Are you guys tracking down the player behind the computer and doing a full-scale, expensive background check to vet the candidates? Is this still happening? Was it just a joke the whole time? If the answer is: "Yes!" -- Don't bother saying it, tell us where you're actually at in the process and an ETA.
I suspect that they are bogged down with the current workflow. Though, there may be reservations about the optics and dynamics of the CRC. Would people approach it as a "political" organization? Would members be regarded as lobbyists for their niche or class? Would specific members be blamed for nerfs or buffs? Could it impede the work of the devs? Could it divide the community? Could it distract from progress for the game? If you want an official answer, your best bet is to PM the CM.
I had no intention of pressing the topic. However, given that it popped up again on the boards here, the concern at this point (if it does even move forward) is how much time continues to lapse from the initial interest and pool of applicants versus when it does actually move forward. The applications happened twice, with the first round of applications tossed/lost/whatever from almost a year ago. I think the last application period was already 6 months ago, yes? I already know several players that applied at one point that don't even play the game anymore right now. I know the CRC is not some sort of ground-breaking, life-changing program (lol?), but please realize that it gave a crowd of players a false sense of hope and excitement surrounding it when both application rounds were announced. I take a little bit of an issue with that regardless how much or how little of an impact this program has on the game.
It's rather apparent at this point in time that the company owners and managers care very little about this program. They seemingly do not take it seriously, as evident in the failure last year and unknown delays from 4-ish months ago that have led to this topic being brought back up on the forums.
The inevitable and completely guaranteed lack of engagement from the few departments players actually want to give feedback to makes the whole thing a bit meaningless anyway. I'd just turf it. The Devs that actually want to hear what we think already make the efforts to do so.
I foresee this as being nothing but a biased narrow viewed sounding board for egotistical-long winded-big word- making up - new initialism/acronym posters who feel their way is the only true way of the game. And after all that - I don't see the council having any impact if it ever makes it off the ground. Like the previous one that faded into nothingness due to apathy. You bet I applied!!!! Righteous man.
I know a few of us from test applied, figuring that since long gone are the days of devs sitting on our PoK bank taking feedback from the playerbase, and the playerbase even there shrinking significantly over the last couple years, it would be a way to do something other than shout into the wind or wonder if maybe one if the two who regularly check discord might see it. Might actually get 1 person from that group of players onto it, and could at least be minimally involved in that process. When they didn't even bother setting up an auto-response "thanks for your submission" to their original email sign-up, it was obvious this was half-hearted to start with. When they relaunched it, hey, maybe they learned. 5 months later, yeah, probably not though. Too many people were interested, cant move forward, only had this in works for a year (now a year and a half), you expected us to have plans in place for any of it?! Its one of those things where a lot of people who applied stopped actually caring about it as a thing that would ever exist (the last time they mentioned it was months ago), but its interesting to just poke at it every couple months since this particular forum still has multiple stickies (HALF of the ones in this forum) about it sitting there reminding us "this is a thing we talked about once" every time you browse the forum.
This whole council thing reeks of "Let's run the clock out and hope people just forget we ever did this." The game is 20+ years old. If the devs had actually wanted to get input from a wide range of players, and not just their raid guild buddies, they would have done it a long time ago...and they wouldn't have needed some special, mythical "council" to do it. This forum exists...players give feedback and suggestions all the time...and almost all of it gets ignored if it's not tied to raiding in some form or fashion. EQ has become a vanity/ego project for the devs (as most video games probably are)...they don't actually care what people think. If they did, they'd actually act like it. Asking players "Ok, what do you think?" after 23 years seems like a slap in the face. And anyone who thinks anything is going to come out of this, if it ever happens, that is something other than just a high-end raider wishlist is being naive.
This isn't just about getting feedback on things but able to get feedback on things that can't be discussed publicly at that time. The crc can be useful for providing feedback on things that are still in development or other issues that arise but are under an nda of some type.
If there's one thing that's true about management everywhere, they are changing thier minds constantly about priorities.
Nah, these things are never useful in any of the games I’ve seen try them. It’s just a waste time like Beta, where they get feedback and decide they want to see how the larger audience responds. Just ultimately built to be an echo chamber.
You are free to have your opinions on it being useful but that doesn't change the fact that at times the devs are looking for feedback on items that are under an nda and can't be shared publicly.
This! I do wish sometimes they had spoken to players (even if it is only a few) before they do major changes. The change to body types springs to mind, along with the removal of the potion belt, changes we have seen to spell/melee filters, retuning of HAs, etc. Sometimes we see a the same things being patch for a few months which if discussed with players doing the content could possibly have been avoided and only done once.
The big problem comes from what others are hinting/eluding to. Just like the original Class Leaders of old EQ, it has the potential for abuse. (those classes who took an extremely heavy-handed nerf are probably still reeling from the effects) There are many facets to EQ. If all of the input comes from high play time raiders, you'll see the game shift to one direction. If it comes from low play time casuals, it will shift in another direction. There are die-hard crafters vs. the average Joe who is a "crafter" simply because of a single augment. I'm not opposed to the CRC. I do think that any outcome which involves(d) the CRC needs to be made public long before it makes it into a patch. And here's my basis of that: "I do wish sometimes they had spoken to players" How many times has the forums erupted over an idea proposal? There's at least one diametrically opposed proposal on the front page of this very sub. "even if it is only a few" That's even worse, because of the likelihood of people able to take part in the CRC sharing similar play styles. I, for one, think the consolidation of body styles was a move in the right direction. I think it had unforeseen consequences/issues, but I don't see how they would have been able to check every single thread of EQ's spaghetti code to avoid it. They had a similarly unforseen issue when they consolidated NPC statistics across levels and classes, instead of every NPC having to be individually set. A quick forum search will likely pull up many results of players opposed to the body type change. (Most of which lend nothing of value to any sort of discussion, but simply voicing a complaint.) So yeah, I'm in favor of the CRC, but at the same time, I don't think the CRC should mold any game design changes. The CRC also has to be as transparent as possible (NDA's and whatnot excluded) and presented to the players publicly before making a change.
Im curious. Do people on test test stuff? Serious question. I was on test a couple months ago to check something in patch notes to see if it was really fixed and then I thought "why not just ask in general". I drew a blank, so had to check it myself. I dont mind checking but it just seemed odd that no one on test tested it. Do you guys test?
Entirely depends on what you want info for. There's not a ton of us left who keep multiple accounts current to the newest expansion AND are making sure we test every possible thing right away. I certainly stopped doing that a couple expansions ago, and just have my one account I also do things on tlp/live with caught up to current. If you want testing done of any current raid content fixes, there's a 0% chance of that. Of anything in current top-tier group content? Theres a couple people left who can get that without having to coordinate things to do it. If its ui stuff? Or easily spottable things? Sure. Hilariously I missed the body type change for... longer than I ever should have, because I'm just used to cloudy potions being garbage and needing to fd potion a lot to solo explore, and in a group I am literally never without top end bard escorts. Its a server where / all xclass 116 120 can and will return 1 or 2 names, at best, for quite a few classes, at any given time of the day. The last year or two have done a number to the server pop, and as a result, a few of the people who can do some of that testing are just playing on Live. If youre going to keep 6 accounts current, might as well play on a server that isn't test, its far more rewarding.
Ultimately, such a program seeks to strike the perfect balance between: 1. Community feeling like their voices are being heard 2. A filter that excludes the worst ideas Were I to choose these players, I'd probably have some sort of minimum "like to post" ratio, to ensure that it doesn't simply select for the loudest and/or high post count users. You also need some care to exclude those only interested in pushing a personal/one-class agenda. Finally, the players deserve that the team isn't simply stacked with shill types who exist to function as a cheap PR campaign of dev team apologists. For the record, I'm not in a place where I'd be interested.
