efficiently and produce good content, and players have noticed for a while now how badly prioritized and managed content creation has been.
You know what they say about assumptions…
My advice is don’t always believe what you read on the internet.
Anyway no more comment on this but I thought I would give my opinion (-:
Big fan of the CDIs. Glad to hear they’re coming back. I know I’ve been more than sarcastic about a few things lately, but.. genuinely, we’ve also seen a lot of cool things come from them.
Keep the communication coming. The back and forth is worth it – in tangible and intangible ways. In a sheer dollars and cents kinda way, too.
