Introducing the World of Warcraft Community Council

Considering Blizzard’s “we know better than you” attitude that started some years ago I have a hard time believing this is gonna be anything other than another avenue for blizzard to say “we’ve heard your feedback” and then do nothing with it.

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The WoW community very soon:

:smirk:

EvE Online has had a community council program like this for many years, and for them it has worked nicely.
Of course, the EvE Online community is far smaller and more tight knit than the WoW community.

I’m not sure how it will work out for WoW, but the concerns are definitely plentiful.

For a number of years Blizzard had the MVP program that mostly aimed at having a profile toward the community and not Blizzard.
And that worked as long as it was understood that MVPs were just posters like everyone else, but with green text color.
As soon as there was an inkling of belief that MVPs had influence or power to affect the development of the game, then the MVP program was met with hostility from those who were not part of it.
Every voice matters…but some voices matter more?

Blizzard also tried to have a secret invitation only VIP forum for high-end PvPers for a while, to really get that expert feedback in a concentrated form.
But it was a disaster.
It turned out that just because you’re good at playing the game, then you can still behave as an immature child on the internet and throw tantrums.

And there have been various summits intended for fansites and prominent community members, but usually with the angle of content creation and promotion, because it turns out that YouTubers would rather cover what’s written on the forums than actually write anything themselves.

But we’ll see how this works out.
I don’t foresee a good result though.
The majority of people who want in - and think they deserve to get in - will inevitably not get in. They’ll be confided to the sideline, jealous and disappointed. Like with the MVP program of old.

On a personal note, and I’m sure I’m in the minority on this, then i don’t really want Blizzard to heed player feedback out of obligation.
I appreciate the notion that Blizzard listens to player feedback to inform their own design decisions. But I don’t like the notion that Blizzard just tries to fulfill as many player wishes as they can.
I feel that WoW is a game designed and developed by Blizzard, and it is Blizzard who should steer the direction of the game going forward.
I don’t want the game to be an open source project that’s partly made by Blizzard and partly made by random people on the internet.
I am a Blizzard fan and I pay to play Blizzard games made by Blizzard. I want to play what Blizzard’s employees thinks is cool, not what random players on the forum thinks - regardless of how wise and intelligent they think they are.

But we’ll see. Right now an initiative like this definitely sends the right signal to the community at large. There’s some trust that needs to be rebuilt, and a lot of players will likely appreciate the gesture.
But I do fear that this will not turn out positively.

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let me guess:
c: - we wanna less grind
d: - it is important part of the game we can’t make so serious decisions. Let’s go another question.
c: - we wanna less random in chest items.
d: - Oh we are highly appreciate your feelings, but 6 belts from weekly chest is fine, just play more.
c: - We wanna balance tunnings. Why monks, mages, hpala etc almost have garanteed spot in m+, while others completely ignored even with good perfomance.
d: - We are focused on raiding atm, keys are tuned for 15 lvl. Our goal to make high quality product so we can’t trade raid quality for some niche activity. Stay tuned we are planing to do it in further 100 years.
c: - we wanna some customization.
d: - Avengers, assemble! They asked us to add some male genitalias to female character. We should include it to 13999.1.5 patch with high priced adds about it !!! go go go

just signed up :smiley:

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I started doing it and at the end of the form you’re being asked to provide a link to some feedback you’d given before, like a video, a post on reddit or whatever and then it hit me, I realized I’m not familiar with a lot of specs and even the specs I play I’m not the best person to speak about them so I’ll let the spot to someone else more qualified than me.

After all I’m just a solo player who pug everything and copypaste builds, I’m nothing exceptional.

Twiluna & Dunkiee are 100% gonna be in it.

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If they are selecting 100 players to form the council, the question is will it be an even split of players from across the world or will it be a majority of US players.

In any case I don’t think this will last past a year.

This is great!
Thank you for the opportunity to help and thank you for inviting us to the table to discuss with you about the game we all love! :purple_heart:

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Just try, no harm in giving it a go!

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I think this is a very high risk strategy, considering all past ptr behaviour.

If the council is set up and there is a consensus on an idea that the council want and the wider player base also think on average its a good idea, but blizz are not keen on the idea, and do not implement it.
The players will never want to communicate with blizz again because it will be seen as futile.

It would be good if there was an nda for all content creators that they can’t use it to indirectly make money from the community with the council discussion or use it as content as this could be abused and bias the discussion.

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I gave applying a go as well. Hey, there’s always that 0.000001% chance they let me in! :open_mouth:

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You are exactly the type of player they need, because if you are not having fun in the game then 90% of other players are also not having fun

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That’s what happened to LOTRO before they introduced pay-to-win.

Hmm, I’m somewhat tempted to apply (I can definitely contribute to discussions about RP, small servers & accessibility in regards to the visually impaired among others) but I worry about that vocal minority that will make it their mission to harass those on the Community Council, be it for jealousy, a difference in opinion, or just for a laugh.

It’s a good thing that there will be a visible forum, as keeping quiet on what’s happening has caused major unrest in the community at large (Last year’s Connected Realms debacle for instance), but it has it’s perils for the council members who might end up with metaphorical targets over their heads.

are you youtuber / streamer ? if no there there is no point to apply because you have to show them at least 3 pieces of “content” you created

its pure PR bs meant to find new streamers/youtubers because old ones left

this time ones shilling hard for game

its just pure cringe

99,9% people didnt even bother to read what they need to do to apply there :slight_smile:

Great and all that we’re getting a council but I don’t believe for a second that the absence of one was ever the reason why feedback was always listened too but never acted on.
As such I don’t see why the implementation of one would have any impact on that general style feedback management

This could be good. We’ll see

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For me, one of the positive things here on the blizzard forum.

As perhaps mentioned above, I hope they start listening to the community in all aspects of the game.

I’ve been a pure PVE player lately, trying to cuting edge, but I’d like to see more content for cassual or pure PVP.

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Is this gonna be like twitch did with that girl who thought she was a deer and then bragged that she could ruin other streamers because she thought it gave her some special powers?

They don’t need a damn council, they just gotta reach out to us on THEIR forums and on Reddit for those who prefer to go there.

If as they say they want an all round view from different players interested in different things, then I don’t see why they would not be interested in your view. LFR and old school stuff is still part of the game and a part that a lot of people play.

I honestly believe that they need representatives from not just those who raid or play mythic+ etc, they need people like yourself too who play what most would call casual content. If they don’t do this then they are saying ‘only some players’ are worth listening to and again in my opinion doing so they lose.

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