I am referring to the latest post about the removing of portals, which you can read here: https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/rearranging-and-removing-portals/117186
This is a relatively long post, so I have put a TL;DR at the bottom.
Basically what this says is: We have heard your feedback, but we are still going through with what we were doing, because we have our own arguments for it.
I do not agree with the removing of portals, but I get it. I have read the argument and I understand it completely. However, when you say you are listening to players it doesn’t mean that you read the feedback and consider it. It means actively acting on it and trying to find a way to use that feedback to bring satisfaction.
Right now, the feedback is read, but it has 0 impact on what does and does not make it to live from PTR. When players give feedback, their intention is to change things, not to provide insight. When players say removing portals is inconvenient, don’t come up with an argument of “the world feels bigger this way”. Instead, try to make changes that makes it so that getting around to old areas isn’t as inconvenient. You could even make iterations on which portals you remove and why.
Example: General playerbase does not like Feature 1, because it is not rewarding enough.
What Blizzard does currently: We have heard your concerns about Feature 1 and appreciate your feedback. However, Feature 1 is designed this way, because of X, Y and Z. No changes are being made to Feature 1.
What the general playerbase wants Blizzard to do: We have heard your concerns about Feature 1 and appreciate your feedback. We have changed X, Y and Z to make Feature 1 more rewarding. However, we will not change A and B because of C.
In the second example, you have made changes according to the feedback you got and tried to find a middleground between the players’ wishes and your own design philosophy.
To apply this to the portal issue: There can certainly be found a middleground as to which portals are getting removed. I have seen that people are especially mad about the removal of the Karazhan and Caverns of Time portals, because those areas contain raids and dungeons which drop mounts. Maybe you could add those two to the portal room.
Also, if the new portal room has a portal to Northrend’s Dalaran, it would be no biggie to remove the Wyrmrest portal in Legion’s Dalaran.
TL;DR: Don’t just listen to/read feedback and try to debunk it. Instead, try to act on it and try to find a middleground between the players’ wishes and your own visions on the game.
Thanks for reading!
