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Re: Influencers Summit thoughts
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Hisagawa
Jedi
Posts: 1808
Registered: 01-23-2004


Hisagawa
PA: New Dawn
Server: Eclipse

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MaceSundancer wrote:
ewwww....... seeing smed post something like this brought back all the horrible memories of what happened in early Nov 05...


Everyone remember last time they talked to "focus groups" ?






bleh...... bring us the hoth expansion already so we have something to do.

The end.


What is there to do on a big ball of ice with a small rebel base on it? Please don't say pvp...

Kuro Ghost - Matukai Adept
Anosa Ghost - Entertainer...I think.

Teras Kasi Elder Elder Fencer Elder Marksman Elder Brawler and a smidge of entertainer. ;)

I support Pre-NGE. It was a different and unique game like no other.

The pets we once had have been replaced with Holo-Pets;
The friends we once had have now been replaced with Holo-People.
02-09-2007 11:30 AM  

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Re: Influencers Summit thoughts
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Colaboy
Jedi
Posts: 610
Registered: 06-26-2003


Colaboy

Reply 107 of 178

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Smed wrote:
Last weekend we had our first ever Influencers Summit. It was a lot of fun, and I have to say I learned quite a bit. We deliberately brought people in that were some of our biggest criitics. We wanted to hear directly from them and understand the issues they had.
 
At one point I spent an hour or so talking with a group of the Star Wars Galaxies players that had come. It was a very interesting and enlightening discussion, and I wanted to thank all of them for their candor.
 
I wanted to make sure I close the loop on that discussion because I walked away with some new priorities.
 
Here are my thoughts:
 
1) Content is the single biggest thing people playing SWG want. - this surprised me. From our perspective we had thought revising the systems in the game (i.e. expertise revamps) was a bigger deal. While they did say this was important, I was susprised they ranked this higher than working on PVP.
2) This lead to a discussion about involving the community in the decision making process. They pointed out that we do a lousy job at this, and they're right. As such, you can expect a poll in the near future to help us prioritize things for the next 6-12 months.
3) Guild Management tools in SWG aren't up to snuff - I went ballistic when I heard you can only manage your guild through the terminal. We need to fix this.
4) Server consolidation - we need to fasttrack this - it's a very hard problem, and the team has had other priorities.
5) We need to explain ourselves and the thinking behind changes a lot better
6) Once we got past the "please bring back the pre-NGE servers" (no, we're never going to do that)  the discussion really got down to brass tacks. Many people ask me why I don't post a lot here, and the simple answer is that it's hard to follow a thread when many of the posts end up being "bring back pre-NGE servers" and other issues we've moved past. Please don't misunderstand me on this - I get why some people want this. It's just that it isn't possible and at some point if we're going to move the game forward new ideas are at the top of the list of things we should be discussing. That's my view anyways.
 
Smed
 



Smed, can you please stop with these "we are going to listen more" threads every year...  You and I know nothing will really change.  The PvE data was right in front of you the whole time.  All you needed to see are the people making officer ranks.  I've seen high ranked officers with no pvp kills.  Its all there.. 

The only certainty you can give us is that pre-nge servers wont be returning.  But I bet if you held a poll, over 70% would want pre-nge servers.  I know for a fact the NGE shouldn't have happened - and the funny thing is I think you believe the same.  One thing is for certain, the NGE was the worst thing that's happened to this game.

I predict more of the same..  You wont learn or listen.  That's why this game is dying.

"I will never be condescending - which means talking down to people."
02-09-2007 11:31 AM  

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Re: Influencers Summit thoughts
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jlutz11
Wing Commander
Posts: 5521
Registered: 04-26-2005


jlutz11
PA: Havoc
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Reply 108 of 178

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You need to bring back the filling indicator for food and drink and let that stuff stack again.  It doesnt make much sense that you cant drink somthing and eat somthing at the same time.





 
 
 
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02-09-2007 11:32 AM  

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Re: Influencers Summit thoughts
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Sasune
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Sasune

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I'd really like to know "why" you can't do what the players want ? Why DO you keep pushing and riding this train wreck ?

Your dying here.. take a look and act fast..Your out of time SOE.

(If everyone was gonna keep copying and pasting this I had to fix the typo lol)

02-09-2007 11:32 AM  

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Re: Influencers Summit thoughts
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ace426
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Registered: 09-15-2005


ace426
PA: WoJ
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Skuzz wrote:
Mr.Smed,
A few thoughts to help you guys at SOE.
  • We need content in a bad way. Specifically we need high-level repeatable content (ie; instances, missions, etc). Agreed!!!
  • PvE has always been the focus of SWG. Yes having a touch more focus on PvP was nice but get back to PvE thats SWG's core audience, hands down.
  • Server consolidation... horrible idea and not worth the time to even think about it. Nobody really wants this and ultimately it will result in even more lost subs. Just let it go. I disagree. Especially if you want harder mobs. It's hard enough to get a group together for an HK run as it is. How the hell would anyone do anything with the tremendous lack of players now? Nope...NEW CONTENT is needed. Stuff people haven't done ad nauseum.
Would you like to know what you could do 'Right now' to make some fast quick changes to hold players over till we get new content? Then read below!
  • Bump up the difficulty of NPC's so they are challenging once again. At present EVERYTHING is solo-able and this is extremely lame. In particular key nasties should require full groups to kill, things like Krayts for example. Players like working together but at present we have no reason to, we are punished with reduced XP and nothing in the game requires more then 1 player to kill. See above!
  • Make Dath, Yavin and Endor scarey challenging places again. Boost the native Critters/NPCs up a bit and have some swank loot drop from em like the good ol days.
  • Give us a reason to explore and travel in the awesome game worlds we have, at present we have zero reason to go anywhere but starports on adventure planets. When the MOB specific loot tables were removed in favor of the universal lame loot tables we have now and creature handler was removed we suddenly had no reason to explore/hunt/adventure out on the planets. Please fix this. Agreed! Would be nice.



Skuzz...I usually agree with you but there are some remarks you make that will hurt the game more. Harder Mobs are needed, but as new CONTENT! Not just making HK harder. Who solo's HK now as it is? Anyone that can do it is bored of doing it. At one time it was a challenge...today it's just boring.

Another thing that would INSTANTLY help the game is increasing group XP for LOWER level toons. Right now it is a solo grind to 90 and they miss building bonds and meeting vet players because of this. They find other low level buddies and they all get bored at the same time rather than learning from those of us who HAVE done almost everything.

Give the LVL30's the SAME XP you give the 90's who are helping them. Make it require the HELPER tag if needed, but let us 90's help again.



General
TUx
02-09-2007 11:34 AM  

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Re: Influencers Summit thoughts
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Duragoth
Wing Commander
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Duragoth

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Colaboy wrote:

Smed, can you please stop with these "we are going to listen more" threads every year...  You and I know nothing will really change.  The PvE data was right in front of you the whole time.  All you needed to see are the people making officer ranks.  I've seen high ranked officers with no pvp kills.  Its all there.. 

The only certainty you can give us is that pre-nge servers wont be returning.  But I bet if you held a poll, over 70% would want pre-nge servers.  I know for a fact the NGE shouldn't have happened - and the funny thing is I think you believe the same.  One thing is for certain, the NGE was the worst thing that's happened to this game.

I predict more of the same..  You wont learn or listen.  That's why this game is dying.


LOL I'm sorry but this is like the whole "Kashyyyk" thing again. Last year around this time the PvP people were being very vocal about wanting PvP content, then they got it, and finaly relized that sometimes wanting is better then getting.
02-09-2007 11:36 AM  

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Re: Influencers Summit thoughts
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Schadwe13
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Schadwe13
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Hey Smed, Remember These?:

OpenLetter
Particularly pay attention to your section labeled "The Path Forward". The replies to your email were EXACTLY what you "found out about" in that "summit" of yours. Funny how you forgot over the course of 15 months. You read but you just DON'T listen. Most of the complaints back then are STILL IN EXISTENCE.

=======================================
Schadwe
"The shadows only move if there is something in the light."

Vendor: StormTech Aerospace Inc
Swoop Territory, Naboo (-5620, 3000). Just outside of Theed.
02-09-2007 11:37 AM  

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Re: Influencers Summit thoughts
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jennernight
Wing Commander
Posts: 1473
Registered: 03-20-2005


jennernight
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Smed wrote:
Last weekend we had our first ever Influencers Summit. It was a lot of fun, and I have to say I learned quite a bit. We deliberately brought people in that were some of our biggest criitics. We wanted to hear directly from them and understand the issues they had.
 
At one point I spent an hour or so talking with a group of the Star Wars Galaxies players that had come. It was a very interesting and enlightening discussion, and I wanted to thank all of them for their candor.
 
I wanted to make sure I close the loop on that discussion because I walked away with some new priorities.
 
Here are my thoughts:
 
1) Content is the single biggest thing people playing SWG want. - this surprised me. From our perspective we had thought revising the systems in the game (i.e. expertise revamps) was a bigger deal. While they did say this was important, I was susprised they ranked this higher than working on PVP.
2) This lead to a discussion about involving the community in the decision making process. They pointed out that we do a lousy job at this, and they're right. As such, you can expect a poll in the near future to help us prioritize things for the next 6-12 months.
3) Guild Management tools in SWG aren't up to snuff - I went ballistic when I heard you can only manage your guild through the terminal. We need to fix this.
4) Server consolidation - we need to fasttrack this - it's a very hard problem, and the team has had other priorities.
5) We need to explain ourselves and the thinking behind changes a lot better
6) Once we got past the "please bring back the pre-NGE servers" (no, we're never going to do that)  the discussion really got down to brass tacks. Many people ask me why I don't post a lot here, and the simple answer is that it's hard to follow a thread when many of the posts end up being "bring back pre-NGE servers" and other issues we've moved past. Please don't misunderstand me on this - I get why some people want this. It's just that it isn't possible and at some point if we're going to move the game forward new ideas are at the top of the list of things we should be discussing. That's my view anyways.
 
Smed
 



Smed,  Ill have to agree with SOME of the post above mine,  Your only figuring this out NOW of all times? 

Honestly HAD YOU ACTUALLY PLAYED THIS GAME,  you would know the things we needed back then,  and you would not be in the boat your in now,  and all those things you posted above would have only happend in OTHER games not this one.  and you damn sure would have NEVER thought of the NGE as a viable option to fix what was not broken or just needed tweeking.

You want to be better than WOW,  First off STOP PLAYING that game and bringing elements of that stupid game here.  We do not want it generally speaking. 

Finally my rule of thumb,  ALLWAYS DO WHAT YOU SAY YOUR GOING TO DO.  YOUR PROMISES AS OF LATE FALL ON DEAF EARS.  PROVE US WRONG SMED.  If you want our help to get the game on track LISTEN TO US.  We know what WE want in game.  OR you can at least have your crew up there reading what we write in the suggestion threads.  the poll would be nice chance to get a feeling of the player base but that depends on the subject matter you poll us on.  When the real information you seak has been written THOUSANDS OF TIMES LITERALLY.  by thousands of other players and thousands more in the future.

You summit last week may have been fruitfull to you but to us it means you invited a few well spoken players there.  While you suggest that they are outspoken and very vocal,  and I would contend that most of them were in the past.  You didnt catch us all.

JENNER NIGHT~ELDER JEDI KNIGHT
PROUD MEMBER OF (TAA) FOUNDER OF KOE
JUSTIN'~COMMANDO PPL~OFFICER
DONT RUN, YOU WILL ONLY D!E TIRED
02-09-2007 11:38 AM  

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Re: Influencers Summit thoughts
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Khristen
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Posts: 7760
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Khristen
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Smed wrote:

....I was susprised they ranked this higher than working on PVP....
 
....Server consolidation - we need to fasttrack this - it's a very hard problem, and the team has had other priorities....
 


I am going to go on the premise that you do not have much knowledge on the workings and systems of the game; the fact that you had no idea that the Guild Management system is a horrible mess certainly suggests this.  Please take time to understand exactly what you're getting into if you try and "fasttrack" server consolidations.

Server merges/consolidations will most likely kill off the subscriptions of most people currently playing on servers that would be removed in a merge.

It has been my experience--reading many, many threads begging for server merges--that those who see no problem with server mergers are primarily PvP players.  Their goals and reasons for playing could succeed on any server with any group of like-minded people.  While there are definitely communities among these players, there is generally little that ties them to the larger server community.  For them it would be no huge deal to move to another server if the PvP situation was "better" there.  They play more for the game mechanics than the community mechanics.

It is the players who do not see PvP as their end-game content that have major issues with the concept of a server merge.  These are the players who have built successful guilds and/or cities, who engage in role-playing, who run businesses--basically those who utilize the world-building aspects of the game.  In this area, each server is unique.  It's not about templates or PvP rankings--it's about community.  The staying power of the game is not about the systems, but instead it is about the world they "live" in.

I've made a "second home" in SWG, with my guild mates, in the city of Kor Spera.  For me and many who live there now, it's more than "just a game".  It's a lasting accomplishment that I'm very proud of personally, both in-game and out.  The journey my characters have taken to get where they are now is much more than boxes on a skill wheel.

Stripping them of those accomplishments, of those testaments to the journey, would destroy them.  For me, those characters are more than just bits of pixelated information stored in a database.  You can't just strip away the world attached to them, copy and paste over skills and numbers, and expect them to be the same as they were before.  Take that away, and you have literally thrown out over three years worth of dedication and effort.

In my own experience, most players fall into the latter category.  Take away their homes and their character's lives and the worlds they have created--they wouldn't have anything left to play for.  For myself, take away my city and you may as well shut the game down completely for all I'd care because I'd be done.

 

PLEASE.... do not pull the team off anything to work on a server consolidation system.  Not only will this be working against the desires of most of your long-term players, it's an effort in futility when it comes to trying to solve the problem of lower server populations.  A merge will not solve the population problem, it will only eliminate the number of servers you are maintaining; most will not bother starting over and you will still have low populations.

The easiest, simplest and most logical way to start dealing with the problem is to offer low- or no-cost server transfers from low population servers to higher population servers.  That technology is already in place.  I would also recommend doing the long-needed structure purge to clean up inactive buildings and cities so that newer players can actually play the game without being held back by those no longer playing. 

At that point, the focus should be on making the game live up to its potential.  Fix the Guild Management, improve Player Cities, add (PvE) content that can be repeated, make leveling less of a chore and something more enjoyable, give back the sandbox-feel to the game so that players can find personal ownership in the game again.  Listen hard to your community and the community leaders on what can be done to improve the game and do everything you can to use those ideas.  Make the game what it can be--as opposed to trying to be like everyone else--and I think your population issues will go away.

 

| Khristen Lockslett Barezz |
| Galactic Senator |00
 
Owner of  The KhrisNea Company located in Kor Spera, Corellia, Naritus -730, 1195
02-09-2007 11:39 AM  

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Re: Influencers Summit thoughts
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DenkiriLargo
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DenkiriLargo
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Honestly Smed...I have quite a few freinds in  guild (and alot not in guild) that are bored to tears....yea alot of them PVP but what do you do when that fizzles out? Run HK for the 349871239870198570938570 billionth time?   All we want is something more to do in this game, because there is so much you can add to this game content wise.

I just hope it happens before too many more lose interest.

Denkiri Largo II Kayja Tahiri II Kur'i Draconis
Jedi Elder [] Master Officer [] Rebel Medic

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------My fellow Americans, I have not been entirely truthful with you. I did gagoogidy that girl. I gashmoygadied her gaflavity with my googus. And I am sorry. -Glen Quagmire
02-09-2007 11:40 AM  

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Jarrel_Reafis
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Jarrel_Reafis

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we dont need server merges, if the game gets better where will the new players go?

Lag is already an issue on populated ones if we have fewer crammed servers, the aging code wont handle it.

Kiss my Wookiee

Underworld Smuggler Jarrel Reafis



Cancelled FTW
02-09-2007 11:41 AM  

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Re: Influencers Summit thoughts   [ Edited ]
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falacy
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falacy
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Thank you for taking the time to let us know that you're still interested in this game!

I've had my up and downs with SOE over the years, but all in all, I think you're doing a good job. Vangaurd is great asset and an amazing addition to the Station Pass. I still play EQ every once and a while, but I've never (not even for a milisecond) been able to get past the character creation screen of EQ II, so that's really a lost cause for me... However, I can play SWG, EQ, Vangaurd, Planet Side, and the Matrix without issue, so that's pretty excellent value for the dollar still.

Anyhow, I was wondering if you'll be consolodating the RMT system to be Station Access service, as aposed to an EQ II exclusive feature? I'm by no means a bazillionaire in any MMO (my SWG riches are in the 7 million range), but it would be great to have a buy and sell for all games that was sanctioned and easy to use. Sort of like the inter-game chat system, which is a real blessing!

People are right about "content" being important, because in all honesty there really isn't any reason for the following planets, Dathomir, Yavin4, and Endor, considering that apart from the one dungeon on each planet the rest is essentially wasted space. Sure, you can "hunt" there, but the lack of any story or regionally dynamic content (random encounters, local recurring story lines, things like the old Jedi Village) there's just nothing to do there that you can't do on any of the other more engaging planets, like Mustafar and Kashyyyk - where qusts are plentiful! SWG has a whole lot "to do", but it really seems to lack a reason to do things. I think that's what people mean when they say SWG needs more "content".

Content = Purpose, Meaning, A Reason for "Doing" things that are already in the game. The GCW helps, but it's not everyone's cup of tea.

Message Edited by falacy on 02-09-2007 11:44 AM


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02-09-2007 11:42 AM  

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Re: Influencers Summit thoughts
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talansen
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talansen
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Smed,

I'm kind of afraid that it's too late. Chapter 5 (the "Trader and Entertainer" revamp) is pretty much the last straw for many of us. We were looking for new schematics (furniture/decorations already in game, but not craftable), the ability to craft items that were at least equal to looted items, the ability to *choose* which two crafting professions we were interested in participating in (rather than choosing the one we were most interested in, and just being stuck with one that we had *no* interest in). We waited for this to happen, had our publish pushed back several times so it could "be done right"... and now we're getting a publish that just doesn't address the core problems we had.

I've PvP'd (quite a bit, in fact) because that's where all the content has gone for the past year or so. It wasn't until I started the Vanguard beta that I realized how much I really missed interesting, challenging PvE content. Now, over there, I'm on the RP server. Not because I'm particularly fond of RP... but because the emphasis on PvP and pure combat over the past year has, quite frankly, created an attitude in SWG that has chased away many of the people that I most enjoy playing with.

An MMO like SWG is supposed to be a social game. It is supposed to encourage people to cooperate an work with each other, to relax and have fun. I actually love PvP... it's why I play Halo, CounterStrike, and a huge variety of PvP console titles. But experience has taught me that competition between players does not encourage positive behavior, or friendly environments. It causes, well, competition.

Combine that attitude of competition with a lack of content, and a complete disregard for folks who are not interested in the combat side of a MMO, and you've already lost a big chunk of your non-PvP playerbase.

I would like to point out that some of the people that I play games like Halo with have actually tried out SWG in the past year. None of them have stuck around. In general, they have *all* felt the same way I do... PvP in a MMO (even the NGE SWG) isn't a test of skill, it's a test of character build. And true hard core PvP'rs just are not interested in that.

Your audience for this game just keeps on shrinking, and six months to a year is going to be too long for most of us to wait to finally have something to do.

You'll have one of my accounts here still... I switched to station access to play Vanguard, and that makes it cheap enough to keep my combat toon. My second account, though (my crafter account), is probably only going to be around just long enough for me to re-outfit my combat toon post Chapter 5. After that, there doesn't really seem like there is any good reason to keep him around any longer.

Talan'sen Corby Rebel Swashbuckler 
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02-09-2007 11:43 AM  

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LeicBear
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LeicBear
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To the community, please lets not focus on the negative instead lets see this in a positive light.

As Smed said we need to focus on moving the game forward and if that means content then that's all good isn't it?

Instead of blaming Smed or Helios or anyone else at SOE we should be posting what we want to have in the way of content, give them some ideas.  If, going forward, they will listen to us more then now is the time to put the past behind us and continue posting/re-posting them new ideas and suggestions.

/Salu

Icobacca - Spy, Ex-Elder Jedi, Elder Smuggler
Guild Leader of PHX (The Phoenix Alliance) - Flurry

Hobby - Trader: Engineering- Flurry
Lieutenant Eslode - Master Officer - PHX - Flurry - Death from Above
"Our armies do not come into your cities and lands as conquerors or enemies, but as liberators."

Hpbbie - CL 82 Spy (Elder Creature Handler), unguilded, Europe-Chimaera
XFIRE: icobacca
02-09-2007 11:43 AM  

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Re: Influencers Summit thoughts   [ Edited ]
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Saphy
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Saphy
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Hello Everyone,

Obviously the NGE has stirred up a lot of strong feelings among the SWG playerbase. There is no denying these changes have upset some of our players. While I can certainly understand and respect these feelings, I assure you we approached them with a longer term strategy in mind and with the best of intentions. That strategy is to lay the foundation for a longer term vision of the game that will keep people playing for the long haul. Yes, many of our long time players are upset... and we do understand why. We're not sitting in our offices thinking of ways to upset our paying customers.. we're trying to bring Star Wars Galaxies to a broader audience to make sure that it's viable for the long haul.

Why?

Many of you ask "Why did you have to make such a sweeping change rather than just fixing the things that were wrong?" - well, to put it bluntly - everyone had different ideas of what we needed to fix. Trying to balance 34 professions, and add compelling content to make everyone happy proved to be a very large challenge. Many design decisions made early on in the game's creation were boxing the team in to the point that we were never going to be able to really make this game rise to the level it needs to as both a great experience AND as a business. We have consistently kept the SWG team as one of the largest teams within SOE (around 70 people). Even with a team that size getting new content done along with maintaining the live game, along with developing new systems for SWG just proved to be tougher than it should have been. We've got a lot of experience doing MMO's, and SWG has always proven to be the game that was the toughest for us to make changes to. So, along with our partners at LucasArts we did a very lengthy look at just what the fundamental issues with SWG were. We spoke to many of you, read the forums and conducted numerous focus group tests with both existing players, people who have played MMO's before (but not SWG) and people that haven't ever tried MMO's before.

The consistent feedback we recieved through this research showed us where the problems were. Here are the top 3 issues:
1) Difficult to get into - too complicated. People didn't understand what all the professions were, and the interface was just plain hard.
2) Combat wasn't exciting enough
3) Game wasn't "Star Warsy" enough. The professions issue also showed itself here.

In order to make the changes neccessary we examined just what we would have to change, and quickly came to the realization that reducing the number of professions was the single most important thing we had to do. Many of the professions overlapped and when we looked at what would make a really fun Star Wars style game, we came up with the profession list that's in the game now. Equally important to making SWG a viable game in the long term was addressing the fact that combat just wasn't fun enough. I recognize that some of you will disagree here - and I hope you can recognize this is a very subjective thing.. but the research we did was extremely clear on this point - the old combat system wasn't up to snuff. We tried different things and landed on the "fast action" style of combat that's in the game now.
We couldn't make changes of this magnitude without changing some things that people loved - creature handlers for example are among the most upset. This was an example of something that was near and dear to people (including myself btw). It's one of the coolest parts of the game. It's one that's only gone in the short term - we'll be bringing it back in a different form in the near future once we work through the consequences of how we can make this core system work within the new framework. It won't be a profession in and of itself, but something people can do as part of the existing professions.

One last thing I'd like to discuss in this explanation is the business end of things. Many of you question the logic of the decision to do this NGE.. stating that many of the existing players will quit because we're changing the game so much. From our standpoint we have to look at the game for the long haul. EverQuest is will be 7 years old on March 16th. We HAVE to think that long-term. With the game the way it was we knew we would never be able to attract enough people to really keep SWG viable as a business. It certainly would have kept some portion of our existing playerbase for a good long time, and we would have put out new expansions and new content as well as fixing bugs.. but it wouldn't have appealed to the really large Star Wars fanbase out there.. and frankly over time the existing userbase would have churned out as happens in any game like this. We just didn't have the game we needed to have if we're going to really grow this userbase. It might surprise you to know that after the first combat upgrade, we actually added new subs. We took a step in the right direction, but it just wasn't enough. So what we're doing here is obviously risky.. we're betting that we can make this game a whole lot more fun to our existing userbase AND make it appealing enough so that we can grow that userbase in a major way. Right now I think it's fair to say we have work to do on both ends. I hope you understand that we absolutely value each and every player. You pay the bills around here, and that's not something we are forgetting. None of us like seeing people cancel..If you think this change is about "acceptable losses for a bigger goal", that's simply not the case.. nor is it how we view things. We have a clear plan to make this game a whole lot more fun, for everyone.. and that's the gamble we're making.. that we can pull this off and get you, our players to help us make this the Star Wars game we all want.
And that brings me to the really important part of this post - the path forward.

The Path forward
The real purpose of this post is to ask for your help. In this thread, could you please list the top issues you see needing to be addressed in the short term. Any big problems from your perspective - what's really keeping the NGE from being a postive thing from your perspective. We will be watching this thread carefully and taking notes, and posting an ordered list of stuff we'll take care of (and we'll try to say how quickly we can do it as well). Please keep this thread on point. We have to move forward - asking us to pull the NGE out isn't going to be productive. If you really want to help, here's your chance.

From our perspective, we're focused on the following:
1) Fixing actual bugs
2) Adding new skills to differentiate the professions much better, and particularly the advancement path (i.e. making cool new skills the higher you rise through a particular profession).
3) Working on making crafting a much more important part of the NGE.
4) Cool new content - particularly focusing on the Galactic Civil War
As for the future expansions.. we have a lot of ideas (wouldn't it be cool for a guild to have a Star Destroyer?)... but for now we want to focus on what YOU want us to focus on. So please add a lot of constructive thoughts to this thread and let us respond by taking care of as many issues as we can.
A few loose ends -

I would like to specifcally address a few consistent things people have been emailing me - No, we aren't making these changes in order to bring SWG to consoles. This is simply untrue. Noone is working on an Xbox 360 or PS3 version of SWG (Or PS2, Xbox or PSP), nor is one on the drawing board. Would that be cool someday? Sure... but it's not on our radar at all.

Unfortunately we also can't put up a pre-NGE (or PRE-CU) version of SWG. That would require us to support 2 separate versions of the codebase and we're just not able to do that. We couldn't simply put up a version like this unsupported.. what if someone found a really bad exploit?
Thanks for taking the time to read this.. and please join in giving as many constructive ideas as you can (preferably in a list form ordered most important to least important).

John Smedley
President, Sony Online Entertainment

 

 

So Smed, this is what you posted after the NGE debacle. I have highlighted something in red that I find very interesting regarding this post here.... interesting as in it leaves some questions for me...

 

 



Message Edited by Saphy on 02-09-2007 11:44 AM

>And that was part of the appeal. Something you completely lose when you "dumb down" the rules so that "anyone can play".
We like to say "complex but not complicated". But I think we might be missing a bit of the point there. As in, actually, complicated has a great deal of appeal.<

-Jeff Freeman, SWG Lead Designer, February 2006
02-09-2007 11:43 AM  

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