auximenes
Well-known member
I don't agree that it's ridiculous to ask that important information relevant to the current content is shared here on the only official outlet.
Corsairs of Umbar - Future Release Plans
- Thread starter Cordovan
- Start date
Elmagor
The Knights of Round Table Ambassador
Not every developer love to post here, some of them love discords, some of them love forums.
Pontin_Finnberry
Your Friendly Neighborhood Hobbit
To me and the way i read it, is all of the important stuff is on the forums and already know about it, anything mentioned outside of forums i've seen i don't see as important cause i feel its nothing new then what already guess from right here on the forums, but some seem to have a different idea of what is important vs what isn't, all the info we really need is on the forums.
Gildoriel
Guardian of the Citadel
Well, this is the official forum, so posting important information here is part of their job I'd say. In my job I also have things to do I like less than others, but I get paid for it. So it is not a question of preference of each developer, but I guess that - at least that's my impression - SSG doesn't have any communication plan except for the regular posts by Cordovan. So it is really a personal decision of each dev where they share information. Whether we like it or not.
BleghWarrior
Well-known member
If the questions asked on discord were asked here, I'm sure that information would be here as well, but they aren't. If you want the information, ask for the information you want. That's what the people on discord do and they get answers
Asylum
Well-known member
People ask, all the time. They don't get responses.
They reply on discord because it's quicker and is not official so they cannot be held accountable for anything they say if it happens to be incorrect or plans change. Any information provided here is official and they can be held accountable for what they say, promise, suggest etc. (though in general they are not in the habit of making promises).
It's also quicker to reply to a pointed message on discord than it is to skim through X number of forum posts and find what is relevant and what needs a 'response'. I do not support them choosing to engage in discord over the forums in any way, merely providing the reasons why they do. That being said, I would much much prefer an official lotro discord server.
One way to solve a lot of things is having a "Commonly Asked Questions" Page with provided "Official or Current" Answers to them.
- Easy examples:
- Current State of Closed Server Transfers.
- When is the Raid coming?
- New Graphics?
- What is happening with Lag to make it better?
- And so on.
The only time where "New Questions & Comments" happen is when Newer Things are being Added or Adjusted for either MMO. Which for such would fall to having timely "Answers" in a form accounting for all the Comments being provided.
- So instead of trying to answer every Comment let the Comments accumulate for a bit and read through them.
- Lock the Thread from further Posts.
- Then a Developer Post would highlight the most common Comments.
- At this point the Thread will be unlocked again for X amount of Time to allow more Comments based on the current info.
- Repeat until the SSG LOTRO Team feels they've gotten their main points across.
auximenes
Well-known member
The information about the bugged reward track recipes I would say is important. Certainly it should be part of the known issues.
I like to occasionally remind people that the Cord of the Rings stream people rely on for information is not sponsored by the company. It is done essentially "during his lunch break" and something that he alone decided to do in addition to his standard workload. There was a period of about five months he had to stop streaming because he needed extra time for himself after being assigned to write festival articles and organize data in preparation of the new website and forums. He has since stopped posting the Beacon for LOTRO and Chronicle for DDO. Some people feel this is wrong and there should be some sort of update made on a weekly basis. Some people even demand to have weekly updates on the progress of every staff member working on the game.
The situation is that the company does not take up "the responsibility" of providing people any information. There has been numerous threads, some even created by developers, that have spanned over a dozen pages (beyond 300 posts) that have tried to establish this sort of communication relay between the workers and the players. Unfortunately, each area of the game is somewhat compartmentalized to their own set of developers and not everything can be conveyed to the public. Account problems are handled strictly through Customer Service but we occasionally get a quick response to a well-known bug. Sales is strictly handled through marketing but occasionally we are told in advance if something is coming. Behind-the-scene adjustments are rarely mentioned or often times generalized in the patch notes. Engineers are constantly bounced between projects and games. Unfortunately, information is time-consuming when the tiniest detail, sometimes a single word, can skew public opinion. This becomes a cascading effect when they then have to come back to correct what was said or further temper people's expectations when things don't go according to plan.
I don't have a good answer to how things should be. If they did provide us a list of their advances on each of their projects, it will steadily become like an operating system's estimated time of completion that constantly bounces around. People would argue over what project should take priority as the developers are only able to focus on the tasks that are assigned to them by their business owners. Then if something doesn't work out, people will call them out on their shortcomings when it might have been better not letting us know about it in the first place. I like having a sort of casual Q&A on a weekly basis. I like when they come out with developer diaries. I only wish there were more of these "future release plans" instead of trying to dive into Discord, see uploaded pictures and information from X (formerly known as Twitter), and watching the stream each week for an unofficial list of changes.
The situation is that the company does not take up "the responsibility" of providing people any information. There has been numerous threads, some even created by developers, that have spanned over a dozen pages (beyond 300 posts) that have tried to establish this sort of communication relay between the workers and the players. Unfortunately, each area of the game is somewhat compartmentalized to their own set of developers and not everything can be conveyed to the public. Account problems are handled strictly through Customer Service but we occasionally get a quick response to a well-known bug. Sales is strictly handled through marketing but occasionally we are told in advance if something is coming. Behind-the-scene adjustments are rarely mentioned or often times generalized in the patch notes. Engineers are constantly bounced between projects and games. Unfortunately, information is time-consuming when the tiniest detail, sometimes a single word, can skew public opinion. This becomes a cascading effect when they then have to come back to correct what was said or further temper people's expectations when things don't go according to plan.
I don't have a good answer to how things should be. If they did provide us a list of their advances on each of their projects, it will steadily become like an operating system's estimated time of completion that constantly bounces around. People would argue over what project should take priority as the developers are only able to focus on the tasks that are assigned to them by their business owners. Then if something doesn't work out, people will call them out on their shortcomings when it might have been better not letting us know about it in the first place. I like having a sort of casual Q&A on a weekly basis. I like when they come out with developer diaries. I only wish there were more of these "future release plans" instead of trying to dive into Discord, see uploaded pictures and information from X (formerly known as Twitter), and watching the stream each week for an unofficial list of changes.
Elmagor
The Knights of Round Table Ambassador
IMHO simple Ctrl C - Ctrl V with important posts from developers in discord posted here can make wonders. No one asking for deep inside with huge wall of text about how that bug happens, why it happens, when it will be fixed. Short and simple "we know about issue and working on that" will be better for communication comparing with dead silence and ignore. Doesn't matter if some developer prefer forum or discord, but having info posted everywhere in multiple sources will be more important
Lady Selene
Winter's Heart
Yeah, it would be okay if the reward was removed from the start, and no heraldries in the track at all. Now, what are we gonna do with them? They cannot even be disenchanted.
Anyway, I'd wait for the new heraldries anyway, I won't fall AGAIN into the trap of spending a rare gold token on the heraldry - only to find out I should wait and get a better one.
Anyway, I'd wait for the new heraldries anyway, I won't fall AGAIN into the trap of spending a rare gold token on the heraldry - only to find out I should wait and get a better one.
So....Combe Forester Event.....
Marmi
Completionist
That just means it will be possible for event to return after 6th December, nothing more. Aside from obvious conclusion it won't return sooner than that. Although it could be likely better worded (I'm not native to say for sure) and of course dev comment about when actually it is planned now would be desirable...
Well obviously. There wasn't a lack of clarity about the possibility of it happening. It is more a matter of the event having been definitively scheduled and yet not left open for more than a few hours all previous times and this time the day has come, gone, and the following day with no additional information. At least with the crafting guilds there was notification that it wasn't ready by the advertised release date concurrent with the expansion OR the December 6th patch. With the crafting event: *crickets chirping*
Elmagor
The Knights of Round Table Ambassador
Why we have only 4 repeatable quests in Hunter's Expedition Camp? And where "Modest number of repeatable quests to this location"?
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Pewpewmidget
Well-known member
Closest to official statement we'll get
This is really lame.
Why not just add the replacement tracks and let everyone who already claimed the old tracks claim them again?
I don't get why they don't thoroughly plan anything out prior to releasing a expansion or new level cap.
Arnenna
Defender of the Great Apes
They were. I asked three times, once on an official thread. No response.
Ena
Keeper of the Forgotten Treasury
Do we even know that we gonna get new heraldry recipes at all? I haven't seen any info about it.