Discussion - Going Rogue Goodies!

Off-topic discussion change:

Although the phrase "the customer is always right" is subject to interpretation, I have a different view and concept of it that I've been following ever since I heard it.

People like to pervert the phrase and take it to mean that anything any customer says is right. That means if someone posts on the forums that they should be able to exploit hamidon farms and go 1-50 in 3 hours, well it's their $15, they're a customer, and it's their right.

"The customer is always right" doesn't mean every customer is always right all the time. That would be impossible, because if one person says "it shouldn't be possible to farm," and another says "farming should be even better," they can't both be right. The cat has to either be alive or dead. And you can't have people calling in saying "Well I want my phone service for free, because I'm the customer and I'm always right."

What the phrase actually means is, the players know what they want. In general. As a whole. If most players say "We want power customization," it's a good idea to give them that. Because they're right. They know what they want. If a restaurant is told that most people want spicy chicken, it's a good idea to try and make it happen. If you try to please the customer, you get repeat business and a fatter wallet. Honestly, if you're trying to serve customers, what YOU want doesn't really matter. I've seen this come up tons of times. "Well I don't like spicy chicken." It doesn't matter. Sometimes you have to bite the bullet and do things you don't like, because it's your job to provide a service to customers. It's about what THEY want, not what YOU want. And if you can't understand that, you won't have customers.

Now not to keep harping on Jack, but he didn't seem to understand this. He kept pushing around "his vision" and the customers be damned. Since we've had new staff take over, they've been on a mission to give the players what they want. Because they know we know what we want. And by delivering it, they make their customers happy. So, they understand the customer is right. And through understanding and deliverance, the game has improved as a whole.

"The customer is always right" has nothing to do with petty squabbles on the forums about minor topics. Or the $15 you pay to voice your opinion about something minuscule. It's more an overall desire and need from the customer who wants a feature or convenience.

Of course, that's my take on it. Your mileage may vary.

Originally Posted by PRAF68_EU Dispari has more than enough credability, and certainly doesn't need to borrow any from you.

I predict that as game design matures as a profession there will be entire semester long classes on this topic. It's not at all simple. Fundamentally in an MMO most players want character progress, however that's defined (typically moving up a skills tree and getting more effective loot). Players generally want this to happen as fast as possible--remember the AE farming craze? That's a natural and predictable outcome of the way MMOs are set up. Most players will gravitate to the path of least resistance/fastest progression.

Game designers want a game that keeps players entertained over the longest period possible. Give the players super fast character progression and you risk boredom and burnout and there goes your subscriptions.

Also, where game designers really earn their pay is by stepping out and giving players stuff they don't want because they have a long term vision of turning it into something better. Did players want ED? The combination of ED and set IO bonuses gave the game a lot more depth. My main gripe is that ED happened many months before IOs, so A+ for concept but F for execution. I think it's safe to say that most of us would not like to have IOs taken away and ED rolled back.

But sometimes devs swing for the fences and miss badly. PVP anyone?

Originally Posted by Zwillinger GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.

Originally Posted by Captain_Photon NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.

I've watched it a good few times myself too I still laugh at "we can fly?!" part

hehe, that was perfect timing. "We can FLY?!?"

Its not that simple. Suppose you discover that you could open a McDonalds and serve lots of customers and make them happy and get rich doing it, but what you want to do is make a small Mediterranean lunch counter that would probably serve a quarter of the customers and you'd make a decent living but that's what you really feel passionate about and there are no other Mediterranean eating places within a hundred miles, so the few customers you do serve are not being served by anyone else at the moment.

Is it better to do what makes more money? Is that the singular purpose of being in business? Are the people who want a Mediterranean dining establishment not as important as the four times as many people that want a McDonalds?

Game design - like all businesses - is a balance between serving "the customer" and doing what you want and hoping there *are* customers.

Perspective is interesting. Jack gets hammered for wanting to follow a game design vision, even though it might be sometimes contrary to the players. Michael Bay is often reviled for the opposite reason: he gives the viewing public what he thinks they want to see, and his ticket numbers suggest he's right much of the time. It is almost never about vision or catering: its about whether you agree with the final result that determines your judgment of the philosophy that got them there.



** Technically, the baseline thing that everyone has in common is the greatest common factor, not the lowest common denominator. The lowest common denominator is the thing that includes everything that everyone possibly wants all together. The people on the bus in Speed are the lowest common denominator. I'm never going to be comfortable using these terms as the general public does, meaning exactly precisely the opposite of what they actually mean.

My thoughts exactly!

I know it's not quite that cut and dry. Just wanted to try and point out that "the customer is always right" refers more to what customers as a whole want, and not what one person on the forums thinks should happen because he holds the power of the $15 a month.

Originally Posted by PRAF68_EU Dispari has more than enough credability, and certainly doesn't need to borrow any from you.

I must agree with this sentiment. Moar newz noa plz.

I still get a bit of a chuckle from

Presenty-man: "Generally, they won't mess with you as long as you don't mess with them."
...
Audience: "Mess with 'em!"

Fix'd but yes that was funny.

Its actually not Posi. He sat down by that point, and its one of the tech guys.
Believe me. I've watched it a lot -_-

Originally Posted by Zwillinger GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.

Originally Posted by Captain_Photon NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.

Like BeyondReach said, Primal Arachnos is a meritocracy (and technocracy) purely because of Recluse's influence. If Arachnos ever existed in Praetoria, then without a Praetorian Recluse it may have remained the fascist Italian organisation it was when Primal Recluse joined it, under the undisputed leadership of a Praetorian version of The Weaver who never had a Recluse to depose him - that's assuming The Weaver ever existed in Praetoria. Lots of "ifs".

Speaking of Primal Archvillains and Italian fascists from the 1920s, I wonder if there's a Praetorian version of Requiem - are there even Nictus in Praetoria?

Doubtful. The Rikti brought the Hydra to Primal Earth from another dimension - and the Rikti are themselves from a different dimension and came to Primal Earth, not Praetorian Earth, because of events specific to Primal Earth that could not have happened in Praetoria (I won't spoil why, just for those who haven't done Dark Watcher's arcs).

The presence of Hamidon indicates that the Praetorian Devouring Earth probably have a similar origin to Primal Earth's DE, though there are obviously differences in how they developed - I suspect that without a Statesman, Freedom Phalanx or Rikti invasion to rally heroes in Shroud(Paragon) City, Hamidon went unopposed long enough to grow to power levels much higher than Primal Hamidon, also explaining why his DE minions spread faster and further.

Though the lack of a Praetorian Nemesis is a good indicator that if Praetorian Earth was ever an exact parallel of Primal Earth up to a certain point, then the divergence did not begin with Marcus Cole (as Nemesis was born over a century before him), so I don't think we can take anything for granted - apart from some familiar names and events Praetoria is a whole new world.

That part I agree with in the main. The part I disagreed with was the part where what the business operator's wants shouldn't factor in at all. Regardless of whether you think the customer is always right, its not true that the customer should always win.

My main point was that when a business sticks to its guns even in the face of public (or customer) opposition, whether that is perceived to be integrity or stupidity seems to be a highly subjective thing.

Hmm. I didn't say that, or at least that's not what I meant to say if it sounded like I did.

What I was trying to say was that the owner should listen to what customers want. That doesn't mean you go and sell Snuggies if what you really want to do is open a burger place. But once you do open the burger place you should pay attention to your customer base and try to cater to their wants and needs.

What you want does enter into it, but I've seen all too often that people take their own desires over the customers and pay the price for it. For example, I helped build a small pub in a chat program game for someone once (kind of like Second Life but not really). It was a little place for people to meet and talk. The owner wouldn't let me add shortcut commands so people could bounce from one room to the next, because she said only lazy people use them. Lots of people coming and going complained we didn't have them. That's an example of ignoring your customer and only doing what you want. It shouldn't matter that you think those features are only for lazy people. People want them, so you should provide.

Originally Posted by PRAF68_EU Dispari has more than enough credability, and certainly doesn't need to borrow any from you.

What Arcana said.

Take a clue from the CoX PvP handbook and don't piss the Devs off. Just strap on your kneepads and tell them they can do no wrong.

I personally am glad that its just a NPC costume. It's too tron meets steampunk for my tastes.

Call me shallow and vain (I prefer playing villains) but my PCs allegience will most likely fall to whos threads my PCs look better in.

Steam-Tron does nothing for me.

Would still be nice to have the option there though.

Beat up the techies to find a way to have glows thart are not hard-coded into costumes, then. Thats the issue with it, same as other NPC parts we dont have due to hard-coding.
It essentially makes them non-customisable, and thus a no-no.
For now.

Originally Posted by Zwillinger GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.

Originally Posted by Captain_Photon NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.

Both well said and pleasure to read.

I honestly don't know. That was simply the reason I was given, when I asked ( Ok, when I complained like a whiney little kid, so I got what was coming to me in that reply >_> )

I would guess that it is the works. Thats about all any of us know at this point though.

Originally Posted by Zwillinger GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.

Originally Posted by Captain_Photon NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.

As elegant as Arcana's essay reads it's a quixotic approach to business. A businesses end goal will always be to meet the bottom line REGARDLESS of its Ideal, Ethics or Moral standings.*

*See Google

Whether it is percieved as integrity or stupidity is inconsequential. The right question is: "Was it a financially responsible decision?"