Sweeping "Bad publicity" threads under the rug unfairly?

Jaedenkaal

Beer40 said:

But the problem was I soon discovered where I was at and said to myself, "Why am I commenting on these? No one really listens to our suggestions and feedback anyway".

I assume what you really mean is "no one from D3 or Demi comments on these threads, or has implemented any of my actual ideas", since we have no way of knowing whether they actually read the threads or not.

Sykobanana

Jonny, I couldnt comment on your original as (although its back) its closed, but it was very good and shouldnt have been moved.  It will now likely fade away, which is unfortunate.  

You have been able to crystalize my thoughts and i will be leaving soon too due to the same reasons and the lack of opportunities to give feedback or even vent without it being censored.  

Good luck in the future. 

fmftint

Phumade said:

Honestly,  you have bad moderators who are as equally inept at communications as demi.  I see no subtlety or tact in how they deal with and interact with forum users.

Have you ever considered having a poll where we may offer 360 degree feedback on their performance?  This is pretty commonly done in most corporations and serves as a feedback loop as to how well they serve the ultimate customer, "the users"

The forum mods are sponsored players, of course they will side with D3/Demiurge whenever possible 

Dormammu

I think these forums are well handled. There's been a LOT of negativity lately and I haven't seen any cases of censorship, which moving a topic isn't.

Everyone wants to lob every post into General Discussion because that will garner the most views/likes/responses but there needs to be an order to these forums as they're organized by topic. Just because you only look at General Discussion doesn't mean every post should go there.

General Discussion is actually my least favorite category on these forums because it's so full of inane posts like this one. I find the meaningful conversations by players who actually have fun with this game to be taking place in every other topic category.

(Sorry I sound like a condescending parent.)

Syleye

I happen to agree that it is intentional. As for making people happy, the best way is to not lie to and /or mislead your players, also actually acting like you care rather than canned responses would go a long way. Something I have tried to instill in my children is if you make a mistake own up to it. A huge mistake was made and instead of admitting it they want to make the players who take the time to comment out to be whiny babies.

Jaedenkaal

Syleye said:

I happen to agree that it is intentional. As for making people happy, the best way is to not lie to and /or mislead your players, also actually acting like you care rather than canned responses would go a long way. Something I have tried to instill in my children is if you make a mistake own up to it. A huge mistake was made and instead of admitting it they want to make the players who take the time to comment out to be whiny babies.

At the same time, though, just because your most vocal children think you've made a huge mistake (like moving to [insert random geographic region here] or whatever) doesn't mean you should tell them you've made a mistake, or apologize for it. Presumably that decision was made for reasons that they can't currently comprehend and do not have any real say in (although you probably took them into account in some way).

You can acknowledge their feelings and find ways to make the new situation work for everyone, certainly, which I think D3 and Demi have done a reasonable job of conveying.

I like this analogy, let's keep it going

Crnch73

Jaedenkaal said:

Syleye said:

I happen to agree that it is intentional. As for making people happy, the best way is to not lie to and /or mislead your players, also actually acting like you care rather than canned responses would go a long way. Something I have tried to instill in my children is if you make a mistake own up to it. A huge mistake was made and instead of admitting it they want to make the players who take the time to comment out to be whiny babies.

At the same time, though, just because your most vocal children think you've made a huge mistake (like moving to [insert random geographic region here] or whatever) doesn't mean you should tell them you've made a mistake, or apologize for it. Presumably that decision was made for reasons that they can't currently comprehend and do not have any real say in (although you probably took them into account in some way).

You can acknowledge their feelings and find ways to make the new situation work for everyone, certainly, which I think D3 and Demi have done a reasonable job of conveying.

I like this analogy, let's keep it going

your second paragraph is where you lost me. I do agree, you can't always apologize and you can't make the "kids" see your reasoning. But looking at the bolded part above... they have done an extremely poor job of this. they haven't acknowledged any feelings, and they haven't found any real ways to make the new situation work.

Using your analogy, let's say your loud/vocal kids think you made a mistake. Whether you did or not, your intentions were good, so you aren't going to apologize. In the long run, the idea behind your actions was for everyone's best interest. However, totally ignoring it does not make it better. If your kids are upset that you moved to a new town... maybe you say "hey! let's go look for a fun new activity near our new home" or "let's go get ice cream, it might cheer you up". But then you get to the ice cream place, and you turn to your kids and say "I hope you brought your piggy banks, you're buying!", or even worse... what if your kid was lactose intolerant?

The intentions behind the initial action were good. The following result upset people. They tried to appease us by making us pay for a "fix". I understand many players will be short-sighted and won't be able to see some changes are what is best for the game in the long run. However, there needs to be a balance where a change can be good for the long run without making the immediate future sucky. If you make the immediate future bad with no fix to that coming, it feels disingenuous and malicious.

Phumade

You can acknowledge their feelings and find ways to make the new situation work for everyone,

I totally agree with crnch.  They've failed miserably at this part

Syleye

The problem is their intentions were not good, they were based on trying to force people to buy health packs and their fix for dilution left many of us with rosters we can't finish at all. When the cure is worse than the disease it's time to look at the quality of what you are actually doing

bleh shouldn't type when annoyed at people who don't get that not owing up to your responsibilities is a character flaw

Jaedenkaal

Syleye said:

The problem is their intentions were not good, they were based on trying to force people to buy health packs and their fix for dilution left many of us with rosters we can't finish at all. When the cure is worse than the disease it's time to look at the quality of what you are actually doing

bleh shouldn't type when annoyed at people who don't get that not owing up to your responsibilities is a character flaw

Probably not, given that the part there that I've bolded is a pretty accusative opinion being displayed as a fact.

Phumade said:

You can acknowledge their feelings and find ways to make the new situation work for everyone,

I totally agree with crnch.  They've failed miserably at this part

Ok, I'll take that part back; they could be doing a better job of this than quietly sending out a single NMG token to everyone who used OML after the nerf.

Anyways I think we're getting a bit off topic here. I disagree that moving a thread to the feedback forum amounts to censorship. There's no restrictions on who can view or post in that forum (to my knowledge).

NewMcG

Jaedenkaal said:
Anyways I think we're getting a bit off topic here. I disagree that moving a thread to the feedback forum amounts to censorship. There's no restrictions on who can view or post in that forum (to my knowledge).

No, there definitely isn't. But I guess it's too much of a pain to take the "this is what I hate about the game" echo chamber to a different forum that isn't as heavily trafficked.

morph3us

Jamie Madrox said:

General Discussion is appropriate for any topics that are game related and would not fall in to one of the other defined forums.

Aren't you defining General Discussion by what it isn't, rather than what it is, then?  Surely this is one of the primary reasons why the forumites have issues about posts being moved to other forums, as it leads to confusion about what goes in GD as opposed to another subforum.

I think F4TD raises a good point.  You need to define General Discussion by what it is.  It potentially needs a title change accordingly.  Until that happens, most topics are going to end up here, because it's "General".

El Satanno

Hey, you know what would be really helpful for everyone? If there was a "Complaints and Whining" sub-forum. Then when the mods put something there, no one will have anything to say! It went where it belonged!

Alsmir

El Satanno said:

Hey, you know what would be really helpful for everyone? If there was a "Complaints and Whining" sub-forum. Then when the mods put something there, no one will have anything to say! It went where it belonged!

Oh, but I've seen that before!
At first it was one topic, called "Rants" and stuff. All the criticism and negative feedback was force-moved to that topic.
Then the topic got more traffic and regular discussion, so it was locked. Then it was moved to Graveyard sub-forum, where all the old, outdated threads were.
Funny, tho, all the criticism was still moved there (yep, to locked topic in graveyard sub-forum).

Then we had a forum move, and that was one of the topics that mysteriously disappeared due to a bug while switching forums.

Then mods didn't even care and started banning people left and right for criticising the game.

JamieMadrox

Just a few things I want to address as a long time player/forumite/mod. I'm going to try to do it using as few words as possible so this doesn't get too long.

1. Rants and complaints are forms of feedback. They belong in the feedback forum.
2. Negative posts do get moved to a section of the forums only visible to mods/admins, but only when those posts violate the rules.
3. Certain forums "don't get as much traffic" because you have decided that they're not worth visiting. This only changes if you make the decision to change it.
4. I completely agree, and have been saying for years, that GD needs to be better defined and more heavily moderated. It may not go over well at first, but it will help to better define what that forum is for.
5. IMHO; GD can be removed from the forums completely as most of the stuff in there could just as easily go in another forum and/or Off Topic.
6. A forum specifically for complaints isn't going to work. Forum rules state that posts need to be constructive (both when you're happy or unhappy) sadly, many posts are not only not constructive, but detrimental to the health of the forums.
7. The Feedback and Bugs forums are most definitely read daily. @Brigby reads them every day and AFAIK reports his findings back to D3/Demiurge staff.
8. In the past, Demiurge's direct involvement in the forums has gone up as the toxic vitriol and unconstructive ranting has gone down.
9. Mods enforce the rules of the forums, but we don't do so in a vacuum. Most decisions are made as a group with input from @Brigby so take that as you will.
10. Modes don't always like what they have to do when modding, but we have a set of rules we have to enforce.
    

Jonny1Punch

Jamie my original post on OML was moved by a mod without any explanation or warning and without brigbys knowledge. He admitted that was not right whatsoever how it was handled and shoved away.... he moved it back to general discussion but it was closed off after being redirected . Phaserhawk brought it back to general discussion in a new thread but it was quickly shut down by another mod saying to discuss it in its original thread ( but the original was closed in GD and quickly getting buried).

It was handled very sloppily and with poor communication. On my end it felt like I was being targeted due to personal bias from certain mods I have a history with in the game.

i could have easily edited the topic and added a " So what's everyone's general thoughts in a post-nerf OML MPQ world ?" to make it fit the GD criteria perfect. 

I worked hard on that article and it's received over 80 likes/insightful reactions. It was extremely disrespectful how the mods handled it and no apology /explanation given. It deserved better then that, it was a constructive and thoughtful non-toxic article.

Mods please work harder to make the forum a better and more constructive place..... not being so trigger happy shoving things you don't like into a dark corner without proper channels of communications is a great way to start. If your moving something with good intent, then shoot that person a quick pm telling them why. You may have missed something or be incorrect in your actions. Thank you.

Magic

@Jamie Madrox I agree with many of your points. The GD needs to be redefined or removed. Otherwise the decisions to keep some threads there and move others looks very arbitrary and in the current "toxic" environment is not good. To be frank with the state the forum "mood" is I would just keep most threads there unless it's an obvious case (something that is suitable for Roster help or bug report). That is until the GD section problem is solved.

Also - I think this discussion has reached a certain point where a moderator responsible for the move of the original post should put on the man pants and step forwards. Explain/apologize (not saying move it back - just for the lack of communication with the OP) and we will be done with it. 

fmftint

Anyone curious as to why THIS thread hasn't been moved?  This in no way fits "General MPQ Discussion" and is just more J1P whining that everything is unfair

JamieMadrox

For full transparency, I did not move the original post, but I am the mod that has extensive personal history with J1P so I would not have modded it in the first place. We have an unwritten rule that we don't mod posts by people that we may have negative relationships with unless it's absolutely necessary.

That said, I don't know who moved the post originally, but the only issue with the move (from our end) was that there was not a link left behind in GD pointing to the post. You may have noticed that the forums recently changed. With that came a whole new set of mod tools and challenges. Some things we used to do are not as easy as they were before and some things just can't be done at all.

One of the things that was less than intuitive was leaving behind the link to a post when it is move. To be honest, I didn't even know we could still do it until it was pointed out. We're all learning a new system on the fly so some hiccups will occur.

Your patience is appreciated.

fight4thedream

Woah can't use my mod color thingy but this is me going into mod-mode: **Mod-mode: ON!**

I do believe the purpose of this discussion has run its course so I am locking it. As I stated previously, it is standard mod procedure to inform a user what actions are being taken and why, either through PM or a public message, when modding a post but it appears one of my fellow-mods failed to do so. Brigby has made it clear to the mod team the importance of notifying members when modding a post.

If your post has been moved or removed and you have not been given an explanation either via PM or in a public post,  please contact a mod or Brigby. As a forum user you have a right to know and contest a mod's decision. Thank you.

**Mod-mode: OFF!**