14 replies to this topic

[Autek]

I propose that public discussions be held when there is a needed change to the game. This way we will have the will of the populus' choice rather than a handful of staff members, half of which do not play our server, or refuse to admit that they play. It will also save staff from the ridicule they recieve when they institute stuff with no player input.

A staff member would bring forth the problem, for instance, Gate Training. He or she would simply say "Okay, there will be no more gate training. We're open to solutions."

Then players would chime in their ideas, defend them, and discuss them with everyone. Ultimately, the fairest and majority supported idea would come out on top, and be implemented into the game.

A staff member has told me that the staff team doesn't want to do things this way because people will simply bicker with one another and it would take too long to get something done. I think that even if an idea were discussed for a week, and then implemented, it would be far better than throwing something out there as fast as possible that only a small portion came up with into the game, facing ridicule from the player base, and in turn ultimately losing a handful of players.

Obviously a level of maturity will be needed to hold these discussions, but I'd bet that people would be willing to raise their level of maturity for this, rather than have the game updated the way that it has been.

[Hawk_Trinsic]

Fantastic Idea. I agree.

[deadman]

Great idea. At least this way staff would not be able to forcefully make us believe something is right and that if we don't agree with them that we are not seeing the long term effects, that we don't know what we are talking about, or that we are to naive...

[Shapeshifter]

like stated before, it also stops player base from ridiculing staff over things that we dislike making the staff feel belittled and unwanted... ultimately making them feel worse about trying to help us out

definitely supported

[Oasis]

Supported. Just because the staff may not care about what the changes will do to current players but in the long run, the current players do sometimes care about the game they love to play and whats happening to it good or bad.

[Trevayne]

A very interesting discussion. Thanks for bringing it up. However, some of the things that you claim are just plain wrong. Let me give you some facts:

1) Of the four new changes to the 1a server, 3 of them started from player suggestions on the forum. Please don't claim that staff don't listen to player input. We clearly do.

2) This game operates more on player input than almost any other game out there. You won't find this level of integration of player suggestions in WoW, Runescape, or anywhere else. Do you see Blizzard admins hunting you down individually or en masse before implementing changes?

3) Of the five active non-admin staff on the 1a server, all of us do have mortal characters on 1a and do play them. Some of us choose not to reveal who we are, because as soon as we do we're accused of cheating or corruption. I've watched some of the players who posted on this very thread say both "staff have no mortals, they know nothing of this" and "staff are biased because of their mortals"... all within 10 minutes. We lose either way, so we decide to keep ourselves hidden. Don't assume that because you don't see us that we're not there.

4) The game isn't, and can't be, a democracy. As much as the staff team tries to take into account what the playerbase wants, you just don't have all the information and we can't possibly give it to you. Would it be fair if I were to reveal the training patterns of all players? Would it be fair if I were to say who made how much gold and where? Would it be fair if I gave out secrets that only a few players in game knew (and who had spent considerable effort to get)? If you don't have all the information, how can you possibly make a good decision? The staff need to take into account many things when decisions are made and as much as we want to make that transparent to everyone, sometimes we just can't do that out of fairness to you.

And now a question for you:

Why aren't people already acting with the level of maturity that your idea requires? Perhaps if we saw a bit more of that, we would be even more willing to bring the things that we can out into the open.

Finally, remember that all the staff are volunteers. We give our time and effort so that you can play this game for free. We all have lives, and we don't have infinite time. We do the best that we can to make Nightmist a balanced, challenging, and interesting game that can keep you engaged for more than just a few weeks. Support us in those efforts.

[Gaddy]

Too many players only want what will benefit their own style or account.
As a member of staff, I feel it is discussed by some of the most experienced and knowledgable people around the game----our current team is made up of such.

We also have the benefit of being able to see and hear what everyone does/says in game...and we can figure ways to adjust the game from that stand-point.

If there are particular problems or changes you disliked, make a post to discuss them without bashing staff, and there is a good chance we will explain or see about making an adjustment, but going through players to update and modify the game?
Why have us act as sysops at all if that is the case?

And I suggest no one answer the bottom question, because any answer that does respond to it will probably be an insult or suggest we're suppose to act as lackies who love to sit about and bend to everyones' will...which will make me ban someone.
-Gaddy

[Throwback]

/clap you guys just ripped tony hahahaha

[Pureza]

It would be nice to see the changes made in a more democratic way. But as said by Trevayne, 3 of 4 changes were done due to player input on the subject. There is really no reason to make it this is a democratic game. Players had a say in who would and would not be made staff. That's about as democratic as it needs to be. You all voted for the current staff. The ultimate decision did belong to JLH, but remember, someone out there in the nm world did support them being staff. And not just a few someones. In closing, Not Supported.

[Redheart]

1. Only 2 so called "Staff' that reply are Trevayne and Gaddy.
Not all of the NM gamers nominated or voted for them to be staff.
Some staff that were appointed staff do absolutely feckall.
Many people that were nominated did not make staff.
My point being All Players did not have a say in who would and would not be made staff.
( in response to Pureza's statement)

2. Nightmist is NOTHING like WOW, Runescape, or any other role playing game.
Nightmist can not be compared at all to these games.

3. Gaddy says" If there are particular problems or changes you disliked, make a post to discuss them without bashing staff, and there is a good chance we will explain or see about making an adjustment.

Dude the post was made and there was not any staff bashing involved in it.
When you create a post you have no control over what other people decide to post on it.(Unless you lock it)

From what I see Nightmist single alt server is discouraging many gamers. The changes should have been created when it was introduced. The changes were made after people already had master/arch characters.

In hindsight you have to admit that it is unfair and those players have an unfair advantage over the rest.

[shomer]

a lot of the players on here don't take the game seriously, so how can you even be sure they'll be mature about decisions instead of just ripping on other people's ideas?

[Freek]

From what I see Nightmist single alt server is discouraging many gamers. The changes should have been created when it was introduced. The changes were made after people already had master/arch characters.

In hindsight you have to admit that it is unfair and those players have an unfair advantage over the rest.

Those players who already had Master/Arch characters had the same amount of time to train as all the rest of the players.. The server opend at the same time for everyone, everyone had the same amount of chance to train as they do now.. Im tired of seeing people bash on the high level alts because they got to "abuse" gatetraining and cleric exp and what not before the changes happend. My comment is, Staff said they were "thinking" about stoping gate training a long time before it happend hence why I abused every chance I could at gate training before the change came in to effect. And now im tired of seeing the high level crit moan about how "omg I just hit arch and now i have to make 4.6billion exp to get the new arch and have nothing to train on because new rules" If you dont wanna shoot for higher then don't, don't just don't complain about it.. I have a lvl 29 mage and im training on 60 pod monsters because nothing else is around that I can go to myself without going deply in debt.

And now to stay on topic .

I think it would be nice, but as gaddy mention'd.. People have posted Ideas they have had, and staff has looked at them and thought about it. (seen staff coments on a few of mine) But it would be nice for staff to give players a tiny bit of what they are thinking of adding so that players could help the idea or say what they think of it.

Edit: Typo.

Edited by Freek, 17 April 2007 - 04:23 AM.

[Lodin]

hmmm Autek for staff?

[Trevayne]

Since you singled me out, I'll try to correct some of the things in this posting that makes me (and most of the other staff) crazy:

1. Only 2 so called "Staff' that reply are Trevayne and Gaddy.

Why would every staff member need to respond to every posting? Also, why make an insult against the two people who are posting to help?

Some staff that were appointed staff do absolutely feckall.

And how would you know? Do you know who makes grid changes? Do you know who runs every behind-the-scene investigation? Please show me where the little "omniscient" flag on your character is set.

My point being All Players did not have a say in who would and would not be made staff.

Everyone at the time had a chance to have their say. Everyone got to post an opinion. Just because JLH didn't do exactly what you wanted doesn't mean that you didn't get your say.

2. Nightmist is NOTHING like WOW, Runescape, or any other role playing game.
Nightmist can not be compared at all to these games.

You're right. They are nothing alike. Except for the fact that they all compete for attention from the same set of people. Really, we should compare Nightmist to other online, free-to-play games. But the point is still the same... players get listened to here far more than they do on other games.

Dude the post was made and there was not any staff bashing involved in it.

You're right... there was no staff bashing in this thread until your post. Congrats for breaking the chain.

The changes should have been created when it was introduced.

This is a very good point. Yes, they should have been. Unfortunately, nobody but JLH knew that the server was opening until it was already open. None of us had time to make immediate changes and even if we had, we wouldn't have wanted to. We try to make decisions very carefully, and that takes time. If JLH had given us a week before opening the server, we might have been able to make it better right from the start.

In hindsight you have to admit that it is unfair and those players have an unfair advantage over the rest.

That's open to debate. I tend to agree. I've been pushing for there to be a reset, but JLH doesn't want one. You'll have to talk him into it.

[Autek]

With regards to the Public Forum

Everyone sees problems in the game, such as gate training etc. They are plain as day, spotting them and suggesting they be changed is the easy part. The difficult part is coming up with a good solution. What I brought up with this post is that the players should have a say in how they are changed, with more of an impact than just bringing up a solution and letting the five or so staff members decide.

To answer Trevayne's question in his first reply, just looking at the results of the poll questions that I threw in there, it seems like people are willing to up their level of maturity regardless of what they've done in the past. And I'd say it's an overwhelming majority of the players that want to see something like this put into use, about 4:1 as it stands right now, and I'd bet that a good bit of those who voted against it were members of the current staff team. I'd suggest a zero tolerance policy as far as the maturity level goes during these discussions. This way, if people want to have their voice heard, they are forced to conduct themselves with a higher level of maturity.

I'd still certainly prefer the my original suggestion, but at the very least, putting together some sort of a player council so that at least some of the players' voices are heard would tremendously benefit the game. On top of that, there would be ridiculing of staff, or at least there would be none that is justified.

Off topic a little bit. As far as a reset goes, that would be absurd. Currently there are 29 players in the game with over 5 days of game time, and a few with over 10 days! Resetting all of that time and effort that those people put in would certainly push a bunch of them over the edge to quitting. Thinning out an already dwindling player base is definitely not the answer. And for the record, I agree with Freek. Everyone has had the same opportunity to put time and effort into their characters. The server was put up at the same time for everyone, so I don't see how anything is unfair. If people devote that much time to playing, more power to them, they should have achieved more feats than those who didn't put the same amount of time and effort in.


Lastly, with regards to Staff etc.

First off, I would never want to be a staff member. I enjoy playing the game, and I know that it would never be the same.

Secondly, I apologize for saying that only half of the staff team play the 1a server. You're right, I had no idea, I was only going off of what I knew.

I have never thought that staff should be able to play mortal characters. Now I know that there are measures taken with regards to new areas etc. to ensure that staff will not be blowing through the areas and getting everything fast because they designed them. However, Trevayne said in his first post, "Would it be fair if I were to reveal the training patterns of all players? . . . . ". I would assume that the answer to those rhetorical questions is simply no. So why then, are the staff members allowed to play mortal characters when they do in fact know all of those secrets etc.? That's something I've never understood.
To answer Gaddy's question in a non insulting way, staff are put in place to make the game more enjoyable for it's players and to better it for it's players. What good is a game without players? Unfortunately, you -have- to take into account the will of the players, as they are what make the game. I don't see how putting things into the game that the vast majority of players disagree with is making it more enjoyable or making it better for players.


Just to sum it up . . .

Overall, since the current staff team was instated, I think they've done a great job. They've just slipped up here on the new server. All I'm trying to do is get some more public input into how changes are made. This saves staff the ridicule, gives everyone the chance to voice their opinion., and ultimately will satisfy the largest amount of people. I still don't understand how this could be turned down.