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Class Advocates and NO Foundry Advocates?
eldarth
Member Posts: 4,494 Arc User
Yep. The Foundry - the red-headed stepchild of Neverwinter developers and yet shoved out in front of the marketing cameras at every opportunity. Sigh.
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As the Foundry is a bunch of random stories put together by the players themselves, what would be advocated for?
We have all kinds of requests and feedback here on the foundry forums, just like the class forums have people making requests and giving feedback. The only difference is that instead of asking for bug fixes, buffs & nerfs to certain class powers, we are asking for bug fixes, and better functionality for a major tool of this game.
Also, with every module they tweak class balance in some way. An increase in power here, a decrease there. The classes get a lot of attention. So far they have done very little to give us a better Foundry (and the foundry was a major selling point for this game) apart from handing us some differently colored legos (new details & encounters). Timers, bosses, OR logic, levers, better rewards, and so forth have been requested since the beginning, with no results, and little to no reports on progress or even intent to implement them.
Actually, the Foundry is not thier priority period. When it comes to the F2P model it's all about what will generate revenue to keep the few people working on the Neverwinter Online team employed and the game afloat. There are a lot of awesome ideas and many things that the foundry team would like to do, however, it comes down to the labor and costs involed and in the end Foundry looses out because quite honestly, it doesn't pay the bills. This is mostly the reason I check the forums every now and then to see if the actual things we suggested nearly a year and a half ago were ever implimented, but have not been that enthusiastic or active.
Ravenloft
Look for@Apocrs1980 or visit the main page here or Ravenloft here
The Foundry "Quests" are the stories put together by the players.
"The Foundry" is the tool/editor used by the players to create those quests.
What would be advocated for?
How about fixing the over 100+ bugs in The Foundry?
How about the 30+ Feature Requests that would make the quests more varied and enjoyable?
Encounter Matrix | Advanced Foundry Topics
Totally Free Advertising for Zen Products.
Product Placement in the entertainment field has existed and SUCCESSFULLY for decades.
12-11-2013 Request: Zen Store assets for Foundry "Product Placement"
Encounter Matrix | Advanced Foundry Topics
Honestly I wonder if the reason they don't put much effort into it is if they're worried about all the exploits that existed previously in it when OB launched. Part of me thinks they look at it as something that will be exploited put more effort into it.
The foundry could have a stronger and more positive impact on the game with meaningful rewards for foundries for PVE players, and also bring in diverse and interesting maps for PVP players... If the foundry got some DEV attention.
At any rate, Akromatic has a lot to deal with. Perhaps we should select our own advocate.... since I highly doubt they intentionally overlooked us poor foundry authors.
With that said, it is simply a matter of making the Foundry part of those metrics. By metrics i mean they look at statistics. How many active accounts log on each day, each month, average time they play. Which expansions sell the most stuff, which items sell the most, and how often they sell. Things like this motivate Perfect World to make changes.
I can't speak for Cryptic, but I can guess that they are much more frustrated than we are. If there is ever to be large changes to the Foundry, it will be because they have business statistics (metrics) that tell them they need to change something.
If every single active account spent 90% of their time in the Foundry, and only 10% of their time in the Cryptic world side... they would notice. There used to be a lot more activity in the Foundry, and they kept nerfing "exploits" until that activity was gone. Now our tools are pretty much worthless other than being a marketing tool for 'infinite end-game content'.
Simple understanding. This is why the War Frame players are so bummed right now. Perfect World bought the IP and the game died. It's hard to know if they just wanted the game, or they wanted to take it off the market to devalue Steam. I could only guess. I'm sure they would prefer Steam died and Arc was getting all the profits. However, their servers and whatnot.... well.... Champions Online was ruined.... and pretty much everything else they've acquired. They're just milking out the $, for as little content as possible (since they would have to pay for that content).
If you really want to get their attention, it would have to be something like ---> the majority of players stop playing when foundry server is down<--- , or something significant like that. Until they see it in the metrics, they won't be doing anything about it. They will have to hire someone to do something about it.
Example.... each day... i play this game... everyday almost. I log on, do the Dragon dailies, do the Dread Ring Dailies, Do the Sharandar Dailies, Do the Icewind Dale Dailies... then if i'm not sick of playing... i try to do a Foundry or maybe a Dungeon or something. If I was THE only person doing the expansions... and not a single other person was... someone would probably get fired. They won't pay for something that doesn't bring them profit.
So the real question isn't about representation, it's more like 'how do we get Perfect World to hire some talent for Foundry Development'. They won't do it until they have data that says, we have no choice but to hire someone for Foundry Development. Either that, or they shutdown the game servers once the lease from Ha$bro expires.
You realize they aren't giving us the full editor because it's exploitable right? It would cut into their profits.
It really sucks to say all this, because I would truly love a full editor... and some really good youtube clips on how to use the scripting language. There is a dire shortage of GMs in the world... most pnp players have given up on Hasbro/Wotc, due to the huge lack of interest in 4e and 5e (which are dumbed down versions of the same stuff).
I think it's safe to assume that when a company launches through Perfect World, they aren't expecting to get a big market share of the consumer base. It was very surprising indeed.
Thanks for the vote of confidence, but I would probably decline.
While I'm happy to keep an organized bug/request list, there are some requests I don't consider feasible, and I've gotten some e-mails about bugs that some individuals consider working-as-intended while I don't consider side-effects WAI. (i.e. Visibility If removing collision).
That being said -- I have been a developer in nearly all languages for almost 40 years now, and a System Architect for nearly 15, and if people are alright with my opinions "tinting" things, perhaps.
I would expect it to be a two-way information highway however, if given resource details (# developers, desired focus, etc), I'd be willing to "filter" my existing lists based on such details. That could mean that the filtered output might be required to be privately PM'ed to Akromatic, or others. I would much MUCH prefer that such filtered suggestions were public, but if Cryptic required it, so be it. I would hope and request that such suggestions could be publicly published after a related module relase.
Encounter Matrix | Advanced Foundry Topics
The Foundry is in "maintenance" mode, Robobo is tasked with other stuff - I was shocked to see posts from him in the Mod 3 Preview forums, and only one or two. He was the Production Manager of Foundry, he is AWOL (public visibility-wise). The only remnants of the Foundry development at all, Eldarth, is our Silverstar tiles that you and I and a couple others cling to for some weird masochistic sentimental reason.
Most companies only care about the bottom dollar, no matter what their external or internal marketing claims. I'd imagine their OSAT is above 10%, though, so you wouldn't need that much activity for the company to take notice. The problem seems to be that the opposite is true - maybe 10% of users right now are interested in the foundry, and no company cares what 10% of their market says.
You'd probably need complaints about lack of new Foundry content from 25-30% of users before the company worried about the impact on their profits if they didn't comply. I've fallen in love with the foundry in the short time I've been on here, but I also work in sales, so when I look at it with those glasses on, I can see why the foundry has ended up on the bottom of the list. It's for the birds, but it's business.
I definitely agree that the foundry could use it's own advocate, though. If the classes each get one, the foundry should too, as it has just as many bugs/requests as the classes.
By definition of that word, this is truth - whether Eldarth admits to it or not.
Also, it all comes down to statistics. Unfortunately only a very small percentage of the player base actually use the editor so there isn't much business sense in devoting time and money to it.
Honestly, I think we'll see the day when the Foundry will be taken away because keeping that feature running ( Extra server hardware, server resources, dev time) will cost more money than it is producing.
@Moonchips
It's more like they're trying to revive a Alzheimer's patient and bring him back into society.
By placing things like coupons (similar to the 15% off Any Companion coupons we have now) as rewards in the foundry quests, and also other rewards worth some AD/gold (purples, gated behind foundries that require at least 20 or 30 minutes of play perhaps) they could vastly improve the popularity of the foundry quests, and the coupons would drive Zen sales.
I think it's worth the development time, honestly.
An advocate would do 2 things in my mind:
1. Compile all the bugs and missing features into a priority list. This list would state which items need to be developed/fixed in order to maximize the increase in quality and quantity of content being produced by current and new foundry authors.
2. Work with a Cryptic dev regarding which items (coupons, product placement, items that need upgrading through the zen store, etc.) Cryptic believes will drive Zen sales the best, and get feedback from the Advocate and consequently from the community (though indirectly).
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Have no fear, the Foundry is here to stay, warts and all. The Star Trek Foundry is (arguably) in worse shape than this one and it still chugs along. I am confident there will be some much-needed love given to the Foundry, it's just that it's turn has to come around. There a limited number of developers, and lot to do.
My only fear is that when it does get some fresh love from the Devs, no matter how groundbreaking or exciting that love is, there will be naysayers who will complain and whine that it's not enough.
~sigh~
This kind of feeds into this article. I wonder if people will agree with it.
http://www.mmorpg.com/showFeature.cfm/loadFeature/8818/The-5-Best-User-Generated-Content-Systems-in-MMOs.html
Or they could issue a temporary version of zen items as a reward for playing a foundry quest once a day instead of AD. There's temporary clothing for the summer event (1 hr) and the first mount from the adventurer's box (6hrs), so why not temporary zen items?
Even if the item only last 1-2 hours, I'm sure it would attract a lot more players. And it's an old sales trick - if you want to sell something to someone make sure to get it into their hands, whether it's getting them to hold a piece of jewelry or test drive a car. Who didn't lose that 6 hr horse and not want a mount? If a player gets an hour or two "trial period" of a zen item, chances are at least a percentage are going to turn around and buy it.
They could even choose what zen items would be the rewards for the month - therefore use it to advertise whatever items they want to sell the most.
This is really an outstanding idea. I think a 2 hour temporary ZEN item reward in the final chests would be ideal. This is a great suggestion!
Awesome idea. I'm adding that post to my foundry request list!
Encounter Matrix | Advanced Foundry Topics
So, with that said, if we can get a Foundry Advocate...
I nominate Eldarth as Foundry Advocate!
Don't forget about us Moonstars! I never got a Silverstar title as my Moonstar one is older and overrides it in the CP. But I still cling to it just as well.
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Meh... I agree. I completely hate the idea he pushes of pooling a percentage of all the foundry loot into the final chest. But honestly he is the best choice. He has kept that bug list going since forever. And the feature request list. And isn't afraid to shove a link to either into in any relevant thread. All of that without even being an advocate.