Bulletin board changes

[Johnathgalt]

my thoughts

With regard to the market forums in particular, I think a significant number of transactions were facilitated by the market forums. Additionally, I'm sure countless in game transactions were expedited because either the buyer, seller or both had a means of acquiring a third party price check based on historical transactions. Essentially, these forums provided a serious amount of lubricant to the Rubi-ka economy. Without the forums, I'd venture to say that many people will become further frustrated with the game because it will become increasing difficult and more time consuming to buy and sell items.

Originally posted by Cz
. . .
Community work consists of
- gathering feedback
- answering questions
- providing official information
. . .

It seems to me that eliminating forums like "suggestions," "game-play bugs/mechanics," etc. makes it much more difficult to adequately perform the first three items composing community work. I suppose all the issues previously raised in those forums; will now filter through direct emails (but is that really the solution funcom desires). It seems to me some very fundemental flaws in game mechanics were raised in those forums (the way initiations were working stands out in my mind). Will the elimination of forums really decrease the workload associated with the remaining forums? Maybe, but one of two things will likely happen: (1) threads not directly on topic will start to appear with greater and greater frequency in other forums (which will mitigate any decrease in workload) or (2) the participation in the official forums with dwindle until it is really not a place where anyone participates (this would certainly decrease valuable player input funcom receives from these forums).

{Moderator: Edited typo.}

[Cz]

Akudama; I've heard the saying. I don't think it justifies flaming. And while I'm fairly think-skinned, I am not going to force everybody else to be.

A global in-game channel would turn into a "general" chat immediately. If we thought that would work, we'd added it a long time ago.

Liyanne; I think the time can never be good for such a change.

Jellobiafra; I listed the things I would have to cut from at the start of the thread. Not sure what else you were asking for.

And I have said before that getting more volunteers wouldn't really help. Managing volunteers takes time too, and there are things I can't possibly turn over to them. Some things I'm working on putting over to them, and when that is done, I migth be able to cope with the rest.

Jynne; Very good points.

Stimmed; Yes, there was such a poll. It ended very even on the options, and hence we chose to not make changes.

At that time I focused entirely on the forums, and almost everything I did were aimed at them. At the same time we saw other parts of the community shrink away, especially the fan sites, while I got more and more to do trying to keep up with the demands of the community. I spent Christmas on recovering, and the time before on planning some refocusing to manage it all, and this is the result; Letting others handle most of the forums, while I focus on gathering and providing feedback.

Suggestions can still be put forward on other bulletin boards, and I'm sure people will comment on them there too. If they gain popularity, send me a link to the thread (and a quick intro about it, if you like).

Poweredge; I'm not sure what you mean with "should at least be made available for viewing". The forums are there, in the archive, fully viewable by everybody.

The Professionals already have some tiny abilities in the profession forums. But handing the basic moderation over to 24+ other people doesn't take away my part of the job. Some things can't be turned over to volunteers. At least not now.

Nrse; I listed what takes up my time at the start of my thread. I spend a good two hours just going through e-mails each day. Not sure what tasks on the list you think take little time.

About volunteers, see above.

Ztatic; I'm sorry, but I really can't discuss our personnel and hiring policies here.

Triskweline; Good point on the posting freedom. I mentioned that in the article, but I hardly think people noticed.

Nugget; Good points, though I must comment that "the whole community likes and does use them" is quite an overstatement.

Aqua; try the ones on the fan site listing. Several of those have forums. And Meister promoted the Stratics forums as having no pop-ups himself, so I'm sure he doesn't mind me doing the same.

We get information from external boards as much as from our own. If the information leaves our forums, we still won't lose track of it.

Johnathgalt; the information gathered on those forums you mention can be attained elsewhere too. Reducing the time spent on other tasks makes me able to obtain that information. As it was, I was never able to read those forums, so the information was wasted anyway, whether it was on our forums or somebody else's.

[RoboKa]

Cz,

I know I've posted some harsh responses in the past and I am not taking any of that back, but I must admit; You have a hell of a hard job!

In this post, I am going to back you up...and even suggest a harsher stance on your part.

As a fellow software developer, I know that the hardest decision is to take functinality away from users. Its a hard decision to make, harder to justify and harder still to gain final acceptance from the user community. Unfortunately, a significant part of your user base apparently feels that the forums are part of the application. Maybe this was never intended and its really gonna be a hard sell.

On the other hand, I know more folks ingame that don't actively participate in the forums than those that do.

The cut backs you are making here, are going to help your workflow, but workflow never levels off. As more players start and come back to the game and as the feature set of the actual application becomes wider and wider, the hours in your day will eventually become to few again.

Cz, as one software developer to another, don't put yourself through this again. You really only have two choices:

1. Cut all the way back to bare minimums...only what truly MUST be there to make things work.
2. Hire the staff to do the work (not recommended).

I would much rather have FunComs dollars working on the features of the game, not the forums. Other sites WILL pick up when these forums in. Capitalize on that free resource.

But, be ruthless about it:

• Beginner's corner is important, but no one should be able to post there if they have had an account for more than 30 days.
• Role Playing should go. Its not necessary and other sites can take it over.
• Community corner - ax it!
• Test Server, obviously necessary, but only to people with open accounts on the Test Server.
• Can't get game running and Other Technical Issues - You have email and telephone connections to your help desk, don't you? This shouldn't be a forum, it should be a knowledge base that folks search through to find answers and only the support desk can insert entries
• Professions - keep them for the feed back, but make the "professionals" be the guardians. THis shouldn't take up your time except to recieve the nectar of the filter input from the "professionals." If the "professionals" don't want to do the extra work, get new professionals
• Market and Bulliten Boards - gone.

Basically, shut it down. I'm not being sarcastic, it's more like tough love. Its better for you and in the long run, since the extra time on your hands will make the game better, in the long run its better for the community.

Good luck

[_____________Borrace]

closing the market forums is a horrid idea.
an absolutely horrid idea.

here's an idea about the market forums and moderation. don't moderate them. if there is a "problem" thread, let the community police it with the "report this thread to a moderator" button.

at first, this game is fun because it is new.
then, it is fun because of the leveling.
then, it is fun because of the character building.
then, it is fun because of the buying and selling.

the forums are the key place where all players can buy and sell excess goods for market prices. there is a degree of certainty that you are dealing with someone who has a real product, and not someone screwing around. getting rid of the market is plain dumb, and WILL take fun out of the game.

[_____________Borrace]

Originally posted by RoboKa
.[*]Can't get game running and Other Technical Issues - You have email and telephone connections to your help desk, don't you?

there is absolutely zero telephone support for this game.

[sarangas]

Well Let me say this about that.First Cz you have my apoligies cause i'll admit ive maybe caused you some headaches in some threads i have started and replied to.(nuff said bout that).In all honesty i think of this as a good thing.Buying and selling,by the way of camping uber loot and the like will become such a chore it will no longer be worth it for the few who exchange uber loot for uber prices.Thus jacking up prices for everone.

People will gather at certain areas depending on faction(backyard 16 southgate tir for example)or (some omni area)to try and sell their goods for a fair price ,not the "compilation of market prices crapolla".Youll have a better chance of getting a good piece for a fair price. because nobody will be willing to take the time to wait it out.Its called a buyers market.Buyers just have to be patient and they will get things for a fraction of what they are selling for now.(because no goods are moving at 350 mil a piece or 800 mil).

This isn't popular but i think you should do it and do it like yesterday.This is my opinion on the matter.Don't let these people convince you otherwise.It'll settle down after a while and the devs (when they have time) will code vendors for us or something along that line.

As for the other parts of the board you can get the same info anywhere on the net..period end of story.

[Jynne]

Yes, RoboKa, let's take access to the Beginner's Corner away from people who actually know the game and can provide answers and help to the new players who post questions there. The game mechanics are just so obvious and/or well explained by the manual that there's absolutely no reason to think new players would benefit from the knowledge of longer-term players at all.

Everyone already knows everything they'd ever need to know by their 29th day of playing. Mmm hmm.

[Lilyflie]

"Beginner's corner is important, but no one should be able to post there if they have had an account for more than 30 days"

Does not make sense as it is the long term players who can best help the beginers

"Role Playing should go. Its not necessary and other sites can take it over."

Not necessary from a perspective yes, but when the people from funcom events said they want to keep a eye on it, the decision was made as Cz mentioned. If I look at this in perspective, this makes sense as people in charge of events would very much like to see what the community is doing, and find ways to incorporate it, or develop on some of those ideas.

"Community corner - ax it!"

Dissagree. This section is where discussions happen on changes, things in the works and ideas that funcom want to propose to the community. This forum makes sense to me for keeping.

"Test Server, obviously necessary, but only to people with open accounts on the Test Server"

All account holders of AO are welcome on test server. There is no seperate account system for them

"Can't get game running and Other Technical Issues - You have email and telephone connections to your help desk, don't you? This shouldn't be a forum, it should be a knowledge base that folks search through to find answers and only the support desk can insert entries"

I kind of agree on this one, but as long as it remained a knowledge base and didn't dissapear completly

"Market and Bulliten Boards - gone"

Don't agree. with either. A early post said very good points for keeping teh market forums, and regardless of what was axed, there is still some good information available here, and areas to take some issues players may be having (ie beginers, Prof forums). I have always been supportive of Keeping WoRk and pvp forums if funcom decided to, but I don't think removing even more, or axing them alltogether is the answer.

[____________Ejeckted]

I have a solution for a marketplace that needs no moderation.

instead of an open text box, produce a simple form.

Posters can select WTB or WTS or AUCTION
and there would be a small text box (30 character limit)
for the item name and another couple of small text boxes
that only accept numerical entries for price and end-date etc

then the reply form would allow nothing but a numerical offer.
(like ebay)

not as good as what we've got now IMHO, but pretty un-abusable.

Originally posted by Cz
Scumbug; if people start posting a lot off-topic, we'll simply have to moderate it. Strictly if needed.

stop and think about that a sec, Cz.
how does that make you have to spend less time moderating?
(the originally stated purpose of removing the market forums)
now you have to moderate more, just in a different place.

I'm sure weeding all the profession forums of WTB/WTS posts
will take more time than you currently spend removing the
rare flamewar on a Market page.

[bowu]

isn'T that easy most bids are not cash only...

and btw. I am paying for my whole account, canceling forums is like taking away some ingame-dungeons...maybe it doesn't reduce the fun of all ppl but it reduces mine.

[Toxinator]

Cz,

The problem i see in this change is that the community is being split up. I really really dont think that is a good idea.

Perhaps if FunCom was to support one site instead of 5+ then this would be better. 1 site would mean that we are just "moving" 5+ means that we are being split.

I know your job is tough, and i know that you cant moderate all teh crap here by yourself, so close non essential forums. That i understand and agree with. But there were some forums that were closed that were essential.. These being PvP, WoRK, and the fun Social Forums. I understand that you cant moderate it all, but there wont be much left to moderate if you close everything.

Also, those that are left in this game are leaving, several because of the forums closing. I dont think thats to profitable .

Now, Market Forums cannot be closed, they are like the most active forums on this site. Closing them will cause major problems within game as well, much of Rubi-Ka's economy is through these forums, so closing them would upset the balance FunCom so desperately seeks.

These are my two cents, and please take a suggestion or two to heart.

LT

[Jamespond]

Cz... the forums is half the game... by taking it away, I and alot of other people, just lost a very important part, of why we play AO...

I feel lost now... I got issues with Notum Wars, and I really would like to be able to discuss these with everyone else... But I cant now... My personal favorite site to go to is AO-basher, but it has like 2 posts in it, I want my posts to reach everyone who plays AO, but now I have to go to 10 different boards, and post the same issues, and even if I did that, I would not be sure that even half the people, that read the official forum here, would read the new forums...

I agree that something needed done.... like the "next patch", "PvP conflict" and "Tarasque" should be removed, because they contained nothing but lame flames and whines, and nerf calls....

But u gave us Notum Wars, an important thing on RK, and its what we, powerlvlrs, lootwhores and whatever, that arent "real" RPers, consider our role and tribute to the story and conflict on RK...

Notum wars got serious issues too... where am I supposed to find out what is only a problem for me, and what is a problem for everyone? Like CC in NW, suddenly it has been removed from the game, why werent we informed?

If this is gonna work, u need to work together with only 1 fan site, to provide some new forums, or the fansites need to work together and create one forum, that supports it all...

Also the proffesion forums was only a small part of this forum, now that we dont have anything to post on this forum, or any real reason to visit it as often, the proffesion forums will die out slowly....

Oh and as someone else mentioned, people will quit the game because of this change, as this forum was what alot of people spen most time on, instead of playing, but atleast u made money on them, they will slowly close their accounts, and move on to something else, and I doubt it will help u financially...

Atleast consider putting NW board and maybe world of rubi-ka board up again...

Maybe let AO-basher run the NW board, then ao-stratics run the world of rubi-ka board, but let them be linked direcly from this forum, so everyone will go to the same forums.... There is no fun in visiting ghost forums....

[Springygirl]

{Moderator: Try again, without calling people names.}

[Kuro]

These forums look almost like what a person would expect to see if a supermodel got stranded on a desert island with nothing but Slim Fast for food: fatally anorexic.

I, for one, can't follow the logic of how closing forums improves communications. I can see the effect its had on my own communications: It's stopped. I haven't checked these forums or any others anything in the past couple days. If I'm not checking any forums, how can you collect any feedback from me?

I can understand having too many tasks, not enough time to do them all yourself, and lacking the staff to assist. I live it every day at work. But I can't shutdown servers to lighten my workload because that would just be cutting off my nose to spite my face. As is cutting down the forums is doing to you.

Whether or not they contributed directly to the feedback you're looking for, Cz, all those extra forums served another purpose

• They brought people to the forums

And people are vital to getting feedback. If there are no people, there is no feedback.

If you can't moderate the forums yourself, don't try. I gave up trying to do everything myself at work and now have even the receptionists at my job doing tasks for me. People have volunteered to moderate the forums. You have a group of individuals that have volunteered to assist you, Funcom, in lightening your workload. Not utilizing those resources is bad business, plain and simple. This isn't a solution to your problems at all. I strongly suggest you seriously consider reversing this decision before the damage done can't be reversed.

[______________Chosto]

Originally posted by Cz
However, due to us needing several of the forums ourselves, we couldn't do that. An evaluation on which forums were needed was done, and we ended up with the current setup.

Umm this is quite a puzzling comment, i thought that we were the customers and you were providing a service to us from which we pay for? Now suddenly it's about what you need from us? I thought we were helping you to build a better game so you would get more paying customers?

I always thought of these forums as a symbiosis between the developers and players - developers get invaluable feedback (buried in whine whine and some whine) from the players and in exchange players get to share their opinions among themselves. Now it feels like you're saying "Ok we'll have to close down this and that forums because we can't be bothered with them anymore, please continue giving us what we need but go away with your petty discussions and whines, we don't want to read about those."

Why not get more people then?
While more people would mean more time, it would also mean more costs. Community work does not in itself produce income, and is thus not the first team to staff up.

Are you serious? Does coding work in itself produce income? Do artists produce income? Does marketing in itself produce income? No - paying customers do. Paying customers who are happy about the game bring even more paying customers. That equals MONEY. If that statement was masterminded by some white collared 'business consultant' i suggest you get him fired.

Nobody here is saying you don't work enough, and if there is too much work for you more people are needed. Simple as that. But your bosses think that the solution to this problem is to cut down forums that i as a paying customer enjoy reading they are dead wrong.

I have been playing this game for a year now and none of the 'nerfs' in game have gotten me mad because i understand why they were needed - to balance the game and make it more enjoyable to players. This forum 'nerf' however really got me mad because nowadays a large part of my enjoyment of the game is because of the forums. I find out what is happening on Rubi-Ka. Now when i look at the forums i feel quite lost - no more World of Rubi-Ka, no more Tradeskills, no more Notum Wars, no more PvP... Most of the forums i enjoyed reading are now gone and i HATE that.

Suggestions:
If your management really cannot understand that more people are needed there are a few options that have been mentioned before:
- Make ARK:s or other volunteers (Professionals?) moderate part of the boards.
- Add a disclaimer on top of some forums that they are not moderated by Funcom (is this possible or are you obligated to moderate all boards that are under the forums.anarchy-online.com domain?)
- If all else fails make a deal with ONE community site and link their forums via the Forums startup page - that way we would'nt have to check 4 or more sites every day.



Chosto

[Noer]

So what alternatives are out there you speak of?

AO-Basher - a site I've not been able to get on for over a year unless I use some sort of US proxy.

AO Stratics - slower than slow, actually even slower. And thats just for the site, I don't even wanna think about how the forums are.

IGN - worst board-system I can imagine and very un-organised boards.

Did I forget any?

There are no alternatives.

We are missing bigtime a forum where we can discuss the encounters, the quests, the wildlife and so on of Rubi-Ka - namely the old The World of Rubi-Ka. I can understand you don't want PvP-forums since they are involving a lot of hot air and requires a lot of moderation. But The World of Rubi-Ka.........

[Beartwo]

We have jobs that wont allow us to dally too much on AO. We have commitments in the evening and sometimes we have to wait for software that is "misplaced/not out yet"... and so on.

For several weeks we had 1!!! person in our entire guild that had Notum Wars. This put us severely behind in the race for bases, and in the know how of how to play "NW style".
The forums were our only chance to keep slightly up to date on what was going on and which problems we might expect in NW.

I played NW test, but couldnt play at release due to the shipping problems so I tried to post for my fellow guildsmen and women on AO forums and guild forums, Most guilds have had to spend money to create a web site with a discussion forum to be able to handle the information flow needed to play this game.

By removing the forums you have moved even more of the information flow to other sites (a lot of them player run sites) thereby increasing the cost of running those sites.

Having the forums gathered in one place was extremely convenient, and I think that FC should be the main cost bearer of the "extra things" needed to run this game properly, not the players!

Having the AO forums made it possible for us to keep in touch with the game from one website. Now I have to go through 5 or 6 to keep abreast of whats going on.

I reconize the need to be effective and keep the costs down, but I am afraid that FC has injured itself further by this move. Money spent on keeping your customers happy is never wasted!

If we have to wait an extra week for a patch because there is one less dev then I would rather do that and feel that I am dealing with a company that prioritizes their customers!

Btw. I work as a systems consultant and I deal with customers every day. If they feel that we dont pay enough attention to them they will go somewhere else, regardless of the quality we provide them with.

Edit : AO Stratics run popups (FYI) and having to hunt three wen sites to see if anyone has said anything interesting isnt really practical since I havent got a clue where people go to post.

Comment to post made further down about the trade channels:

Shopping 1-50 has been a general spam place for a long time, now its virtually impossible to have it in view because it floods me. I dont mind turning it off, but low level players have to try an dsift through that insane amount of posts to try and find their ill treated Nova or whatever they are looking for.

Imagine what it looks like when a n00b takes his first steps out of the backyard and into Omni ent....

[assassimon]

Originally posted by Cz

At that time I focused entirely on the forums, and almost everything I did were aimed at them. At the same time we saw other parts of the community shrink away, especially the fan sites, while I got more and more to do trying to keep up with the demands of the community.

Cz, you don't really seem to understand, most of us here couldn't care less about the Fan sites, we not interested in visiting them, we want to have these forums and chat, discuss and help, this is the community, what you are doing now is to killing the whole community.

So why don't you try to do your work and keep up with the demands we have and give us back some forums and skip the whole Fan site BS?

[Animoy]

Those who played from launch know how horrible trading through the ingame trade channels can be when everyone is doing it.

Omnibot/Shopbot helped alot, but viewing the trade channel (especially 1-50) was like having "Other hit other" turned on at Shade camp.

Today, with even more players in game and more trading going on and no Omnibot/Shopbot option, the trade channel will become close to useless.

This will not only hurt the players, but also Funcom, since the game will become less attractive and many will leave to other games.

This again will increase the activity on E-Bay, something I know you dont want to happen.
Example: A fixer wanting GA4 would go to E-Bay and sell his valueable loot to raise real money, so he could buy a GA4 disc on E-Bay.

Multiple shop forums and auction systems will drive the prices up, since it becomes harder to aquire items. Supply and demand.
This again is something I know you dont want to happen.

I dont want to relate to multiple shop forums, multiple auction systems, flooded trade channels or E-Bay.

Keep the Market Forum. It's half the game.

[Wildwal]

Originally posted by Azzazzimon


Cz, you don't really seem to understand, most of us here couldn't care less about the Fan sites, we not interested in visiting them, we want to have these forums and chat, discuss and help, this is the community, what you are doing now is to killing the whole community.

So why don't you try to do your work and keep up with the demands we have and give us back some forums and skip the whole Fan site BS?

amen

community > game
forums = huge part of the community
fan sites = suck

need 1 central forum for all of us, just bring back the world of rubika.

wonder if funcom thinks we play this for its amazing gameplay