Developer lack of communication

[Reaperking386]

Really that is what you take away from the live letters and community management? You know how many times questions get ignored because they don't want to answer them. Or when they implement major systems and put little fore thought into how the community is going to play it and having someone who can respond.They can plan to hang out in Germany/UK/US but can't have a dev and translator when new content goes live. I don't mean a patch with two dungeons and some clicking on npcs.Hunts and the pure server melting system they were at launch. No one could have fore seen it and been ready to respond? Housing and reclamation? Diadem v2 was slightly faster. But I chalk that up to timing/luck, not them planning and responding.

Devs have been paying attention to us and have made changes. A good example is the changes to summoner and bard. The Dev's do listen to us, but they do not have to listen to us all the time. If they listen to us all the time we would have romper wearing bunny boys running around our streets.

[Moonlite]

Devs have been paying attention to us and have made changes. A good example is the changes to summoner and bard. The Dev's do listen to us, but they do not have to listen to us all the time. If they listen to us all the time we would have romper wearing bunny boys running around our streets.

You consider expansion balancing listening? Listening would have been 3.1 Bard population has dropped off the face of the earth we fixed it. Two years for balancing REALLY REALLY. I want to type more really's. That is not a defense that's an example of not listening. Anything as simple as cast bar making it two patches is not listening. That is head in sand and hoping people adapt so you don't have to fix it. This is literally why I can't take any defense of the dev team serious.

[Welsper59]

You consider expansion balancing listening? Listening would have been 3.1 Bard population has dropped off the face of the earth we fixed it. Two years for balancing REALLY REALLY. I want to type more really's. That is not a defense that's an example of not listening. Anything as simple as cast bar making it two patches is not listening. That is head in sand and hoping people adapt so you don't have to fix it. This is literally why I can't take any defense of the dev team serious.

It's a priority thing. It always is, and it always will be. Conflicts with design goals are generally not going to be changed quickly if the current product is acceptable (it was). Minor balance changes or job-killing imbalances are often going to be addressed far sooner than later, simply because it's a quick tweak to static potency numbers that you can easily redo if it's still a problem. It'd be nice to fix any problem quickly, regardless of severity, but that's unrealistic to expect.

Listening and taking action are two completely different things. You are right, it is a "head in sand and hoping people adapt" situation. That's how it always is. If developers for any game have literally nothing better to do than immediately appeal to every criticism and adjust games based on the public's image (not their own), then the game has no future. If they simply listen however, they can prioritize things and watch how it unfolds over time. There's a strategy behind it, which as a saving grace for them, affords them time to work on other things. You don't want to knee-jerk reaction your changes because random people think something is bad. I would hope anyone sensible would agree with that. Hence why I'd argue they are listening. It's not an all or nothing thing. It rarely ever is, in life. Nor does it mean they must listen and act on everything. At that point, that's not listening, that's "obeying".

As you noted, you (or anyone) shouldn't be taking their defense as the only thing there is to it. They're not going to tell us exactly what's going on to the smallest detail, especially since it'd almost always involve something the public would not like but that the devs have to adhere to. The thing is, while it may not be all there is to the situation, I'd argue that it's at least a true statement in general usually. Your mention of two years for BRD was in regards to a major gameplay change that, while many did not like it (myself included), some did enjoy it. It didn't break the jobs ability to perform, obviously. What they did change frequently though was potency in light of the play style. They did the same for MCH and AST as well. Meaningful, yet simple changes that can result in consequence if left unfixed, like breaking the ability to perform effectively. They probably just decided from the beginning to let the turret playstyle linger through HW, in light of how fights were balanced and how they could freely change it with a new expansion.

[SendohJin]

You consider expansion balancing listening? Listening would have been 3.1 Bard population has dropped off the face of the earth we fixed it. Two years for balancing REALLY REALLY. I want to type more really's. That is not a defense that's an example of not listening. Anything as simple as cast bar making it two patches is not listening. That is head in sand and hoping people adapt so you don't have to fix it. This is literally why I can't take any defense of the dev team serious.

that has to do resources and they don't want to jeopardize the balance of the raid groups. the design was hugely flawed but it was functional. there's a difference between listening and doing. people who work for me can ask for raises/promotions, i always listen, doesn't mean i can always give them out when they ask.