I'm happy. For now.:) If anyone wishes to closed this thread, plz do so.
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I'm happy. For now.:) If anyone wishes to closed this thread, plz do so.
Players don't see behind the scenes because there is little to no information from behind the scenes given to us. I am aware of only two times that any such thing occurred, one was some sort of dev chat and the other was a post that swansea made toward abakker after abakker made some apparently unpleasant post. Both were removed swiftly from the forums as swansea himself made comments that were extremely hostile and condescending toward the community, as well as blasting everybody for being so ignorant of what goes on (in fairness to Swansea, I did not read abakker's post that triggered the issue, I believe it was already gone by the time I started reading.) One of the people in the dev chat prior (do not the know name as it was in some other chat forum in which people had different names) stated point blank that the medal drop rate change was purely a money issue, and also some obscure comment that they could not even analyze the drop rate themselves because so much of the info the players posted about them was anecdotal if not outright false (while this is true, how could the devs be unaware of their own drop formula?) Both threads were removed with no explanation.
At any rate, the community being unaware of things "behind the scenes" is a direct result of such information not being shared with us. Not saying that is the fault of the mods, as they are most likely given little information as well, but if we have something now like these massive server merge/collapses with little to no forewarning, and all of the issues that they've had, and no information is given to us from the company--I don't think the server merge info is even available to anyone that didn't have a character on one of the already merged servers, I'm only going by what players have copy-pasted--people are going to assume the worst, which is likely that players are evacuating as fast as they are coming in, and it is no longer profitable to run the older servers, and that telling us this would just result in more people leaving sooner.
*To this day there has not been a satisfactory statement from the company about most of these issues. The last thing said about medals was that it was to "make it more challenging." They could have just said straight up that it was a money issue, or that that was the original drop rate intended but for some issue on older servers when spam raids with scouts could still yield medals. Either or both of those would have been more accurate and acceptable, whether the individual players agree with it or not.
*The ads? They said they were going to make them more conservative weeks or months ago, the same ones are still floating around. They could have said either "No, we're not going to change them, this type of advertising is effective and that's why we're using it," or that it would take some months for the current set to run through whatever block of time was paid for. Either of those would have been acceptable and accurate responses, again whether the individual players agreed or not.
*There has been no known banning of people who exploit multiple accounts for extra resources, troops, infinite cash shop items, etc., no statement regarding what, if anything, is to be done about these people, and no reply or action taken regarding the reports sent by me or anyone else that I am aware of, either on the harassment board or via the ingame "contact us" button, only automatic emails which say they should respond in 24-48 hours, email us again if we don't, and they have yet to do so for me or anyone else I've talked to or encountered that has done the same.
*And another asterisk just because I like asterisks
Sekai, I must agree with you here. I have seen alot of the back room talks around here, and its been my hope that we could get more openess on these forums. First off, the post I made an apology for was my last 2 post on the "Pulse of the Community" thread (still exist, you just have to dig for it.) Unfortunately, all that I see going on behind the scenes ever was an attempt to change the mod hiring process as well as the introduction of super mods (both of which does nothing for the individual player but actually helps the company only as well as a very few select groups). That is the only thing I've been aware of that has been worked on behind the scenes. This still leaves many of the gaping issues occuring though that I've been trying to fix.
It does no good to address the "I hate Evony" threads or the "Evony Sucks" threads because you all don't give anything that can end those arguments. (Foxy, this is what I would rather see you work on then what you've been doing in the past, fix things at the source, not at the result) I mean we are currently stuck in a cycle here on these forums that I find very annoying, and I've been reading between the lines what everyone does here in these forums. Thalin's actions have been the most interesting to me by far because they are the most genuine of anyone in power I see (not like he can get more power here on the forums). The only issue I have with any of his responses ever are that he does seem to try to skirt around the true basics of the question, but again he may not be allowed to answer it. Yet, the actions he has done make me able to see Evony's current thoughts, such as the stickies in the Game Suggestion Box.
Through reading between many of the lines here on these forums, and the changes implemented by Evony recently, I think Evony has come to realise they need to figure out something for people that have managed to become very strong in their server and have nothing left to do. In my opinion, Evony's profits more then likely have been droping off recently (started back a while ago, prior to the first merger), so they have been trying to figure out ways to reinvigorate people and recover revenue. The world mergers are somewhat an attempt at this while also hammering out the bugs for a preparation of merging into the Age 2. Hence the reason why they are continuing with these world mergers although they had a botched attempt last time. I mean all Thalin should do now to address these concern with the Wn2 merger is add on to his announcement in the Game section and give the company's reasoning behind it and say "We will try to make this attempt go through smoother then the last". In other words, admit mistakes-VERY IMPORTANT, tell the customer why you are doing it, and more or less talk to us.
I mean, if the company would just be blunt with the players, I think things would flow much smoother on these forums, and if you did such, you wouldn't have to worry about people like Kempion, Zenrax, and ccc really. Overall, if you fix the problem at the source, you then stop people from being asses on here because they have no way they could attack you. Yes, people will always complain, but you remove their argument, and you crush them. Overall, the arguments aren't being removed, and you are getting problem makers on the forums because you picked fights with peope you shouldn't have. Knowing how a person reacts is vital to running a forum.
((By the way, that chat you are talking about was posted by me, and really there was very little information in there. Overall, the purpose I had for posting that (a chat between many of the regular users of the forums, 1 Rep, and more or less only 1 mod) was an attempt to inform the community of actions being taken behind the scenes to bridge communication, while just feeding a little (again not much at all, just an expect date of release for the queen results) information to the payers. And trust me, I have alot more behind the scenes chats too. Not any big converance chats, but 1 on 1 chats with very interesting motives and such able to be seen in them. They have caused a good amount of hostility by me anymore to a few, but whatever.))
ABakker, the problem with giving information to players is it will inevitably be used as ammo. Just look at the reactions mods and admins get when they dare to make a comment.
Devs: "We are going to change this thing here to that thing there. You have been advised. Please plan accordingly."
Posters 56 thru 654: "Take your bleeping bleep and shove it up your bleeping bleep, you bleeping bleeps!!!!"
so, like I said, people always complain. Do you see any well made argument there though? Because I sure as hell don't. That is just a person ranting off because they have nothing better to do. We in the community see that and we then feel compassion for the mod and Dev team. I mean you have to utilize the intellegence of the community rather then think we have none. I can stand those rants because its nothing but a crazy spewing off nonsense. If you aren't able to sift through reasonable things and the crazies, well then, we have an issue.
Yet at the moment, I feel no sorrow for the mod team when it comes to users like Zenrax and Kempion. They made those enemies themselves and the fact that they are unable to effectively deal with them is very annoying. Its just common sense as to being able to point out peope that can cause you real trouble and those that rant off nonsense.
(And as a side-note, you can tell there are issues because the forum numbers keep dropping. Yes, it does to a certain extent mean people are just staying in game more, but yet it should stabalize, and these forums aren't, they are getting less and less people everyday.)
Numbers are a tricky business to get into. For example, 8 million accounts does not mean 8 million active accounts. 8M is simply the number of non-verified email registrations. You could easily see a scenario wherein 1M players have created 8M accounts.
This is REALLY smart business on Evony's part. If they required email verifications, then the number of new accounts would drop to a trickle and Evony's people wouldn't be able to beat their chests over the number of total accounts. That said...
This thread is way off topic and I am as guilty as the next person for letting it stray this far off.
Oddly enough though, it isn't that far off topic because this is the basics as to the OP of this topic. The fact is its not about threads staying open or getting closed, rather its about the relationship between Devs/Reps/mods and players. We don't know where every relationship sits exactly, and that's where the problem arises. Without understand everyone's personal goal, there is no hope to fixing issues that arise. Rather, I think the topic is still very much along the original blue-print. Now, yes numbers tend to be a lie, yet I already gave my thoughts about how the forum numbers are dropping and not stabalizing.
There are all kinds of people in this world. These forums are no exception. You have every type of personality represented here.
How often DO threads get closed due to little more than a personality conflict between the poster(s) and a mod? I would say it's as often as someone cuts you off in traffic because they think highly of themselves and everyone else can't drive for squat. lol
Driving is even less impersonal than internet interactions. On the freeway, you don't know if the person you just cut-off is going to take you out, but, on an internet forums, your safety is assured by sheer anonymity. This is a blessing and a curse in many ways. It's a blessing because you aren't really associating with people whom you may not like. It's a curse because you WILL be misinterpreted, and that can lead to all kinds of consequences (of the internet kind.)
yeah I`ve noticed that too.
I`ve seen numerous threads that have only 3 or 4 people doing all the posting in them. A 3-4 page thread that only has 3 people posting in it should just be closed and let them take the conversation to private messages.
as far as the topic of not releasing info to the players/customers,
In general when people are kept in the dark and denied info what happens is that speculation and rumors begin to pop up.In a very short time the rumors and speculation begin to feed on themselves and grow.
At some point in the life of the rumors and speculation any information that is released will be misinterpreted/twisted and used to support or confirm the truth of the rumors/speculation.
Most people will accept bad news if they understand the reason for it.
If a doctor tells you he is going to amputate your foot but doesnt tell you why, you arent going to accept that or cooperate without putting up a fight.
but if the doctor tells you that he is going to amputate your foot because it has gangrene and you`ll die if it isnt amputated, you`ll probably be more cooperative.
Nobody says you have to accept whatever, or even put up a fight. There is such a thing as cooperation, where you work with them to make changes. Most people come to the forums to complain, very few make suggestions and very very few try to help out altogether.
Also, everyone must remember this is a business, they don't have to inform everyone of every decision they make. The major ones, they inform as a courtesy. I am not sure how much time was given as I only check the "News" section every so often myself.
ABakker, Kempion made himself an enemy. No one forced him to act in the manner he does. He keeps getting chance after chance to be part of the community and shows he cannot behave himself for more than a few hours at a time. So, no sympathy for him. Zenrax, he went overboard by attacking a new member of the forums without cause. No one made him that way, it is something he did for who knows what reason. Again, no sympathy for him either.
When you consider 90% of the threads are complaints without positive input to help change whatever everyone might think is wrong, it's no wonder that quite a few threads get shut down. When the problems with the first merger happened, there were at least 30 threads about it. Most of the posts in those 30 threads were nasty and way out of line.
In my experience in RL, if a customer comes to me with a complaint or a problem, I will work with them to solve it. If a customer just comes at me screaming and calling me names and threatening me, I will give them a few seconds to calm down, however if they continue I boot them out of my store. There comes a point when a customer just becomes a disruption of business and is only creating a hostile environment for employees and other customers. This is why quite a few threads get closed down or deleted, not because they don't value input. It is because when it is only hostility projected in the thread, it is of no value to anyone. Not as input or anything else.