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Thread: Refocusing the Community work

  1. #201

    Question

    Just curious, Cz...

    Do you really think this change will make people post here less? (thereby trimming your workload, as per the goal?)

    Hundreds of us are still going to be sitting at work, just as bored as ever... wanting to do what they always do: Come here to post &/or read posts.

    Do you think people will post less often, simply because a handful of forums no longer exist? Or do you think people will submit the exact same volume of dribble, merely dispersed throughout a fewer number of forums (thereby making it harder for us to find the kind of information that we're looking for)?

    And do you really think this is going to slow Thyrra & Letah down one bit?
    Lucas "Madhava" Graves || Gear
    Level 203 Chief of Staff Surgery
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    Chakra "Accessory" Red || Gear

  2. #202
    I think this is taking away one of my favorite parts of the game, you cant close some of the forums, when you have several people that are willing to help to keep them open. Were extending a hand to help, take it.
    GalxandJoan "Toxinator" Rox :: 202 Doc
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  3. #203
    I have a feeling that lag will be reduced over the next couple of months. In fact, I bet it will almost go away completely by the summer.
    Travesty
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  4. #204
    I thought that the forums was part of the fee we pay to play. That is what they said when I signed up atleast, forums will be the best way to communicate with the AO playerbase. Correct me if I am wrong but I thought that the Forums was a service provided by Funcom to get feedback and make the game better.
    ****************************
    Winterizer lvl 213 Solitus Keeper
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  5. #205
    Originally posted by Travesty
    I have a feeling that lag will be reduced over the next couple of months. In fact, I bet it will almost go away completely by the summer.
    That took me a second...
    GalxandJoan "Toxinator" Rox :: 202 Doc
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  6. #206
    Originally posted by Dragonsphere
    I thought that the forums was part of the fee we pay to play. That is what they said when I signed up atleast, forums will be the best way to communicate with the AO playerbase. Correct me if I am wrong but I thought that the Forums was a service provided by Funcom to get feedback and make the game better.
    One would think that yes...

    From this i see that FC is having problems. If they werent in some kind of financial problem i would think that they would just hire another person, such as Cosmik used to be.

    But i think that if the players want to help, they should be able to. I will be more then happy to help out CZ, more then happy to put my posts that could be seen as "against FC" tucked away. I have played this game for a long long time, I would really rather help, then site on my hands and wait for everyone to cancell their account.
    GalxandJoan "Toxinator" Rox :: 202 Doc
    He "Tearspoint" Totem :: 215 Nano Tech :: Equipment :: Perks
    General :: Band of Brothers :: Band of Brothers Forums

    Account Created
    2001-08-23 04:59:27

    Account Status:
    Open

  7. #207
    This is truly sad.

    Once more Funcom fails to learn from other MMORPG that have tried this tact. As the fan sites get overwhlemed with post and themselves unable to handle the work you will send them their forums become more unmoderated. And as such less informative. Then after a period of time those forums fall into the realm of "not read because of to much complaining, nothing constructive". UO tried this and only after fan sites closed down from the traffic and trash they where getting did they figure out that a good community team and informative offical site was the proper route.

    The sad truth is this is more about company resources (read as money/man power) than it is about helping the players. It is no secret that AO is not living up to what it was meant to be. The number of players that remain must be truly a sad amount for funcom to keep it hush hush after 17 months and one booster pack. Of all the MMORPGs this is the only one that you can not get active player numbers for and that says alot for a 17 month old game that was the FIRST EVER to make you pay for a booster pack. Expansion I can see paying for not boosters.

    Funcom has on so many occassions taken actions that directly conflict with what they are saying that we as players don't even expect anything good anymore.

    I for one can say I will NOT spend my time fan site hoping looking for info about the game. And I also feel I will spend less time here as here will not be getting all the current great info first.

    I am truly waiting for the day when FC annouces the game is going away do to lack of funding. Four year story line will never see the end.

    Sorry to rant so long, but this really stinks of more troubles to come for player base.
    Lheann
    President of When I Grow Up

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  8. #208
    grrrr. Need to count to 1000 before posting my anger.
    Last edited by prophet; Jan 21st, 2003 at 10:30:53.

  9. #209
    The people here who link the closing of some forums to the end of AO or a problem Funcom might have, certainly must be mediums of some kind with spiritual insight into the realms of mystery and shadows. I for fone find such assumptions very much to be without any facts to base them on and simple manipulation of what Cz said to enrage the community against him and Funcom in general.
    Director "Meister"
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  10. #210
    I can understand the trimming of the official boards if it is for more efficient managing. However, the number of sections being cut is excessive. Why does Funcom want to diffuse a thriving community by pushing it to other fansite forums? /me shakes head

    This is the impression Funcom is giving me - your customer who has been around since Beta 4 and who has years of service industry, media analysis and performing arts experience.

    * This move does not appear to re-focus support, instead it overwhelmingly reeks of a move that will divide a thriving community and diffuse that same community's voice.

    The value of a collective voice outweighs any single voice effort (email, pm, irc, etc). A smart company is one that will harness such a collective voice to its benefit and to the benefit of the playerbase, hence a win-win situation. This move looks a lose-lose situation in the long run.

    ** This move does not appear to re-focus support for the playerbase, instead it blatantly appears to bolster Funcom's support for 3 specific fansites.

    The fansites do their bit for the game, kudos to them. But, for goodness sake, if people don't already flock to them in droves, it does say something about the demerits of the site's drawing power, doesn't it?

    Furthermore, I will be like most players around here - I visit the official forums for convenience and to present my voice and to listen to the other voices that make up the collective voice of the community here. I will balk at having to visit 3 other sites with popup-ads, suffering email spam as a consequence of providing an email address, etc ... all just for a game I pay supposedly to get enjoyment. As a customer I want convenience and enjoyment, not added hassle.

    *** If Funcom doesn't have time for 1 board, it won't have time for 4.

    Please do not pull wool over our eyes. If you do not have the resources, you do not have the resources simple as that ... people can see and understand. By trying to smooth it over with 're-focussing excuses' and weak denials of the consequence ... only insults the intelligence of your customers and lowers respect for your company.

    **** Do not flippantly dismiss the disappointment being expressed by the players here. Address their concerns with solid reassurances.

    Understand that you are disappointing the community by such a move. A community that has developed over time and one that is about to be broken down. A community that was allowed to build up because you allowed it as such by the very forum sections you provided. People do not like to see stuff they build up being torn down, it's psychological. It's a let-down, pure and simple.

    ----

    I suggest keeping the RP section and make what's left of your role-players happy. Crowd-control is already making a joke of the MMO part of the mmorpg, please don't make a further joke of the RPG part of the mmorpg as well. Your broken storyline was already a major disappointment to many who were drawn to AO by the initial storyline premise in the first place. And with Shadowland coming, AO is looking more fantasy than sci-fi. Players need to find creative ways for continuation and bridging. Creativity fuels interesting interactions ingame - that plus the friendships bonded along the way.

    I suggest keeping the Tradeskills section also. The bulk of your playerbase is more concerned with PvM than PvP. Notum Wars may be a booster but has become a PvP aspect of the game that got too much prominence over the core game itself lately. With or without NW, players still want to figure out tradeskill processes and share findings and bugs, all of which are beneficial to the ENTIRE playerbase.

    I suggest keeping the patch section - it would be so much easier for you to gather all the post-patch problems and bugs at one spot. And your players will feel more assured seeing problems being reported by others and acknowledged by FC. Be more ruthless with off-topic posts in that section so that it stays relevant ... after a while players will learn to stay on topic for that particular section.
    Ino
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  11. #211
    Good lord, once again funcom shows its propensity to viciously OverNerf things. I can see wanting to close some of the forums, I don't even read half of them let alone post in em, and I'm sure most of us are like that... HOWEVER WTF!?!?!?!?!? You guys are basically crippling the forum community, fragmenting it into small chunks that'll fade away. No you couldn't just close or merge some of em, you had to get rid of most of em.

    I was planning to come back in 6 months or so (8 more days on my account), but damn... half the fun of anarchy was the forums. I dunno if I'll want to come back if there's no forum community to come back to.

    bah
    Sredniaka Sherrmanaka Posthasteaka Thanatopsysaka Vashtareliusaka Nnerroaka Alexxander

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    Sredni Vashtar the Beautiful.
    by HH Munro

  12. #212
    ca0l
    Guest
    dumbest **** I've ever seen... "Why pay for this service when our fans can do it themselves!?" Sure, spread the people onto a zillion different bulletin boards. The only good thing that could come of this is that another bulletin board makes it as -THE- one board, and Funcom loses all of their moderation posibilities.

  13. #213

    my under 2c opinion

    First: Closing forums has to be very hasty decision from FC. It weren't long ago when you pushed all trolls to rise their postcounts by giving them right to chance avatar. Now I see that you are penalizing everyone because you made wrong move.

    Second thing which worries me is bandwith. Closing forums here will save some money. At future same reading goes to fanpages which are paying themself their bandwith (with some restrictions allways).
    I will not be suprised when I see that one of my favourite sites will soon said: "We have used our monthly bandcapasity today. Welcome back at next month".
    This will hit back very hardly to FC.

    Third what I dont like is that registering to x+1 forums. Some forums will ask you name,job,shoes side,char names and you grandmothers address.
    They dont have any way to prevent hoaxes or check that forumaccount and charnames has any connection. I have used one of my charname over 10 years already - it has been always same, what game I have played. Soon I will get tells etc that "I will buy your stuff at 10m what you posted at that and that forum" or some worster case that some orgs start to ignore me because two forumaccounts at some fanforum says that I ninjalooted that etc...

    There will be several very bad situations coming which will shatter community.
    As long we have FC forums, we know that behind every forumaccount is one player, which has some history behind.
    2c
    Lyijy Engineer
    Zernia2 Ancarim Iron Legion Enforcer

  14. #214
    I don't really understand this decision and certainly not why we were told so little in advance. It IS a well tought decision that was debated internally, right ?

    Why, can't FC simply appoint players as forum moderators ? Give them some guidelines and thank them by letting them play for free if they do a good job of it. Most of the games I know that have (a) strong forum(s) work like that.

    Please, bring up alternatives that are acceptable to Funcom (I guess they want to save some money and/or trouble) and make up a poll. At the very least, you would know how much people care about forums.

    One thing I can tell you for sure is that I care very much. And getting the forums split over different sites would cause major repetition and many annoyances (mutiple passwords or vulnerability to password leak and unability to cross search all the forums).

    Personally, the absence of a good set of forums would create a major decrease of my interest in the game. And I'm not in anyway joking or exagerating.

    At the very least, there should be a page that links to all the popular forums around. with some kind of search engine that goes through all of them.
    The information above is highly classified and only available to worthy Omni-Tek employees; any individual spilling out this info to filthy rebels will be considered a traitor, cooked alive and fed to leets.
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  15. #215
    Quoted by Meister

    The people here who link the closing of some forums to the end of AO or a problem Funcom might have, certainly must be mediums of some kind with spiritual insight into the realms of mystery and shadows. I for fone find such assumptions very much to be without any facts to base them on and simple manipulation of what Cz said to enrage the community against him and Funcom in general.


    In response to that i say fine. FC have loads of money.... yet cant afford to hire a chimp or two from the local collage to mod the forums?... hmmm..........
    (not for one second suggesting Cz is a chimp... he does a great job and kudos to him)


    Dont get me wrong i WANT AO to stay for a long time yet, but moves like this and the fact that Cz is not allowed to mention these "reasons" for it happening, only adds to my paranoia as to whats going on. When a die-hard AO fan and promoter (i try to get everyone i meet who plays games to try it) is worried and considering the future then what does that say? Thyme leaving?.... whos next? Letah? Noer? Meister *grins*
    TAMIYANA - RK1

    Mail Tami!
    ------------------------------------------------
    To fear your enemy is wise.. to know your enemy is wiser still.....

  16. #216

    Angry

    Not impressed, this basicly constitutes removing content from the game, whats next to go ? Newland?

  17. #217
    Ravegrrl, no, your monthly fee does not include access to this bulletin board.

    Zarch...
    3) We can too, technically.
    4) Right now we read close to nothing. Is that better?

    Megabio, read it. Was there something you didn't understand in the line you took so nicely out of context?

    Slavor_MoK, the model from the IRC server might be an option. However, there are already many questions and issues around the IRC server, and it has only a fraction of the user base of the bulletin board. I'll give it some thought.

    Lumin, I was part of making the decision, and no, I don't play the game on a daily basis. I wish I did. I simply don't have time.

    Hotsy, yea, I'm sure you'd enjoy that.

    Zylina, thank you for a very constructive post. Keeping it in mind. (No, I don't say that due to the compliment. )

    Note that we already have ARK moderators though.

    Jayde, good input. Thanks.

    Megabio, no, I know you're not asking us to change anything. We're not doing this because you asked us to. We're doing it because something needs to be done.

    Lumin, the short notice is because I expect to work 14-18 hours a day answering questions and e-mails about this. You think I'd be able to keep up with that for a week?

    Yes, you heard right, I expect tons of questions and comments about it. Of course I know it's not a popular move. But it's a needed one.

    Jynne, now you're speculating based on guesses and doomsday-theories.

    Lord Tritoch, no, it's no going under. Relax.

    Cosmik is not working here anymore. I posted that in a Community Answers thread a while back.

    Tamiyana,

    Templar Red, maybe not, if people show the enmity towards other bulletin boards that some here portray.

    Dragonsphere, the forums is one of our sources for feedback, yes. When we can't gather the feedback due to too much time being spent on just running it, that purpose is a bit lost though.

  18. #218
    Hm, I need to start quoting things again. Sorry if people don't understand what I'm replying to.

    I'll try get better time to reply and all a little later today.

  19. #219
    WOOT i got a from Cz! he wubs me!! *swoons*



    seriously though Cz.... tell me im wrong by all means, but talking about im not the only one who is getting a little bit paranoid by actions lately. You say that its alot of work to moderate the forums which is a fair point. But surely one person can be hired to moderate the RP forum at least?... RP is a large part of this game, dont let the community get fragmented and lost.
    Last edited by Tami; Jan 21st, 2003 at 10:58:24.
    TAMIYANA - RK1

    Mail Tami!
    ------------------------------------------------
    To fear your enemy is wise.. to know your enemy is wiser still.....

  20. #220

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