You can't legally be fired for becoming disabled either, but employers do that in California as well. At will applies to the employer's legal ability to fire you. You can be fired for almost anything, but not for nothing. I mean you can, but it exposes the company to litigation. You CAN be laid off, have your position eliminated and have a new position created with a different description and not be hired back. Most employees in these situations are offered an opportunity to resign and retain benefits with the promise of good references and unemployment as well as any other parting benefits you might have versus being fired. Any way, none of this is really relevant unless we knew whether anyone was fired, laid off, or given the option to resign for whatever reason. It's likely their human resources department is the only people who know for sure, and frankly, it has nothing to do with what we can do to help improve Everquest. Let's get back on topic. We have what we have, let's work with what we have the best we can and move forward. Tin foil hats are not the new black, people.
The big one these days is "ageism". Late 40s to early 50s and you are expected to "retire" whether you're ready or not. You can try and fight it, but you'll lose and you'll be broke from legal fees.
Holly - speaking of bug fixes. If there is going to be a major change in how a mechanic of long-standing works - even if it is a 'bug fix' from the developers' POV - any chance of letting players know a few months in advance? That it is about to bubble to the top of the priority stack? A lot of players like to plan out what they are going to do (in rough terms) months out. Sudden major changes can be frustrating, as a player finds they've been working towards something and they are just about there, and *poof* the cheese gets moved. When stuff has worked one way for 18 months or more (pick some arbitrary amount of time), it's no longer game-breaking; the game is already broken. Players are going to assume 'working as intended' and plan/act accordingly. It's great to see that EQ keeps getting cleaned up, and the devs want to improve things. But if the devs are going to massively change something that has worked one way for years, it would be nice to have a heads up further out than the preceding week's test server patch notes. Even if it is only something like 'we think X is broken/not good for the game/bad juju because Y; we are looking at changing it so it does less Y/more Y/Z. We haven't decided on the fix yet, but it is on our priority list - expect changes soon/not so soon/longish.' Just give us a heads up, so we can decide 'OMG, I need to get Shawl 2.0 completed ASAP!' or 'that sounds good - let me wait on that a bit and see what happens with the fix.'
I hope so - we're holding off TDS util that particular nerf is lessened - wife, kids*, and I like going back and visiting older content, don't understand the push to the end game. That's never been our playing style, we find things we would like and go after them (oh say the Class 5 Roboboar upgrade - besides, what in blue blazes are the polishing kits for?) , tradeskills are intriguing since I'm not convinced all recipes have been sussed out - too many holes in the database. I'd love to rush to the top, IRL obligations prevent the amounts of time required for such an endeavor. Tell you what too, rezzing an old, basically retired, guild (Hands of God - surely you've heard Hackin, shout 'HoGs in Da House' from time to time in the Rathe's GL) - beginning to show promise actually, new members, old ones reactivating. Just rambling I guess - I was in shock there for a few days about the sale and what I knew was coming next - the layoffs - extremely happy that EQ wasn't going directly into sunset - been running around random zones with fond memories attached taking screenshots, still working on getting my toons reproduced via 3d printing (they mean that much, one is older than my youngest child, priorities, I know lol) *Started some halflings with the kids on Fippy when it opened, taught the appreciation of the live servers, now I can't get them off the servers, trying different combinations - BatHill in Misty Thicket is what broke them, I'm pretty sure lmao. 'Walked up hill both ways, in the snow, to school, and wasn't always exactly sure which way school was' kind of lesson heh.
Nothing Illegal about it...its called business. SO why pay a person lets say $60,000 a year when you can replace them with someone that can do the same job and quality of work for $45,000 a year or less? New management has the ability to clean house, they didn't have to keep anyone unless it was in the purchase agreement....even then they could let them go later and simply say it was a change in direction or something. Just because you work for someone does not mean you are guaranteed to keep your job.
Most tort cases are taken on contingency. The likely hood of winning or losing simply depend on the merits of the case.
Unless the employer is forbidden from doing it... I wasn't laid off as I got older. I did retire in my 60s.
What happened to being 30 levels apart and everyone getting exp? regardless of how small. It wasn't that long ago the "team" changed all the group missions to allow for a 30 level spread. Why is new content 85+?
California has it's own version of the WARN act that was put in place in 2003. It puts tighter restriction on companies than the federal version. Several companies that tried the fire-to-hire-cheaper-labor trick were sued based on that act and lost (my own company at the time included which is why I know about this). Yes, California is an at-will state but did you really think that this liberal bastion wouldn't have some kind of protection for workers in this area?
Your estimate completely leaves out Marketplace items. I'm not trying to say they really are making huge cash, just pointing out there is more income there right off the bat. Their own items and player studio items they get 60% of account for at least several thousand if not tens of thousands in sales with little overhead each month. They probably aren't making big money, but I think with some better choices they might start making more.
As a quick aside, I feel fairly certain they make good money off Hero's Forge and Guild Hall related stuff, among other things. I suspect that the bigness of the number of people who have spent the money to get a Palatial Guild Hall for their personal/private alt guild might surprise us if we had that data. x3 Part of why I wish they would continue to integrate the (frankly pretty darn robust) housing system even more into the way the game is organized and played is precisely because I am aware there's monetization potential for DG in doing so, while simultaneously providing an experience for players that is very positive.
Some people have stated that they feel like the operators of EQ are out of touch with the product because they do not participate or play the product and I bet loads of players feel that way about the owner/operators of EQ. My thought was, sheesh, how many people hang out where they work after they get off work? I only visited my worksites off duty when I was forced to. That being said in a situation like this it appears to me, if those responsible for the yea or nay on anything EQ, if not even casual ( 2-3xs a week) players, should then have the foresight to ask someone who is a casual player then ask a regular player and finally a hard core player or players for the insight to the product, the insight they don't have. All this time I thought that was what the test server was for? There are so many super simple glitches that could be repaired in 5minutes or less by the professional level staff you have it makes even a casual, yet nearly daily if possible, player like me think, hmmm that does not look right. A super simple example of which was the limit of 200 people in the /gen chat at one time. Forcing the remaining gamers to another /gen chat channel. Did it really take that much effort to raise the /general chat channel occupancy to include everyone? Yet that took forever to get resolved and I'm sorry to say I have loads more of examples like this. Again, to me non-computer tech person, super simple appearing problems that would be super simple to "fix". Along the lines of the recurring, Lets have a player pole!, topic. Here is the problem with the player poles as I see them. The same as the glitches in the product. The person who has the yea or nay power. That person is not a player like we are and so will create a poll that does not ask the right questions. So the poll will have questions irrelevant to the discussion topic which has been and always should be, "What is wrong with Everquest as you see it and what would you recommend to repair this problem as you see it?". And thereby perpetuating the Heritage glitches we have lived with over the years. At least that is what I have seen represented in the few player poles I've been fortunate enough to participate in since I began playing in '99. Super happy to participate in them but just don't seem to find the poll question that pertains to my needs or wants with Everquest. My only real question that would at least satisfy my curiosity and soothe my "git it done" upbringing is who is the yea or nay power person and why he/she is not able to "git the job done"? Even tho I have not yet purchased TDS (the FIRST expac I didn't pre-order) I of course still plan to but will probably wait until next expac release. There wasn't enough incentive for me to purchase yet to receive the nerf. But yet I have so much other Everquest to explore and "quest" still that I will not miss it but yet will still enjoy the new weapons and gear from it. upgrades, upgrades, upgrades right? LONG LIVE EVERQUEST!!!
It has been said in the discussion above that devs/designers aren't people persons, and shouldn't be expected to be - and if so, how are they going to elicit feedback from that focus group of players you mention? There are answers (CRT, SOECC, or just plain Community staff, who are supposed to be people people), but no matter what else, they need to play the games at least a little. It's really important they they don't get snowed by one single very vociferous group. Remember how it felt when various staff have reported on their in game activities? Pretty good, right, even if they were obviously spending a relatively little time doing it. Similarly, how it can frustrate when staff tweet about how great it is playing WoW, LoL, GW2, etc (but never EQ). It's part of what should be expected of them, it doesn't matter what you do in your off hours, that's just how it is. And... you really do have to be a programmer to know just how hard it can be, and how unpredictably long it can take, to fix bugs in legacy code.
The masses have spoke and its all very clear If Dzarn is gone that is by far the worst choice https://www.change.org/p/daybreak-games-reinstate-dzarn?just_created=true Also Columbus Nova (who owns Daybreak) 900 Third Avenue, 19th Fl. New York, NY 10022 212.418.9600 (phone) 212.308.6623 (fax) General Inquiries: info@columbusnova.com let's let them know how we feel
The release of Dzarn has me questioning if the powers that be here in the take over have a clue on the pulse of things and where they want to go forward. IF ANYONE there had a clue and are so hell bent on making the game better and brighter moving forward, you just laid off the best weapon for that and asset to the company and the game and its community. Ya'll really need to re think that one.
Before everyone freaks about the Dzarn thing, does anyone have any confirmation that he was fired? For all we know, he didn't want the company to be acquired by Columbus Nova, and so quit. He could have had a job offer elsewhere. I have seen no definite statements from anyone that he was laid off, and would like to before jumping on this particular bandwagon.
