Feedback does not inherently mean that the people giving feedback will get a response. The threads are properly named what they are. A thread for players to GIVE feedback. By definition, there is no requirement for the devs to respond.
Would it be nice? Yes. But this is the most dev feedback i've seen on any mod in neverwinter (at least from certain devs).
This may be true but the absolute silence in some threads are turning off the people who the developers are actually hoping to get feedback. Lets use TR again since it is the most glaring of the cases. It has now been almost 30 days since anyone at cryptic has posted in the thread. to date we have had 1 power fixed as it was not working at all, and some encounter cooldowns (prior to the global change just recently) that were not included in any of the patch notes.
It seems that none of our concerns have been looked at or addressed in any way. The core mechanic of our class is now useless in group content and mostly useless in solo. Powers and Feats are backwards in which paragons they should be a part of. Certain powers on which we have asked for fixes during the last 3 mods are still not addressed even though the issue that they were preventing is no longer in the game.
It has lead to a massive burnout from the highly respected class leaders who know the class inside and out. Most of them dont even want to bother posting anything as the feeling is that they will just be completely ignored once again. Trueglue finally bucked this trend and posted a lengthy 4 post recap of the class and yet still we have absolute no response. as long as NoWorries is in charge of the TR the feeling is why bother doing anything as nothing will change. Why give any feedback when time and time again it is shown to be absolutely useless to do so?
Even a comment like "We actually can´t respond to the feedback due to more important issues, concernig mod 16" is a valid answer and accepted. But if you recognize that several threats gain 40000% more feedback than others do, it is also valid to point at the disbalance. Several threats run out of feedback allready, there is no need to reiterate same issues 10 times.
Why give any feedback when time and time again it is shown to be absolutely useless to do so?
I agree with what you're saying. I'm not saying no input from the devs is right. Just that it's not expected.
I get the game is undergoing a vast and drastic overhaul. I get that an unnamed dev has lived in some feedback threads responding, giving input, giving arguments for/against certain changes while another dev has been nonexistent.
I also get that the latter method of communication is an enormous turnoff to the community that is giving feedback and reporting bugs.
It's almost like the company needs some type of liaison between the community and the developers. Someone that sits with devs and goes over high menu items to make a list of revisions. Someone that scours the forums for good feedback/bug reports and hands that over to the devs. A middleman of sorts between communities and devs that manages all the communication. A...community manager.
Or just someone that pops into the forums and says either "this is the direction i'm taking with this class. report bugs if you like but any other class feedback will be ignored completely. i'm smarter than you. i know what you want." or says "i'm here. i hear you. im swamped so dont expect me to talk but i see your comments (and i'm still going to ignore them because i'm smarter than you!)".
0
micky1p00Member, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 3,594Arc User
edited April 2019
Two things:
Feedback to feedback encourages more feedback. Sometimes it's bad, more noise. But can be funneled, "Ok, we have an issue, I'm willing to redo feat X, and power Y, ideas are welcome". People will respond to this. "Z will not be changed now, please focus on A & B" Can bring ideas that will help both sides.
The caveat is that you actually want to crowdsource ideas, and feedback. If the assumption to begin with is that posters do not have clue what they post about (which sometimes true) then all feedback is useless, and lets save everyone time. For things to be effective, there is need to be an attempt to understand the underlying idea, the issue, and the suggestions, not directly assume people ask about trivialities or do not understand.
Second thing: At the end, reading, not reading, responding or not, all that is less important, the patch notes are the true indicator of things. I haven't forgot some thing, like guild donation logs, guild tag in alliance chat, and others that were added after feedback, not a lot of fuss or responses, just added, and thanks for that.
But it is discouraging when a class is just not fun to play, with useless class mechanics, and there only line in patch notes, is a fix for a single power that most do not use (maybe will, but for now do not).
Feedback to feedback encourages more feedback. Sometimes it's bad, more noise. But can be funneled, "Ok, we have an issue, I'm willing to redo feat X, and power Y, ideas are welcome". People will respond to this. "Z will not be changed now, please focus on A & B" Can bring ideas that will help both sides.
It might not be a good idea to let the player to get so involved in the game design. Its inviting all kind of bias suggestion due to the fact that every player wants their own class/build gets buffed and the end result are usually tilted one side instead of a balanced product. The developer that handles these kind of feedback has to be extra careful and only take those that aligns with the balance. Players are still players after all.
In my opinion, dev should emphasis more on class balance (which are the main idea of this whole mod) than giving what the player wants as not all suggestion given by player is fair and genuinely honest. Suggestion should be treated as reference and not main source of ideas. The dev need to have their own direction and only consider ideas that align with their direction. Giving in to what the player wants will only make the game more messy as there is no definite direction for future follow ups. That's why most games out there don't let their player based involve with their game design. Not just its a form of conflict of interest, its also pretty unfair to other player as well.
Feedback to feedback encourages more feedback. Sometimes it's bad, more noise. But can be funneled, "Ok, we have an issue, I'm willing to redo feat X, and power Y, ideas are welcome". People will respond to this. "Z will not be changed now, please focus on A & B" Can bring ideas that will help both sides.
It might not be a good idea to let the player to get so involved in the game design. Its inviting all kind of bias suggestion due to the fact that every player wants their own class/build gets buffed and the end result are usually tilted one side instead of a balanced product. The developer that handles these kind of feedback has to be extra careful and only take those that aligns with the balance. Players are still players after all.
In my opinion, dev should emphasis more on class balance (which are the main idea of this whole mod) than giving what the player wants as not all suggestion given by player is fair and genuinely honest. Suggestion should be treated as reference and not main source of ideas. The dev need to have their own direction and only consider ideas that align with their direction. Giving in to what the player wants will only make the game more messy as there is no definite direction for future follow ups. That's why most games out there don't let their player based involve with their game design. Not just its a form of conflict of interest, its also pretty unfair to other player as well.
I agree that the devs should pay attention to player feedback but it ALL should be taken with a grain of salt. And it's a very tricky dance to sort of the good stuff from the bad.
One thing that has been bothering me greatly is I have seen a lot of the devs making remarks concerning how player were/are too powerful (now) in mod15 and this is supposedly the major motivation for all the changes. And, although I can agree there is a subset (the elite players) that may be killing end game bosses in a few seconds, they do not represent the majority of people playing NW.
The elite players are a small subset of NW players that have spent years and a ton of money honing the their methods and systems and because of this they get a lot of attention from the devs because they are always on the cutting edge, making videos and guides and all that.
And guess what? I have been watching said videos of a few of the elite players this weekend playing in MOD16 and they are marching through all the new material like it’s not there. When you watch them you rarely see them struggle and even be really challenged. Why? Because the are so ahead of everyone else in the game the new level 80 was just a matter of grinding it out.
However, just randomly pluck some level 70 non-elite out of the player pool and they will have their arses handed to them in MOD16. And this is what worries me.
Because these elite players are so good and so well versed the only way the devs can hope to give them a challenge it to make the game so hard that the normal everyday player is going to get nuked into the ground and this will drive players away because it will be come so tedious and drawn out to grind through, the fun will sucked out of the game.
I do my best to post feedback where I can (as a non-elite) and I really hope the devs understand that most of us are not elite players. We're here to have a good time. I am just so afraid in an attempt to challenge the elite, (because they tend to draw the most attention) the everyday Jane players like myself will go unheard.
Just fyi, it is really hard to provide neutral feedback. We always compare to the old system, so most of all feedback is subjectiv, not objective. You should watch the facebook groups, too. About felt 75% postings are negative. Some people already mentioned an exit scam, what I do not hope at all. Just to let you know, there are around 18k members in this group, I mentioned.
I’m not sure how the internal structure at Cryptic works, but I gather @noworries#8859 is lead developer on Mod16 and that having that role makes him insanely busy in the period of public feedback, which makes having time to make responses to threads impractical or well outside the scope of the job.
Given this, and the general diversity of roles people have, perhaps next time we approach a mod with a need for significant feedback on classes (like say mod17 with its QoL focus) a person tied to each class, but with lower overall responsibilities be placed in charge of the community side of it so that more engagement can be maintained?
I realise some community members will still show disrespect, but it’s much easier to not be frustrated and start posting that frustration when there is clear engagement. Something that is evident in all the play testing that I have been involved in.
Obsidian Moonlight - Paladin Obsidian Oath - Warlock A whole lot of other Obsidian toons as well.
Feedback to feedback encourages more feedback. Sometimes it's bad, more noise. But can be funneled, "Ok, we have an issue, I'm willing to redo feat X, and power Y, ideas are welcome". People will respond to this. "Z will not be changed now, please focus on A & B" Can bring ideas that will help both sides.
It might not be a good idea to let the player to get so involved in the game design. Its inviting all kind of bias suggestion due to the fact that every player wants their own class/build gets buffed and the end result are usually tilted one side instead of a balanced product. The developer that handles these kind of feedback has to be extra careful and only take those that aligns with the balance. Players are still players after all.
In my opinion, dev should emphasis more on class balance (which are the main idea of this whole mod) than giving what the player wants as not all suggestion given by player is fair and genuinely honest. Suggestion should be treated as reference and not main source of ideas. The dev need to have their own direction and only consider ideas that align with their direction. Giving in to what the player wants will only make the game more messy as there is no definite direction for future follow ups. That's why most games out there don't let their player based involve with their game design. Not just its a form of conflict of interest, its also pretty unfair to other player as well.
I agree that the devs should pay attention to player feedback but it ALL should be taken with a grain of salt. And it's a very tricky dance to sort of the good stuff from the bad.
One thing that has been bothering me greatly is I have seen a lot of the devs making remarks concerning how player were/are too powerful (now) in mod15 and this is supposedly the major motivation for all the changes. And, although I can agree there is a subset (the elite players) that may be killing end game bosses in a few seconds, they do not represent the majority of people playing NW.
The elite players are a small subset of NW players that have spent years and a ton of money honing the their methods and systems and because of this they get a lot of attention from the devs because they are always on the cutting edge, making videos and guides and all that.
And guess what? I have been watching said videos of a few of the elite players this weekend playing in MOD16 and they are marching through all the new material like it’s not there. When you watch them you rarely see them struggle and even be really challenged. Why? Because the are so ahead of everyone else in the game the new level 80 was just a matter of grinding it out.
However, just randomly pluck some level 70 non-elite out of the player pool and they will have their arses handed to them in MOD16. And this is what worries me.
Because these elite players are so good and so well versed the only way the devs can hope to give them a challenge it to make the game so hard that the normal everyday player is going to get nuked into the ground and this will drive players away because it will be come so tedious and drawn out to grind through, the fun will sucked out of the game.
I do my best to post feedback where I can (as a non-elite) and I really hope the devs understand that most of us are not elite players. We're here to have a good time. I am just so afraid in an attempt to challenge the elite, (because they tend to draw the most attention) the everyday Jane players like myself will go unheard.
There's some truth here, and it's a valid concern for any game like this.
However, I don't see open world content ever being (purposefully) tuned to the "elite" player. It's not there to be unduly challenging; after all, it's the most accessible content in the game and is part of what players do to become "elite" (which is a silly word that gets abused and overused throughout the forums on a weekly basis).
The closest thing Neverwinter has to end-game content is usually whatever dungeon happens to be the capstone of the newest campaign, and I would suggest that these dungeons are typically not overtuned; rather, Cryptic puts unrealistically low minimum item level requirements on them, setting the bar frustratingly high for many random parties.
Also, Cryptic's previous design philosophy of "Choose Your Own Misadventure" is partly to blame for the "non-elite" players' struggle. The abundance of useless and counterintuitive build options did the average player no favors. As much as we collectively like to complain now that variety and personal choice are being curtailed in M16, this is likely to be a significant benefit to players who don't identify as number-crunchers or some other flavor of "elite" that happens to be in-the-know as to what's really going on under the hood when it comes to character design and playstyles that are effective in the current state of the game.
> @iamsmokingone#2455 said: > so having to find a decent build was too hard for a lot of people? so just throw having a build right out the window? make everyones stats scale to the same value.....make gear your build now? enchantments and boons worthless? make scaling so a level 80 near BIS character is half as effective as a fresh level 70 with level 70 gear? how can i even help a friend? I can't, I need them to help me do level 70 content at level 80 because my stats are reduced so much.....so getting BIS was wasted because it does nothing but make the game harder for ME. why would i play this game???
Your assumption is that the devs want level 70 to be harder for a level 80 than a level 70. Did it occur to you that it is system not working as intended?
Given my experience with every class on preview, but the Paladin and Warlock in particular, there is plenty of scope for player choice now (and I expect that to improve in the next 3 weeks). What there isn’t is the possibility not to be able to try different combinations with maximum impact “because you haven’t unlocked it”. Which means we can all play differently without our choices automatically making us significantly worse because we chose wrong.
YMMV
Obsidian Moonlight - Paladin Obsidian Oath - Warlock A whole lot of other Obsidian toons as well.
By play differently you mean use different powers right? I don't see how this is valid....as a cleric half my powers have basically no use because the cooldown is over 20 seconds and on top of that they dont do any damage. so i have maybe 4-5 powers to choose from. I feel they might as well do away with "respec" for feats and just let you change them on the fly since they only affect 1 power at a time, it's a strange and oddly unintuitive system they have invented for the "build" now....
Well, the feats for clerics are really bad - which is something we have been saying for quite a while, but I am hoping we will see some meaningful changes to them tomorrow. As for not doing damage, you are exaggerating a bit...I think there are only two powers that don't do damage and one of them is actually borderline useful in some circumstances.
It is quite possible to do decent damage as a Cleric - the problem is just that because you are totally tied to a specific rotation because of the pip management, it is somewhat, well...mechanical and boring.
Hoping for improvements...
4
adinosiiMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 4,294Arc User
so just throw having a build right out the window? make everyones stats scale to the same value.....make gear your build now? enchantments and boons worthless?
Basically yes. That will go a long way towards solving the "problem" of having differences between players.
make scaling so a level 80 near BIS character is half as effective as a fresh level 70 with level 70 gear? how can i even help a friend? I can't, I need them to help me do level 70 content at level 80 because my stats are reduced so much.
To be fair, that's just because of how scaling works right now - they still have time to make some changes there.
so having to find a decent build was too hard for a lot of people? so just throw having a build right out the window? make everyones stats scale to the same value.....make gear your build now? enchantments and boons worthless? make scaling so a level 80 near BIS character is half as effective as a fresh level 70 with level 70 gear? how can i even help a friend? I can't, I need them to help me do level 70 content at level 80 because my stats are reduced so much.....so getting BIS was wasted because it does nothing but make the game harder for ME. why would i play this game???
obsidiancran3 and adinosii have summed things up pretty well.
Stats and scaling are still being adjusted on Preview; take them with a huge grain of salt.
And yes, lack of transparency in character progression choices has been a problem, historically. If decent builds were so easy to stumble upon, we wouldn't have this situation where the "average" player's experience of Neverwinter is completely different than that of the player who reads forums and blogs and/or theorycrafts with people who know how the mechanics work behind the scenes.
I can't count the number of players I know, of all item levels, who have expressed frustration that their characters were ineffective or that content was too hard up until someone took the time to explain to them how their feats, damage bonuses, and overall mechanics really worked.
It's fine to have a huge, sprawling feat tree, but it has to be worthwhile. It would have been great to keep all of those feat trees and have them be filled with mostly meaningful options, but I think the devs made the right decision in pruning it down to something manageable for now. With a little time and with future releases, hopefully we can see feats expanded again.
Your actually alluding to the problem with unimportant or trap feats and the Boon structures.
If the feats and boons matter, and offer meaningful choices there is plenty of room for builds still without a failure to understand the mechanics of the game crippling you at the power level.
Obsidian Moonlight - Paladin Obsidian Oath - Warlock A whole lot of other Obsidian toons as well.
What a surprise, curently i try to give feedback about guardian fighter and i am properly deleted each time i post. I am not rude in my post and i dont insult anyone. I spend time to translate from french to english but they dont care, i suppose i must been from family devs to post an opinion.
Are you editing? That flags you as spam. Happens to me too when I try to fix the spelling errors made by autocorrect.
Happened to me to a while back, got a neat response from Mod. When people are editing their post to much and too fast it's automatically flagged as spam by the forum.. Mod had my post later recovered.
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lordaeolosMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 167Arc User
However, just randomly pluck some level 70 non-elite out of the player pool and they will have their arses handed to them in MOD16. And this is what worries me.
Because these elite players are so good and so well versed the only way the devs can hope to give them a challenge it to make the game so hard that the normal everyday player is going to get nuked into the ground and this will drive players away because it will be come so tedious and drawn out to grind through, the fun will sucked out of the game.
I am one of those "elite players", however I have tested alts that have no boons, nothing better than a rank 7 enchantment on gear, companion with rank 7 bonding stones... My IL topping out at about 9k starting at 70, and I leveled through the undermountian content solo without a problem (albeit much more slowly), I haven't tested any dungeons yet on the lowbie alts, but my assumption is that they should all be do-able, with exceptions for some of the time based mechanics like in ToNG (with the DPS race against the clock on the first and last boss and nerfed damage output I'm not sure ToNG with be viable for any normal group)... my experience so far on both my high IL mains as well as low IL alts is that the changes create a much wider gap between players with skill and good timing, and a much smaller gap between item levels
"Don't ever become a pessimist... a pessimist is correct oftener than an optimist, but an optimist has more fun, and neither can stop the march of events."
Well my experience with the changes is that things are becoming more and more mechanical and boring, per the Cleric post a few up by adenosii. Except to me that also applies to the other classes I play, CW and BarFbarian.
I've been trying very, very hard to stay positive and optimistic about M16 and the feedback cycle with their customer base. But it's not going well.
People can ostrich their head in the sand all they want, and several of the people who posted recently in this thread are saying between the lines to coll off and it'll get better, but it hasn't. ANd I'm not seeing clear evidenc e that it will, in fact, it looks like it will get worse.
People giving feedback are being ignored in several threads, as has been mentioned repeatedly some classes more than others. Dude's busy?? Get someone else to take over that accountability. You're a business, and we pay you for a service. You are not a charity, and we are not here asking for handouts we're asking for service delivery in exchange for purchase.
OF course if you are mostly listening to freeloaders, fanboys who won't say the tough things to you, and non-paying folks .... well then you are missing your actual customers. The ones who pay to play monthly because we want a fun escape from the boredom of our day. You know, we want a "perfect world."
But we don't like being missed so many of us are leaving.
Too much complexity has been removed from the game. The classes are boring now.
Thank you for fireball. Can we have something to do with Wizard besides "I shoot it!" Can we have something to do with Cleric besides "I shoot it not as good" or "I'm a heel b!tich" (after being told to "heel" by their party members.)
The railroaded design choices are a bad idea. A very bad idea. Dumbing it down to 13 year old intellect does not attract the people who put the real money into your business -- the 20% of your customer base who are responsible for 80% of your revenue.
Some people are saying this is Mod 6 Elemental Evil mistake all over again -- it's actually worse.
Now it's not too late -- it could be fixed by adding some complexity back into the game's design and mechanics, you already have the code for it cause it's live right now -- but then people would have to actually be willing to admit to themselves and others that this current direction is about as viable as the Fane of the Night Serpent was when it first went live -- lag bomb, emphasis on the bomb.
Wake.
Up.
This is well put.
I am not sure what is really going on with MOD16 because I have a hard time thinking adult people with critical thinking skills could possibly think the changes in MOD16 will entice existing players to play more and/or spend more money. I won't go into the list but almost every conceivable area of the game has been dumbed down, devalued, nerfed or had all the fun sucked out of it (or a combination there of).
The only thing I can think of is that they A - Want to drive the current, active player base away and B - Have some sort of future roadmap (that has not been mentioned/revealed) on monetising something to get new players spending.
I hope that there is some type of grand plan we are not privy too because right now, with every new update from the devs I just keep shaking my head trying to figure out why they are alienating us existing players so much. I swear it feel like they want us to stop playing.
The only thing I can think of is that they A - Want to drive the current, active player base away and B - Have some sort of future roadmap (that has not been mentioned/revealed) on monetising something to get new players spending.
I hope that there is some type of grand plan we are not privy too because right now, with every new update from the devs I just keep shaking my head trying to figure out why they are alienating us existing players so much. I swear it feel like they want us to stop playing.
I keep seeing people say they think the devs are trying to drive the players to MtG. Let's think about that from a different viewpoint.
What logic is there to drive a player away though these means? I could drive a player away through this method and what does that cause? Massive distrust. Loss of faith in the company moving forward. Feelings of betrayal from the community from the looks of the forums. Are these the traits of future customers for a new product? To me, this is a sure fire to get people to not support your company in a new game.
If I wanted to kill a game, I would just kill the game and say "We're no longer going to support Neverwinter as of [pick a date]. We hope you'll support us in our future endeavor MtG. It's been a blast making this game for you guys and we think MtG is going to blow you away."
That seems like an approach that would keep some of my angry mob customers while sunsetting a game.
I don't believe that they want to drive players away. I do believe that they're willing to lose players to get their so-called "vision" the way they want it. The issue is that the vision, well, it's kinda half baked and not fully thought through. Another issue is execution. There are certain nameless responders in the forums that seem to think there's nothing to worry about and the #1 complaint on the forums (scaling) is totally fine and WAI.
That right there says enough about the gap between what testers/preview players think is acceptable and what the devs think is good.
There are a few people who like that the game is easier and dumbed down and that the gaps are being closed, and are just everywhere telling everyone that it's great, but that doesn't actually make those good things in a broad perspective. I agree that I doubt this is a purposeful attempt to get people to quit or a sunset move, but it is a blatant disregard for what people playing joined to do in order to bring their particular vision of the game into existence with a take it or leave it attitude. And there are going to be many, many people who choose the leave it option. If they wanted to play a HT generic character game, they wouldn't have been here in the first place. There are less bug ridden options for that on the market to be chosen.
I don't think the devs are trying to drive anyone away, but one of the "seven deadly sins" is Pride. That's what I think is driving this, just as it did for Mod 6. Between January, 2015 and April 7, 2015, everyone and his dog was telling the devs that they were about to make a monumental mistake. It all fell on deaf ears, and the number of players absolutely cratered after it was launched. I think this is what we're seeing: no conspiracy, just simple Pride.
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...just as it did for Mod 6. Between January, 2015 and April 7, 2015, everyone and his dog was telling the devs that they were about to make a monumental mistake...
And the game survived and thrived for 10 mods. Give Mod16 a chance, it may turn out to be the same.
I don't think the devs are trying to drive anyone away, but one of the "seven deadly sins" is Pride. That's what I think is driving this, just as it did for Mod 6. Between January, 2015 and April 7, 2015, everyone and his dog was telling the devs that they were about to make a monumental mistake. It all fell on deaf ears, and the number of players absolutely cratered after it was launched. I think this is what we're seeing: no conspiracy, just simple Pride.
I think there might be some (or much) ego/pride in there but I suspect there is a lot more that we aren’t seeing. I think the powers that be have dropped the devs into something that is frankly beyond their professional ability to actually fix (by no fault of their own I want to add). So even though they aren’t starting over from scratch, they are using duct tape to fix a severely leaky ship.
If the technical managers at NW had the proper budget I am sure they would prefer to hire a whole slew of new more seasoned professionals to fix the game the way it should be but due to financial issues, they have both hands tied behind their backs.
The powers that be have also clearly mandated these changes which is clear in the inflexibility we are getting from the devs posts and how they act. I have watched a few vids of some of the people from NW talking about the future of NW and if you know anything about body language it’s clear to see they are uncomfortable/embarrassed at what they are saying. I suspect because they know they are feeding us half truths or even all out lies.
If I were to guess, I think, even though they might not be admitting it to the actual devs, management at Cryptic have already placed NW in life-support mode and will now focus the best part of their technical know how to the new MtG game coming out. They will try to generate as much revenue as they can between now and lights out but NW is indeed circling the proverbial drain.
Most of me doesn’t want to see NW go away because, well I love it (in it’s current form) but on the other hand maybe it’s time to say goodbye to this iteration and hope that the IP goes to a different company that can breathe some fresh air into the franchise.
...just as it did for Mod 6. Between January, 2015 and April 7, 2015, everyone and his dog was telling the devs that they were about to make a monumental mistake...
And the game survived and thrived for 10 mods. Give Mod16 a chance, it may turn out to be the same.
Comments
It seems that none of our concerns have been looked at or addressed in any way. The core mechanic of our class is now useless in group content and mostly useless in solo. Powers and Feats are backwards in which paragons they should be a part of. Certain powers on which we have asked for fixes during the last 3 mods are still not addressed even though the issue that they were preventing is no longer in the game.
It has lead to a massive burnout from the highly respected class leaders who know the class inside and out. Most of them dont even want to bother posting anything as the feeling is that they will just be completely ignored once again. Trueglue finally bucked this trend and posted a lengthy 4 post recap of the class and yet still we have absolute no response. as long as NoWorries is in charge of the TR the feeling is why bother doing anything as nothing will change. Why give any feedback when time and time again it is shown to be absolutely useless to do so?
But if you recognize that several threats gain 40000% more feedback than others do, it is also valid to point at the disbalance.
Several threats run out of feedback allready, there is no need to reiterate same issues 10 times.
I get the game is undergoing a vast and drastic overhaul. I get that an unnamed dev has lived in some feedback threads responding, giving input, giving arguments for/against certain changes while another dev has been nonexistent.
I also get that the latter method of communication is an enormous turnoff to the community that is giving feedback and reporting bugs.
It's almost like the company needs some type of liaison between the community and the developers. Someone that sits with devs and goes over high menu items to make a list of revisions. Someone that scours the forums for good feedback/bug reports and hands that over to the devs. A middleman of sorts between communities and devs that manages all the communication. A...community manager.
Or just someone that pops into the forums and says either "this is the direction i'm taking with this class. report bugs if you like but any other class feedback will be ignored completely. i'm smarter than you. i know what you want." or says "i'm here. i hear you. im swamped so dont expect me to talk but i see your comments (and i'm still going to ignore them because i'm smarter than you!)".
Feedback to feedback encourages more feedback. Sometimes it's bad, more noise. But can be funneled, "Ok, we have an issue, I'm willing to redo feat X, and power Y, ideas are welcome". People will respond to this. "Z will not be changed now, please focus on A & B" Can bring ideas that will help both sides.
The caveat is that you actually want to crowdsource ideas, and feedback. If the assumption to begin with is that posters do not have clue what they post about (which sometimes true) then all feedback is useless, and lets save everyone time.
For things to be effective, there is need to be an attempt to understand the underlying idea, the issue, and the suggestions, not directly assume people ask about trivialities or do not understand.
Second thing:
At the end, reading, not reading, responding or not, all that is less important, the patch notes are the true indicator of things. I haven't forgot some thing, like guild donation logs, guild tag in alliance chat, and others that were added after feedback, not a lot of fuss or responses, just added, and thanks for that.
But it is discouraging when a class is just not fun to play, with useless class mechanics, and there only line in patch notes, is a fix for a single power that most do not use (maybe will, but for now do not).
In my opinion, dev should emphasis more on class balance (which are the main idea of this whole mod) than giving what the player wants as not all suggestion given by player is fair and genuinely honest. Suggestion should be treated as reference and not main source of ideas. The dev need to have their own direction and only consider ideas that align with their direction. Giving in to what the player wants will only make the game more messy as there is no definite direction for future follow ups. That's why most games out there don't let their player based involve with their game design. Not just its a form of conflict of interest, its also pretty unfair to other player as well.
I agree that the devs should pay attention to player feedback but it ALL should be taken with a grain of salt. And it's a very tricky dance to sort of the good stuff from the bad.
One thing that has been bothering me greatly is I have seen a lot of the devs making remarks concerning how player were/are too powerful (now) in mod15 and this is supposedly the major motivation for all the changes. And, although I can agree there is a subset (the elite players) that may be killing end game bosses in a few seconds, they do not represent the majority of people playing NW.
The elite players are a small subset of NW players that have spent years and a ton of money honing the their methods and systems and because of this they get a lot of attention from the devs because they are always on the cutting edge, making videos and guides and all that.
And guess what? I have been watching said videos of a few of the elite players this weekend playing in MOD16 and they are marching through all the new material like it’s not there. When you watch them you rarely see them struggle and even be really challenged. Why? Because the are so ahead of everyone else in the game the new level 80 was just a matter of grinding it out.
However, just randomly pluck some level 70 non-elite out of the player pool and they will have their arses handed to them in MOD16. And this is what worries me.
Because these elite players are so good and so well versed the only way the devs can hope to give them a challenge it to make the game so hard that the normal everyday player is going to get nuked into the ground and this will drive players away because it will be come so tedious and drawn out to grind through, the fun will sucked out of the game.
I do my best to post feedback where I can (as a non-elite) and I really hope the devs understand that most of us are not elite players. We're here to have a good time. I am just so afraid in an attempt to challenge the elite, (because they tend to draw the most attention) the everyday Jane players like myself will go unheard.
Given this, and the general diversity of roles people have, perhaps next time we approach a mod with a need for significant feedback on classes (like say mod17 with its QoL focus) a person tied to each class, but with lower overall responsibilities be placed in charge of the community side of it so that more engagement can be maintained?
I realise some community members will still show disrespect, but it’s much easier to not be frustrated and start posting that frustration when there is clear engagement. Something that is evident in all the play testing that I have been involved in.
Obsidian Oath - Warlock
A whole lot of other Obsidian toons as well.
However, I don't see open world content ever being (purposefully) tuned to the "elite" player. It's not there to be unduly challenging; after all, it's the most accessible content in the game and is part of what players do to become "elite" (which is a silly word that gets abused and overused throughout the forums on a weekly basis).
The closest thing Neverwinter has to end-game content is usually whatever dungeon happens to be the capstone of the newest campaign, and I would suggest that these dungeons are typically not overtuned; rather, Cryptic puts unrealistically low minimum item level requirements on them, setting the bar frustratingly high for many random parties.
Also, Cryptic's previous design philosophy of "Choose Your Own Misadventure" is partly to blame for the "non-elite" players' struggle. The abundance of useless and counterintuitive build options did the average player no favors. As much as we collectively like to complain now that variety and personal choice are being curtailed in M16, this is likely to be a significant benefit to players who don't identify as number-crunchers or some other flavor of "elite" that happens to be in-the-know as to what's really going on under the hood when it comes to character design and playstyles that are effective in the current state of the game.
Contagion - Cleric
Testament - Wizard
Pestilence - Ranger
Dominion - Paladin
NIGHTSWATCH
> so having to find a decent build was too hard for a lot of people? so just throw having a build right out the window? make everyones stats scale to the same value.....make gear your build now? enchantments and boons worthless? make scaling so a level 80 near BIS character is half as effective as a fresh level 70 with level 70 gear? how can i even help a friend? I can't, I need them to help me do level 70 content at level 80 because my stats are reduced so much.....so getting BIS was wasted because it does nothing but make the game harder for ME. why would i play this game???
Your assumption is that the devs want level 70 to be harder for a level 80 than a level 70. Did it occur to you that it is system not working as intended?
Given my experience with every class on preview, but the Paladin and Warlock in particular, there is plenty of scope for player choice now (and I expect that to improve in the next 3 weeks). What there isn’t is the possibility not to be able to try different combinations with maximum impact “because you haven’t unlocked it”. Which means we can all play differently without our choices automatically making us significantly worse because we chose wrong.
YMMV
Obsidian Oath - Warlock
A whole lot of other Obsidian toons as well.
It is quite possible to do decent damage as a Cleric - the problem is just that because you are totally tied to a specific rotation because of the pip management, it is somewhat, well...mechanical and boring.
I have seen many new L70w, with short playtime and horribly ineffective builds. Basically yes. That will go a long way towards solving the "problem" of having differences between players. To be fair, that's just because of how scaling works right now - they still have time to make some changes there. Well, that's only when you are playing scaled down. If you are, say, a lvl 80 doing expeditions, you will enjoy having your full unscaled gear/stats.
Stats and scaling are still being adjusted on Preview; take them with a huge grain of salt.
And yes, lack of transparency in character progression choices has been a problem, historically. If decent builds were so easy to stumble upon, we wouldn't have this situation where the "average" player's experience of Neverwinter is completely different than that of the player who reads forums and blogs and/or theorycrafts with people who know how the mechanics work behind the scenes.
I can't count the number of players I know, of all item levels, who have expressed frustration that their characters were ineffective or that content was too hard up until someone took the time to explain to them how their feats, damage bonuses, and overall mechanics really worked.
It's fine to have a huge, sprawling feat tree, but it has to be worthwhile. It would have been great to keep all of those feat trees and have them be filled with mostly meaningful options, but I think the devs made the right decision in pruning it down to something manageable for now. With a little time and with future releases, hopefully we can see feats expanded again.
Contagion - Cleric
Testament - Wizard
Pestilence - Ranger
Dominion - Paladin
NIGHTSWATCH
If the feats and boons matter, and offer meaningful choices there is plenty of room for builds still without a failure to understand the mechanics of the game crippling you at the power level.
Obsidian Oath - Warlock
A whole lot of other Obsidian toons as well.
When people are editing their post to much and too fast it's automatically flagged as spam by the forum..
Mod had my post later recovered.
Guild Leader: Mistaken Identity (formerly Midnight Express)
My Twitch Stream
See my Youtube Channel for guides and more
"Don't ever become a pessimist... a pessimist is correct oftener than an optimist, but an optimist has more fun, and neither can stop the march of events."
I am not sure what is really going on with MOD16 because I have a hard time thinking adult people with critical thinking skills could possibly think the changes in MOD16 will entice existing players to play more and/or spend more money. I won't go into the list but almost every conceivable area of the game has been dumbed down, devalued, nerfed or had all the fun sucked out of it (or a combination there of).
The only thing I can think of is that they A - Want to drive the current, active player base away and B - Have some sort of future roadmap (that has not been mentioned/revealed) on monetising something to get new players spending.
I hope that there is some type of grand plan we are not privy too because right now, with every new update from the devs I just keep shaking my head trying to figure out why they are alienating us existing players so much. I swear it feel like they want us to stop playing.
What logic is there to drive a player away though these means? I could drive a player away through this method and what does that cause? Massive distrust. Loss of faith in the company moving forward. Feelings of betrayal from the community from the looks of the forums. Are these the traits of future customers for a new product? To me, this is a sure fire to get people to not support your company in a new game.
If I wanted to kill a game, I would just kill the game and say "We're no longer going to support Neverwinter as of [pick a date]. We hope you'll support us in our future endeavor MtG. It's been a blast making this game for you guys and we think MtG is going to blow you away."
That seems like an approach that would keep some of my angry mob customers while sunsetting a game.
I don't believe that they want to drive players away. I do believe that they're willing to lose players to get their so-called "vision" the way they want it. The issue is that the vision, well, it's kinda half baked and not fully thought through. Another issue is execution. There are certain nameless responders in the forums that seem to think there's nothing to worry about and the #1 complaint on the forums (scaling) is totally fine and WAI.
That right there says enough about the gap between what testers/preview players think is acceptable and what the devs think is good.
Blood Magic (RELEASED) - NW-DUU2P7HCO
Children of the Fey (RELEASED) - NW-DKSSAPFPF
Buried Under Blacklake (WIP) - NW-DEDV2PAEP
The Redcap Rebels (WIP) - NW-DO23AFHFH
My Foundry playthrough channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/Ruskaga/featured
If the technical managers at NW had the proper budget I am sure they would prefer to hire a whole slew of new more seasoned professionals to fix the game the way it should be but due to financial issues, they have both hands tied behind their backs.
The powers that be have also clearly mandated these changes which is clear in the inflexibility we are getting from the devs posts and how they act. I have watched a few vids of some of the people from NW talking about the future of NW and if you know anything about body language it’s clear to see they are uncomfortable/embarrassed at what they are saying. I suspect because they know they are feeding us half truths or even all out lies.
If I were to guess, I think, even though they might not be admitting it to the actual devs, management at Cryptic have already placed NW in life-support mode and will now focus the best part of their technical know how to the new MtG game coming out. They will try to generate as much revenue as they can between now and lights out but NW is indeed circling the proverbial drain.
Most of me doesn’t want to see NW go away because, well I love it (in it’s current form) but on the other hand maybe it’s time to say goodbye to this iteration and hope that the IP goes to a different company that can breathe some fresh air into the franchise.