57 replies to this topic

[Renthrak]

Kaijin, on 11 September 2013 - 03:58 PM, said:

That's right. Move the poll to Jettisoned Communication so nobody but those who have been getting shafted by PIG for a year or more will even know where to find it. Community Warfare at it's finest.

Egomane moved it to Metagame. Someone with higher authority moved it here. He bears no blame.

[Kaijin]

Renthrak, on 11 September 2013 - 07:49 PM, said:

Egomane moved it to Metagame. Someone with higher authority moved it here. He bears no blame.

Apology to Egomane.

[Egomane]

Kaijin, on 11 September 2013 - 11:31 PM, said:

Apology to Egomane.

Accepted!

*Poking the other mods for the suggested movement*

Edited by Egomane, 12 September 2013 - 01:10 AM.

[Kaijin]

Renthrak, on 09 September 2013 - 03:51 PM, said:

Actually, I believe MWO is gaining players. The point that I am getting at with that argument is that a number of the recent changes seem to have been intended to make MWO appeal to more 'casual' (for lack of a better term) players. Now, attracting less dedicated players is certainly necessary to keep the game going, however making the game less palatable for the hardcore fans in the process doesn't seem to be a wise trade-off.

Rather than 'new player retention', I would like to see statistics about 'paying customer retention'. Are all these new players actually spending money, and do they stick around after paying (which would indicate that they may pay more in the future)? That would be a bit more telling of a statistic, but I doubt that we will have access to that data for industry competition reasons.

So, given that it is unlikely that we will ever have solid data to use as a basis for debate, we might as well talk now. The discussion itself, I think, is necessary. Thus, there is no sense in refraining from debating the future of the game with 'incomplete' data, given that we will likely never have 'complete' data.

Also, this thread does NOT belong in the Jettisoned Communications forum, which is explicitly for "[color=#959595]discussion of any subject not directly related to MWO.".[/color]

I've pointed it out to [PGI] before, that the hardcore fans are the ones most likely to be forming, participating in, and recruiting to merc units, participating in PIG sanctioned events, putting on their own events, and creating websites related to the game, which is free advertising for MWO. Treated right, these BT/MW fans would continue to pump revenue into the game. Not just their own monies, but by their activities, they would be a draw to new players, who in turn would contribute financially. Censoring and/or ignoring our input, which is most often given because we want the game to be a success, is counter-intuitive.

At first, I was quite surprised by [PGI] 's behavior toward the MWO community, but have sadly become resigned to the sorry state of affairs. Perhaps firings and hirings at the Lead level could turn this around. Not that anybody responsible for that sort of thing is ever going to see this, since it's been 'jettisoned.'

(edited by a staff mod)

IGP's edit was to change PIG to [PGI]. However, I am not being insulting when I use PIG - I'm just using it as shorthand for the conglomeration of[ PGI/IGP]. Therefore, I would hope these edits be reverted. Or perhaps I can get a ruling on using GIP instead?

Edited by Kaijin, 13 September 2013 - 07:29 AM.

[Renthrak]

Kaijin, on 12 September 2013 - 01:21 PM, said:

(edited by a staff mod)

IGP's edit was to change PIG to [PGI]. However, I am not being insulting when I use PIG - I'm just using it as shorthand for the conglomeration of[ PGI/IGP]. Therefore, I would hope these edits be reverted. Or perhaps I can get a ruling on using GIP instead?

For clarity, I might suggest [PGIGP], which works forwards or backwards.

[Renthrak]

Kaijin, on 12 September 2013 - 01:21 PM, said:

I've pointed it out to [PGI] before, that the hardcore fans are the ones most likely to be forming, participating in, and recruiting to merc units, participating in PIG sanctioned events, putting on their own events, and creating websites related to the game, which is free advertising for MWO. Treated right, these BT/MW fans would continue to pump revenue into the game. Not just their own monies, but by their activities, they would be a draw to new players, who in turn would contribute financially. Censoring and/or ignoring our input, which is most often given because we want the game to be a success, is counter-intuitive.

Having given the matter more thought, I am wondering if we haven't been caught in a catch-22 situation.

Early in the Beta forums, you have only the most interested people participating in the first place (Founders), and everyone is throwing a huge assortment of ideas out there because the game is so incomplete, just about everything is up for grabs.

We get to Open Beta and open the doors to the general public, which means a greater influx of opinions about how the game should work. At the same time, the commitment level of the participants is lowered, as they only need to register an account and click the Download button to participate. The result is a wider variety of ideas, but more bad/impossible/already-rejected ones.

Since then, PGI has worked hard to get more people involved, and have clearly done that. The 10,000+ people that participated in the Sarah's Mech fundraiser is pretty unambiguous. The down-side of this is that the ratio of workable, well-thought-out ideas to random thoughts and general noise becomes less favorable. What this looks like from above is the problem. Simply put, it looks like the forums are becoming steadily less helpful as time goes on. This can also be attributed to some of the more dedicated participants leaving for one reason or another, but the sheer volume of unproductive threads will drown out the potentially useful ones very rapidly.

So good ideas get lost more easily, the posters of good ideas become increasingly frustrated and post less, and the bad ideas outnumber the good ones to an ever greater degree. Throw in the fact that contentious argument threads get more posts than idea discussions, and the outlook is rather grim.

In that environment, it isn't terribly surprising that PGI would trust their own interpretations of the gathered data over the messy forum chatter. Unfortunately, this seems to have been taken to an extreme that isn't helping MWO, but I don't know what to do about it.

It's easy to say 'listen to the forums', but it isn't that simple. 3PV is an obvious exception to this, being one of the few issues that unites a clear and overwhelming majority, but that is neither here nor there.

[Kaijin]

In November of last year, I suggested a Community Council.
http://mwomercs.com/...__fromsearch__1

Where we pick our best and brightest and have IGPGI use them as a sounding board for ideas, and it could go both ways, but the idea received little attention then, and in any case the thread was locked before it'd had much of a chance to get anywhere. I agree with you that the signal to noise ratio is a problem, but on the other hand, it's been quite obvious to me throughout closed beta which of our forum members were really applying themselves to addressing mechanics and balance issues in a sane and logical manner. Unfortunately, IGPGI have driven off many of them already, but I still see a few soldiering on.

[Renthrak]

Kaijin, on 14 September 2013 - 10:39 AM, said:

it's been quite obvious to me throughout closed beta which of our forum members were really applying themselves to addressing mechanics and balance issues in a sane and logical manner. Unfortunately, IGPGI have driven off many of them already, but I still see a few soldiering on.

The down-side to flagging certain posters as more relevant is something that I rapidly discovered in my own suggestion threads, which is that anybody can have a good idea. It also follows that anyone can have bad ideas.

Still, condensing the most productive discussions does strike me as a good idea.

Perhaps what is needed is something similar to the community maintained Upcoming Content Tracker. Someone could take it upon themselves to regularly browse the forums, find promising threads, and put categorized links to them in a single compilation thread. That way, no matter how many 'nerf it NOW!' threads drown the forums, people could still find specific threads on the topics they wish to follow. Replies to the thread itself could be used to nominate threads for inclusion in the list. It would be a considerable amount of work to create and maintain, but it might be the best way to remain relevant in providing ideas.

[Steve Varayis]

I can wholly understand PGIGP's situation

[Rasc4l]

A very well done poll. Too bad it was so damn difficult to find. I guess I'll have to change my MWO link to Jettisoned Communications, since all the discussion is here nowadays...

[Troa Barton]

Ouch. No wonder this got censored.

Renthrak, on 14 September 2013 - 09:13 PM, said:

The down-side to flagging certain posters as more relevant is something that I rapidly discovered in my own suggestion threads, which is that anybody can have a good idea. It also follows that anyone can have bad ideas.

Still, condensing the most productive discussions does strike me as a good idea.

Perhaps what is needed is something similar to the community maintained Upcoming Content Tracker. Someone could take it upon themselves to regularly browse the forums, find promising threads, and put categorized links to them in a single compilation thread. That way, no matter how many 'nerf it NOW!' threads drown the forums, people could still find specific threads on the topics they wish to follow. Replies to the thread itself could be used to nominate threads for inclusion in the list. It would be a considerable amount of work to create and maintain, but it might be the best way to remain relevant in providing ideas.

This Should Be PGI's Job..

[Troa Barton]

A thing to note about this post is that if your opinions change, you can delete your vote and retake it.

[Heffay]

Troa Barton, on 02 October 2013 - 10:03 PM, said:

A thing to note about this post is that if your opinions change, you can delete your vote and retake it.

Another thing to note about this post is that it is a self selected poll and therefore statistically irrelevant.

[MarineTech]

[Tank]

I would buy more Bird mech now...

[MarineTech]

[Tank]

ATM bird disagrees with you, we already taken out the cash

[MarineTech]

You're doing it wrong.

Snag it from business women.