Odd that they used to be able to fix "careless disregard" as you spin it. Speaking of "spin", check out the difference between can not and will not sometime. (nice try though) You're right that nothing will stop mistakes born of innatention to detail. That's why it was nice when CS was allowed to fix these things - at least regarding raid loots. Asking for a mechanism where guilds can fix their own mistakes, at least in a raid, isn't asking for anything that wasn't there already. -Rat
It is more difficult to get something out of a guild bank than to loot a chest. Guilds already come up with many administrative measures to track who won what and how it was paid for/earned. I don't see how extending that layer of administrative control into the game itself is going to cause problems, other than groans from the "The stupid and the ignorant must pay for their mistakes. Its not SoE fault you are " crowd.
Past tense. Now, they do not. Get over it. Yet somehow, a number of players insist that CS continue to correct those mistakes -- despite there is admittedly no way to stop same.
I'm not saying that the players didn't screw up - of course the players screwed up. That's not remotely my point. We play money to play EQ. Transferring an item from one person to another (in the same guild, in the same raid, in the same dz) isn't game-unbalancing. Fixing a player's bone-headed mistake is just good customer service. Part of the problem is that GMs seem to have very little discretion. There shouldn't be a hard and fast rule (i.e. "we always fix loot mistakes" or "we never fix loot mistakes") - it should be decided on a case by case basis. I've also had (for the most part) good interactions with CS and GMs on those rare occasions that I've had issues. The issue isn't with the people giving the customer service, it's with those making the high-level policy decisions behind the scenes. If Sony were spending all of our fees on awesome content, I'd gripe less about cutting back on customer service; but clearly almost no money went into the current expansion. So, I'm left with the conclusion that Sony is just cutting back on EQ expenditures... period... without lowering fees or customer expectations.
Add a loot window mod to allow the raid leader to assign the loot to the character that is to loot it.
Anytime you're involved in a financial arrangement with a company, particularly "big business", you need to keep only one question on the front burner when a change happens. That question is: "As a result of the change, am I getting more or less of a product for the same money as I had yesterday?" I can see not wasting time fixing mistakes with group loots. But fixing raid loot mistakes, or at least implementing a means for a guild to fix it themselves - is good CS for some of the core spenders here. (ie raiding guilds, and boxers) -Rat
Is anyone really surprised that they don't want to do this the problem is as I have said before they are pulling to many people away from EQ to work other games. Which results in less help to situations, less stability in the game, and pretty much an attitude of not caring what happens to us.
People talk like adding things like " anyone who was in the raid at the time of the chest opening is able to have the item traded to them " or " have the raid leader be able to assign the item to whoever they want ". will be something easy to implement. Like yall are confused why they don't just snap it up there over a lunch break at work or something. Ratbo's question remains the same here. My uninformed guess is that we would be getting less of a product for the same money if they suddenly diverted their limited resources to implement something like this. Obviously they only have so many people to work on so many things. Never before has it been more apparent. Is *this* what we really want them to differ resources to? Something that is easily avoidable on our part if we pay more attention? ( yes, mistakes happen ). Personally, I would prefer them work on other things. My guess is something like this would end up having to be a major feature for an expansion, It would also need quite a bit of testing, as I see the potential for quite a few loop holes. Let us not forget why they had to stop moving mislooted items around. It was because we, as a playerbase, could not keep ourselves in check.
Before we used to get the level of CS that would fix it AND new content, now you are trying to compromise and say we can get one or the other. We have received LESS for our money if you are to believe this is the case.
Apparently we need to accept this as the new norm and "get over it", according to some posters on this thread. Not too surprising since "value" has all but disappeared from the global business vernacular.
Let's put this in perspective. Does EQ have a shrinking amount of time being afforded it to fix issues and create content? Obviously, the answer is yes. Have they implemented something to have a person confirm they want to loot it? Yes. A person has to make at least 2 (two) mistakes to misloot an item. They have to click the wrong item, and then they have to ignore the pop up. Has the playerbase on the whole shot themselves in the foot by exploiting this issue in the past? Yes. People want a way to police themselves. I think " loot what you mean to loot, and if you mess up, you will def. remember it next time " is an option on how to police yourself. Do mistakes happen? Yes. Do they suck? Yep. While I wish they still did the same type of service, I can understand why they aren't. I can also understand why they can't just wave a wand and change how loot works ( in regard to making a way for a raid leader delegate an item, have items tradeable for X amount of time, etc ). I am not saying we can only get one or the other. I am saying, that regardless of things pan out with this issue, we *are* getting less than what we paid for years ago in a sense. It is happening already. I am merely hoping they keep their resources pointed at the most important issues. I just feel there are many more important issues than this at the moment.
Customer Service is probably a different pot of money than what is drawn from for EQ development, though. The CS department is for all games in SoE's portfolio, correct? Cutting back on Customer Service across the board may or may not have any direct effect on development of content in EQ. I am leaning towards it has no impact whatsoever. Anyway, when stock value rises, COE pay increases but quality of products and service goes down as well as people being laid off, I tend to throw the BS flag on those types of plays. "Get over it" only has so much mileage before it is time to say that no more inches are going to be given for all those miles taken.
Assumption, pure and simple nothing has ever been posted by any dev, CS, SOE employee in any official capacity/status or forum moderator as to why handling loot issues change occurred, unless Tarrin is a SOE CS (kind of seems like it, because many other people who pay for a game are rightfully upset that a needless change was made to CS?). It is a loss of service period, a service that is partly paid for by our subs and expansion purchases, and should be reverted back to the previous level of service or monthly sub price should reflect this lack of service. Expansion quality/content has also slowly spiraled down in recent releases more than likely due to limited resources and supporting staff.
I'm with you Langya. I laughed when I read the MOTD when they said customer service wasn't responsible for loot mistakes anymore. I can just see the day when it turns into "Customer support is not here to address your connectivity issues" and then "EQ developers are not here to give you yearly expansions" and well, you see what happens.
I've interacted with CS at least a dozen times if not more since starting this game and I have always had fairly quick service and resolutions. I find it hard to believe that every time CS answered my petitions I just happen to get a squared away one instead of all these screwed up ones that everyone else seems to get.
Fixing these mistakes for years has impacted CS negatively. It caused other players petitions to wait longer while these issues were worked out. This caused a different kind of problem. There isn't an easy or simple answer to this issue, just a variety of different tactics. For years we fixed these mistakes at other players expense. Now we're changed our policy. We do however continue to listen to opinions on this subject.
