Do Blizzard even look at the feedback we're giving them on Forums?

PVP Arenas
1

We see a bluepost in the PvP section on average once a month. Therefore there’s no way of knowing whether or not were wasting our time giving feedback. Also any options to give feedback when cancelling sub has been removed. It honestly makes me mad to look at the recent blueposts. It seems they’re only responding to completely rubbish posts in the general forum like: “What’s your most favourite moment in bfa” - “What do you like to drink before playing WoW” - What’s the most fun you’ve had bla bla bla" I havent seen a blue-post informing or addressing any of the feedback that has been given for months and months. Too me it honestly looks like they should fire more of CM’s and hire some fat neckberds that cares about the game who will respond properly to real problems.
Anyway sub wont be renewed this time :slight_smile:

2 Likes
2

Since December, Blizzard has lost roughly 10% of its total work force. ~1-2% from the optional leave packages they offer, and 8-9% (the number will increase with time) from firing people last week. Many of the people fired were from the customer support, quality assurance and community managers teams. So yeah, don’t count on it.

2 Likes
3

It’s not like it would be hard to let people know that they’ve seen the feedback and will take it into consideration. They could litterally hire a single person for the whole PvP forums and it wouldn’t be hard to keep up

1 Like
4

They probly checking it but they dont care about it. Look first of all if they would have care about what gaming community wants then things like azerite traits dont even coming live in game and trinkets would have remained disabled in pvp

1 Like
5

We’re wasting it.
We are on the forum because we care. Still, we are a small minority of the whole playerbase, so clearly Blizz cannot do anything just based on our feedback.
They primarly look at data, as many companies do.

To do changes based on player feedback they should either do mass close answer surveys which are most often useless due to low partecipation, or people giving stupid answer just for fun, or do open answer surverys, who then take a lot of manpower to go through the answer provided.

6

It’s worth pointing out that there’s a difference between communication and feedback.

As far as communication goes, then that’s everything from blue posts on the forums, to tweets on twitter, to Ion and Lore’s Q&As on twitch, to news and blog posts on the WoW webpage and launcher, to email newsletters, YouTube videos, and so on.
That’s all communication.

What players always want is more personal communication. Talk to me. Respond to my questions. Address my concerns. That kind of stuff.
But it is nigh impossible to respond to millions of people individually. Not just for a video game company, but for anyone in any context. So it’s perhaps worth adjusting the expectations a bit here. We can’t all be the center of the universe.

As far as feedback goes, then that’s a different thing entirely. It mainly goes on behind the scenes. It’s a one-way communication and not a two-way communication.

What that means is that you basically express your thoughts about the game here on the forums, on twitter, YouTube, or wherever. And then there is a CM team (Aerythlea for the EU-EN community) who compiles a general weekly report for the development team about the EU-EN community’s latest feedback on WoW. That report includes everything from big topics of concern to individual posts of interest to new emerging talking points and what not.

On top of that the developers can request player feedback on specific topics. So let’s say the developers want to know what players feel about the GCD changes – then they request a report on that. And then the CMs scour the forums, twitter, YouTube, and compile everything the players have said about the GCD changes into a nice little report that the developers can read and learn everything about what the players feel about the GCD changes.

There really isn’t any communication involved in that feedback process. In a way feedback is treated a bit as a library, a source of knowledge you can freely dig into – but you don’t have a conversation with a book. :wink:

So that’s sort of the gist of it. :upside_down_face:

7

Take a look, do you see any blue posts here?
How about when changes go through “buff by 250%, nerf by 500%”, what does that tell you?
0 Fs given.

8

Blizzard most probably use only automated data gather and analyze tools for balancing and eventually some feedback from the tourneys. That’s why they seem disconnected to a degree from what’s happening.
Of course automated tools are a must and it’s reasonable to rely upon them, but in games like this nothing can replicate the personal experience and numbers just numbers can hide a lot of things from a developer.
Blizzard just don’t want to spend man hours for manual testing and feedback analyzes.
So no, forums are mostly for the people posting in them actually, not for blizzard.
Also, they, I’m pretty sure, don’t consider the people posting at the forums qualified and understanding enough of what and how game design works, to listen to their feedback at all.
You ever seen blizzard admit they did something wrong?

9

Some long time ago they tried. One wrong sentence and dramas can spread as virus,effecting shares and so on. And tbh 95% of conversations here are totally BS,why to get involved? Lessons learned,mistakes were made. But the propblem is,they went a bit too far with ignorance. I don’t use twiter, so I live in the dark:d

10

They still do on the NA forums, by the NA CM team (which has been reduced by the recent layoffs). The EU team is just more limited in what they can and cannot say.

It doesn’t affect shares, you don’t understand how that side of the business works if you think a game forum can affect it.

I suggest you check out BellularNews on yt, which is a fairly new channel by Bellular, where he goes over how the inside of Blizzard looks these days, in past videos.
It’s pretty surprising, because he has typically been a huge shill like a typical gaming journalist tends to be. But in that new channel he’s actually been covering more of the “dark side” of the going-ons inside of Blizzard.

11

Reputation?Active subs?
Edit for you. I don’t need to watch some youtuber, its all connected. Reputation of company is rule nr1. Wont go into details, but I would say you don’t understand:)

12

Sentences. No comprendo, señor.

You’re a funny guy. xD The “reputation” isn’t dictated by the forum. Not in any way, shape or form. The stock market is a speculative assessment of future earnings, and how those earnings are earned doesn’t matter to that market at all as long as it doesn’t mean the earnings will be penalized later on. Not to mention how few people actually checks WoW’s forum, it’s not exactly a big social hub.

13

So the press has nothing to do with predictions? So there isn’t point from advertising also?

14

Forum isn’t the press. Learn the difference. Then there is recognized media and amateur media, which also carries different implications.
Advertisement doesn’t really correlate to the stock market.
Google and educate yourself, because to explain it all in detail would exceed the character limit of a post and is not really what you’d call “appropriate” for a game forum.

15

I did no say its major effect,its just all connected and have effects.Propaganda starts from forums and some twisted facts, lets say if some blue posted something .
I can bet that blue posters got orders from HQ to don’t reply on sensitive topics,as its effects a lot, one odd sentence and can interpret it a lot of ways.There are major gaming webs,youtube and so on where they get some info from forums.
If advertising,reputation doesn’t effect predictions, then I dunno what to say else.

16

You’re conflating things left and right. Advertisement is an expenditure with projections for expected exposure from that, and “reputation” does matter a lot. You’re just confused about what dictates that reputation. What players say doesn’t affect it at all, it’s what goes on in the corporate side that dictates the “reputation”. For example, if there’s no job stability in a company, even amongst officers, then that’s a red flag for investors. If there’s no growth in production then that’s also a red flag for investors. If the projected earnings targets aren’t reached when it’s estimated to be reached, then that’s also a red flag for investors. If there’s a hint of consumer decline then that’s a big red flag for investors if the company doesn’t outline a way to get back on track quickly. THIS is the “reputation” you mean, but you don’t seem to know what determines it.

Then about the media, it’s if scandals and so on attracts negative press and it shows an impact on sales then that’s of course a red flag. But the amateur media doesn’t hold even a fraction of the power the recognized media holds. Influencers only counts as much as the number of people following them.

I told you, go educate yourself.

PS:
There’s even a special column for customer retention in earnings reports, and especially the long-term customer base.

This is why people say that it only matters when you speak with your wallet. Because if a company pays attention to feedback or not is completely voluntary. However, what customers can do is stop feeding money to the company, then they’re forced to react in major ways.

I’ll trim it down to make it easier to read:
The stock market is a gathering of people worldwide who are focused on the “end result”. How that end result is accomplished doesn’t matter much to them, as long as the end result looks good. It’s a speculative market where people speculate how well the company will fare on the business side, that’s all. If customers are unhappy but still paying, then that dismay of customers doesn’t matter to investors at all.

17

i hope they dont,. cuz feed back on this forum is absoulute horrendes

18

So you don’t want them to see your spam in that glorious tyranny thread? :rofl:

19

Just realize that many of those posts coming regarding nerfs and such are also people who lack on skills, and just get offended by the game because they legit are sh1t.

20

I don’t have time to write a wall of texts here cos you start to explain basics how shares work.Forums are source for information what effects = gaming press+youtube + influencers++ thats effect customer choices,spendings = income. Dunno what you try to prove here, but basically you said it by yourself.

Then about the media, it’s if scandals and so on attracts negative press and it shows an impact on sales then that’s of course a red flag.

Have to think deeper in details, then just learn basics.