"You are the Dev" Issue #1: Fix the Problem or the Perception?

You lock the threads talking about it.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but hasn't there been instances in the past where players have insisted that something was wrong or bugged, the Devs kept insisting it wasn't, but in their analysis of the code and data they found something related to the "problem" that really was messed up, and wouldn't have found it if the players hadn't been wrong and brought it to their attention?

I feel like there's been a time or two where this has been the case, but I can't think of specific examples. If I'm right, it would be a good example for not ignoring what the players are saying, wrong or not. The data doesn't lie, but sometimes we're asking the wrong questions about it, or making the wrong conclusions because we don't have all the information and resources the Devs do.

I'd consider #1 by far the most immediate priority. Finding a balance problem before the players do is a dev's dream... fixing it in the next patch will avoid the sort of huge "you nerfed my favorite ability" blowback you get once a bunch of players start taking advantage of the overpowered ability. So fixing Shepard's Crook is the main goal in patch one, along with any other glaring balance tweaks (ie, nerfs) that come up.

Problem #2 isn't really a problem at all. I'd just tell the Community lead to keep reassuring people that data mining shows that Cannon of Justice is balanced and wait for the inevitable: before long the power-gamers are going to find the actual best abilities (hopefully not before the first patch's balance changes!) and as word spreads most players will realize the Cannon isn't actually that great after all.

Problem #3 is also pretty significant, not so much because one ability is underpowered but rather because less than 6% of the player base is bothering to use the "stay at home" system. I would collect ideas on how to revamp this system to make it more attractive to players, both from the devs and from players via forum posts. I'd probably toss a quick fix buff to Meekling in patch one (something that takes no real time, like doubling the bonus or something) and not really worry about if it was still a bit underpowered or if it became a bit overpowered. More importantly, I'd announce an upcoming revamp of the Stay at Home system and begin soliciting ideas.

Patch two would focus on new content, including a boss enemy that used Cannon of Justice so that when players start beating him they'll be inclined to think that mabe Cannon isn't so powerful after all. New content is important, especially for new MMOs, so as soon as the glaring balance issues are solved (and the inevitable "why wasn't this caught in beta?!?" complaints dealt with) it's time to add more things to do. The community team would conduct polls and dialogues with the player base regarding what changes they wanted to see in the Stay at Home system.

Patch three would focus on more new content unless new balance issues cropped up. In particular, I would try to implement things that lots of players had requested, especially things like more UI customization or additional features like in-game email. If the players showed enough interest in a revamped Stay at Home then that would be the main focus of this patch. If there just wasn't much interest, the current Stay at Home system would be tweaked to also offer some minor benefits in the rest of the game and then left alone until there was enough interest in it to justify more dev time or someone had a great idea for how to revamp it that the players liked. (An example of adding small benefits to other gameplay might be changing Meekling to make it build a small cottage that provided faster recovery to players who are inside it.)

Looks interesting, here's my stab it the scenarios

For me the first patch would be dedicated to fixing the Shepard's Crook overpower issue. I'd dedicate 3.5 of my powers team on this issue. .5 would work back and forth on on Shepard's Crook and also just take a quick look here and there on the Meekling Power issue. Doesn't have to come up with a solution for it, just some vague ideas and rough drafts on what to do about it. I would also prepare a few posts in explaining to the player base why Shepard's Crook was nerfed in case it gets out of hand.

Second patch would have all 4 work on getting the Meekling Power up to snuff. Using the research done by the previous member who was going back and fort between Shepard's Crook issue and taking a look into Meekling power. Have the team find out what can be done to balance it more.

Honestly for the Canon of Justice complaints, if my power team tells that it's balanced, and they can prove it, then it's balanced. What's the point of fixing something that isn't broken. If any I would tell the team to read the forum complaints and find out what the source of the complaint is. Is because players perceive that it's underpowered when used in PvP, against certain foes, items, and what not. Also actually post on forums and interact with the playerbase in regards to this so-called issue. If any I'll just dedicate 2 on working on a new powerset and 2 going over any glitches or bugs that are currently present in the system for the 3rd patch month.

*Sips coffee*

Go on...

*evilgrin*

People who saw lucks turn off probably saw them turn off right before death... because in actuality the game had already killed them before the client's animation was done and turned off the inspiration.

Kinda like how it doesn't tell you you are dead fast enough to prevent you from using your Oh **** power but still starts it reactivation timer.

I'm going to split the team a bit (and do my best to bring more people into the team - for a project as big and as popular as described, we both should be able to have more people and we need the ability to do two things at once.

The larger team is making changes. If I really am stuck with only 4 people, it's a team of 3 (the odd man out may rotate from time to time). Assuming nothing changes, priority #1 is the Shepard's crook, then mending. And the community team lets it be known that changes are coming to the Shepard's crook, so don't assume that how it is now is how it always will be. Then comes mending.

But team #2 is going to be "work with the community team and the players to be our sanity check on what we think we know". I know the scenario as laid out says that there's nothing wrong with the Cannon while the Crook is completely overpowered - but what if we're wrong?

I remember the infamous video of regen scrappers doing godlike things shown as proof of the overpowered nature, players noticing "wait, that scrapper is slicing through deep purple foes like they didn't exist" and only on review was it realized that the scenario was run in a test environment without the purple patch. Sometimes, developers miss things. And players do have a unique perspective. While we as developers know how the powers work when used as we planned them to be used, the players know how they're working as the players are using them.

So even while the odds are strong that what we've seen in our testing is true for players, cannon fine while crook overpowered - there's a chance that we're wrong. That the cannon actually does need some refining while the crook really isn't that bad. So work with the players to find out why player perception does not match our data. Yes, it uses up 1/4 of our workforce, but one of two good things happens: (a) Through the process, we both quiet the complaints by those players who are wrong and earn respect with the players as "we take their feedback seriously", or (b) We find an error in our data, fix the things that really need fixing, can look to see why our data was at variance with reality and do better in the future - and earn respect with the players as "we take their feedback seriously".

I'd fix/balance #1, but I wouldn't deploy that fix until the players started to notice that Shepard's Crook was overpowered (possibly via covert prompting). That way when I do deploy the fix it looks like I'm listening and responding to player concerns instead of needlessly nerfing a power that was just fine.

I'm not going to pretend I were a game developer, because I both know I'm not and know I wouldn't be qualified to be one anyway. As such, I will instead list the degree of immediacy and approaches to solving each of the problems in turn.

Problem 1: This has to take priority. Of all the things the development team is obligated to do, NOT allowing the game to melt down takes priority over everything else. If a problem is discovered before it becomes a problem, then this needs to be solved on the spot, even if everything else has to stop in order for this to happen. If such a problem is discovered, then it should be kept under wraps until it is fixed, and it should be fixed immediately. Not three years down the line.

Problem 2: Is not a problem. This is solvable via community communication. It is a fact of this business that no matter what is done and indeed no matter what is not done, people will complain. Informing people of the situation and the reasoning behind it, however, can do much to dampen this. And when the developers are right, they will win out in the end and and the community will self-stabilise. This has been proven time and again, just so long as we're sure they are indeed true. In the hypothetical situation, this is given as objectively true, not a matter of estimate or opinion, therefore it requires no developer action.

Problem 3: This has to take priority, but only secondary such. Improvements are always secondary to preventing the game from imploding. This can wait until the immediate dangers are resolved. In the meantime, community communication can be used to extend player patience. Explaining to the community that such a power is indeed understood to be underperforming unacceptably and is indeed due to a fix in an indeterminate but not infinitely distant future will do much to placate discontent. It won't do enough to placate ALL discontent, but nothing sort of divine intervention can do that. What it WILL do, however, is placate discontent down to such a level where it will become self-regulating rather than cascading.

The key in all three instances is communication with the community. When people feel like they are not being lied to, are not being patronised and are being heard, they will often be much more willing to show patience and understanding. Not ALL people, obviously, but enough of a critical mass of people will be reasonable to keep disturbances isolated to individual occasional skirmishes, rather than general population resentment.

There are few things worse about a development team's community relations than for said team to be seen as dispassionate, uncaring profiteers who view their players as sheep. You can NEVER please people with just basic gameplay entirely. There's always an emotional component brand loyalty. Alienate your players and you're faced with a losing battle - pleasing players with a game they don't like entirely, and a game being made by someone they resent. There are few faster ways to cause people to leave.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

I would have them all work on problem #9 instead of #1, #2 or #3....

Thats by the way simply consulting XABAXABAHEY the whispering Demon on what to do next?

And if that isnt an acceptable answer...then i would choose #5....and get in a honda 4x4 and run everyone down.

And that is still not accepted.....
Then could you please re-phrase the entire question so that there is an escape hatch i can get through?

And um by the way.....which was YES on again?
Was it the Destroy Russia or #2?

I would have the full team "working" on problems one and two for the first update, since they are related. All the actual coding time would go into problem one while the spare moments of programmer's block and the like would be spent examining the perception gap. Do the vocal players have a playstyle that doesn't mesh well with Shepard's Crook so that they aren't the ones who play it? Similarly, (or even identically, maybe) is there a simple defense against Cannon of Justice that these players are forgetting about/not bothering to use? Is it just a flavor-of-the-month thing, where next month Cannon will be forgotten as these people move on to the next uber-build, one that consistently beats the Cannon users? (which would definitely be Shepard's Crook if we don't fix it, maybe even if we do)

In the meantime, If Arcanasberg has shown themselves to be trustworthy, I'd send him/her a PM asking them not to publicly apply their number crunching abilities to Shepard's Crook until after the next update in exchange for the promise that unless another emergency pops up, Meeklings will get buffed in the update after. I'd also ask for their analysis of the Cannon situation, since sometimes an outside perspective really helps. Maybe it's a display bug, and the powers-development lady has looked at what the power actually does and hasn't noticed that the numbers that show up on the screen/in the combat log are different?

And then I'd keep that promise for the next update, even if it wasn't made publicly, because if so few people are using the Stay-at-Home system then the development time we spent on it in the first place was mostly wasted. It's quite possible that it was, but maybe we can get more people to give it a try if we show that we care about the sub-section with a well reasoned buff. (accompanied with a revision of that tutorial that few people finish, if we can spare the manpower)

A few points I wish to make before I begin:

1) Studies seem to indicate that if a person receives a negative response to an action or effort he/she tells ten people about it. This is negative advertising.

2) Similar studies seem to indicate that if a person receives a positive response to an action or effort he/she tells ten people about it. This is positive advertising.

Now, with all this being said, I would do the following:

1) Hire a fifth person (preferably Arcana). Clearly the City of Hotties team is incapable of even the most basic quality control (my chosen field btw) otherwise they would have seen that SC was grossly overpowered during Test or (gasp!) even initial development. If you FIX the problem before it leaves the design room then it's not a problem and doesn't NEED fixing.

2) Said person begins the same Forum Judo that was mentioned on Page 1...comparing the numbers of Cannon with it's closest power and claiming that in certain circumstances the other power is even better. Issues a challenge to others to prove him wrong (which will send the ultra-competitive twitch players into a feeding frenzy for about a week). Post the real numbers after 5 pages of hotly-contested debate claiming that the team has devoted exhaustive time to balace the power (which is not a lie since this was obviously done before it was released. Just omitting the facts about the timing of the work...).

3) Said person then crafts a modest buff to #3 which might take 4 months to accomplish alone but since it affects a small percentage of the players and they seem happy anyway nothing lost there.

4) The initial team fixes #1 before it becomes a problem that THEN needs to be addressed, making the whole team look stoopid because they do this for a living and yet managed to make such a terrible blunder. Removes a potential negative blowback from players later which, in the long run, is a net positive.

5) Send the lead designer for SC home for a weekend with math homework. It was his responcibility to catch it in the first place. A little scolding is warranted.

6) Raise the jiggle factor if the system can handle it. Since 95% of the players are 15-25 year old men this will please the largest portion of the player base with the least chance of negative feedback. It will distract most from any hiccups in #1, give the folks NOT involved in the debate over #2 something to talk about and likely won't affect the players in #3 at all.

When you run so close to schedule versus man-hours of work needed people hurry and mistakes are made. Having even one extra pair of eyes looking at things can help catch a host of problems before they become REAL problems. The profit margin might suffer on the short term but in the long run players will be happier with the better-quality product, tell their friends about how few bugs there are and so forth. This has the potential of raising the player base and slowing the departure of players devoted to the game but frustrated by the constant mistakes.

Btw in my several years on these forums this is one of the best threads I've seen. Praise to the OP.

Great idea, Marcian!

2 people fix #1 immediately. 1 should work on #3, 1 should work on #2. And by work on #2, I mean communicate with the playerbase about what they feel is overpowered, and have them provide numerical substantiation to prove it. (ie, "Listen, guys, right now, the team does not agree with your assessment that SC is overpowered. BUT we are willing to listen. However, we need you 1) to provide concrete, detailed proof that what you say is happening is actually happening, and 2) that that thing is out of whack witht he rest of the game..."

Then ask Arcanasberg look over the reasoning. But importantly, do not keep this communication with Arcanasberg secret. (Don't necessarily go out of the way to publicize it, but don't make it a secret). Keeping secrets like this undermines trust in both parties.

The PR problem presented by #2 is important; if one wants to build a devoted, loyal playerbase (which imo is extremely important), consideration and honesty are two vital components to making those happen.

Edit: change my mind, the 4th dev should work on #3 1/2 the time, and #1 1/2 the time. So, to be clear, 2.5 Devs on #1, 1 dev on #2, 0.5 devs on #3. And stay clear of 'creative truthtelling/lying' - nothin p***es people off more than the words, "Well technically, I was telling the truth..."

Comicsluvr, your point 1 is not necessarily the case - it may be that no one tried to combine SC with some other more obscure power that creates some kind of Unholy Synergy (Hey, can we get a power called Unholy Synergy please? ) that wasn't seen in test because hey, who the heck would do THAT?!?

Remember, no matter how good the devs are, 100,000 minds are >>> than 10 minds.

Also, players are dirty haxxors who will do whatever it takes to break the System.

I keed, I keed! (a little.)

Edit: I guess the words 'can readily perform' means that my above words are invalid, so nevermiiiind...