446 replies to this topic

[IraqiWalker]

Haakon Magnusson, on 16 September 2014 - 02:19 AM, said:

Of course they should, as much as possible. But they simply can't say to an external all the things which might be relevant. No matter the NDA, which can't be bad enough not to result in a leakage of information.
And thus, with only partial visibility to sw/hw architecture, external design is SOL ... could be that I am wrong, how they intend to go about this. But I am equally worried of selective leaking of PGI backend implementation details to each their organizations. That crap this community can't take without imploding.

Not to say I wasn't interested in such details, might even have few suggestions since I work in the infrastructure side of datacenters/servers... but it's sensitive issue.

I'm with you there. I think what might end up happening is that once mechanical suggestions are compiled and handed off to PGI, they'll tell us which ones they can and can't work on, without needing to disclose a lot of information. For example, we don't know all the details, but we all know why MASC isn't being implemented right now.

[The Wakelord]

I vote against the council; in particular the council taking our requests & deciding which ones to pass on & which to ignore.

Council making their own cool events or giving out rewards (ala No Guts No Glory): awesome!
Council having any influence on the game: No. That should be designed by a company, not biased fans.

Bront, on 14 September 2014 - 10:39 AM, said:

Why would players who love this game enough to try to work for the community to help the devs balance the game actively seek to harm it? (and balance issues do harm the game tremendously).

Many of the nominated players are the disenfranchised, bitter founders. The ones constantly saying how the game is horrible & unplayable while spending 3 hours a day having fun on it. I don't want those hypocrites ruining the game.

Especially if it is to make the ECM more true to old lore. Ie: Rules made for a turn-based, "mechwarrior tactics" tabletop game.

I vote for a poll system in game. A simple "answer this question and get 5MC (or something trivial)" -- The devs will then get positive, negative, apathetic & abstaining votes clearly.


tl;dr I vote against. Council has too much ego, not enough fairness. I prefer ingame poll.

Edited by The Wakelord, 16 September 2014 - 03:00 AM.

[Joseph Mallan]

The Wakelord, on 16 September 2014 - 02:59 AM, said:

I vote against the council; in particular the council taking our requests & deciding which ones to pass on & which to ignore.

Council making their own cool events or giving out rewards (ala No Guts No Glory): awesome!
Council having any influence on the game: No. That should be designed by a company, not biased fans.


Many of the nominated players are the disenfranchised, bitter founders. The ones constantly saying how the game is horrible & unplayable while spending 3 hours a day having fun on it. I don't want those hypocrites ruining the game.

Especially if it is to make the ECM more true to old lore. Ie: Rules made for a turn-based, "mechwarrior tactics" tabletop game.

I vote for a poll system in game. A simple "answer this question and get 5MC (or something trivial)" -- The devs will then get positive, negative, apathetic & abstaining votes clearly.


tl;dr I vote against. Council has too much ego, not enough fairness. I prefer ingame poll.

Employee Involvement takes the suggetions and requests of the whole, organize them by importance as decided by those involved as well as the EI committee. So player participation in the process is welcomed AND expected. I would suggest that the ECM committee should follow the same guidelines.

How can you say the council has to much ego? I haven't even been elected yet!

Edited by Joseph Mallan, 16 September 2014 - 03:08 AM.

[Bilaz]

Well i'm for one more in favor of direct votes on different matters, not in any gathering of community representatives. Units - sure they have structure, some kind of discipline, they more or less know other their people and have means of communication out of game - so they may trust one of their members to represent their opinions and such. Community as a whole is just a unorganised bunch of strangers - some dont read forums, some dont write in them - some here for a day, others have been there for years - so theres no structure, no responsibility, no way to get something back from delegate - so its bad idea i suppose.
From another point of view - imagine somene getting into said consul - pr campain, lots of text and work - gets to devs, shows his projects and/or campain promises and they say "cant be done" or "1.5 years from now - maybe". Then what - revolution, shitstorm?

So i''d rather vote for ideas, for targets, for implementations - not for people. For instance Russ says they want to change something so that we'll have incentive to do more lance on lance fighting and less hugging with whole team in more or less one spot - so we as a community may wote on that and bring out ideas or implementations how that can be done - from which pgi can sort out (with or without community help) more promicing ones and we can vote on them again. If we get needed majority - it goes our way, if not its as pgi desires. To me it seems more fair and logical than put all in hands of some random people, who may not even want (or able) to work with pgi in a constructive manner. How many presidents turned out to be complete <censored>?

I'm also ok with proven experts - champions - just person its its personal, or official representative from unit have a say that weights much more than my opinion on matters which they champions in - thus their input being much more valuable to pgi. Want your word to have more weight - prove it not by pr campain, but by playing the game.

[Duke Nedo]

Just re-elect the council every 6 months. If any of them do a poor job, replace them. Don't throw away a potential hotline to the devs!!

[Lanessar]

I've been involved with development for an online game before. "Player Councils" haven't ever worked per my experience, and this just ensures not everyone gets heard. Instead of involvement, the attitude in general shifts to "those guys will handle it", and some really brilliant thinkers and good ideas never get forwarded on.

Technically, I guess, it's fundamentally like the House of Representatives. It's all fine and dandy until they start taking vacations paid for by special interests.

In all seriousness, though, it's not any sort of corruption or whatever that I fear. Honestly, the system itself is flawed. To some degree the bias of those representing always interferes with the process, no matter how well-intentioned the person is. Say the representative has an incorrect idea of how heat scaling works. A guy comes up with a brilliant solution, simply stated. That idea then gets dismissed as "too simple for a complex issue" or gets muddled with another idea and then forwarded to the devs. The devs read it over and, not seeing the original idea, have to pass on the "modified solution".

It would be better to have in-game surveys. In fact, there was a system for that during closed beta testing already present. At least, I remember filling out surveys.

Perhaps it is time to polish up that code?

Edited by Lanessar, 16 September 2014 - 03:21 AM.

[IraqiWalker]

The Wakelord, on 16 September 2014 - 02:59 AM, said:

I vote against the council; in particular the council taking our requests & deciding which ones to pass on & which to ignore.

Council making their own cool events or giving out rewards (ala No Guts No Glory): awesome!
Council having any influence on the game: No. That should be designed by a company, not biased fans.


Many of the nominated players are the disenfranchised, bitter founders. The ones constantly saying how the game is horrible & unplayable while spending 3 hours a day having fun on it. I don't want those hypocrites ruining the game.

Especially if it is to make the ECM more true to old lore. Ie: Rules made for a turn-based, "mechwarrior tactics" tabletop game.

I vote for a poll system in game. A simple "answer this question and get 5MC (or something trivial)" -- The devs will then get positive, negative, apathetic & abstaining votes clearly.


tl;dr I vote against. Council has too much ego, not enough fairness. I prefer ingame poll.

What exactly do you think the council will be doing? They will be cataloging all kinds of suggestions for (in this case, ECM) and compiling the into a legible mechanical proposal, and the community, and devs will be able to follow up on it. The Council is not going to be making any decisions at all. The final say is with PGI. All the community needs to do, is making good suggestions. Which can, and has already been done. Instead of sending the devs on a wild goose chase where they keep making suggestions and polling people for them.

Bilaz, on 16 September 2014 - 03:07 AM, said:

Well i'm for one more in favor of direct votes on different matters, not in any gathering of community representatives. Units - sure they have structure, some kind of discipline, they more or less know other their people and have means of communication out of game - so they may trust one of their members to represent their opinions and such. Community as a whole is just a unorganised bunch of strangers - some dont read forums, some dont write in them - some here for a day, others have been there for years - so theres no structure, no responsibility, no way to get something back from delegate - so its bad idea i suppose.
From another point of view - imagine somene getting into said consul - pr campain, lots of text and work - gets to devs, shows his projects and/or campain promises and they say "cant be done" or "1.5 years from now - maybe". Then what - revolution, shitstorm?

So i''d rather vote for ideas, for targets, for implementations - not for people. For instance Russ says they want to change something so that we'll have incentive to do more lance on lance fighting and less hugging with whole team in more or less one spot - so we as a community may wote on that and bring out ideas or implementations how that can be done - from which pgi can sort out (with or without community help) more promicing ones and we can vote on them again. If we get needed majority - it goes our way, if not its as pgi desires. To me it seems more fair and logical than put all in hands of some random people, who may not even want (or able) to work with pgi in a constructive manner. How many presidents turned out to be complete <censored>?

I'm also ok with proven experts - champions - just person its its personal, or official representative from unit have a say that weights much more than my opinion on matters which they champions in - thus their input being much more valuable to pgi. Want your word to have more weight - prove it not by pr campain, but by playing the game.

The council's job will be to find these ideas, and better refine them. For example: Saying that lance on lance combat is something desire by the community, is actually not helpful in it's own right. However, finding mechanical rules, and compiling them in a more easy-to-access manner. Helps infinitely more. That's what the council will be doing.

Lanessar, on 16 September 2014 - 03:09 AM, said:

I've been involved with development for an online game before. "Player Councils" haven't ever worked per my experience, and this just ensures not everyone gets heard.

Technically, I guess, it's fundamentally like the House of Representatives. It's all fine and dandy until they start taking vacations paid for by special interests.

In all seriousness, though, it's not any sort of corruption or whatever that I fear. Honestly, the system itself is flawed, and people don't get heard. It would be better to have in-game surveys. In fact, there was a system for that during CBT already present. At least, I remember filling out surveys.

Perhaps it is time to polish up that code?

I assume by CBT you mean closed beta?

Can be confusing, since CBT is usually used to reference Classic BattleTech.

[Joseph Mallan]

Duke Nedo, on 16 September 2014 - 03:09 AM, said:

Just re-elect the council every 6 months. If any of them do a poor job, replace them. Don't throw away a potential hotline to the devs!!

I would think a different group would be better for each issue the DEVs give us players. this way a committee is only thinking about the issue they're working on and not spreading their energies over multiple problems.

Edited by Joseph Mallan, 16 September 2014 - 03:14 AM.

[Lanessar]

IraqiWalker, on 16 September 2014 - 03:12 AM, said:

I assume by CBT you mean closed beta?

Can be confusing, since CBT is usually used to reference Classic BattleTech.

I meant closed beta testing, yes.

I also expanded upon my point of "players won't be heard". It's early, I still am on my first cuppa.

The points you make on "refining" and "compiling" are exactly what I'm afraid of. It assumes that the person representing is pretty savvy, when in fact, that is probably not entirely accurate.

Putting the system of checks and balances into place to resolve this would take months. If the devs want player feedback, then they should manage the community, and determine the best vehicle (since it's obviously not the forums).

Edited by Lanessar, 16 September 2014 - 03:24 AM.

[Bilaz]

IraqiWalker, on 16 September 2014 - 03:11 AM, said:

What exactly do you think the council will be doing? They will be cataloging all kinds of suggestions for (in this case, ECM) and compiling the into a legible mechanical proposal, and the community, and devs will be able to follow up on it. The Council is not going to be making any decisions at all. The final say is with PGI. All the community needs to do, is making good suggestions. Which can, and has already been done. Instead of sending the devs on a wild goose chase where they keep making suggestions and polling people for them.

The council's job will be to find these ideas, and better refine them. For example: Saying that lance on lance combat is something desire by the community, is actually not helpful in it's own right. However, finding mechanical rules, and compiling them in a more easy-to-access manner. Helps infinitely more. That's what the council will be doing.

Well actually knowing what community wants (and what it wants not) is very important on its own. Russ for instance feels that less than 1k engagements are more liked by players and it affects his balance decisions - what if he's wrong? how consul would help finding better ways to implement wrong things (or for wrong reason)s? Not even mentioning that theres no reason to belive that elected people would be able to do work on finding and refining that you put in their hands.

[IraqiWalker]

Bilaz, on 16 September 2014 - 03:22 AM, said:

Well actually knowing what community wants (and what it wants not) is very important on its own. Russ for instance feels that less than 1k engagements are more liked by players and it affects his balance decisions - what if he's wrong? how consul would help finding better ways to implement wrong things (or for wrong reason)s? Not even mentioning that theres no reason to belive that elected people would be able to do work on finding and refining that you put in their hands.

The short answer is that the council is formed mainly form extremely experienced players, who not only know about the lore, and the current state of MW:O, but are also suffering from the same problems the community suffers from.

LONG Answer:

Add to it that the council is tackling one issue at a time. So for now, the issue might, MIGHT, be ECM. For that, the community has provided posts and feedback over the past years to give an idea of what is needed. Once those are compiled, an extracted from all the chaff, and white noise. Add to them what the community is talking about recently, and what they are suggesting. To finally end up with some viable suggestions.

Let's not forget that most of us are also former beta testers for many games. Every one of these guys is playing the game with the rest of us, and have complained about the same things, sometimes. The biggest difference is that I've also seen them propose great fixes, and solutions. They weren't just complaining, they actually contemplated the problem, and debated possible solutions with people, and that alone gives them more qualification to be in such a position that most other players. At the end of the day, all they can do is help find the community's ideas and suggestions, and work with the community on finalizing a proper suggestion that gets proposed to PGI.

Edited by IraqiWalker, 16 September 2014 - 03:31 AM.

[Fut]

Lala Satalin Deviluke, on 14 September 2014 - 11:59 AM, said:

Just one question to moderator and those who voting for Players Council/Commettee:

- Does Koniving, etc., will be able to make a refund of a real money if they would commit a decision which affects PUG's/Random Players (70% of MWO players) gameplay, mechs technical characteristics etc,.? Will they'll be material responsible for their deeds?

Warning you there is just two short answers, walls of text not being taken to attention.

Go read the original post by Russ. Clearly the council will not be affecting any monetization within the game, this is not their purpose.

Their purpose is to weed through all of the ECM suggestions, find the most viable, clean them up a bit and show PGI what the community has come up with.

Seriously, it seems like none of the people who are against this council have a clue what the council is actually supposed to be doing,

[IraqiWalker]

Fut, on 16 September 2014 - 03:39 AM, said:

Seriously, it seems like none of the people who are against this council have a clue what the council is actually supposed to be doing,

You just hit the nail on the head. I'd say most of them have no clue. Some do.

[N0MAD]

Joseph Mallan, on 16 September 2014 - 02:08 AM, said:

thank you. I do my best!

Also, Jarhead not Sailor. Most Marines would be quite insulted by the mistake.

Surely you know what i reference.

[Joseph Mallan]

Lanessar, on 16 September 2014 - 03:20 AM, said:

I meant closed beta testing, yes.

I also expanded upon my point of "players won't be heard". It's early, I still am on my first cuppa.

The points you make on "refining" and "compiling" are exactly what I'm afraid of. It assumes that the person representing is pretty savvy, when in fact, that is probably not entirely accurate.

Putting the system of checks and balances into place to resolve this would take months. If the devs want player feedback, then they should manage the community, and determine the best vehicle (since it's obviously not the forums).

I will assume that is why it is a council instead of a single community spokesman. Any one player on the ballot is fallible. More so than a group is. So Players Like StJobe and Roland, would curb my enthusiasm for power player style, while My power player leanings would allow for a voice for not to much Nerfing.

N0MAD, on 16 September 2014 - 03:56 AM, said:

Surely you know what i reference.

I could only assume... And you know what that would end up doing!

[TamCoan]

I really dislike this idea of "forced government". There is no one on these forums that I give the power to speak for me. If I have an opinion or idea than I'm perfectly comfortable expressing it myself. The idea of a council seems ego driven. Add in that some of the names on the list seem to be pretty biased in their opinions and I really don't feel like it is a good idea.

[Lanessar]

Joseph Mallan, on 16 September 2014 - 03:58 AM, said:

I will assume that is why it is a council instead of a single community spokesman. Any one player on the ballot is fallible. More so than a group is. So Players Like StJobe and Roland, would curb my enthusiasm for power player style, while My power player leanings would allow for a voice for not to much Nerfing.

And that's the problem, right there, mate.

I won't argue any longer. Councils stalemate key issues. You still run into the issue of ideas getting muddied, modified, and made unusable. You've made my point with three different people putting a "spin" on it.

[N0MAD]

MischiefSC, on 16 September 2014 - 12:09 AM, said:

So other people can't speak for the community... but you do?


It seems like your issue is that people are getting selected by community consensus. That puts the ego issue here as yours, not anyone elses.

At no stage have i stated or even mentioned i represent the community, you are the one saying the community wants it you are the one saying you represent the community dont twist things mate.
Nice of you to thro in the (youre not selected so you got butt hurt), the Ego thing we know who it affects, the ones with a couple hundred forum supporters thinking they represent the MWO community (hey look we represent the Community, no we dont know them we cant talk to them but this is what they want, because we say its what they want), You dont and even Russ has told you in the past that youre nothing but a loud minority (forum goers), his words not mine.
So get of your high horse and stop pretending your representing anyone but your own wants, you want a council, you want to feel important, what the General community wants no one knows, cause they dont even know whats going on.

[IraqiWalker]

TamCoan, on 16 September 2014 - 04:12 AM, said:

I really dislike this idea of "forced government". There is no one on these forums that I give the power to speak for me. If I have an opinion or idea than I'm perfectly comfortable expressing it myself. The idea of a council seems ego driven. Add in that some of the names on the list seem to be pretty biased in their opinions and I really don't feel like it is a good idea.

Again, read what the council actually does.

Instead of you voicing your opinion, and having the very likely chance of not actually being heard at all. The council will be able to look at it, and try to present it to PGI.

The council isn't really speaking for the community so much as translating what the community says.

Take any single debate thread we have right now, and I can guarantee that out of 50 pages, you might end up with 4 or 5 usable posts. The council will be able to highlight those posts, instead of leaving them buried in some thread that will be forgotten.

[Tombstoner]

Lanessar, on 16 September 2014 - 03:09 AM, said:

I've been involved with development for an online game before. "Player Councils" haven't ever worked per my experience, and this just ensures not everyone gets heard. Instead of involvement, the attitude in general shifts to "those guys will handle it", and some really brilliant thinkers and good ideas never get forwarded on.

Technically, I guess, it's fundamentally like the House of Representatives. It's all fine and dandy until they start taking vacations paid for by special interests.

In all seriousness, though, it's not any sort of corruption or whatever that I fear. Honestly, the system itself is flawed. To some degree the bias of those representing always interferes with the process, no matter how well-intentioned the person is. Say the representative has an incorrect idea of how heat scaling works. A guy comes up with a brilliant solution, simply stated. That idea then gets dismissed as "too simple for a complex issue" or gets muddled with another idea and then forwarded to the devs. The devs read it over and, not seeing the original idea, have to pass on the "modified solution".

It would be better to have in-game surveys. In fact, there was a system for that during closed beta testing already present. At least, I remember filling out surveys.

Perhaps it is time to polish up that code?

EVE created a PC for the super carrier redesign. Tapping into your players for non binding creative input is on par with and potentially better then 3 guys sitting at a table.