Transparency & accountability

[Fimbar]

In the hope you agree that both transparency & accountability are important.
I want to bring that simple suggestion to 'bring it'.

The past months has been fueled with rumors and stories behind the scenes.
Wherever it's:
Gravord being booted out of the balance team
Or the ban of Evilspinner
Or their relation with Hazmy
Or departure of Hazmy

And while I kind of understand the need to keep some stories secret, I don't think it help the community as it escalate. People lose faith in the team behind the scene, and people are at each other throat whenever any problem occur.
Secret: Bad, Rumors: Bad
Right ?
Not communicating on the reasons of balance changes is even worst.

And the community (I don't want to say 100% because it's a stupid made up number) share the feeling that some balance changes are questionable.
Or not going in the (their?) right direction.

Now, understand me. The reason I preface this stupid post with dirt sheet is that they goes hand to hand.
If you don't communicate to people for why this or this balance is made they will made it up in their mind.

So what do I suggest ?
More transparency and accountability.
When a balance change is made:
* explain the why it is done
* add the ig name of the person who push the change

Why the name ? Same reason why it was necessary 'way back' then (remember the shady stuff that damage the game and the reputation of the team?). Also, I see people shitting on other people assuming they were the author of the (balance) change.
As said, the community is slowly and surely losing faith in those changes, and it infect the discord, the forum and IG.
How many times do we read order/destro biais ? How many times do we see grown ass man spreading lies, or profiting of such rumors ?

I don't think it is an environment I want to be in, and maybe I'm alone to think that.
But lately the game, the forum and even the discord went more toxic (people calling other 'Bitch', or imply they are retarded, people naming names insulting two people at the same time)

[SZ244663]

Fimbar,

Looking back at your posts -- I see you've been here since 2016, much earlier than me. So respect to you for that. Regarding the suggestions you bring up, as a humble fellow member of the WAR community I would say that we should focus less on focusing on names, and instead focus on directions and focus of the game.

I agree with you that it would be helpful for more discussion between the balancing team/Devs and the community about the upcoming balance changes, especially given that the big changes to initiative/weapon skill as well as many classes comes right after a two week grindfest event that many of us spent many hours working hard to acquire. I think many are concerned about these balances are starting to fundamentally changing how WAR classes feel for players -- many players are concerned about this. Certain classes have gotten significant debuff for next upcoming patch while certain classes have not (as is always the case, but many in the community are concerned that the classes that haven't been nerfed are getting exceptionally strong)

I think the fort changes were absolutely needed so they did a great job there, and have a track record of great job with changing things related to PvE/logistics of the game, I think the balance changes need to be slower and have at least some input from the community members if at all possible -- we would really appreciate it (and also encourage some of us to continue to promote WAR, create content related to WAR such as introductory Youtube videos, twitch streaming, podcasts for WARhammer related content)

One area that is significantly lacking for example that can be worked on is helping T1/T2 players know how to play the game and make it a bit more noob friendly. Warbands are starting to discriminate and not take ppl unless CR 40. I intentionally take CR16-39 players because I want to make sure everyone feels included in the game and continues to enjoy the gameplay. Will I lose some key abilities for my tanks/dps? potentially. But I want to do this to help promote more of the LOVE of the game, to keep everyone enjoying the game. I am willing to help make some more WARhammer related introductory videos on this in the future. But we definitely want to feel like the community is being heard so we can get the continued motivation to keep growing the game too.

Regarding the rumors, I do not know of these, and will not speak to these. I do not want to add any fire to anything that I do not know for certain. All I can say is I want to help promote a drama-free environment so everyone can enjoy the WAR project.

[Aluviya]

Without disregarding the rest. I also believe Names should not be a thing. As they can quickly lead to certain people being the scapegoat for decisions that are probably mostly made in team. Let's not forget the RoR community is very small and harassment is always a thing out there in the external discords.

[Rotgut]

More transparency would increase trust between Community and Dev Team, and you could also extend the protection on the Devs.

The majority of people here are rational adults that defend the Devs, because they understand the nature of volunteer work. Give monthly updates, make sure all decisions are supported by the Team so its not "X decided to nerf this class" but "Balance Team decided to nerf this class", make harassment of Devs even if done privately a bannable offense, and we would be in a better spot.

More communication would protect the Devs and make community feel more involved, which promotes player retention. Its just like marriage, if we talk more we get to the root of more problems, but the more problems we uncover the more active BOTH sides will have to be. So yes it is more work, it will enforce change, but it will make the game grow.

[Acidic]

Including names is wrong, more reasoning would be good.

The adding of names just incouages toxicity and blame, this should never be allowed or encouraged.
Good or bad changes are one thing volunteering to get harassed is kind on not a winning option, remember every changes is generally end of the world for one group and the savior for another.

[BoriqOne]

More transparency would increase trust between Community and Dev Team, and you could also extend the protection on the Devs.

The majority of people here are rational adults that defend the Devs, because they understand the nature of volunteer work. Give monthly updates, make sure all decisions are supported by the Team so its not "X decided to nerf this class" but "Balance Team decided to nerf this class", make harassment of Devs even if done privately a bannable offense, and we would be in a better spot.

More communication would protect the Devs and make community feel more involved, which promotes player retention. Its just like marriage, if we talk more we get to the root of more problems, but the more problems we uncover the more active BOTH sides will have to be. So yes it is more work, it will enforce change, but it will make the game grow.

no need for bans, just have thick skin is all. if i put up a store and no one wants to buy my products, so what? why cry? make it better, make it happen, take responsibility, move along or let someone else take over. and get off the punishment ideas this world has hurled us into. ..... power corrupts, absolute power, corrupts absolutely.

[Aethilmar]

More transparency would increase trust between Community and Dev Team, and you could also extend the protection on the Devs.

The majority of people here are rational adults that defend the Devs, because they understand the nature of volunteer work. Give monthly updates, make sure all decisions are supported by the Team so its not "X decided to nerf this class" but "Balance Team decided to nerf this class", make harassment of Devs even if done privately a bannable offense, and we would be in a better spot.

More communication would protect the Devs and make community feel more involved, which promotes player retention. Its just like marriage, if we talk more we get to the root of more problems, but the more problems we uncover the more active BOTH sides will have to be. So yes it is more work, it will enforce change, but it will make the game grow.

no need for bans, just have thick skin is all. if i put up a store and no one wants to buy my products, so what? why cry? make it better, make it happen, take responsibility, move along or let someone else take over. and get off the punishment ideas this world has hurled us into. ..... power corrupts, absolute power, corrupts absolutely.

A store is not the correct analogy as it implies a commercial exercise. Think of this more as a house party. They want to have a party. It often helps to have lots of "interesting" folks at a party to keep things lively. As hosts they have some level of responsibility to make sure their guests are having fun. However, at the end of the day, it is their party and we all are just guests.

As a guest, if you don't like party and your hosts can't/won't accommodate you, then you can go find another party. If a guest is excessively rude or disruptive, they are asked to leave. And if too many guests get disruptive, the party is shut down. It all depends on how long they want to try to keep the party going.

TL;DR as good hosts they might decide to have more "transparency" if it makes the guests more comfortable and want to stay but they certainly don't owe it to anyone either.

[Rotgut]

TL;DR as good hosts they might decide to have more "transparency" if it makes the guests more comfortable and want to stay but they certainly don't owe it to anyone either.

It isn't about if they owe us or not, its about the impact that will have in player retention. Its just a good practice to make players feel involved and respected, specially so in a PvP game where you need players to have content. We are the content therefore we are the product, so there has to be policy in place with that in mind. Make players feel involved, give us some QoL stuff based on feedback, give us monthly updates on what the Devs are trying to do and chances are a lot of players would come back. The best alternative to that is having a team with 15 devs being paid to churn out new classes, maps and overhauling oRvR every 3 months - but we can't do that. So work with what we have.

Like how many posts you see accusing Devs of faction bias? How many small QoL stuff we could have that is ignored? How many balance change discussions turn into finger pointing because we have to speculate on the reasons they were made? This is all caused by the silence and mystery involving this project and it could all be fixed with better communication.

Not talking about creating more stuff, more patches, more work - just communicating. "Hey guys we hear you and we'll try to rework oRvR but that will take forever - so we'll drop this patch now to make lvling and gearing a bit faster, we'll add a Renown/Mastery Trainer near the dummies, we'll make stacking items on your banks work smoothly, we're gonna give you some dyes, and the same scheduled events will keep happening while we take the next 6 months to work on oRvR. See you next month with a 2min video on how our progress is going".

Tell me something like that wouldn't raise faith in the Team by 1000%.

[Caduceus]

+1

[Erolgamer]

This last patch is a good example of what I see on a daily basis in my job as a software engineer. Developers tend to think they'll do better than the others although they usually won't.

Even big companies can't do patches like this with such confidence; changing everything everywhere. it's obviously impossible to track the actual output of such patch unless you have a huge testing infrastructure.

My only conclusion would be to change completely how they work: make very small patches and track the results on a weekly (or two) basis based on carefully collected metrics NOT feelings. Reveal publicly these metrics and adapt the figures.

The MMO gaming world live on balance changes, the genre struggle since its birth and make it a living as well.

KISS strategy with disclosed metrics would be a major improvements to straighten the communication between ROR teams and the community IMO.