They say I'm going soft

That reminds me of a guy I knew years ago. We were part of a small group of friends that at least knew of each other, and we all gave our own little (lack of?) talent for the fandom we were part of.

One of my friends of this was an artist, and the guy I was talking about would do nothing BUT point out everything that was wrong about every single picture my artist friend would draw to the point that my artist friend didn't want to post any artwork he did. The guy didn't even understand why, even after a half-dozen of us explained it to him.

See, he figured that any praise is worthless. Praise is automatically assumed by everyone for everything, and so you shouldn't even say it because praise doesn't improve anything. He even mentioned he didn't understand why things like game reviews gave positive grades since, again, the praise is worthless.

Granted, that's not what's going on here, but it just reminded me of the guy...who I can't remember his name now.

Instead of explaining it to him, you should have all constantly pointed out how unappreciated, useless, and ineffective his feedback was. Clearly his lack of understanding of the situation mandated highlighting his noteworthy lack of social skills, his fundamental inability to effectively communicate, and his obvious lack of intellectual self-reflection typified by repeating activities observationally conclusive in failing to generate the desired response.

These are all things I would assume this person would want to know, since its important to point out failings so they can be improved.

I disagree with this, because the most recent thing to be released has been Going Rogue, and that was what, a year ago?

For everything else, you got not only the time you paid for with a retail code, but also extra items that are NOT unlocked for everyone (yet). Going Rogue feels like an understandable slap in the face when I spent $40 on it (collectors edition for $30, then $10 when it was on Steam sale), so getting 1200 funbux back would be amazing, but I can only justify it due to GR being released under a year ago.

Viewable Data < Usable Data *nodnod*

Heh. I still have occasons where I will edit a screenshot to post to a forum and have the "30Kb? I'll be crucified if I post something that large!" moment. Yay for broadband internet. :-p

Here's an interesting parallel: I write stories. Not professionally, not in any realistic fashion, but I write as a past time. For years now I've been trying to get people to comment on them, but because they're all tl;dr, I simply can't, beyond the very simplistic "It's nice." or "I didn't like it." Occasionally, through begging and coercion, I'll get a person to comment in multiple sentences, and what I get most of the time is a short, polite "I liked it, I thought it was nice. You're pretty good at this." comment.

This
Is
Worthless!

Don't get me wrong, I like compliments as much as the next guy. Obviously if I pot 100 hours into writing an 84-page story, I do like it when people enjoy the story. But my ultimate goal is to improve my writing skill, talent and approach, and this doesn't happen with polite praise. I need to know what went right and, more importantly, what went wrong. I WANT people to pick my stories apart and tell me where they fail. I want to know what the problems with them are, so that I can fix them, or alternately decide that's just how I like to do things.

Of course, as with most threads where I ask for feedback or advice, this doesn't mean I won't argue specific points, simply because I believe in discussions. A recent story I made and posted on another community's site generated a comment from a friend of mine that it was slow, plodding and heavy. Fair point - it was. But that was more or less deliberate as that particular story was more focused on observation of emotion than a specific plot flow. He had very good reason to point out that flaw to me, and I do appreciate it. It's just that that particular flaw was deliberate. Whether it worked or not is subject of interpretation, but I liked it.

Years ago, when Zombra still played City of Heroes, he realised something very few people seem to - I enjoy having people tear my work apart and find every flaw in it that they can. When I post a costume, I enjoy having people tell me everything they see wrong with it. When I post a story, I want people to tell me where all the mistakes I made are. When I make a point, I like having my lapses in logic pointed out (in a polite manner). Either this tells me what I need to fix, or it teaches me which of the things I enjoy are perceived as wrong by people. In fact, I really liked the old Rep system we had, since rep comments - both good and bad - were a very good source of feedback of my activity on the forums.

Obviously, the positives and negatives of any feedback are something that needs to be balanced, but I find empty praise to be just as useless and unconstructive as trolling, to put it bluntly.

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.

Well, yes, obviously non-specific feedback is going to be pretty useless. "I liked it, I thought it was nice, you're pretty good at this" is just as useless as "I hated it, it sucks, you're terrible at this". The first one makes you feel a bit better, the second one makes you feel a bit worse, but they're both equally non-issues for the quality of your writing.

But conversely, specific feedback is always useful - whether positive or negative. "When you introduce the ruthless Emperor 'skipping along the flowerbeds' it doesn't really build the air of menace you seem to be going for" is good feedback, as is "great idea with having the brother always saying 'poodle skirt', it really takes on a whole different meaning on a re-read, especially in light of what happens at the variety show".

I don't mean to be a damper on things, but aren't I already, as a subscriber, getting a better value than the proposed plan? Like, by a lot?

Current Plan: I pay once a month, get new power sets and costumes and places and missions for free as we update the game (barring packs here or there, or silly things like having to unlock the ability to fall over) as part of the deal.

New Plan: Pay for all new content like power sets individually, or use points which you earn from buying things, along with the VIP fee.

I hope I'm seeing this wrong, but it seems... oddly disproportionate.

Depends.

If you are cynical you are now having to use points to get buy stuff you once got for free.

If you are being optimistic you can now decide whether you want to new powersets and if you don't, you can get something you do want instead.

So I think we have to wait to see how it all comes out in the wash

I'm feeling pretty positive

Welcome to Life

Currently you get powersets and some costumes for $13~ a month and some costume packs and powers you have to pay extra to acquire.

In the Future you get a number of points each month to spend on what you like.

This is only a bad thing if the number of points you get a month results in you receiving less new content that before. At this point no one can tell.

As to whether you like a powerset or not, well thats the same now. You only know by playing. At least with this system if it doesn't interest you don't waste a thing. In other words you have to make the same kind of decision you make when buying anything, whether its lunch, movie tickets or a new house. Seems to me you are complaining about having a choice.

I probably worded my statement in question poorly. I didn't mean to say that positive feedback - meaningful such - isn't useful. I meant to say that it isn't interesting. Specifically, when you give positive feedback, it's taken, noted and no-one speaks of it again. Bada bing bada boom. When you give negative feedback, however, more often than not it turns into an argument, feelings get hurt, threads reach 20 pages and people tend to remember. Positive feedback is useful to make, but very rarely useful to discuss, because even when people don't agree with what's positive, they've not very likely to step up and correct you. Well, people who aren't me, but that's besides the point. Liking something people dislike rarely elicits a response.

Now turn things around and rag on something people like - you can bet your peg leg they'll be incensed and make it a point to correct you and argue you to a standstill. That's all people end up remembering, and that's what ends up defining how people see others. All the times I said I like specific weapons, costume pieces, story arcs and whatnot, that all drops down the drain because I said it in-between other posts, a flame war didn't start over it, no-one responded, no-one quoted me and it just fizzled. That's not what people remember. That one time in that one thread that I made a big deal about arguing with people that just because I don't like the Incarnate system doesn't mean I have a psychiatric illness, though? Yeah, people remember that, because it went on for 20 ******* pages, if you'll pardon my English.

Positive feedback is always useful to give, but positive feedback doesn't make an impact on pretty much anyone but the work's creators - in this case the developers. It's their work, they care about how we perceive it, they absorb our positive feedback, but that's it. Players don't perceive things this way, because players don't come to the forums to seek feedback. We come here because we have an agenda, we come here because we have something to say. We see positive feedback and think alternately either "Ayup! This!" or "Meh, I don't care." and go about posting whatever it is we came here to post. We see negative feedback of things we like, though, and go "Hold the phone! What you're saying is wrong! This is good and you shouldn't speak about it like this!"

Ask yourself this question - how many people around here have a reputation for being positive and praising the game? Now try and think of how many have a reputation for HATING the game? It's the same situation as "the devs nerfed accuracy." You don't notice accuracy until you miss, but you don't stop to appreciate it the bulk of the times when you hit.

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.

Aww, I like you.

Change it to "nobody that counts likes me"

For some reason I feel like sticking my chest out... now that I've brought somebody comfort....

But the fact of the matter is... If Nobody did it... Then Nobody cares!

You are seeing things wrong, because you won't be paying for all new content, just some new content.

For example, in Issue 21, the Time Manipulation set is free to subscribers, as is the revamped early game experience (new tutorials etc...), Powerset Proliferation, First Ward, Some costume sets and probably some other stuff I'm forgetting. And they have said that they will continue to launch Issues on a regular basis. And there are the Signature Arcs, 2 new arcs per month which are included in the subscription.

That seems to me to be a pretty descent amount of content, certainly comparable with what we currently get. If they keep that level up, then just keeping subscribed and using the free points you get will net you more stuff than you currently get. With the choice to pay for even more, if you want to.

This probablem might well be solved via the test server. In the past, buyable items have been free on Test and I wonder if that trend will continue? Possibly with only VIPs having access to the Test server.

I would propose that the Potentials have access to the full test server, but that it is on a timer for say, 2 weeks before toons get wiped. That way they can have a taste, but are not sated by playing on test forever.

Often times my inspiration for rolling a toon is watching what someone else can accomplish with a particular powerset combination.

Another way to figure it out is look at your roster. If Melee is non-existant, or sparse, chances are you may be able to restrain yourself from grabbing Titan Weapons or Street Justice asafp.

The new plan still includes the same quantity of "Issues" that we currently enjoy. One of the devs already commented in an interview about working on issues 22 and 23. The existence of content that is exclusive to the store does not automatically mean that we will no longer receive the sort of "free" content that we are accustomed to receiving as subscribers.

Now, I know nothing about the proposed content of the next two issues so I can't say whether anyone will be pleased with that content and it's quality or quantity. Knowing that they are under active development is enough, for the moment, to satisfy me that the devs are continuing to insure that a subscription retains the same sort of value that it has had in the past.

Since the devs have announced a gigaton of content in I21 that is confirmed included with your VIP subscription, your perception that the new plan involves paying for all new content is in error.

The plan is actually to take everything they used to include in boxed expansions or booster packs and add them to the in-game store so players can buy them ala carte, and then add more stuff on top of that.

No one on the dev team has said, and no one else can make the case that, the devs are specifically targeting "things we used to get for free" and removing them from the game and adding them to the in-game store. The only people making such an argument have as their rationale that even though all evidence currently is to the contrary, we can't trust the devs and its obvious that's what they will have to do regardless of what they say. That's not evidence. At least, its not evidence of the devs' future plans.