On the Recent Territory Battle Issues (6/20/18) [MEGA]

ShaolinPunk

Hello everyone,

Over the past few weeks as CG_SCrumb has been ramping up, I have been taking a little bit of a step back, and I am so appreciative of the support of this community in helping to bring him into the fold, despite sometimes having frustrations with me stepping back too swiftly as we figure out how we want to communicate going forward. The number of personal messages I receive on the forums, Reddit, Discord, Twitter, and through other channels is unmaintainable with the responsibilities I have running this game. We are looking for ways to ensure you get timely responses to as many of your questions and concerns as possible, and Crumb is picking up more and more of those responsibilities very quickly.

Also, the timing of this transition isn’t ideal, because as we end a quarter, there is less we can say about the future. However, as promised, we will be doing a Road Ahead Blog for the upcoming months in the first couple weeks of the next quarter, so early July we will be blasting info once again. And we are committed to outlining the regular cadence of communication moving forward so you know what to expect and when. While we can’t post as frequently or on as many topics as everyone would want, it is my sincere hope that we are in a significantly more trusting place than we were a year ago.

I say all of this to explain that I wanted to be the one to post today, because as the Senior Producer on Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes, there are times I need to bear responsibility for things that go wrong. We will not all agree (if ever) about whether or not something should work one way or another, and while we have read all the posts about Ships, the Sith Raid, and the changes to GXII, we believe we can work together between devs and the community to ensure that we address concerns, while striking a balance to maintain a healthy game.

However, in the recent weeks, we’ve had a number of issues in the live game that were not intended, such as the bugs yesterday and today in the Territory Battles. To have these issues off the back of issues in the past three TBs, is really unacceptable. I want to sincerely apologize and ask for your patience while we sort out what caused these issues to escape into the wild in the first place.

We will be doing a significant makegood in light of these issues, and will be rolling it out next week, after we’ve addressed the issues facing us right now.

Thank you as always for being such a great community, we will continue to still strive to be worthy of your passion for this game,
-Carrie Gouskos

Original Post (LINK)

ShaolinPunk

Reserved.

Nikoms565

I appreciate your candor and willingness to take responsibility. I say that with all sincerity (I realize I sometimes have been known to be a bit "snarky"). Honestly, a few minor hiccups here and there are definitely understandable.

Thank you also for the clarification on upcoming communication and how that will be outlined in more detail moving forward.

Qitorien

I appreciate your recognition of the issues and your commitment to make it right with correction and compensation. There's a lot of negativity out there so here's something positive.

BaseDeltaZero

We will all gladly accept the 50k GET and express our sincere thanks

ShaolinPunk

I mean, I am a Jedi, but I still have archives of passion for this game. Always the cheerleader, I am ready to see the improvements ahead. Thank you to the CG team for continuing to push for a better and better experience.

BrtStlnd

A fully crafted zeta and we can call it a day.

PhiGonSharobi

Thanks Carrie. You guys are doing a much better job lately, despite some missteps here and there. I feel good about where the game is headed.

gufu21

As another sometimes snarky critic of dev decisions with this game, I also appreciate your honesty in simply owning that things haven't gone as they should. I can't speak for everyone, but I get the sense that openly owning up to goofs goes a long way in this community. Thanks also for being willing to engage with us when you do, even those of us who are often critical. I believe that you really are trying to do the best job you know how with this game, even if our ideas of what that best is differ.

ChickenFett139

@CG_Carrie that’s all we are asking is acknowledging the player base and letting us know on the official forums that hotfixes are incoming or whatever. Blizzard is successful because of their open communications with the player base. Disney is successful because of their communication and customer service. We pride our customer service at a really really large social platform in Menlo Park.

Outreach is number one. EA even did a good job with The Old Republic and Battlefront with outreach and support. Everyone here loves Star Wars, it’s why we play hoping you guys grow and improve service and don’t bail to MSF.

Thank you.

pac0naut

I echo these sentiments. Thank you Carrie!

EventineElessedil

Shower us with IPD shards and sack of magic beans and we will forget this ever happened.

Vettes4Fetts2

Firstly, I appreciate the step up for responsibility. As a Manager myself, I can truly relate to it always falls on the Leader. I can respect that.

With that said, however, I must take you to task on a thing or two.

"And we are committed to outlining the regular cadence of communication moving forward so you know what to expect and when. While we can’t post as frequently or on as many topics as everyone would want, it is my sincere hope that we are in a significantly more trusting place than we were a year ago."

We heard this last time. The doubt is real. Hate to say it, but it's true. The track record is not good. And certain decisions you've made hasnt helped you. I get you have your vision of what you want the game to be... but sometimes your vision isn't perfect. You see it as it's DESIGNED. We see it as it's PLAYED.


"We will not all agree (if ever) about whether or not something should work one way or another, and while we have read all the posts about Ships, the Sith Raid, and the changes to GXII, we believe we can work together between devs and the community to ensure that we address concerns, while striking a balance to maintain a healthy game."

We don't have to agree. But we do have to be CLOSE. We are miles apart at the moment. From those 3 topics alone, it's your way or the highway. And people are taking that highway! You asked for feedback. We gave it to you. And, for all intents and purposes, you rolled it up into a ball, and Kobe'd it into the trash. You did your own thing anyway.

I do not mean to be harsh. But I do mean to be firm.

QuentinOllah38

Ok, I'll be "the ****" and ask the questions.
At which point, @CG_Carrie , would you as a producer, say the time for patience is over? At which point do you make it a priority to NOT mess something up with nearly every release, even if it means delaying a character? I know you will say that each update is more complicated than it seems, but everything should be tested before making any live changes, right? You have an entire team to develop and test these changes, correct (funded presumably by numerous purchases throughout the game)? I'm asking because I just simply don't understand why this game has the growing pains of a new released game after years of errors and mistakes. Is the team not learning from these mistakes? Mistakes are ok to make so long as something is learned from them, but from the player perspective, nothing appears to have been learned.
This is why people are nervous about a new raid, or new ship tables, or G12+, or really any other content. Because there is always *something* that goes wrong. Take your time and fix the issues. I'm implore you, delay the new content until you test it in ALL areas of the game.
I'm hoping I'm not crossing a line here, but I feel it needs to be said. If I were producing this game, I'd be embarrassed to admit it.
*climbs down off of soapbox*

Xezee

If you could make carbantis actually drop from challenge as advertised instead it being only 3 pieces every 4 out of 5 times, people would forget, forgive and on the sudden become very patient, compassionate and understanding.
Also thank you for being sincere

HobbitCraft

This timeline is starting to go bad real fast.

All started with the "Communication thread"; we were hopeful for the first time in months.
Then Ships 2.0 came out, and we were hyped! New ships content for the first time in way too long! Aaaaaaand it dropped hard, with the same one team being used by everyone, with the addition of it being even more Pay2Play than normal.
I have to say the Solo character releases just didn't live up to the normal cadence - having EVERY character as a marquee event is just a littttle bit greedy.
Then the G12.5 post - a hope for some new gear, dashed by the realisation that this gear was HSith only, and would ruin all players not in HSith guilds.

And now DSTB, where some players cannot get IPD shards due to a bug.

Between every event we hoped for communication - some, ANY - yet the promises of more regular communication has fallen flat.

I really hope you try harder in the future, because I'm seeing more ingame friends disappearing than ever before.

Madpup

While we certainly won't agree on everything I hardly feel like anyone has been taking player feedback to heart we share with you what we are seeing telling you what won't work and what's broken and you time and again ignore our feedback. If you read anything you wouldn't be touching hSTR until you are also ready to increase sub STR rewards. We tell you there are game breaking bugs, ignored. We tell you difficulty in lower tiers is too high. Ignored. Challenge gear in reward boxes need to be removed. IGNORED! You guys don't have the benefit of the doubt anymore. You haven't had it for months at this point. Start listening or keep losing money and player base.

Carrie

QuentinOllah38 wrote: »

Ok, I'll be "the ****" and ask the questions.
At which point, @CG_Carrie , would you as a producer, say the time for patience is over? At which point do you make it a priority to NOT mess something up with nearly every release, even if it means delaying a character? I know you will say that each update is more complicated than it seems, but everything should be tested before making any live changes, right? You have an entire team to develop and test these changes, correct (funded presumably by numerous purchases throughout the game)? I'm asking because I just simply don't understand why this game has the growing pains of a new released game after years of errors and mistakes. Is the team not learning from these mistakes? Mistakes are ok to make so long as something is learned from them, but from the player perspective, nothing appears to have been learned.
This is why people are nervous about a new raid, or new ship tables, or G12+, or really any other content. Because there is always *something* that goes wrong. Take your time and fix the issues. I'm implore you, delay the new content until you test it in ALL areas of the game.
I'm hoping I'm not crossing a line here, but I feel it needs to be said. If I were producing this game, I'd be embarrassed to admit it.
*climbs down off of soapbox*

There's nothing wrong with your questions, they're fair, and I don't think you're being a ****.
I think it's all a matter of perspective - the issues we are facing now are significantly different, and I believe smaller than the ones we had in the first and second years of development. Each year we (usually), and we know this because we monitor it, have fewer escape defects, and fewer scrambles to patch major issues in the update. Those of you who were around Year 1 will have fond memories (as I did as a Beta/Day 1 player myself), but memories of how tough certain things are fade with time. Things have been, on the whole, much smoother.
That being said, the reason I posted this is because the pattern in the past few weeks has not been good. We are identifying process changes and making them to ensure that this stops now.
As for how long I can ask for your patience, I can only ask. If you choose not to maintain it, then I completely understand. But I think it's more important to indicate that we are aware of our shortcomings, we are incredibly hard on ourselves, and we do want to be better.

The only thing I object to that you said is that I couldn't be more proud to be the Producer of this game. Things don't always go well, and we make mistakes, but I will proudly put my name behind the good and the bad.
-C

Jeffrome

@CG_Carrie I just read your post in the updates about all the problems that have been happening lately, especially in TBs... and just wanted to say thank you for your response. I appreciate that you guys go to great lengths to communicate with your player base. As you’ve said, we may never see eye to eye... but you’re making the game and many people enjoy playing it. Thank you for the humility and for being as translucent as seemingly possible.

kalidor

Thanks for the update. I understand that your postion makes it difficult for you to juggle the game and the forums, but if you'd do me a favour and pass on some of your communication wisdom to the new guys it would be much appreciated. Regular contact with CG is a must, before sparks become a wildfire.

Semi

À lot have been said already. But in resumé :
Quality > quantity . Please fix/polish what's there and stop adding new content for some time...
It cannot ever be perfect. But still be way better.
Keep on keeping on

FiddleMaster

Have we not heard the gist of this messaging before? Almost like it's cyclic. Unliked/unwanted/uneeded changes are made and communication is abysmal, community reaches some negative sentiment threshold, apology happens and promises are made, community does a complete 180, cycle restarts. Sorry, actions speak louder than words, unfortunately, the actions never seem to match the words.

Roguetechna

CG_Carrie wrote: »

That being said, the reason I posted this is because the pattern in the past few weeks has not been good. We are identifying process changes and making them to ensure that this stops now.

@CG_Carrie I appreciate the candor and communicative response. I am just hoping you could clarify, is the above quote directly relating to the Territory Battles issue, or the bigger problems with the game (eg Ships 2.0, the Sith Raid/ rewards ect)?

I also don't mean to be on the offensive... I understand creating quality content, making the players happy and also managing a business is a fine line to walk, however the response to these changes has been, on the whole... negative and it seems as though CG has been... not unresponsive, but not exactly direct, either, about admitting there is a problem, which is why I was hoping for a bit of clarification on the context of that piece of the response.

For the record, too, while I certainly have my share of frustrations of late with some of the changes, on the whole, I do appreciate the work, time and product we have been given.

RzrPhreak

CG_Carrie wrote: »

QuentinOllah38 wrote: »

Ok, I'll be "the ****" and ask the questions.
At which point, @CG_Carrie , would you as a producer, say the time for patience is over? At which point do you make it a priority to NOT mess something up with nearly every release, even if it means delaying a character? I know you will say that each update is more complicated than it seems, but everything should be tested before making any live changes, right? You have an entire team to develop and test these changes, correct (funded presumably by numerous purchases throughout the game)? I'm asking because I just simply don't understand why this game has the growing pains of a new released game after years of errors and mistakes. Is the team not learning from these mistakes? Mistakes are ok to make so long as something is learned from them, but from the player perspective, nothing appears to have been learned.
This is why people are nervous about a new raid, or new ship tables, or G12+, or really any other content. Because there is always *something* that goes wrong. Take your time and fix the issues. I'm implore you, delay the new content until you test it in ALL areas of the game.
I'm hoping I'm not crossing a line here, but I feel it needs to be said. If I were producing this game, I'd be embarrassed to admit it.
*climbs down off of soapbox*

There's nothing wrong with your questions, they're fair, and I don't think you're being a ****.
I think it's all a matter of perspective - the issues we are facing now are significantly different, and I believe smaller than the ones we had in the first and second years of development. Each year we (usually), and we know this because we monitor it, have fewer escape defects, and fewer scrambles to patch major issues in the update. Those of you who were around Year 1 will have fond memories (as I did as a Beta/Day 1 player myself), but memories of how tough certain things are fade with time. Things have been, on the whole, much smoother.
That being said, the reason I posted this is because the pattern in the past few weeks has not been good. We are identifying process changes and making them to ensure that this stops now.
As for how long I can ask for your patience, I can only ask. If you choose not to maintain it, then I completely understand. But I think it's more important to indicate that we are aware of our shortcomings, we are incredibly hard on ourselves, and we do want to be better.

The only thing I object to that you said is that I couldn't be more proud to be the Producer of this game. Things don't always go well, and we make mistakes, but I will proudly put my name behind the good and the bad.
-C

I have one more question to ask and i mean it in the nicest way... Since you are proud to put your name behind it... Can we at least get an explanation for the flip flop in the direction and reasoning behind the Heroic Sith Raid rewards? Your company plainly stated it didn't want to build a gap in the playerbase, yet you quickly turn right around and a very short time later and bring changes to divide and put an even bigger gap in the playerbase with the rewards.

It's not your decision to do so that bothers a lot of us, It's the complete 180 you all have done on this topic within a very short span that builds mistrust and anger with the developers and you specifically as the Producer. Please help us understand this!

Carrie

Iy4oy4s wrote: »

I just want to know why the very long delay in fixing the rewards in the Sith raid....in all tiers. They are absolutely garbage and do nothing to help us progress to being able to complete the HSTR. Throw us a bone here, we’ve been asking and asking and asking over and over again! Bugs happen, totally onboard with that, but the rewards are entirely in your control!

Crumb touched on this a bit this week, but there are a few factors here. We pulled a LOT of sentiment from the forums about concerns about the STR. Most of which existed in Tiers IV-VI. We also regularly analyze tons of different pieces of quantitative data like completion rates/times/number of guilds in each tier/GP of those guilds, etc.
We were also talking about some tiers needing more of one thing or another, like some might need reward tweaks, while others might require slightly easier gameplay. As others have said in this thread, and believe me after our earlier attempt, I was pretty gunshy, we wanted to take the time to make sure we did this as best as we can.
There were other real world factors - some critical issues in HSTR which we had to fix, one which took way too long to fix, and one which required us to introduce new gear, and which will have a knock-on impact to other tiers, because we tune each tier how it fits in the whole. Our aim being to get people to graduate up to the next one, and the effort/reward to get there.
And finally, the third run of JTR has massively increased her numbers in the lower tiers, and that will definitely impact the completion rates.
This is all while running development on a number of other things in the pipeline. I hope you understand I'm not trying to make excuses, but trying to walk you through my thought process. It doesn't excuse what has happened more recently, but we are trying to be deliberate and do the right thing.

-C

Mol_Kelly

Thank you for the acknowledgment... I’m sure it’s hard to read some of our (my) posts sometimes

Vettes4Fetts2

@CG_Carrie

For one moment, step back from completion rates, quantitative data, numbers, data and all the "technical jargon" and ask yourself this...

Are the players happy with what we've done?

Mol_Kelly

I’m still salty about how some customers get punished when they receive rewards later than others... I wish you guys would address this, I know some people feel this is a minor inconvenience, but sometimes minor inconveniences can have a snowball effect on this game. Not getting rewards for a few hours is a minor incvoniebce... days? That’s unfair to customers who didn’t get those rewards to use in raids, tw, double drops, etc. and now, with the changes to raid rewards, if you miss 10th place by 1 point of damage, no full gear for you! Sorry for my rant... you guys get enough of it I’m sure... but this is a big deal in my opinion.

Ferdolima

ShaolinPunk wrote: »

Hello everyone,

Over the past few weeks as CG_SCrumb has been ramping up, I have been taking a little bit of a step back, and I am so appreciative of the support of this community in helping to bring him into the fold, despite sometimes having frustrations with me stepping back too swiftly as we figure out how we want to communicate going forward. The number of personal messages I receive on the forums, Reddit, Discord, Twitter, and through other channels is unmaintainable with the responsibilities I have running this game. We are looking for ways to ensure you get timely responses to as many of your questions and concerns as possible, and Crumb is picking up more and more of those responsibilities very quickly.

Also, the timing of this transition isn’t ideal, because as we end a quarter, there is less we can say about the future. However, as promised, we will be doing a Road Ahead Blog for the upcoming months in the first couple weeks of the next quarter, so early July we will be blasting info once again. And we are committed to outlining the regular cadence of communication moving forward so you know what to expect and when. While we can’t post as frequently or on as many topics as everyone would want, it is my sincere hope that we are in a significantly more trusting place than we were a year ago.

I say all of this to explain that I wanted to be the one to post today, because as the Senior Producer on Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes, there are times I need to bear responsibility for things that go wrong. We will not all agree (if ever) about whether or not something should work one way or another, and while we have read all the posts about Ships, the Sith Raid, and the changes to GXII, we believe we can work together between devs and the community to ensure that we address concerns, while striking a balance to maintain a healthy game.

However, in the recent weeks, we’ve had a number of issues in the live game that were not intended, such as the bugs yesterday and today in the Territory Battles. To have these issues off the back of issues in the past three TBs, is really unacceptable. I want to sincerely apologize and ask for your patience while we sort out what caused these issues to escape into the wild in the first place.

We will be doing a significant makegood in light of these issues, and will be rolling it out next week, after we’ve addressed the issues facing us right now.

Thank you as always for being such a great community, we will continue to still strive to be worthy of your passion for this game,
-Carrie Gouskos

Original Post (LINK)

Beautiful words but nothing more. I gave up. Nor will I discuss how hypocritical it is to talk about health of the game when the changes ignore everything the community reports of problems. I honestly gave up believing in devs. I have complained several times on the blog and all have been ignored. But the last change in Sith Raid rewards was too much for me. The only thing I can do to demonstrate my dissatisfaction is to give 1 note to the game in Google play, because as I do not spend much money in the game devs clearly do not care for my opinion.

DanadHamar

Nothing I appreciate more than accepting responsibility. Everyone makes mistakes, even if it wasn’t directly your fault for the recent issues, thank you for acknowledging that mistakes were made and making attempts to make it right. Mistakes are how we all learn, and the fact that mistakes are happening is evidence of the effort being put in to expand the boundaries of the game and continue to improve it.

Thank you for the effort that you and the other developers put into this game. I can’t imagine the amount of work it takes to create an environment that is as well balanced between free to play and paying customers as this game is. Keep up the good work, mistakes and all!