Better community communication needed

Not A Communist · Jun 3rd 2016, 1:55pm

So, it has come to my attention that there sometimes is a poor amount of communication between the CoW community and I suppose the devs and other bytro staff that make decisions about this game.

One of the things that annoyed me most recently was the pretty much destruction of the "blitzkrieg" game style. Putting the resources to the normal amount in regular games completely defeated the point of the game. It makes it hard to manage the large armies you start with, and practically impossible to manage your resource intake, and breaks the supposed realism that the blitzkrieg version of games is about. The CoW community wasn't informed about this prior to it happening, we didn't get the change to discuss this and there wasn't even an announcement when it did finally happen.

Stuff like this has happened before but I can't remember it right now, I'll edit it in later when I remember.
But yeah, change is needed :beer:

TankBuster · Jun 5th 2016, 1:20pm

Completely agree, we can't be kept in the dark over everything that changes the game. We should have the ability to influence what changes- what units get updated into the game, how game mods are changed: maybe official poles or questionnaires?

wildL SPQR · Jun 5th 2016, 2:00pm

This game is owned by Bytro and the devs make the decisions on what to change and what they work on.

They constantly look at bug reports, suggestions/critizism and they have already been informed by many, that people are not taking a liking to the "nerf" of the blitz map.

As for influence, I don't think that polls is the right tool for important decisions about game mechanics, as the forum is not exactly representative of who is playing CoW- A lot of users don't use the forum or read/participate here. Nor does the forum have the competence to decide on such things. Best left to the developers.

You have the influence, that you can submit ideas and critizism and I think that's good enough, since the Devs actually DO listen, even though it might not feel that way.

As for communication, Bytro makes regular updates on most things they do, and they started listing adjustments and stuff they change, so it's really getting better and better!

TankBuster · Jun 5th 2016, 4:40pm

wildL SPQR wrote:

This game is owned by Bytro and the devs make the decisions on what to change and what they work on.

They constantly look at bug reports, suggestions/critizism and they have already been informed by many, that people are not taking a liking to the "nerf" of the blitz map.

As for influence, I don't think that polls is the right tool for important decisions about game mechanics, as the forum is not exactly representative of who is playing CoW- A lot of users don't use the forum or read/participate here. Nor does the forum have the competence to decide on such things. Best left to the developers.

You have the influence, that you can submit ideas and critizism and I think that's good enough, since the Devs actually DO listen, even though it might not feel that way.

As for communication, Bytro makes regular updates on most things they do, and they started listing adjustments and stuff they change, so it's really getting better and better!

Its more the unwanted change to the Blitz map, which no one asked for, nor was even raised as a possible issue.

I also believe we do, as a collective group, can have the 'competence' to to decide on things- that sounds more like an insult on the intelligence of those of us taking part here, and personally I don't like my intelligence being insulted.

Bytro used polls on S1914 to great use, and maybe at this stage we don't have the manpower to warrant polls or the likes, so maybe a recruitment drive to increase forum activity- maybe a pop up on the home page, or a advertisement in the newspaper.

wildL SPQR · Jun 5th 2016, 5:15pm

@TankBuster I agree.. I did not appreciate the Blitz map being changed either and I've personally let higher-ups know, but there is not much I as an individual can do about that.

I did not mean to insult your or anyone else's intelligence, what I meant was, that we as users do not have the same insight on how the game is made and what is possible and what is not, hence I don't agree with letting users decide exactly what to change and what to implement. There are often things that people suggest, I know can't be implemented since it is not possible to implement in the code, or devs have to change too much in order to make it happen. I certainly didn't mean that people aren't good at suggesting things or are not intelligent.

Of course the devs could make polls on what people would rather like to see next, if that's the kinda thing you're looking for?

wildL SPQR · Jun 5th 2016, 5:45pm

Also, I think the Blitz map was nerfed due to stats abuse. (my own personal opinion)

TankBuster · Jun 5th 2016, 7:18pm

wildL SPQR wrote:

@TankBuster I agree.. I did not appreciate the Blitz map being changed either and I've personally let higher-ups know, but there is not much I as an individual can do about that.

I did not mean to insult your or anyone else's intelligence, what I meant was, that we as users do not have the same insight on how the game is made and what is possible and what is not, hence I don't agree with letting users decide exactly what to change and what to implement. There are often things that people suggest, I know can't be implemented since it is not possible to implement in the code, or devs have to change too much in order to make it happen. I certainly didn't mean that people aren't good at suggesting things or are not intelligent.

Of course the devs could make polls on what people would rather like to see next, if that's the kinda thing you're looking for?

Yes, more like "Here is a list of maps/units/features- pick the one you want to be in the upcoming update"- i'm not saying we should be involved in coding, but we should take a more proactive role in help bytro- such as the 'Tech tree' threads which, as a community, we've helped build.

Coding and such is the role of developers, but features, units and maps are something we can help- such as the Map competitions that S1914 has. Things like this help us shape the game, and it makes life easy for devs.

The devs no best when it comes to game state, but many people here have a huge knowledge of the second world war and the likes, so maybe the community can help carry the weight. CoW is an insanely fun game, I've managed to get a few of my friends into it and they've enjoyed it, so I wish to help out more.

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