166 replies to this topic

[DirePhoenix]

jozkhan, on 26 April 2013 - 03:03 PM, said:

No it's actually a word for word quote by MWO Creative Director Bryan Ekman in response to the forum vote on 3rd person view actually

It just seemed pertinent to the current situation somehow

Ekman was referring to the playerbase of MWO. Very very few people who play MWO visit the forums (or any games playerbase visiting their game's forums for that matter).

Playerbase =/= forum users.

However, forum users == forum users.

So, questioning forum users and taking input about the forums that they use is pertinent. Taking input about the forums from people that only play the game and don't visit the forums would not matter. Taking input about the game from players that use the forums and play the game has to be balanced against the people that play the game and don't use the forums because the proportion of forumites vs total players is so small.

[Mechwarrior Buddah]

jozkhan, on 26 April 2013 - 03:27 PM, said:

Correct me if I'm wrong but K town is a subforum of a subforum of a subforum yes? Buried 3 layers deep that casuals have no access to as you MUST be logged in to even see it exists as it doesnt show up if not logged into the website. Why is that by the way? It seems to be the only subforum this applies to?

Its the hiding place for all the threads they dont want to just delete
or the ones they want to be made fun of

Edited by Mechwarrior Buddah, 26 April 2013 - 06:42 PM.

[Zphyr]

Workarounds & Help a Player
- Move Workarounds to rest under Help a Player.
There aren't that many "real" workarounds to start with, most seem to be questions and not answers. While it's "support" it may gain more visibility (specially for new players) if it were in there. I liked it when we had a Workaround sub-forum under each Patch, as it helps solving that Patch's (and previous) issues that may have been corrected later on. However I do not see it being of much use as we walk (hopefully) towards more stable releases.

BattleMech Guides
- Keep BattleMech Guides divided by Weight-class.
While sub-forums inside a sub-forum is often frowned upon, in this case it makes sense... ish. At least it would be easier to find what we need (again, specially for newbies) since our current search function is so very lacking. The ability to post outside of those sub-sub-forums is nice, as it allows less class specific guides.

Other Guides
- Keep the various Guide sections divided in their subjects.
Important note: I choose this one only because we need sub-forums... but not this many! It looks organized but in an OCD manner of organization. But unifying everything becomes too confusing.

Menus & UI Game Discussion
- Do Not create this subforum.
No need, indeed.

Mech Decor Discussion
- Do Not create this subforum.
Come on, this is just being nitpicky. You actually considered this one instead of other suggestions? We can speak of whether my Hula Girl is sexier than your Hula Girl somewhere else, instead of a specific (and yet another) section for it, like Mech, maybe Loadout or in a non-existing General. Or Meta? Still don't know what's that one for.

Ready Room and Debriefing Room
- Keep the two sub-forums distinguished.
And then remove the "look how awesome I am" sub-forum, it's usually just for the ego and does not seem to be of much use content-wise. If someone needs help there's an area for that, if someone want to advise based on a match or a hundred, there's also an area for that. If someone want to brag, then there's also an area for that! Or used to. The ready room may be interesting as a welcoming area (specially when C3 works as intended)... but look out for the guilds and groups and clans ads in it. The other alternative is to simply remove both of them.

Factions
- Leave Factions sections under MWO Universe.
They are part of the MWO Universe and will play a decisive role when CW hits, no?

Fan Movement
- Keep the Fan Forums on the Front Page to increase their visual presence.
Please the Fans, please keep it in the Front Page... at most, only not that eye-catching, perhaps? For example, many forums put fan art and fictions under the same banner of fan creations; or perhaps merging digital contents (videos, mostly) with websites. Anyway, IMHO it can stay as it is.

BattleTech Discussion
- Revert and merge all back into BattleTech Discussion.
It does no harm separating them... but looking at the numbers of topics in each one, do we need 3 more sub-forums where 2 of them are nearly empty? However, it may encourage more discussions regarding video-games if those 2 existing topics were not dwarfed by those 404 about the TT...


Just some opinions as a player, forum member and mods in another forums. The second change did improve usability, but it's still not that user-friendly. Fortunately MW fans are older than many other gaming communities, but people in general are getting less and less inclined to lose time figuring out what they believe should be obvious. Also, please organize the pain that is the International forums section... there are too many of them in the front page. I am part of the "international players" yet don't think we need such a highlight in form of a handful of half-empty often-ignored forums.

[Mechwarrior Buddah]

IMO LESS subforums is better. Yes, it becomes more easily obvious to new players that there are a number of issues, but it also makes those new players less likely to see 50,000 subforums and close the browser because its too complicated

[blinkin]

Jaguar Prime, on 26 April 2013 - 06:30 PM, said:

2, The only time they listen is when there is an uproar. (we can always take a trip down memory lane starting in closed beta.)

yes lets!

• state rewind (direct attempt to counter lag shield)
  
• PPC/ERPPC heat reduction (i thought they were great weapons before this but the community disagreed)
  
• jump jets (several changes to balance them and keep people off of skyscrapers)
  
• UAC5 (holy crap they have tried dozens of methods to balance these)
  
• flamers (huge damage buff recently)
  
• machine guns (crit damage was an attempt to make them desirable)
  
• testing grounds (was ripped right out of the suggestions forum)
  
• alpine (came from countless complaints that maps were too small)
  
• streaks (went through several changes in closed beta)
  
• cockpit size for almost every released mech (all directly from QQ threads)
  
• ballistic weapon flight speeds (increased because people whined about not being able to aim)
  
• they got rid of firing delay on ballistic weapons (i never even imagined this was possible)
  
• locking arms to torso (that was a rough surprise when i first played with that)
  
• decaying throttle (again one of the community demands that i had to turn off)
  
• manual missile doors (i just got used to the 0.50 second delay when using my SRM catapult before that was added)
  
• missile door indicator (not what it could be but it is there)
  
• chat before match
  
• chat after match
  
• mech designations displayed for other players in game
  
• the broken ship out in the water on forest colony
  
• the rocks added to caustic
  
• double heat sink adjustments (whether you agree or not there were plenty of posts about nerfing DHS)
  
• several redesigns on river city
  
• thermal (i thought the old version was fine)
  
• night vision (i loved it for close combat and just wished there were more night maps)
  
• gauss rifle hit points (direct result of gaussapult QQ threads)
  
• increases on most AC weapon ammo
  
• ECM effect on PPC (from ECM QQ threads)
  
• new pilot bonus cbills
  
• component based rewards
  
• reduction of heat in the caustic caldera
  
• cheap single use paint schemes (have one on my catapult)
  
• rework of whole painting menu
  
• heat profile in mech lab
  
• top speed in mech lab
  
• open crit space in mech general stats
  
• open crit space shown on each individual component when crit space is moused over
  
• equipment shown in each component and number of when moused over
  
• coolant flush (again whether you like it or not people asked for it)
  
• chain fire
  
• mech lab reworks

ALL of these things (and many more) were mentioned in the suggestions forum (except the stuff that happened in closed beta, then it was the beta forums) before it was added to the game. i have been here i do remember, which is more than i can say for many on these forums. is this game exactly what i want? no i mostly quit playing weeks ago, but it is an outright lie to say they ignore what is said on the forums.

Edited by blinkin, 26 April 2013 - 07:51 PM.

[Tabrias07]

We have too many subforums already. Consolidate most of them and bring back general.

[blinkin]

Tabrias07, on 26 April 2013 - 07:55 PM, said:

We have too many subforums already. Consolidate most of them and bring back general.

i give you general discussion 2.0!

[Mycrus]

Niko Snow, on 26 April 2013 - 12:01 PM, said:

just realized that you gave up your "luddite liaison" sig tag...

anyway, played your poll game but i still don't see a voting button to revert back to the normal GD forums...

btw, why haven't you broken up the "general discussions" in each of the international forums?

Edited by Mycrus, 26 April 2013 - 09:05 PM.

[blinkin]

Mycrus, on 26 April 2013 - 09:01 PM, said:

just realized that you gave up your "luddite liaison" sig tag...

anyway, played your poll game but i still don't see a voting button to revert back to the normal GD forums...

btw, why haven't you broken up the "general discussions" in each of the international forums?

no it simply moved
general discussion 2.0!

[Faithsfall]

you add a vote on to the poll to bring back general then i will vote on all the rest

[Mechwarrior Buddah]

Quote

2, The only time they listen is when there is an uproar. (we can always take a trip down memory lane starting in closed beta.)

which wont happen now as theyve realized the way to fix this problem isnt to make the game better, its to split apart the forum community more.

blinkin, on 26 April 2013 - 08:50 PM, said:

i give you general discussion 2.0!

I thought it was Kaekaetoa?

I think the person to blame for the forum fiasco is really Bill Roper. This has his brand of failing funk all over it

Edited by Mechwarrior Buddah, 26 April 2013 - 10:47 PM.

[Delas Ting Usee]

blinkin, on 26 April 2013 - 03:31 PM, said:

yeah because there are a lot of people who are too lazy to think about where they should actually be posting stuff. so we could have a useless forum section that the developers can't get anything from because it is far too haphazard OR we could have an organized system where the developers can maybe, just maybe find the occasional useful tidbit of community feedback. everyone complains that they don't listen to the community. this will make it easier for them to listen.

Also to a lot of people - Time is precious.
Perhaps you don't 'Work' for a living OR have a family to go back to after a full day. A lot of us do.
What little time we have, we either spend with our kids or (shudders involuntarily; you would to if you've met my wife) significant other.
A lot of us have only a limited amount of 'me' time. We choose to spend our 'me' time carefully.
A lot of us are drawn into the AWESOME game due to it's table top & various video game incarnations.
A lot of us have neither the time nor inclination to SEARCH through over 70 sub forums to find out what's what.
Doesn't make us lazy. Make us pioritize our usage of a very precious commodity.
A lot of us have disposable income - a lot of us choose to spend an obscene amount of money what what we think is important during our limited 'Me' period.
Hence, a lot of us would like 'General Discussion' back.

[Mechwarrior Buddah]

Delas Ting Usee, on 26 April 2013 - 11:01 PM, said:

Also to a lot of people - Time is precious.
Perhaps you don't 'Work' for a living OR have a family to go back to after a full day. A lot of us do.
What little time we have, we either spend with our kids or (shudders involuntarily; you would to if you've met my wife) significant other.
A lot of us have only a limited amount of 'me' time. We choose to spend our 'me' time carefully.
A lot of us are drawn into the AWESOME game due to it's table top & various video game incarnations.
A lot of us have neither the time nor inclination to SEARCH through over 70 sub forums to find out what's what.
Doesn't make us lazy. Make us pioritize our usage of a very precious commodity.
A lot of us have disposable income - a lot of us choose to spend an obscene amount of money what what we think is important during our limited 'Me' period.
Hence, a lot of us would like 'General Discussion' back.

this. But since now our protests are strewn across 8-10 sub forums, I doubt it will happen.

[blinkin]

Delas Ting Usee, on 26 April 2013 - 11:01 PM, said:

Also to a lot of people - Time is precious.
Perhaps you don't 'Work' for a living OR have a family to go back to after a full day. A lot of us do.
What little time we have, we either spend with our kids or (shudders involuntarily; you would to if you've met my wife) significant other.
A lot of us have only a limited amount of 'me' time. We choose to spend our 'me' time carefully.
A lot of us are drawn into the AWESOME game due to it's table top & various video game incarnations.
A lot of us have neither the time nor inclination to SEARCH through over 70 sub forums to find out what's what.
Doesn't make us lazy. Make us pioritize our usage of a very precious commodity.
A lot of us have disposable income - a lot of us choose to spend an obscene amount of money what what we think is important during our limited 'Me' period.
Hence, a lot of us would like 'General Discussion' back.

ok you countered my first sentence, now how about the rest of it?

[Jestun]

RG Notch, on 26 April 2013 - 02:02 PM, said:

I seem to be missing the vote for return of General Discussion.

Exactly.

There was one near universal criticism and they are still completely ignoring it.


Fire whoever is in charge of the forum (or whoever made the decision after days worth of meetings and for the final decision to be "don't reinstate general discussion"). Now.


:edit:

I have no intention of voting in a poll which intentionally leaves out the complaints (i.e., no vote on general discussion), just so PGI can make the changes voted in here and say "see, we listen!" while continuing to ignore the actual problem.

Edited by Jestun, 26 April 2013 - 11:27 PM.

[Mechwarrior Buddah]

Jestun, on 26 April 2013 - 11:24 PM, said:

Exactly.

There was one near universal criticism and they are still completely ignoring it.


Fire whoever is in charge of the forum (or whoever made the decision after days worth of meetings and for the final decision to be "don't reinstate general discussion"). Now.


:edit:

I have no intention of voting in a poll which intentionally leaves out the complaints (i.e., no vote on general discussion), just so PGI can make the changes voted in here and say "see, we listen!" while continuing to ignore the actual problem.

well EVEN THEY have said that polls dont matter on the forums:

Quote

Roadbeer, on 22 March 2013 - 01:15 AM, said:

Bryan, please answer this honestly. I have seen 2 polls on this topic and they have been OVERWHELMINGLY against 3rd person. Why are you guys so stuck on this when clearly the players (by majority) don't want it?

Bryan Ekman, on 21 March 2013 - 04:39 PM, said:

Honest answer.

The analysis on those who voted, showed that the majority of votes came from a very narrow demographic of our player base. And while they represent some of core players, they did not necessarily represent the opinion of the general user base. The majority of our players never visit, post, or read the forum content, so the poll could be considered weighted in favour of a specific demographic.

Since the majority of players who have an issue with 3rd person come generally from the core players, we elected to address this issue via this forum post to collect all of the concerns and ideas that this group faces or has with 3rd person.

Edited by Mechwarrior Buddah, 26 April 2013 - 11:47 PM.

[Chavette]

Still beating around the bush?

No problem. You wont see me coming back here for a while.

One way you could of done it is the hot topic heatsink way, why isn't it possible to post in gameplay discussion and the subforums too? Same for the barrack area. Or you could make anything posted in the barrack subforum visible in the barrack mainforum too... but to be honest I don't see the point of a barrack forum when name&shame is not allowed, how is one supposed to talk about his battles when he can't post images of the ppl taking part in it?

[Jestun]

Mechwarrior Buddah, on 26 April 2013 - 11:46 PM, said:

well EVEN THEY have said that polls dont matter on the forums:

To be fair, they may have a slightly different stance when the poll relates to the forum.

Because the forum population is 100% of the forum population, not just some sub-section.


Although the fact that general discussion has neither been reinstated or included in this poll doesn't exactly leave me hopeful.

:edit:

I assume I can't change my vote once I make it?

I was going to abstain from them all since it doesn't address the actual issue, but I'm holding off on the off chance they realise they admit that they screwed up by not having a question on general discussion.

Edited by Jestun, 26 April 2013 - 11:50 PM.

[Mechwarrior Buddah]

Jestun, on 26 April 2013 - 11:48 PM, said:

but I'm holding off on the off chance they realise they admit that they screwed up by not having a question on general discussion.

Doubtful. Theyd have to care what we think first

[Jestun]

Quote

Mech Decor Discussion

*sigh*

PGI/IGP think that adding a forum to discuss the bobbleheads and fuzzy dice is more important than reinstating the general discussion forum.


I'm almost speechless...