About feedback and attitude towards designers

[Vanitas]

A frequent user posted this on the Paizo forums regarding the Advanced Classes Guide playtest, I think it raises some interesting questions.


Positive feedback is immensely preferred to negative feedback. See Sean’s post here for a bit on that. But suffice to say, positive feedback is more helpful because it fosters a helpful environment. It’s the difference between working together and stand-offishly stating your “factpinions” as gosepl. If you ever start a sentence that follows this form, you’re doing it wrong: “<feature X> is the worst thing I’ve ever seen and here’s how I would change it to make it <(balanced, useful, cool, english)>.”


Notice that in context what he means is actually "constructive criticism", not positive feedback.

This kind of negative attitude is one I've seen plenty of in these forums. Mind you, it even happened in the Path of War playtest, to the point where one of the authors (who was being questioned for engaging on this kind of behaviour in his own book, for starters) had to call down the poster on it.

I think my question here is... why? Why so much hate, why so much elitism, why so much acting like your opinion is fact? Why is that somehow connected to RPGs and ingrained in the D&D/Pathfinder community?

EDIT: Btw, Paizo is officially going to change several stuff in their playtest.

[Craft (Cheese)]

Wait wait wait, Paizo doesn't want you to suggest changes to the playtest classes?

[avr]

First off, there's a selection effect where mostly the people who feel strongly respond. If you feel strongly about something, it's natural to express yourself strongly. If you feel you know a lot about something, a brushoff can spark an angry response. Note that people often can't identify their own brushoffs or strong expressions.

In the case of SKR in particular his attitude breeds conflict very easily.

I didn't read whatever happened in the Path of War playtest and I doubt whoever was involved handled it as badly as Sean, but it's certainly possible the problem was at both ends.

[eggynack]

Well, to put it quite simply, I disagree with the idea that positive feedback is somehow better than negative feedback. Perhaps constructive criticism is better than criticism that is only made to attack, but it looks like Paizo's designers are opposed to even that, judging by the example comment at the end. If I see something that I disagree with, I'm going to say that I disagree with it a good amount of the time. For example, right now. I try to be as polite as possible in my criticism, at least at first, but it will be criticism nonetheless. It will also generally be criticism that is substantiated with supporting points, but still, criticism.

I don't even think that Paizo should particularly seek out positive feedback, even if they prefer it. Negative feedback is what tells you what you could improve on, and it helps guide you to a better end result. Sure, not all negative feedback should be followed, and I don't even necessarily think that most of it should be followed, but saying that it just shouldn't exist is highly problematic. If there's anything that is full of elitism, it is the implicit claim that the product that Paizo has designed is somehow faultless or infallible. I seek to make the things I criticize better, possibly by offering alternatives, and possibly by suggesting that the idea be scrapped altogether. Moreover, when I do so, I won't be "doing it wrong." I will be doing it right, in the best way I know how.

[Kelb_Panthera]

The behavior isn't all that surprising, really.

If you have a group of intelligent, opinionated people in an anonymous setting and ask them for their honest opinions on a matter, you can't really be all that surprised when they're somewhat less than tactful in expressing those opinions.

Seriously, highly intelligent people tend to have trouble with tact in person, you really expect that to get better with anonymity? Then there's the fact that the folks at paizo claimed they were going to fix 3.5 and did nothing to the core of the game's balance issues and precious little on most of the minor points.

Their lead designer, SKR, still wouldn't know good game design if it bit him and many of the others still haven't got a full grasp on the game as a whole, which results in myriad bad options just like the WotC designers before them. The 3.5 design team can be given some leeway since they were starting over from scratch and they did get a lot better toward the end. Paizo had more than a decade of player feedback that they virtually ignored altogether and that tends to rub players the wrong way.

[Zanos]

Wait wait wait, Paizo doesn't want you to suggest changes to the playtest classes?
Not unless your suggested changes serve to massage their delicate egos, apparently.

People presenting their opinions with negative tones or with virulent criticism doesn't make their input less valid.

[avr]

& while ignoring angry criticism is understandable, if Paizo wouldn't accept any response of the form "There's a problem with X, here's how I'd fix it" that's a problem with Paizo.

How many responses of the form "X is cool!" do you need, anyway? They're good for the ego but lead to little improvement in the finished product.

[Vanitas]

Well, talk about missing the point. Yeah, I should have known this would not go well.

[Craft (Cheese)]

Well, talk about missing the point. Yeah, I should have known this would not go well.

It's obviously because you don't have the amazing powers of precognizance we so clearly possess!

[avr]

I don't agree the problem is as you have stated it, no.

[Kelb_Panthera]

Well, talk about missing the point. Yeah, I should have known this would not go well.

Well if we missed your point, would you care to clarify?

I mean, seriously, the quote you've posted from a paizo rep is, itself, standoffish. Factpinions, really?

Positive feedback doesn't accomplish any notable change in a product. Negative feedback that is well put and based in concrete analysis, as opposed to opinions about what is or is not "cool," helps far, far more than positive feedback ever will.

[LordBlades]

Positive feedback is immensely preferred to negative feedback. See Sean’s post here for a bit on that. But suffice to say, positive feedback is more helpful because it fosters a helpful environment. It’s the difference between working together and stand-offishly stating your “factpinions” as gosepl. If you ever start a sentence that follows this form, you’re doing it wrong: “<feature X> is the worst thing I’ve ever seen and here’s how I would change it to make it <(balanced, useful, cool, english)>.”



What if a poster truly believes <feature X> is the worst feature he has ever seen and offers reasons ofr his opinion (see the Caustic Slur thread a while ago)? Should you say that something you believe sucks doesn't just to pat the designer's ego?

Honestly, I don't see a problem with negative feedback as long as it's constructive. '<feature x> sucks, here's how I'd change it' is useful input and therefore ok in my book. Simple '<feature x> sucks' is not.

What I read from that quote is 'we don't want criticism, not even constructive, we want praise'.

[olentu]

Well, talk about missing the point. Yeah, I should have known this would not go well.

Now now, that feedback on how people have responded in the thread is much too negative. Normally I would ask you to clarify how you think the question could be better answered but that would put things in the "I think X is bad and here is how I would change it to make it better," formula that is to be avoided.

[eggynack]

Well, talk about missing the point. Yeah, I should have known this would not go well.
What is it about the point that you think I have missed? You asked why negative feedback pops up so often hereabouts, and I said that negative feedback is a good thing, so there isn't a problem with it happening with some frequency. An attitude where you think that any negative feedback of your work is an intrinsically bad thing is a poor attitude to have.

[Tvtyrant]

Well, talk about missing the point. Yeah, I should have known this would not go well.

The funny part is that the line they are specifically quoting actually offers how the user would modify the system to make it better, which is perhaps the most constructive approach you can have. The designers are free to ignore the advice given to them, but being insulted when people try to help them?

I think it is safe to say people don't miss the point so much as disagree with it.

[Der_DWSage]

Well...the problem, such as it is, stems from many sources. It's not one of those things that just has a single answer, but instead many different ones that are bundling up together.

1)Many people dislike SKR on a personal level, and he tends to be the most visible developer.

It's that simple. Many people dislike SKR, because he handles things in an offhanded, occasionally immature way himself. Some people can handle that and power through it with maturity and grace regardless. Most people just boggle at what he says and post reactionary comments because what he says is just. So. Wrong. Add into the mix that he tends to be the most visible of developers on the Paizo forums, and you have a lot of bad blood.



2)Many of the things wrong with D&D that have been debated for years were not actually changed. And they don't like it when you bring this up.

Which things? Take your pick! Everyone has their own selection of things that weren't fixed in Pathfinder, and while there were still a lot of boneheaded moves, there was also a lot of change. Caster superiority was not challenged except for the Druid and Divine Metamagic, and that is commonly tossed about as the biggest annoyance. And when well-reasoned, intelligent thoughts are tossed out about how to fix this? It gets banned. Which brings me to...


3)The banhammer flies tonight!

...Yeah, a selection of people got banned from the Paizo forums for stating that there were still issues with the system. And rather than ignore these statements, or address them, those that spoke out were banned. Bad blood, once more.


4)Psychological reasons

Go back and read Avr's, Kelb's, and Eggy's posts. I'll wait.



5)Posts like that one only get people thinking they're insecure children.

I've got to be honest there-what they said was 'We want positive feedback!' What I saw was 'We can't handle internet people telling us we're wrong! Tell us we're doing a good job!' Because honestly? There are still problems with what they're doing. The Arcanist is doing a wonderful job of replacing both the Wizard and Sorcerer by being better than both, which is not in line with balance. I would change it by messing with spell progression, or spell slots, or both.

It just further establishes that they can't take criticism, not even from the internet. And if they ever showed signs of working with the criticism instead of ignoring it or flaring up about it, the backlash probably wouldn't be as vitriolic. But they ignore us, so we grumble while trying to get the gems out of the system they set. SKR flails about, while others work in spite of him. Paizo forums are only allowed to say how glorious the emperor's clothes are, and no one is allowed to point out that he's got a rather massive hole over his backside.

That, at least, is why I think it is. I've only gone over to those forums a few times myself.

(Also, factpinions? Are we back in the 90's now?)

[OldTrees1]

Why elitism?

Because a culture bred from incentivising system mastery will result in a culture that rewards the accumulation of knowledge. In a system that rewards the accumulation of knowledge, one should expect individual to accumulate and find self worth in knowledge. What we find valuable in ourselves is partially how we judge others. This results in people being judged based on how much knowledge they have.

Why opinions stated as facts?

Now if the system being mastered is a subjective one like D&D, you can expect some of the "knowledge" being rewarded by the culture to be reasonable opinions rather than pure facts. Combined with the natural elitism you get passionate, yet reasoned, opinion based debates.

Why the hate?

I do not know. However a component of it would be how new ideas can propagate through the collective consciousness. New Opinions and Facts would be adopted based upon the merit of the reasoning and the listener's opinion of the speaker. Well reasoned opinions and facts and the opinions of people with a reputation for being trustworthy would spread quickly. (Modeled like the rate a rumor would propagate)

[Spore]

Guys, while I understand strong opinions and can empathize with them (heck, I was banned from forums for having a strong opinion and in others I moderated), I can still see the problem with watering down objective and reasonable reviews with "Oh god you idiots, what are you doing to the game"-type of "criticism".

Not all those reactions are that kind of black and white but try and keep your calm. The playtests would work better if everyone just sat back and TESTED it instead of reading a few tables of the book and then go on a forum spree.

Banning people for having an opinion is just plain stupid. I am sorry. I have been on both ends of the ban hammer and it is just very very simple for the moderator and leaves a feeling of powerlessness and anger with the banned. It is stupid and should never be used without warning.

[tiercel]

Can we get a copy-paste of that Paizo paragraph for the dictionary illustration for the word "hypocrisy"?

First, the paragraph is really all about being negative itself, concentrating on what you should NOT do to Paizo.

Second, the paragraph helps to foster an UNhelpful environment, since it actively discourages people from making suggestions for improvement.

Thirdly, it is standoffish by telling people that they are "doing it wrong" and takes it as gospel that anyone who disagrees with Paizo and offers an alternative is not only wrong, they are dangerously unhelpful. (Bonus points for using the abomination "factpinion," which is standoffish all on its own.)

About the only way this paragraph could violate its own tenets any more thoroughly is to have a literal concluding sentence: "Negative feedback is the worst thing we at Paizo have ever seen, and we would change it to be positively phrased because it generates a kinder, gentler environment that focuses more on the importance of making us developers feel good about ourselves rather than actually improving product."

Admittedly, at that point the paragraph would cross the line from hypocrisy to The Onion levels of self-satire, but hey.

[Waker]

I just have to say, that factpinion is probably the dumbest portmanteau that I've ever heard.

Whenever I work on Homebrew, while getting people to tell me what a handsome homebrewer I am is nice, it ultimately does very little for me. I wanna know what I did wrong so I can fix it. Saying that you can't post any negative criticism, even constructive, just blinds you to your faults. How can you fix something if you don't even know it's broken?

[Spuddles]

The behavior isn't all that surprising, really.

If you have a group of intelligent, opinionated people in an anonymous setting and ask them for their honest opinions on a matter, you can't really be all that surprised when they're somewhat less than tactful in expressing those opinions.

Seriously, highly intelligent people tend to have trouble with tact in person, you really expect that to get better with anonymity? Then there's the fact that the folks at paizo claimed they were going to fix 3.5 and did nothing to the core of the game's balance issues and precious little on most of the minor points.

Their lead designer, SKR, still wouldn't know good game design if it bit him and many of the others still haven't got a full grasp on the game as a whole, which results in myriad bad options just like the WotC designers before them. The 3.5 design team can be given some leeway since they were starting over from scratch and they did get a lot better toward the end. Paizo had more than a decade of player feedback that they virtually ignored altogether and that tends to rub players the wrong way.

No, low charisma people have trouble with tact. Has nothing to do with int.

[jedipotter]

I think my question here is... why? Why so much hate, why so much elitism, why so much acting like your opinion is fact? Why is that somehow connected to RPGs and ingrained in the D&D/Pathfinder community?

Well this is really just part of the bigger problem with society. The whole last generation or two has been badly lied to and brainwashed. This like ''everything must be fair'' and ''everyone is right'', for example have been taken too far. It is the reason schools don't allow kids to play games where only one kid can win, give any points scored in a game to both teams(so the game is always a tie), and everyone gets awards, even if they just stand there.

And gamers, like any sub culture, have clicks. And most people stay in the comfort zone of their click. So if you think monks suck, then it is very likely that everyone you know thinks the same. And even worse when you come to a place on line and low and behold everyone that posts agrees with you too. This can quickly go to peoples heads as ''everyone'' agrees with them, so they must always be right, and even as far as what they think is a fact.

Though too, most people have a hard time formatting letters too. They don't mean to say ''your thing sucks and don't work'', butthat is how it will come across.

And you can see the Pathfinder folks as being part of ''them'', as they don't want negative feedback? What? If I don't like the Sword Class I should just be quiet? I should never say why I don't like it? And then just not buy that book?

[Vanitas]

Well this is really just part of the bigger problem with society. The whole last generation or two has been badly lied to and brainwashed. This like ''everything must be fair'' and ''everyone is right'', for example have been taken too far. It is the reason schools don't allow kids to play games where only one kid can win, give any points scored in a game to both teams(so the game is always a tie), and everyone gets awards, even if they just stand there.

And gamers, like any sub culture, have clicks. And most people stay in the comfort zone of their click. So if you think monks suck, then it is very likely that everyone you know thinks the same. And even worse when you come to a place on line and low and behold everyone that posts agrees with you too. This can quickly go to peoples heads as ''everyone'' agrees with them, so they must always be right, and even as far as what they think is a fact.

Though too, most people have a hard time formatting letters too. They don't mean to say ''your thing sucks and don't work'', butthat is how it will come across.

And you can see the Pathfinder folks as being part of ''them'', as they don't want negative feedback? What? If I don't like the Sword Class I should just be quiet? I should never say why I don't like it? And then just not buy that book?

For starters, congratulations on a well written and well thought out post. :smallsmile:

Now, about Paizo, I failed to include a link which was in the original statement. It's basically badly written - it's not that they don't want negative feedback, they want constructive criticism. This is 100% my fault, though - context is everything and I failed to give full context here. I deeply apologize.

[Kelb_Panthera]

No, low charisma people have trouble with tact. Has nothing to do with int.

That's true but life has shown me that there tends to be an unfortunate confluence of high int, low cha, and strong opinions in people, especially in internet forums.

[LordBlades]

Now, about Paizo, I failed to include a link which was in the original statement. It's basically badly written - it's not that they don't want negative feedback, they want constructive criticism. This is 100% my fault, though - context is everything and I failed to give full context here. I deeply apologize.

Actually I think you failed to provide a bit more than context.

I googled the exact quote, and I got the link it's from:

http://paizo.com/paizo/blog/v5748dyo5lfjd?Advanced-Class-Guide-Playtest-is-Live

The exact quoted text is from the first reply, which is made by the user 'Cheapy' with the title 'Pathfinder Companion, Roleplaying Game Subscriber'. Now I'm not an expert in Paizo forum titles, but this guy doesn't seem to be associated with Paizo in any official capacity.

So it's just a guy stating his (greatly exaggerated and wrong on multiple accounts IMO) opinions in a blog comment. Jason Buhlmann's actual blog entry and, surprisingly, SKR's post he links to have a much more reasonable stance.

[Vanitas]

Actually I think you failed to provide a bit more than context.

I googled the exact quote, and I got the link it's from:

http://paizo.com/paizo/blog/v5748dyo5lfjd?Advanced-Class-Guide-Playtest-is-Live

The exact quoted text is from the first reply, which is made by the user 'Cheapy' with the title 'Pathfinder Companion, Roleplaying Game Subscriber'. Now I'm not an expert in Paizo forum titles, but this guy doesn't seem to be associated with Paizo in any official capacity.

So it's just a guy stating his (greatly exaggerated and wrong on multiple accounts IMO) opinions in a blog comment. Jason Buhlmann's actual blog entry and, surprisingly, SKR's post he links to have a much more reasonable stance.

I thought he was forum staff, he is basically running the discussion on the playtest.
If that is not the case, I apologize for my mistake.

[LordBlades]

I thought he was forum staff, he is basically running the discussion on the playtest.
If that is not the case, I apologize for my mistake.

Well, if he is Paizo staff, his forum title makes a lousy job to communicate it :P

[Cog]

His userpage also gives no indication of being staff.

Given that both the context and source have been accidentally misrepresented, perhaps putting an edit disclaimer in the first post would be appropriate?

[Big Fau]

For starters, congratulations on a well written and well thought out post. :smallsmile:

Now, about Paizo, I failed to include a link which was in the original statement. It's basically badly written - it's not that they don't want negative feedback, they want constructive criticism. This is 100% my fault, though - context is everything and I failed to give full context here. I deeply apologize.

No, they truly don't.

:smallannoyed:

[Vanitas]

No, they truly don't.

:smallannoyed:

There is a world of difference between constructive criticism and attacking designers.
Again, I mention the Path of War playtest, in which one of the people in the whole paizo forums fiasco, banned for attacking designers was attacked by another poster and noticed just how awful to be in the receiving end. His response? Your criticism may be valid, but you would get more mileage out of it if you didn't phrase it as an attack. That is constructive criticism, that is what any developer (heck, any person) wants.

[Segev]

I think, reading the OP's quote, that the key clause is not "...and this is how I'd make it [work]," but, "This is the worst thing ever..."

I don't know for a fact that this is the case, but I suspect a statement of, "Arcanist is currently doing the wizard and sorcerer's jobs better than both, and needs to be reduced in power to bring it in line with those classes. I suggest..." would be met with debate, certainly, and requests for examples of how it's overpowering the other two arcane classes, but would ultimately engender the kind of discussion that Paizo says they want.

"Arcanist is an overpowered piece of garbage that should have never been designed this way. It might be salvageable if..." is the kind of comment I believe they're saying they don't want.

It comes down to tone. Respectful, reasoned commentary is one thing. Hyperbolic condescension is another.

[Lord_Gareth]

Again, I mention the Path of War playtest, in which one of the people in the whole paizo forums fiasco, banned for attacking designers was attacked by another poster and noticed just how awful to be in the receiving end. His response? Your criticism may be valid, but you would get more mileage out of it if you didn't phrase it as an attack. That is constructive criticism, that is what any developer (heck, any person) wants.

Note that I started here, though. I didn't ignore the guy just because I felt attacked; I still dealt with the information and processed it. You'll get angry criticisms at times and some of the best and most helpful reviews I've gotten about my work (homebrew or otherwise) have been frothing at the mouth with undying hate. Wanting a gentler tone does not justify throwing out the criticism.

Paizo's designers, on the other hand, do throw out the criticism. Every time. When they run a 'Playtest' I observe with skepticism and thus far my gloomy predictions of 'nothing useful will be changed' have been borne out. If something doesn't fit their paradigm or stroke their ego they ignore it, bust out the banhammer, make personal attacks, or Yes.

[Cybris75]

It comes down to tone. Respectful, reasoned commentary is one thing. Hyperbolic condescension is another.

I agree, and also disagree a bit. IMO personal attacks, including condescension, are despicable, and have no place in a civil discussion.

OTOH, people invest a lot of time in these games, and have strong opinions. A little hyperbole can happen. Especially because gamers are not professionals in communication. I don't think most criticism is supposed to hurt, instead I think it's supposed to help. I personally would reserve strong words (not insults!) for very important aspects, though.

What I personally don't like is the attitude that every criticism has to be disguised as a praise. I've had professionals tell me that I should always praise part of a work before criticising it (e.g. "I like that you ..., but I think ... needs some work") - I think that's bull. Here is my advice to developers: you are not your product. Please don't identify with your work, it's not healthy. I certainly wouldn't mind if someone told me "That's ****, you need to fix x and account for y" if I made a mistake in my job. But maybe my skin is thicker than most peoples.

[RFLS]

Seriously, highly intelligent people tend to have trouble with tact in person, you really expect that to get better with anonymity? Then there's the fact that the folks at paizo claimed they were going to fix 3.5 and did nothing to the core of the game's balance issues and precious little on most of the minor points.

Intelligence and tactfulness have nothing to do with each other. You might be familiar with the Stormwind Fallacy. Think about it, and how that relates to what you just said. I'll wait here.


Their lead designer, SKR, still wouldn't know good game design if it bit him and many of the others still haven't got a full grasp on the game as a whole, which results in myriad bad options just like the WotC designers before them. The 3.5 design team can be given some leeway since they were starting over from scratch and they did get a lot better toward the end. Paizo had more than a decade of player feedback that they virtually ignored altogether and that tends to rub players the wrong way.

Quoted for truth. Paizo does many things right, but listening to player feedback is not one of them. Hiring SKR....that was akin to shooting themselves in the foot.


I think my question here is... why? Why so much hate, why so much elitism, why so much acting like your opinion is fact? Why is that somehow connected to RPGs and ingrained in the D&D/Pathfinder community?

This seems to be the crux of your question, and the basic answer is in two parts:


Humans are, by nature, elitist, egocentric critters. A lot of people overcome this, but they're far outnumbered by those that don't. Society does a lot to repress this, but when you swirl anonymity into the mix, you get people that feel like they're entirely unaccountable for what they say, which makes them 100% willing to express any and all of their opinions.
This isn't innately connected to RPGs - it's connected to people. The only reason you see it more in the D&D and PF communities is that they're larger than just about any other RPG community out there.

[Vanitas]

Note that I started here, though. I didn't ignore the guy just because I felt attacked; I still dealt with the information and processed it. You'll get angry criticisms at times and some of the best and most helpful reviews I've gotten about my work (homebrew or otherwise) have been frothing at the mouth with undying hate. Wanting a gentler tone does not justify throwing out the criticism.

Paizo's designers, on the other hand, do throw out the criticism. Every time. When they run a 'Playtest' I observe with skepticism and thus far my gloomy predictions of 'nothing useful will be changed' have been borne out. If something doesn't fit their paradigm or stroke their ego they ignore it, bust out the banhammer, make personal attacks, or Yes.
I've seen several strong worded arguments getting their way into the FAQ or even errata. I'm sorry, but you're objectively wrong here.



OTOH, people invest a lot of time in these games, and have strong opinions. A little hyperbole can happen. Especially because gamers are not professionals in communication. I don't think most criticism is supposed to hurt, instead I think it's supposed to help. I personally would reserve strong words (not insults!) for very important aspects, though.

Oh, but it is. It is intended to hurt.
This is distilled hate we see, attacks instead of criticism. Gamer forums are full of people trying to one up each other - not trying to discuss, but trying to prove others wrong. Not only gamer forums actually, that's something that happens in geek communities in general.
These attacks are not even the problem. They are a symptom.
Geeks (and specially gamers) are a vicious kind. Stereotype is that most of these guys were bullied at some point - it's easy to be the tough guy on the internet and throw insult after veiled insult at others, since retribution at most means you are banned and you're not even using your real name. So the bullied becomes the bully, in a sad vicious cycle where no one respects each other and only the speaker's opinion counts.
If you want to hurt someone's feelings, someone's dignity, because of a game... you need help. You need serious, professional help. And you need to do something more productive with your time.


This seems to be the crux of your question, and the basic answer is in two parts:


Humans are, by nature, elitist, egocentric critters. A lot of people overcome this, but they're far outnumbered by those that don't. Society does a lot to repress this, but when you swirl anonymity into the mix, you get people that feel like they're entirely unaccountable for what they say, which makes them 100% willing to express any and all of their opinions.
This isn't innately connected to RPGs - it's connected to people. The only reason you see it more in the D&D and PF communities is that they're larger than just about any other RPG community out there.


I really don't want to think that's human nature, but I guess that's unavoidable.

[Der_DWSage]

...People need psychological help because they're passionate about things they care about, have differing opinions, and aren't always kittens and hugs when opinions differ?

I have no words. :smallconfused:

[Vanitas]

...People need psychological help because they're passionate about things they care about, have differing opinions, and aren't always kittens and hugs when opinions differ?

I have no words. :smallconfused:

If you think that being passionate about something unequivocally means hurting someone's dignity, I'm afraid you're just proving my point.

[RFLS]

...People need psychological help because they're passionate about things they care about, have differing opinions, and aren't always kittens and hugs when opinions differ?

I have no words. :smallconfused:

Well, it goes farther than that - sometimes they even rephrase what the other person is saying, using synonyms that, while denotatively the same, have different connotations, and they do it just to make the other person look or feel silly!

....

>.>

[Cybris75]

This is distilled hate we see, attacks instead of criticism.

Distilled hate? That sounds hyperbolic to me, and the word is much overused. People insulting each over in a game forum is usually not a product of hate. They don't even know each other! I know there are sick people out there, but I refuse to believe people genuinely hate each other over stuff like that. Hate is a very strong emotion, and I don't see it happening in this context.


Gamer forums are full of people trying to one up each other - not trying to discuss, but trying to prove others wrong. Not only gamer forums actually, that's something that happens in geek communities in general.

That's a broad generalisation which I personally don't believe. Maybe there are some people like that, and maybe there are other people that need attention and troll each other, but if you look around in this forum I see mostly civil discussion.



These attacks are not even the problem. They are a symptom.
Geeks (and specially gamers) are a vicious kind. Stereotype is that most of these guys were bullied at some point - it's easy to be the tough guy on the internet and throw insult after veiled insult at others, since retribution at most means you are banned and you're not even using your real name. So the bullied becomes the bully, in a sad vicious cycle where no one respects each other and only the speaker's opinion counts.


What exactly is a geek? Well, that's quite an insulting stereotype. And I don't give much for stereotypes in general.

If your answer to your own question is "Geeks (and specially gamers) are a vicious kind.", then I don't quite understand why you asked it. Did you come here for confirmation?



If you want to hurt someone's feelings, someone's dignity, because of a game... you need help. You need serious, professional help. And you need to do something more productive with your time.

This, I agree with. But I don't think it applies to most people on game forums.

[Vanitas]

Distilled hate? That sounds hyperbolic to me, and the word is much overused. People insulting each over in a game forum is usually not a product of hate. They don't even know each other! I know there are sick people out there, but I refuse to believe people genuinely hate each other over stuff like that. Hate is a very strong emotion, and I don't see it happening in this context.
I wish it was hyperbole. Every other thread you get someone saying they hate SKR.


That's a broad generalisation which I personally don't believe. Maybe there are some people like that, and maybe there are other people that need attention and troll each other, but if you look around in this forum I see mostly civil discussion.
I think you misunderstand me, than. I never said it always happens, I just said it happens.


If your answer to your own question is "Geeks (and specially gamers) are a vicious kind.", then I don't quite understand why you asked it. Did you come here for confirmation?
I'm asking the opinion of others.


This, I agree with. But I don't think it applies to most people on game forums.
So we agree on another thing, because I also don't think it applies to most people on game forums. :smallwink:

[Der_DWSage]

If you think that being passionate about something unequivocally means hurting someone's dignity, I'm afraid you're just proving my point.

I think I'd need an example of what you mean by 'unequivocally hurting someone's dignity' before we could have a fair debate on this. But I'd actually argue to the other side of things, mostly because I believe people should have thick skins.

If your worldview is so shattered, so absolutely destroyed by a few attacks from The Internet Hivemind that you actually feel like less of a person afterwards...know what? Maybe you need to re-examine your worldview, your work, your place in life, whichever of the lot. Because it sounds like it's fragile and delicate, and can't survive being challenged. But challenge helps us grow as people and individuals, whereas fragile crystals never change unless they shatter.

Obviously, there are limits. But those limits tend to be rare on the list of 'things that actually happen.'

Regardless, we've gotten off-topic here. And an edit to the original post about how that's not Paizo, and merely a subscriber, would be much appreciated.

[Novawurmson]

Please change the original post. This was not a quite by a Paizo employee. Cheapy is usually an insightful and frequent poster on the Paizo forums, but he is not employed by Paizo.

SKR did post this (http://paizo.com/paizo/blog/v5748dyo5lf8m&page=37?Advanced-Class-Guide#1812):


Positive playtest feedback is more effective than negative playtest feedback. Frex, "I'd like it if the skald had a way to get inspire courage" is better than "the skald sucks because it doesn't have inspire courage."

Which, though I think it could be taken poorly, is mostly an appeal for people to give constructive criticism.

[Cybris75]

I wish it was hyperbole. Every other thread you get someone saying they hate SKR.

I don't visit Paizo's forums, but I guess people who say that will be banned quickly (as they should be, maybe after a warning). On this forum, I very rarely see the word 'hate', and I read most of the PF threads.

Even if someone says they hate someone/something, usually the actual emotion is not really involved. I hate asparagus, but that's not the same thing as real hate.



I think you misunderstand me, than. I never said it always happens, I just said it happens.

Fair enough, but I still don't see a pattern.



I'm asking the opinion of others.


My opinion is this:
People should grow up. That goes for idiots making personal attacks as well as professionals that should know that idiots exist. Der_DWSage already said the rest of what I would write here.

[Sewercop]

Paizo does the same thing as d&d 4th, d&d next, rolemaster, harp scifi, "enter game" does. They present almost complete stuff that needs hype before it is put up for sale. They are not interested in actual inputs besides praise and fanwankery.

Go around on the forums that excist, you will see alot of the same people banned over and over. Why? Because they actually playtest and bring up issues.

Why the harsh tones when you bring up issues you say?
Have you ever been online on a forum? If you are not a regular with hundreds or thousands of posts many will ignore you. The second you put a harsh comedic spin on it you gain attention. Attention means you get your point through.
That leads to a ban if that means the product looks bad.

There are many many more reasons to why i personally think paizo suck, but i dont feel like getting banned here.

[Big Fau]

There is a world of difference between constructive criticism and attacking designers.
Again, I mention the Path of War playtest, in which one of the people in the whole paizo forums fiasco, banned for attacking designers was attacked by another poster and noticed just how awful to be in the receiving end. His response? Your criticism may be valid, but you would get more mileage out of it if you didn't phrase it as an attack. That is constructive criticism, that is what any developer (heck, any person) wants.

While this is true, it doesn't change my opinion of Paizo's actions during the PF open beta. I'm taking that grudge to my grave; the only reason I haven't started a boycott is because PF is OGC by default (thus such an effort would be fruitless).

I have every right to express my anger about that, so long as I remain civil while doing so.

[Firechanter]

I think Sewercop has a point there.

Also, I think when tempers flare, it may have to do with frustration. Frustration that people who have been doing this job for umpteen years still don't really understand the mechanics of their own game.
Like, when you already know that the Wizard is one of the 3 most powerful classes, and it doesn't get nerfed, but buffed (PF CRB). And then some time later, a new class is proposed that's even more powerful? You want to scream.

[LordBlades]

SKR did post this (http://paizo.com/paizo/blog/v5748dyo5lf8m&page=37?Advanced-Class-Guide#1812):



Which, though I think it could be taken poorly, is mostly an appeal for people to give constructive criticism.

It could also be interpreted as 'we want you guys to point out stuff you'd like us to add, not what's wrong with the current stuff'.

I don't think something like 'I'd like if Prone Shooter actually had a mechanical benefit' accurately conveys how broken that feat was at printing.

[Vanitas]

Paizo does the same thing as d&d 4th, d&d next, rolemaster, harp scifi, "enter game" does. They present almost complete stuff that needs hype before it is put up for sale. They are not interested in actual inputs besides praise and fanwankery.
Then do they actually take feedback in their forums? :smallconfused:
Their designers are always around, answering questions


Go around on the forums that excist, you will see alot of the same people banned over and over. Why? Because they actually playtest and bring up issues.
No, they are banned because they present their feedback as personal attacks.



Have you ever been online on a forum?
Uh, I am in one right now...?

If you are not a regular with hundreds or thousands of posts many will ignore you. The second you put a harsh comedic spin on it you gain attention. Attention means you get your point through.
That's a very childish way to garner attention.

That leads to a ban if that means the product looks bad.
No, that leads to a ban because it is rude. In these forums, it is even specifically against forum rules.


While this is true, it doesn't change my opinion of Paizo's actions during the PF open beta. I'm taking that grudge to my grave; the only reason I haven't started a boycott is because PF is OGC by default (thus such an effort would be fruitless).

I have every right to express my anger about that, so long as I remain civil while doing so.
Hold as many grudges as you want, that's not the point. The point is that people are not being civil about it and people were not being civil about it back then. You were not banned because you gave feedback. You were banned because of personal attacks.


I think Sewercop has a point there.

Also, I think when tempers flare, it may have to do with frustration. Frustration that people who have been doing this job for umpteen years still don't really understand the mechanics of their own game.
Like, when you already know that the Wizard is one of the 3 most powerful classes, and it doesn't get nerfed, but buffed (PF CRB). And then some time later, a new class is proposed that's even more powerful? You want to scream.
This doesn't mean they don't understand the rules of their own game, it means they disagree with your concept of balance. Taking your own opinion as the one true gospel is no excuse to offend others.

[LordBlades]

You were not banned because you gave feedback. You were banned because of personal attacks.

That's debatable. I have interacted (on various forums)with several of the people that got banned by Paizo during beta, and they are pretty reasonable and civil persons in general. Now I can't be 100% sure OFC, but from what I know of both the majority of these people and SKR, I personally find 'they got banned because they kept pointing out flaws in SKRs work and because they disagreed with his one true opinion of stuff' much more likely than 'they attacked SKR so they got banned'.



This doesn't mean they don't understand the rules of their own game, it means they disagree with your concept of balance. Taking your own opinion as the one true gospel is no excuse to offend others.

SKR has proven he has no clue of balance whatsoever (http://www.seankreynolds.com/rpgfiles/misc/featpointsystem.html for example)
And at least two other guys in PF design team (the guy who wrote Prone Shooter and the guy who OKed it for publishing, assuming they do have QA) have shown they have no idea of (at least some of) the rules and don't care enough to double check.

[olentu]

Honestly I see more personal attacks from reynolds then I do from anywhere else. Well, unless you take disagreement, a negative opinion of the product, and so forth to be a personal attack.

[Muja]

I think a main issue here is that the OP hasnt personally seen the horrors of Pathfinder Playtesting, or at least doesnt see the problems as they are. I was also involved in the Beta discussions, as well as some of the early playtesting. I love the game, I really do, but the staff is basically the tabletop equivalent to EA, but doesnt have the excuse of focusing on sales projections since the game is free by default..minus adventure paths and people who actually buy the books, anyways

[Vanitas]

I think a main issue here is that the OP hasnt personally seen the horrors of Pathfinder Playtesting, or at least doesnt see the problems as they are.
I did. Actually, I was one of those guys banned for personal attacks.

[Muja]

I did. Actually, I was one of those guys banned for personal attacks.

How would you define whatever you did as a 'Personal Attack'? Because a good friend of mine was banned on that forum for that same reason, and I was reading the thread at the time. What did she do to warrent that ban? She questioned the balance-point of monks in the early development, and how nothing was really being changed to better balance the class. She didnt whine, attack the staffs character, and even gave some ideas for what needed improving on. The result? Banned, with a lot of her posts scrubbed.

So yeah, some forum goers can act like real children, but so can developers. Its the job of the staff to act professionally, to set the standard for the consumer. If all they do is cry when they are criticized, then yes they will get people hating them and therefore lose customers

[Kelb_Panthera]

I did. Actually, I was one of those guys banned for personal attacks.

Then how in hell can you defend them?

[Vanitas]

Then how in hell can you defend them?

Because I recently realized I was wrong.

[SiuiS]

It's not elitism, it's just standard practice. People speak in that fashion constantly, and new people to the medium pick it up and propagate it. It's an almost mindless acquisition, and angry apathy that breeds like a fugus and seems to live on its own.



No, ms. (cheese), they don't want you to change the classes because "they suck and here's how I, the unpaid amateur with pretensions, would do it to make it right".

Change is good. Change because ONG U SUCK is not good.

[Kelb_Panthera]

Because I recently realized I was wrong.

Maybe you were but I think you may be over-correcting. Many of those that were banned were nowhere near vitriolic enough to deserve it and some were downright polite in their criticisms. Maybe paizo's gotten better since, I quickly lost interest after seeing their final product, but I seriously doubt it as long as SKR is still running the show.

[Vanitas]

It's not elitism, it's just standard practice. People speak in that fashion constantly, and new people to the medium pick it up and propagate it. It's an almost mindless acquisition, and angry apathy that breeds like a fugus and seems to live on its own.

Yeah, I think it's this. It created all sorts of problems for me when it spread from gamer forums to RL. I needed therapy and everything.

[Muja]

Maybe you were but I think you may be over-correcting. Many of those that were banned were nowhere near vitriolic enough to deserve it and some were downright polite in their criticisms. Maybe paizo's gotten better since, I quickly lost interest after seeing their final product, but I seriously doubt it as long as SKR is still running the show.

Shudder at the thought, but it has actually gotten WORSE now since the finished product. The 'Advanced' Classes are a good example of how unbalanced things are and how the staff just cant or 'wont' see it

[jedipotter]

So yeah, some forum goers can act like real children, but so can developers. Its the job of the staff to act professionally, to set the standard for the consumer. If all they do is cry when they are criticized, then yes they will get people hating them and therefore lose customers

People are just weird. See when they put lots of hard work

(hard work? Ha? As a RPG game developer? Ha! Right, what hard work! What a hard job! ''Jhonston you have a deadline of five to make six new prestige classes'' Oh, the horror! Try to just imagine doing that every day)

into something, all they want is praise. It's the fault of the ''everyone wins'' and ''everyone is a star'' society. People just want to be told how good they are again and again. But they don't want to do it the ''real'' way of : if you make good things then people will praise you (amazing revelation, no?). And sure they will say(and by say we mean lie) that they want criticism, but they only want very narrow criticism that agrees with them. So if the class they make as cure moderate wounds, you can say it should have cure light wounds too. But you can never say why cure wounds, that is just wrong.

[Vanitas]

People are just weird. See when they put lots of hard work

(hard work? Ha? As a RPG game developer? Ha! Right, what hard work! What a hard job! ''Jhonston you have a deadline of five to make six new prestige classes'' Oh, the horror! Try to just imagine doing that every day)

into something, all they want is praise. It's the fault of the ''everyone wins'' and ''everyone is a star'' society. People just want to be told how good they are again and again. But they don't want to do it the ''real'' way of : if you make good things then people will praise you (amazing revelation, no?). And sure they will say(and by say we mean lie) that they want criticism, but they only want very narrow criticism that agrees with them. So if the class they make as cure moderate wounds, you can say it should have cure light wounds too. But you can never say why cure wounds, that is just wrong.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but you have never worked as an RPG designer, right?

[olentu]

Because I recently realized I was wrong.

Eh, the fact that you made real actual personal attacks and got banned does not mean that everyone actually made personal attacks.

[Vanitas]

Eh, the fact that you made real actual personal attacks and got banned does not mean that everyone actually made personal attacks.

It doesn't, but I was there and I know what I saw.

[Kelb_Panthera]

Shudder at the thought, but it has actually gotten WORSE now since the finished product. The 'Advanced' Classes are a good example of how unbalanced things are and how the staff just cant or 'wont' see it

I saw that thread here. *shudder* I know their grasp of balance hasn't gotten any better.

I was actually referring to their forum moderation.

[Muja]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but you have never worked as an RPG designer, right?

Whether someone has worked in a profession that the person they are critiquing is irreverent. Its not hard to understand what they go through, they have deadlines and playtesting and editting and formatting. Its a hard job, I doubt anyone thinks its a braindead chimp's job :smallbiggrin:

The point is that you cant only expect praise and timid critiques, because then the game will never be properly balanced. Granted getting personal with attacks is a step to far, but rarely does it actually go that far unwarrented. I saw people do it during playtests, and over half of them were out of line. But the others? The did it in response to the Staff's dismissive, rude behavior to anyone not worshiping their product. Is that childish? Yes, but acting like a child will get childish responses, basic psychology right there xD

[olentu]

It doesn't, but I was there and I know what I saw.

Eh, I guess we saw very different things when we were there then.

[SassyQuatch]

Some people just want every conversation to be accompanied by smiles and unicorns and rainbows. Their personal belief is that anything that does not sound like it came from an over-medicated Care Bear is somehow inherently wrong and must be immediately discarded else the sad clouds appear and ruin everything. Well, the real world is not a Saturday morning cartoon, and valid criticism can come in many forms. Continuing to delude oneself that only positive feedback is truly valid encourages the attitudes of a cartoonish caricature and creates a resulting product that reflects an immature mindset.

[jedipotter]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but you have never worked as an RPG designer, right?

Nope, my skill set is Computers. Why?

You gonna say it is hard to sit around for eight hours a day and make RPG stuff and play RPG games?

Or you gonna say it is hard to freelance where they don't play you to come into work everyday like a normal shift job? I'll admit that the whole freelance thing is a messed up system.....but then that is why I have a normal 9-5 job.

[Vanitas]

Whether someone has worked in a profession that the person they are critiquing is irreverent. Its not hard to understand what they go through, they have deadlines and playtesting and editting and formatting. Its a hard job, I doubt anyone thinks its a braindead chimp's job :smallbiggrin:
jedipotter explicitly does.


The point is that you cant only expect praise and timid critiques, because then the game will never be properly balanced.
One thinh has nothing to do with the other. In fact, it's the other way around. If you scream at someone, there are less likely to listen to what you have to say. Talk to them politely and respectfully and you are a lot more likely


Granted getting personal with attacks is a step to far, but rarely does it actually go that far unwarrented.
Nothing you see in an RPG book warrants personally attacking its writter. Ever.


I saw people do it during playtests, and over half of them were out of line. But the others? The did it in response to the Staff's dismissive, rude behavior to anyone not worshiping their product. Is that childish? Yes, but acting like a child will get childish responses, basic psychology right there xD
Oh, I'm not even saying the staff was right. I never said that. We have a saying in my country - "if a mule kicks you, would you get kick the mule back?" I think it applies quite well to this situation.


Nope, my skill set is Computers. Why?

You gonna say it is hard to sit around for eight hours a day and make RPG stuff and play RPG games?

Or you gonna say it is hard to freelance where they don't play you to come into work everyday like a normal shift job? I'll admit that the whole freelance thing is a messed up system.....but then that is why I have a normal 9-5 job.

That is not how RPG design works, put simply. Very few designers are actual employees, most of them are freelancers. Those that are employees have other responsibilities as well (including managing the freelancers). I assure you, no one in the business gets paid to play RPGs 8 hours a day.

[SassyQuatch]

Nothing you see in an RPG book warrants personally attacking its writter. Ever.
Completely untrue. If a dev repeatedly demonstrates that he is unable to accept any sort of feedback that doesn't stroke his ego then there is nothing wrong with pointing out that he is an immature and insecure egomaniac. Especially if he is so thin skinned as to being unable to engage in reasonable debate.

Which perfectly describes a certain developer who has been repeatedly mentioned in this very thread.

[Vanitas]

Completely untrue. If a dev repeatedly demonstrates that he is unable to accept any sort of feedback that doesn't stroke his ego then there is nothing wrong with pointing out that he is an immature and insecure egomaniac. Especially if he is so thin skinned as to being unable to engage in reasonable debate.
Considering that is not something you see in an RPG book, I still don't see what is untrue about my statement.

[SassyQuatch]

Considering that is not something you see in an RPG book, I still don't see what is untrue about my statement.
Only if you are blindly selective. Ignoring and shutting down constructive criticism and then pushing personal opinions as to game design into published material counts. Poorly created errata made to punish others' play styles counts.

[TuggyNE]

(hard work? Ha? As a RPG game developer? Ha! Right, what hard work! What a hard job! ''Jhonston you have a deadline of five to make six new prestige classes'' Oh, the horror! Try to just imagine doing that every day)

… write six prestige classes in eight hours? Do not want. I'd have some trouble getting one done in that time; in fact, I've never written my own class, despite making quite a lot of other homebrew. I do, however, know more or less the amount of work it takes to, say, write a new spell, never mind a whole book of new stuff, and that's not something I'd consider trivial. It's not the hardest job in the world, but it's no cushy sinecure either.

Mind you, I'm not a major PF fan, and some of their decisions and attitudes sit poorly with me, but I try to recognize when someone has at least made some reasonable attempt to accomplish a task, and also when they've accomplished things I'd be unwilling or (in practice) unable to do myself.

[Vanitas]

Only if you are blindly selective. Ignoring and shutting down constructive criticism and then pushing personal opinions as to game design into published material counts. Poorly created errata made to punish others' play styles counts.

I'm sorry, let me see if I get this straight.
You think it is OK to personally attack someone because they wrote their own game in a way that you did not like?
You think it is personally OK to attack someone because you did not like an errata?
I strongly advise you reconsider those positions, because your stance is morally flawed.

You seem to have fallen into the classic trap of criticizing an author and his creative endeavor because it wasn't what you wanted it to be.

[LordBlades]

I'm sorry, let me see if I get this straight.
You think it is OK to personally attack someone because they wrote their own game in a way that you did not like?
You think it is personally OK to attack someone because you did not like an errata?
I storngly advise you reconsider those positions, because your stance is morally flawed.

On the other hand:

-writing the game in a certain way after promising (or strongly hinting) that you would write it in a different way
-putting stuff in the game and then making sure it's strictly inferior to other stuff just because you personally don't like it

are also morally flawed actions if you ask me.

[jedipotter]

… write six prestige classes in eight hours? Do not want. I'd have some trouble getting one done in that time; in fact, I've never written my own class, despite making quite a lot of other homebrew. I do, however, know more or less the amount of work it takes to, say, write a new spell, never mind a whole book of new stuff, and that's not something I'd consider trivial. It's not the hardest job in the world, but it's no cushy sinecure either.

I Homebrew tons of stuff, so I know it is hard. Creating is hard, writing is hard, editing is hard.

But I'm not talking about for fun....I'm talking about getting paid to do it. Sitting at a nice desk at work in your office being paid to make up stuff. That is easy.

[Vanitas]

I Homebrew tons of stuff, so I know it is hard. Creating is hard, writing is hard, editing is hard.

But I'm not talking about for fun....I'm talking about getting paid to do it. Sitting at a nice desk at work in your office being paid to make up stuff. That is easy.

It is not. Also, that is not how it works and I have already explained why.


On the other hand:

-writing the game in a certain way after promising (or strongly hinting) that you would write it in a different way
-putting stuff in the game and then making sure it's strictly inferior to other stuff just because you personally don't like it

are also morally flawed actions if you ask me.

Writing your game the way you wanted and making it available for free is morally flawed because...?

[Weimann]

I think my question here is... why? Why so much hate, why so much elitism, why so much acting like your opinion is fact? Why is that somehow connected to RPGs and ingrained in the D&D/Pathfinder community?Well, for one, I don't think it is particularly exclusive to RPGs. I mean, look at politics. It's essentially a big game of that. Sometimes supported by facts, of course, but in the end, "my opinions are better than your opinions" is the core conflict.

As someone who is not at all involved in D&D, but who is following the development of the new Exalted edition closely, I can understand the message Paizo is sending. I don't think it has to do with receiving dissenting feedback, but more with the signal to noise ratio in that feedback.

In the message in the original post, they state that they don't want "This is wrong and here's how I'd do it instead" kind of replies. That's understandable, as it says very little about the actual problem. If someone was to post "this is problematic because of this and this and this" instead, that'd probably go over much better, since that gives the devs better insight into what the poster considers the actual problem and doesn't leave them to infer it from the suggested solution.

After all, and this may sound harsh, a tester is not a developer. I don't know how it is here, but the Exalted developers are contractually obligated to not copy or be influenced specific pieces of fanwork. I guess this has to do with copyright. Proposing a solution to a problem would actually only serve to cut off that very solution from the available set of potential solutions. It might not be so with Paizo, but I can still see why they'd rather get problem formulations than solutions. It helps them do their job more.

[Der_DWSage]

One thinh has nothing to do with the other. In fact, it's the other way around. If you scream at someone, there are less likely to listen to what you have to say. Talk to them politely and respectfully and you are a lot more likely

While this is true, there's a give and take system. You give someone politeness-you expect them to give it back. You give someone polite criticism-you expect them to consider it, even if they completely disagree.

When someone asks for criticism, they should expect criticism. Harsh criticism, at times, because they are asking for people to speak their minds. They might not actually want that harsh criticism, but they still asked for it. And the break in the give-and-take system, between Paizo and the players, is right there.

They ask for criticism (In the form of talking with Beta testers, participating in threads like the one that was linked, being active in their own forums) and then completely dismiss or even ban those that give it. When people saw that, they started the screaming, because they saw people that were being polite getting the same reaction as someone that was screaming.

While I agree that a soft tone is good for staying civil, sometimes you have to scream to get a point across. It's never a good time when you have to scream, but those times exist.


Nothing you see in an RPG book warrants personally attacking its writter. Ever.

Again, I think we need to see what you think is an example of a 'personal attack.' For example, SKR's Feat Point System? He looked like he had some good thoughts, and then he absolutely mangled the execution. I looked at it and went 'Wow, SKR is kinda dumb. I thought he was going somewhere more impressive, after that build-up.'

How about the Truenamer? That's a pretty notable piece of failure. I wouldn't walk up to the designer(s) of that class and punch him in the face, but I would actually hope he/they got fired for mangling it so badly when I shelled out money for the book in the first place. Because the attack I would give them would be, 'You are horrible at class design. I paid 30 dollars for your garbage. Please find a job you're better at, or at least have someone competent look at your work before you turn it in.'

If they were repentant after that point, and I had them in front of me? I'd probably relent, and see if we could work together on fixing some shortcomings. If Paizo ever did that, you can bet there wouldn't be nearly as much vitriol. But instead of taking the high road, they seem insistent on being as childish as Youtube comment sections. And so, we see no reason to stop calling the garbage what it is.

People face consequences for their actions. It's a way of the world. And sometimes, those consequences are as simple as the fact that others won't like them because of the work they did.



Oh, I'm not even saying the staff was right. I never said that. We have a saying in my country - "if a mule kicks you, would you get kick the mule back?" I think it applies quite well to this situation.

Kick it? Probably not. Discipline it so it doesn't kick again? Probably. Because if you keep feeding it sugar cubes, it's just going to learn that kicking you = Food, and keep doing so.




That is not how RPG design works, put simply. Very few designers are actual employees, most of them are freelancers. Those that are employees have other responsibilities as well (including managing the freelancers). I assure you, no one in the business gets paid to play RPGs 8 hours a day.

...And here's where I swing around to agreeing with you. Any job is going to be hard work if you're putting in even a minimum of effort. Badmouthing an entire career field is bad juju, as that gives you a false sense of superiority that you are 'better' than other people that you've never met, merely judged on the vaguest of information.

Well, except for mattress testers. Those guys really lay down on the job.

[avr]

If you're working on RPG design for money, a fair amount of what you produce - pitches, outlines, maybe even half-finished products - will never see daylight. It's also not a living wage on it's own for most if not all freelancers.

If you want to learn about the process there are a fair number of people you can ask; the gaming den (www.tgdmb.com) is one place where some of the regulars are former freelancers who have posted a fair amount on the subject of the mechanics and economics of producing games. (A number of the posters there are absurdly aggressive, wear flame-retardant clothing.)

8 hours a day gaming is not a good model for how a team of writers work.

[LordBlades]

Writing your game the way you wanted and making it available for free is morally flawed because...?

If you're a hypocrite about it it is.

[SassyQuatch]

I'm sorry, let me see if I get this straight.
You think it is OK to personally attack someone because they wrote their own game in a way that you did not like?
You think it is personally OK to attack someone because you did not like an errata?
I strongly advise you reconsider those positions, because your stance is morally flawed.

You seem to have fallen into the classic trap of criticizing an author and his creative endeavor because it wasn't what you wanted it to be.
And what is wrong with criticizing an author? Nothing, so long as the criticism is valid. [I'm looking at you Karen Traviss >:( ]

Game devs are also authors, but that does not give them carte blanche to ignore valid complaints or to abuse their authority to attack others. When they do so they open themselves up to valid criticism.

If you behave like a spoiled child then you have no right to demand not to be described as such.

[Der_DWSage]

Right. A tidbit I'd forgotten earlier.


Writing your game the way you wanted and making it available for free is morally flawed because...?

Actually, the 'making it available for free' is their saving grace. Heck, it's 90% of the reason I give Paizo love.

But you're most certainly allowed to dislike the work that someone does. You're also allowed to say that you dislike this work, especially when they're asking for criticisms. You should go into detail about why you dislike the work then, in the hopes of getting some changes made to the portions you didn't like.

The not-moral flaws come when they say 'I'm not making changes to this because I personally dislike the class.' That is when you are letting your personal feelings get in the way of the business. And Paizo's still a business, even if they're mostly OGL. The moral flaws come when people say they will honestly consider your opinion, and then ban you when you share your opinion because it turned out to be something they didn't like.

[TuggyNE]

I Homebrew tons of stuff, so I know it is hard. Creating is hard, writing is hard, editing is hard.

But I'm not talking about for fun....I'm talking about getting paid to do it. Sitting at a nice desk at work in your office being paid to make up stuff. That is easy.

I program for fun, and also as my job (freelance). It is, if anything, harder to program professionally, even though I'm getting paid to do it: my standards have to be even higher and I have to consider more possibilities and a broader scope. Why would any other creative career be substantially different, especially one with so many similarities?

[Vanitas]

If you're a hypocrite about it it is.

How can you be a hypcrite for writing your game the way you want it?

People disagreeing with you does not make them hypocrites.


Right. A tidbit I'd forgotten earlier.



Actually, the 'making it available for free' is their saving grace. Heck, it's 90% of the reason I give Paizo love.

But you're most certainly allowed to dislike the work that someone does. You're also allowed to say that you dislike this work, especially when they're asking for criticisms. You should go into detail about why you dislike the work then, in the hopes of getting some changes made to the portions you didn't like.

The not-moral flaws come when they say 'I'm not making changes to this because I personally dislike the class.' That is when you are letting your personal feelings get in the way of the business. And Paizo's still a business, even if they're mostly OGL. The moral flaws come when people say they will honestly consider your opinion, and then ban you when you share your opinion because it turned out to be something they didn't like.

But I never said you have to like it. My point here is that not liking something in an RPG book is not an excuse for personally attacking the author.`


And what is wrong with criticizing an author? Nothing, so long as the criticism is valid. [I'm looking at you Karen Traviss >:( ]


Criticizing is not the same as personal attacks.

[Der_DWSage]

And again, we have to come back to 'What constitutes attacking the author?' because it seems that your definition may vary from ours. mine and those of a few others in this discussion. (Note to self, stop trying to represent a hivemind.)

Incidentally, three people, including myself, have asked you to change the original post so that you're not misrepresenting Paizo. There's enough bad blood for things they have done, no need to create more.

[olentu]

You know, I really have no clear concept of what you would consider a personal attack. It apparently encompasses much more stuff then I would say that it does. It might be helpful for you to explain.

[hamishspence]

And again, we have to come back to 'What constitutes attacking the author?' because it seems that your definition may vary from ours. mine and those of a few others in this discussion. I'd say the forum rules on this forum are a pretty good starting point- they have a list of things that might qualify.

Imagine that the author was posting here- and look at the replies they get. How would this forum treat those replies?

[Vanitas]

I'd say the forum rules on this forum are a pretty good starting point- they have a list of things that might qualify.

Agreed completely.

[SassyQuatch]

(Note to self, stop trying to represent a hivemind.

One of Us. One of Us....

Also, from what I've read I presume that not offering to feed the author grapes from off the vine and cooling them with palm fronds is somehow what is constituting an attack.

[olentu]

I'd say the forum rules on this forum are a pretty good starting point- they have a list of things that might qualify.

Imagine that the author was posting here- and look at the replies they get. How would this forum treat those replies?

Eh, if we were going by that measure then I would stand by my position. The forum rules may even be a bit more lenient on the matter then I would be.

[Der_DWSage]

I'd say the forum rules on this forum are a pretty good starting point- they have a list of things that might qualify.

Imagine that the author was posting here- and look at the replies they get. How would this forum treat those replies?

I'd actually agree, but I'm specifically asking for Vanitas' definition, as that seems to keep tripping people up.

And it's great that you agree, Van...but could you be more specific? Clear communication is the framework that debate and understanding kind of relies on.

[Vanitas]

I'd actually agree, but I'm specifically asking for Vanitas' definition, as that seems to keep tripping people up.

And it's great that you agree, Van...but could you be more specific? Clear communication is the framework that debate and understanding kind of relies on.

I don't see how I could be more specific, GiantITP forum rules are an excellent starting point as they even mention this very issue with personal attacks.

[Der_DWSage]

You could quote. So I'm going to guess we're going by the 'Flaming' portion of the board rules...

Tell a poster to shut up or to stop posting on the current thread.
Name calling, including terms obviously meant in a pejorative sense such as "troll" or "fanboy"
Use passive-aggressive insults, such as "Anyone who believes that is an idiot," or "I'd call you an idiot, but it's against the rules." Yeah, we know that technically, you didn't call him or her an idiot, but guess what? It's still not allowed and will result in an additional infraction (see Mea Culpa above).
Harassment of other posters, such as repeatedly following them from thread to thread to dispute them, personally.
Tell a poster that they clearly didn't read what you or others wrote upthread. Alternately, any statement that implies that the only way someone could disagree with you is because they don't understand/can't read properly is likewise not allowed.
Posts that while directed at another's post content are inherently insulting to the poster, such as, "Your comment is moronic/insane/nonsensical."
Responding in kind to a poster who has flamed you. Please inform a Moderator via PM and wait for the offending post to be scrubbed or deleted. Remember, the more they flame, the deeper a hole they dig for themselves, but don't spur them on.
Belittling people who care more about roleplaying than mechanics.
Belittling people who care more about mechanics than roleplaying.
Putting down or insulting ANY play preference, including (but not explicitly limited to) choice of game system, choice of preferred levels, classes, or races, choice of setting, choice of power level, etc. You cannot call another poster a munchkin or make any other disparaging remarks about how they like to play the game. You can express your own preference, you can express why you don't care for their preference, but you can't put someone down for feeling differently.
Belittling or putting down anyone or their opinions based on post count, member rank, or how long they have been a member.
Posting insults or slurs based on anyone's race, religion, ethnicity, age, gender, or sexual orientation is a Permanent Infraction (see below).

Would this be correct, or is there something else to add? Because frankly, I'd call out what I did (You're bad at your job and you should feel bad, Truenamer writer.) as an attack, and I think most people would agree. But if this is the set of 'attacks' that you'd adhere to, I actually agree for the most part. (Well, aside from the mechanics - fluff bit. Any game designer has a slight responsibility to make sure their class is actually fun to play before the flavor is added in.)

[LordBlades]

How can you be a hypcrite for writing your game the way you want it?



Easy: when you're saying or implying one thing and doing another you're a hypocrite.

Let's consider the following two purely hypothetical situations:

-You say your new game is going to fix <insert old game here> and then you fail to deliver or didn't plan on doing so in the first place (depending on who you ask). That makes you a hypocrite.

-You include a class you dislike(let's say Monk) in your game for whatever reasons you might have (pressure from above, trying to get Monk lovers interested in your game etc.) but because you dislike them, you do your best to limit their viability as effective characters. That makes you a hypocrite.

[Vanitas]

Easy: when you're saying or implying one thing and doing another you're a hypocrite.

Let's consider the following two purely hypothetical situations:

-You say your new game is going to fix <insert old game here> and then you fail to deliver or didn't plan on doing so in the first place (depending on who you ask). That makes you a hypocrite.
Except they never said that. Psyren covered that in another thread, I'll see if I can find it. It was the thread that lead me to register in the first place.


-You include a class you dislike(let's say Monk) in your game for whatever reasons you might have (pressure from above, trying to get Monk lovers interested in your game etc.) but because you dislike them, you do your best to limit their viability as effective characters. That makes you a hypocrite.
Considering how PF design works (ensemble work) and how you have already misinterpretated statements by the Paizo team, I'm not convinced this happened. Sorry.


You could quote. So I'm going to guess we're going by the 'Flaming' portion of the board rules...

Tell a poster to shut up or to stop posting on the current thread.
Name calling, including terms obviously meant in a pejorative sense such as "troll" or "fanboy"
Use passive-aggressive insults, such as "Anyone who believes that is an idiot," or "I'd call you an idiot, but it's against the rules." Yeah, we know that technically, you didn't call him or her an idiot, but guess what? It's still not allowed and will result in an additional infraction (see Mea Culpa above).
Harassment of other posters, such as repeatedly following them from thread to thread to dispute them, personally.
Tell a poster that they clearly didn't read what you or others wrote upthread. Alternately, any statement that implies that the only way someone could disagree with you is because they don't understand/can't read properly is likewise not allowed.
Posts that while directed at another's post content are inherently insulting to the poster, such as, "Your comment is moronic/insane/nonsensical."
Responding in kind to a poster who has flamed you. Please inform a Moderator via PM and wait for the offending post to be scrubbed or deleted. Remember, the more they flame, the deeper a hole they dig for themselves, but don't spur them on.
Belittling people who care more about roleplaying than mechanics.
Belittling people who care more about mechanics than roleplaying.
Putting down or insulting ANY play preference, including (but not explicitly limited to) choice of game system, choice of preferred levels, classes, or races, choice of setting, choice of power level, etc. You cannot call another poster a munchkin or make any other disparaging remarks about how they like to play the game. You can express your own preference, you can express why you don't care for their preference, but you can't put someone down for feeling differently.
Belittling or putting down anyone or their opinions based on post count, member rank, or how long they have been a member.
Posting insults or slurs based on anyone's race, religion, ethnicity, age, gender, or sexual orientation is a Permanent Infraction (see below).

Would this be correct, or is there something else to add? Because frankly, I'd call out what I did (You're bad at your job and you should feel bad, Truenamer writer.) as an attack, and I think most people would agree. But if this is the set of 'attacks' that you'd adhere to, I actually agree for the most part. (Well, aside from the mechanics - fluff bit. Any game designer has a slight responsibility to make sure their class is actually fun to play before the flavor is added in.)
I think this is pretty much it. However, I'd like to point out that someone failing at a "slight responsibility" is also not an excuse for personal attacks, but I'm not sure if that is what you meant.

[LordBlades]

Except they never said that. Psyren covered that in another thread, I'll see if I can find it. It was the thread that lead me to register in the first place.


Considering how PF design works (ensemble work) and how you have already misinterpretated statements by the Paizo team, I'm not convinced this happened. Sorry.


I did say 'purely hypothetical situation' didn't I? I really have no interest, neither in restarting the 'Paizo said they'd fix .3.5! Did not! Did too!' debate, nor in whether you believe me or not. Sorry.

EDIT: Not to mention your OP still starts with 'Paizo says' despite several posters supporting the point that the guy who actually says that is in no way associated with Paizo. So if somebody is guilty if misinterpreting statements, that's you.

[Vanitas]

I did say 'purely hypothetical situation' didn't I? I really have no interest, neither in restarting the 'Paizo said they'd fix .3.5! Did not! Did too!' debate, nor in whether you believe me or not. Sorry

Oh, I'm sorry, I somehow missed the 'purely hypothetical' bit. I sincerely apologize. My mistake.



EDIT: Not to mention your OP still starts with 'Paizo says' despite several posters supporting the point that the guy who actually says that is in no way associated with Paizo. So if somebody is guilty if misinterpreting statements, that's you.
I acknowledged this back at page one. Yes, I make mistakes. Your point?

[Der_DWSage]

Right then. Clarity achieved. I feel accomplished.

And if that's the list you go with for attacks, then I'm 95% agreed. (Again, I believe RPG designers should focus more on crunch than fluff, but that's another matter.) Namecalling is petulant and childish, and most of what the list was about. No reason to call people a doo-doo head, but plenty of reason to say they might want to pursue a different career, because they're lacking in their current vocation. (It's also rather different from my own definition of 'attack' which has quite a few categories added in beyond that.)

With that in mind, please try to be more clear about such things in the future so that similar discussions don't devolve into two pages of 'That's not what I said.' 'Then what did you say?' 'I said this.' 'I said this too!' 'No you didn't.' 'Yes I did!'

[Ceaon]

Completely untrue. If a dev repeatedly demonstrates that he is unable to accept any sort of feedback that doesn't stroke his ego then there is nothing wrong with pointing out that he is an immature and insecure egomaniac.

No.

No no no no no no.

If YOU PERCEIVE a dev repeatedly demonstrates that he is unable to accept any sort of feedback that doesn't stroke his ego, then there is nothing wrong with pointing out that YOU PERCEIVE that he is unable to accept any sort of feedback that doesn't stroke his ego.

Calling him an immature, insecure egomaniac is something else entirely.

If you want to be a polite and helpful person, it is YOUR job to be as polite and helpful as possible, regardless of what you feel about whom you are addressing.

[Vanitas]

With that in mind, please try to be more clear about such things in the future so that similar discussions don't devolve into two pages of 'That's not what I said.' 'Then what did you say?' 'I said this.' 'I said this too!' 'No you didn't.' 'Yes I did!'

OK, I will be sure to try.

[LordBlades]

I acknowledged this back at page one. Yes, I make mistakes. Your point?

I didn't claim you didn't acknowledge it, I said you didn't alter the OP of this thread to reflect it. Whoever enters this thread now and decides to reply without reading all the posts (which many forum users do) will be doing so under the assumption that your quote is an official quote from Paizo.

[Sewercop]

Then do they actually take feedback in their forums? :smallconfused:
Their designers are always around, answering questions
Imo, and just mine, I dont think they are taking alot of feedback to heart. It seems they are more interested in garnering hype towards new products. This is a common thing to do.
They might be around answering questions, but it seems more like they are putting out fires when they smell smoke. This is not just Paizo, just look at the 4th and 5th from wotc. Same thing.



No, they are banned because they present their feedback as personal attacks.
I agree somewhat. Constructive critisicm are often seen as personal attacks and that is somewhat the problem. Of course some attacks are personal, i wll not deny that. But they often come after designers refuse to see inherent problems in their designs and answer snarky when their baby(game) is under what they feel as an attack. Being able to take critiscism is a skill to learn and an important one. Many are banned because designers feel ridiculed, sometimes they are. Often they are not.


That's a very childish way to garner attention. You are free to think so, but it gets the point across. You need a way to differentiate yourself from the herd of sheeple. If you want your input to count towards the game, garner attention.


No, that leads to a ban because it is rude. In these forums, it is even specifically against forum rules.
See...
If you want input and that input makes your game look bad,that is not rude, that is the feedback you asked for when you have an open playtest.
I would never participate in a test where i wasnt allowed to provide actual feedback because it was rude to point out flaws. Im guessing that wasnt what you meant.


Hold as many grudges as you want, that's not the point. The point is that people are not being civil about it and people were not being civil about it back then. You were not banned because you gave feedback. You were banned because of personal attacks.
People got banned because they pointed out flaws and design issues, that being ignored lead to personal attacks. That is given online with anonymity.


This doesn't mean they don't understand the rules of their own game, it means they disagree with your concept of balance. Taking your own opinion as the one true gospel is no excuse to offend others.
Understanding the rules is one thing, to understand how they affect the game when combined with each other is different. Balance is tricky, I dont think they understand it all. That they have proven several times. Just look at the arcanist now... Thats not balance

When they put up their design goals and ask for input just to ignore it.... then to deliver something different then what they sat out to make.Along the way banning those that pointed that out? Thats just being a hypocritical ass.

Do you want your game influenced by a 11 year old that have no clue about the system or do you want some of the recognized posters to have a say?
As of now the 11 year olds influence it more... thats sad

[eggynack]

I feel a bit like we're arguing around the point, instead arguing it directly. Does anyone have any sort of documentation on this stuff that occurred, or has it all drained away into the ether of the internet? I suspect that it's the latter, as some folks mentioned post wiping. Anyway, what we're left with is a situation where some people are saying, "This was a personal attack," and other people are saying, "This was not a personal attack, or at least not a personal attack mean enough to justify a banning," and people, mostly me, have no way of knowing what "this" is, and it might not even be the same "this" for both sides.

Vanitas mentioned that a similar amount of hate occurs hereabouts, so perhaps linking posts here that match the approximate tone of posts that justified a banning there would be a workable solution. Similarly, on the other side, people mentioned posters getting banned without just cause, so maybe using posts here to indicate the general tone and content there would work. It's a rather complicated way to go about things, but the way we're going about things now clearly isn't working.

[Craft (Cheese)]

If your answer to your own question is "Geeks (and specially gamers) are a vicious kind.", then I don't quite understand why you asked it. Did you come here for confirmation?

Seems to be it, yeah.

[Yora]

It's because of GIFT (Greater Internet F*** Theory):
"Normal Person + Annonymity + Audience = Total ****"

(I didn't know that comic is almost 10 years old by now.)

[Cybris75]

Yeah, I think it's this. It created all sorts of problems for me when it spread from gamer forums to RL. I needed therapy and everything.

I'm risking crossing the line here, but I think you took this stuff way too seriously. Internet discussions about games should not influence your life in this way.

Be advised that different social circles have different norms for communication. For example, they way I talk to my buddies while having a drink is very different from how I address my boss. I talk to my parents in a different tone than I talk to people on the street. My girlfriend understands expressions that my coworkers don't. I even write different things in forums than I would say face-to-face. Every communication has a different context of what may or may not be appropriate.

Also, don't let yourself be influenced by others in order to fit in. If, hypothetically, everyone in an internet forum is trash-talking and throwing insults about, you don't have to join in on that. Relax and be yourself, but be aware who you're talking to and how they may receive things. Communication (especially in written form) is difficult enough.

[Vanitas]

I'm risking crossing the line here, but I think you took this stuff way too seriously. Internet discussions about games should not influence your life in this way.

Be advised that different social circles have different norms for communication. For example, they way I talk to my buddies while having a drink is very different from how I address my boss. I talk to my parents in a different tone than I talk to people on the street. My girlfriend understands expressions that my coworkers don't. I even write different things in forums than I would say face-to-face. Every communication has a different context of what may or may not be appropriate.

Also, don't let yourself be influenced by others in order to fit in. If, hypothetically, everyone in an internet forum is trash-talking and throwing insults about, you don't have to join in on that. Relax and be yourself, but be aware who you're talking to and how they may receive things. Communication (especially in written form) is difficult enough.
That happened years ago so... yeah. :smalltongue:

[The Insanity]

I don't know about you guys, but where I come from part of being a professional (which Paizo designers arguably are) is to take all (constructive) criticism into consideration, especially if you are specifically asking for it. How much better could PF be if the devs swallowed their pride and actually considered points raised by those that were banned?

[Muja]

I don't know about you guys, but where I come from part of being a professional (which Paizo designers arguably are) is to take all (constructive) criticism into consideration, especially if you are specifically asking for it. How much better could PF be if the devs swallowed their pride and actually considered points raised by those that were banned?

Thy would focus on bridging the gap between casters and mundanes, and rework options that are simply broken into what their intended purpose was supposed to be. It would be hard for them, given at least two of the staff have no concept of balance AT ALL, but the other staff members seem to at least try to do their best

[The Insanity]

It wouldn't be that hard, considering that they would have input from hundreds if not thousands of experienced players that would want nothing more than to improve their favored game.

[TexAvery]

I'm sorry, let me see if I get this straight.
You think it is OK to personally attack someone because they wrote their own game in a way that you did not like?
You think it is personally OK to attack someone because you did not like an errata?
I strongly advise you reconsider those positions, because your stance is morally flawed.

You seem to have fallen into the classic trap of criticizing an author and his creative endeavor because it wasn't what you wanted it to be.

What, exactly, are you counting as a personal attack? Because "you're not very good at your job, because of your track record of producing lots of bad material" is not a personal attack.

Also, with your talk of having needed therapy for your negativity permeating life so much, you come off as an AA member hanging out at the bar at a wedding telling everyone alcohol is evil and they can't handle a glass of champagne.

[Phelix-Mu]

Paizo posted this for their playtest, I think it raises some interesting questions.



This kind of negative attitude is one I've seen plenty of in these forums. Mind you, it even happened in the Path of War playtest, to the point where one of the authors (who was being questioned for engaging on this kind of behaviour in his own book, for starters) had to call down the poster on it.

I think my question here is... why? Why so much hate, why so much elitism, why so much acting like your opinion is fact? Why is that somehow connected to RPGs and ingrained in the D&D/Pathfinder community?

Alright, well, I am and have been both a writer and an editor in my day. Here's some guidelines if you are a writer (or designer) and want comments:

1.) You want comments. Don't tell people not to comment. Don't tell people how to comment (as this has the effect of discouraging people from commenting).

2.) Get ready to not like some of what people say. Everyone has different opinions; this is a simple and immutable fact of life. No matter how good it is (or how good you think it is) someone is not going to like it. Suck it up.

3.) Take people's comments seriously, but only insofar as the people commenting have taken a serious effort to do so. The comments that sound like they have thought behind them...those are the ones that are worth waiting for. Unfortunately, it's the nature of life (and especially the internet) that you will get a bunch of "LOL, that is total suck" for every thoughtful bit of critique.

Now, here is some advice if one is commenting on someone else's work, editing, or otherwise advising revisions:

1.) Be nice. Writing/designing can be hard. Writers spend much of their lives cooped up in their own heads, and, even if you are nice, fair bet plenty of others will not be. A civil tone is always welcome, and if you avoid invectives, you can get to your point faster, which is always good.

2.) Be direct. One can be civil while still getting to the deeper issue, the part not liked, the reasons it wasn't liked, and some tips on what might be better. Writers often have to go through heaps of comments. Don't beat around the bush.

3.) Don't be too nice. Ultimately, the best comments will point out things that can be improved. That's the whole point of the revision/critiquing/playtesting process.

EDIT: The quote the OP cited's suggestion that "negative comments aren't welcome" is stupid. It's the internet; anyone that speaks internet knows that there are fanboys, trolls, and flamers, amid legion others. You can't ask everyone for help and then tell half of them to go away.

[Kudaku]

Please note that the post OP is referencing was NOT posted by Paizo. Varitas has been repeatedly asked to edit it and has either ignored those posts or doesn't know how to edit :-/. If anything I've found that the developers have been encouraging and shown interest for the feedback they've been getting. An example would be this post (http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2qdje&page=4?Warpriest-Discussion#200) in the Warpriest thread.

[Phelix-Mu]

My bad, my post edited to reflect that. I skipped a bunch of posts getting here; oh, darn you, forum-trawling laziness.

[Kudaku]

No worries, thanks for editing. :smallsmile:

[eggynack]

Please note that the post OP is referencing was NOT posted by Paizo. Varitas has been repeatedly asked to edit it and has either ignored those posts or doesn't know how to edit :-/. If anything I've found that the developers have been encouraging and shown interest for the feedback they've been getting. An example would be this post (http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2qdje&page=4?Warpriest-Discussion#200) in the Warpriest thread.
I don't think I gots any beef with Bulmahn. By my recollection, he tends to be generally reasonable. It's usually SKR who says things that are problematic.

[Phelix-Mu]

Hmm. I just feel that, if you want help, you really have to usually bite the bullet and accept all help.

Want only positive feedback? Pay someone.

Ask for people to give feedback for free? Take them lumps and be glad that at least a portion of the people on the internet are friendly and helpful (or at least helpful...maybe...if you're lucky....:smallwink:)

[OldTrees1]

Hmm. I just feel that, if you want help, you really have to usually bite the bullet and accept all help.

Want only positive feedback? Pay someone.

Ask for people to give feedback for free? Take them lumps and be glad that at least a portion of the people on the internet are friendly and helpful (or at least helpful...maybe...if you're lucky....:smallwink:)

Agreed, but both sides can hold themselves to a higher standard. Being willing to read terrible responses does not mean that those responses couldn't be improved. Communicating the quality of responses to those that are responding is a necessary step in enabling those responding to improve.

[Phelix-Mu]

Agreed, but both sides can hold themselves to a higher standard. Being willing to read terrible responses does not mean that those responses couldn't be improved. Communicating the quality of responses to those that are responding is a necessary step in enabling those responding to improve.

I don't know. The original quote in the OP


Positive feedback is immensely preferred to negative feedback. See Sean’s post here for a bit on that. But suffice to say, positive feedback is more helpful because it fosters a helpful environment. It’s the difference between working together and stand-offishly stating your “factpinions” as gosepl. If you ever start a sentence that follows this form, you’re doing it wrong: “<feature X> is the worst thing I’ve ever seen and here’s how I would change it to make it <(balanced, useful, cool, english)>.”

This really makes it sound like responders can be "doing it wrong." "Please help, but only certain help is welcome" sounds like it's at cross purposes.

But I do agree that a higher-standard would be nice. Nice. Not realistic.

[Pickford]

Paizo posted this for their playtest, I think it raises some interesting questions.



This kind of negative attitude is one I've seen plenty of in these forums. Mind you, it even happened in the Path of War playtest, to the point where one of the authors (who was being questioned for engaging on this kind of behaviour in his own book, for starters) had to call down the poster on it.

I think my question here is... why? Why so much hate, why so much elitism, why so much acting like your opinion is fact? Why is that somehow connected to RPGs and ingrained in the D&D/Pathfinder community?

Game enthusiasts have less than normal emotional intelligence. As a group gamers don't recognize when their words have gone too far, and in some cases simply don't care.

For anecdotal evidence, see: That insane DM (the one who actually ended up getting arrested, all because he didn't like the drawing on a players character sheet).

[georgie_leech]

Game enthusiasts have less than normal emotional intelligence. As a group gamers don't recognize when their words have gone too far, and in some cases simply don't care.

For anecdotal evidence, see: That insane DM (the one who actually ended up getting arrested, all because he didn't like the drawing on a players character sheet).

I think it's a bit of a generalisation to say that gamers are less emotionally intelligent than normal people. Every group is made of people; some people are jerks; every group has at least some jerks. It seems unfair to characterise an entire group (especially when you presumably count yourself in that group :smalltongue:) based only on the ruder members.

[jedipotter]

I program for fun, and also as my job (freelance). It is, if anything, harder to program professionally, even though I'm getting paid to do it: my standards have to be even higher and I have to consider more possibilities and a broader scope. Why would any other creative career be substantially different, especially one with so many similarities?

Because you have to do it. If your told ''write up a five page paper on this'', you have to do that. It's not that the work is easy, it is that you must get it done, so the motivation is easy(as you have no choice).

Compare: I want to make some homebrew Air spells. I sit down, think of some ideas. Look up some stuff. And write down a rough outline of say three spells. This takes a whole hour. Then something happens and I have to go do something else....even though I want to just sit down and make spells. Now take the workplace. Your stuck at a desk, for eight full hours. You get told to make 25 air spells, and you just sit at your desk and do so. Just think of something you do at work, like I spend two hours a day putting peoples incident reports into a spreadsheet. But I have to...it's part of my job. Just think what it would be like to make up D&D stuff for a living.

And yea, ok, so most are freelance right? So they have like the oh so hard task of waking up maybe just before noon. Then the oh so hard task of just lounging around for a couple hours. Then, maybe, if they feel like it write up some just for work. And then just do whatever they feel like doing. Unless your going to say there is a freelancer that wakes up in the early AM and locks themselves in a home office for eight hours.

[georgie_leech]

snip

As someone who is making what amounts to a custom game in his spare time for his D&D group, I think you're underestimating how much energy is needed to actually create something. Having ideas is easy. Turning said ideas into in-game effects, checking to make sure they're balanced with existing effects, trying to find any unexpected mechanical combinations with existing effects, deciding whether such combinations should work, rewriting to try to exclude the effects you don't want, editing for clarity, and then finally testing. And that's for a single spell, or ability, or feat. Of course things like Prone Shooter will slip through. What we see in the actual books are a fraction of what they've made, and errors will always get through.

Look at the Truenamer. That sort of disaster is what happens when you rush or don't test things properly. When balanced against all the content that works and that some people love to use, it seems like something of a disservice to look at the results and say "eh, anyone can throw that together, it looks easy."

And for the record, I've a friend who works freelance (in web design), and he wishes that meant he could be lazy. The practical effect of "freelance" for him means that he has little job security and doesn't get any pension or benefits that company's provide for long-term work.

[Pickford]

I think it's a bit of a generalisation to say that gamers are less emotionally intelligent than normal people. Every group is made of people; some people are jerks; every group has at least some jerks. It seems unfair to characterise an entire group (especially when you presumably count yourself in that group :smalltongue:) based only on the ruder members.

:smallbiggrin:

Perhaps it's just that rude people are always more vocal than polite people? (And consequently more likely to be answering feedback)

[The Trickster]

Game enthusiasts have less than normal emotional intelligence. As a group gamers don't recognize when their words have gone too far, and in some cases simply don't care.

For anecdotal evidence, see: That insane DM (the one who actually ended up getting arrested, all because he didn't like the drawing on a players character sheet).

Or that one poor fellow who had his DM arrested, because the DM wouldn't leave the guy's house when asked to. Apparently that actually happened.

What I have concluded from this thread;

- Paizo banned a bunch of people who play tested their game.

- Some of these people were banned because they said (well...typed) things that were a bit offensive. These people probably deserved the ban.

- Some were banned because they politely gave constructive criticism, and Paizo didn't like that. These people didn't deserve to be banned. (I though the point of a playtest was to find broken things/glitches/etc in the game, so that it can be fixed before launch).

Did I forget anything?

[Muja]

What I have concluded from this thread;

- Paizo banned a bunch of people who play tested their game.

- Some of these people were banned because they said (well...typed) things that were a bit offensive. These people probably deserved the ban.

- Some were banned because they politely gave constructive criticism, and Paizo didn't like that. These people didn't deserve to be banned. (I though the point of a playtest was to find broken things/glitches/etc in the game, so that it can be fixed before launch).

Did I forget anything?

Thats basically it, yes.

[Kudaku]

Did I forget anything?

I'd just like to note that while I wasn't around for the original Pathfinder beta, I have participated in the last three play tests and I haven't seen anything like the attitude some of the posters here talk about - SKR can come across as snarky true, but overall I find that Paizo's attitude to their community is pretty outstanding. How many other companies have a Creative Director who manages, and more or less keeps up with, a thread called '>>Ask *James Jacobs* ALL your Questions Here!' with 38 000 posts and counting?

[The Insanity]

That's just conjecture. We mostly know about it from 2nd or 3rd hand relations, and even if we had the story from someone who actually got banned or was there when that happened, it's still just one side of the story.

[Spuddles]

I think it's a bit of a generalisation to say that gamers are less emotionally intelligent than normal people. Every group is made of people; some people are jerks; every group has at least some jerks. It seems unfair to characterise an entire group (especially when you presumably count yourself in that group :smalltongue:) based only on the ruder members.

Of course it's a generalization- when compared to the general populace, gamers tend towards the social retardation side of the emotional intelligence spectrum. Pickford is like 110% right; I just wish I had more data than anecdotal. For every personable person I've played D&D with, there have been two neckbeards.

Dont get me wrong, I've gamed with people who have 18 charisma and are super duper awesomesauce humans. But most of tend towards 9 charisma and abrasive personalities.

[Muja]

I'd just like to note that while I wasn't around for the original Pathfinder beta, I have participated in the last three play tests and I haven't seen anything like the attitude some of the posters here talk about - SKR can come across as snarky true, but overall I find that Paizo's attitude to their community is pretty outstanding. How many other companies have a Creative Director who manages, and more or less keeps up with, a thread called '>>Ask *James Jacobs* ALL your Questions Here!' with 38 000 posts and counting?

Oh well yes, SKR does usually limit himself to just being a snarky person. I never said he was foaming at the mouth yelling profanities at the naysayers, if that was true this thread would (hopefully) not have a reason to exist. What IS the issue is how he pointedly ignores most of the crtisisms, cherrypicks some he likes, and makes mostly false promises to 'fix' his/their 'mistakes'. Like how people were saying that Monk was fairly weak still in the game, and after that TWF scandal occurred it took a large body of protesters for the developers to say they did (maybe/sorta/notreally) mess up a bit in terms of nerfing. The problem still persists, and the general arrogance of the group's more vocal section has led to people just stopping to care at all.

a good example of how the staff are still acting is in the playtesting threads for the advanced classes that were newly released: They mostly respond to positive bootlicking posts, and when critism pops up they either ignore it or say they 'will look into it', and usually do the opposite of what was suggested.

Betatesting was a lot better and a lot worse, since the staff at least responded to criticism. granted it ended in bans half the time, but things actually got answered

EDIT: Also, can we please drop the gamer generalization discussion please? Its starting to become very offensive, and seeming less about facts and more about bited remarks

[Lord_Gareth]

That's just conjecture. We mostly know about it from 2nd or 3rd hand relations, and even if we had the story from someone who actually got banned or was there when that happened, it's still just one side of the story.

Hi. You called?

[The Insanity]

Hi. You called?
No, I didn't. But as long as you're here, lets hear your side of the story.

[Phelix-Mu]

Ditto on the dropping the generalizations about gamers. We run a big tent, and, on principle, pigeon-holing people is just counterproductive (they tend to not like it). I'd also argue that gamers tend to incorporate a wide range of outliers, which would mean that it's inherently a group for whom generalizing is particularly inaccurate. But, if I did make that generalization, I'd be just as bad as the stuff that is bothering me. Doh.

So, lets just all be us and get on with whatever else the discussion is currently about

[eggynack]

on principle, pigeon-holing people is just counterproductive (they tend to not like it).
Hey, stop pigeon-holing the pigeon-holed by stating their opinions on the topic for them. They all hate it when you do that.

[Lord_Gareth]

No, I didn't. But as long as you're here, lets hear your side of the story.

One should keep in mind that when all of this happened I was a much younger person. Much, much younger - puberty was a thing that was brand-new and in the process of happening and I hadn't yet earned any design chops.

I observed the Pathfinder playtest for much longer than I actually participated in it. I was very excited about the idea but kinda nervous about attempting to provide feedback; the CharOp guys played on a level that was alien and strange to me and I didn't even begin to understand it. What I did understand, though, was seeing long, well-written posts full of TERRIFYING NUMBERS addressed to the designers, with suggestions on how to fix the arcane problems being spoken of.

The reactions were not pretty, and I wish these threads hadn't been lost during the shift to the Gleemax Boards. Many posts were met with derision and condescension. Mentions of the phrase, 'In real games,' or 'real players' happened. Eventually the designers left that playtest in a huff...at which point myself and a few others, hopped up on righteous indignation, went to the Paizo boards.

It, ah, it wasn't pretty. I said some fairly unprofessional things. Others didn't, though - they just patiently brought in the data to show to the community and to re-show to the designers. Post-scrubbings and bans followed until eventually we were all either A. banned B. banned or C. inclined to leave in disgust.

I lost a lot of respect for Paizo as a company during that time, and for SKR as a human being. And then I found out about his previous career playtesting for WotC >.<

[Zrak]

Well this is really just part of the bigger problem with society. The whole last generation or two has been badly lied to and brainwashed. This like ''everything must be fair'' and ''everyone is right'', for example have been taken too far. It is the reason schools don't allow kids to play games where only one kid can win, give any points scored in a game to both teams(so the game is always a tie), and everyone gets awards, even if they just stand there.

I hear this all the time, but I really don't buy it. I mean, for one, it is by no means the "whole last generation or two." Aside from awards for participation, I don't even think any of the things you mention are even particularly common. I played games with winners and losers when I was in school. Kids younger than me played games with winners and losers in school.
Kids my ex babysat played games with winners and losers in school last year.

Moreover, even if it were the case, it really wouldn't be relevant here, at all. If we are to accept, for the sake of argument, that my entire generation was brainwashed to believe that "everyone is right," wouldn't we not respond to others' opinions with hatred, elitism, and dismissal? The essence of the idea that "everyone is right" is not that "I am right and everyone else is wrong." One might go so far as to claim that the two viewpoints are in nearly diametric opposition. If we had been brainwashed by this idea that "everyone is right," the designers would respond to criticism by acknowledging the subjective correctness of the critics' positions while apologetically pointing out that their vision for the product, alas, was different; the critics, in turn, would accept that the designers had their own beliefs to which they were entitled and encourage them to follow their own vision for the product. People who believe "everyone is right" don't ban people for disagreeing with them, just as people who believe "everyone is right" don't hurl personal attacks at those whose viewpoints differ from their own.

[olentu]

I hear this all the time, but I really don't buy it. I mean, for one, it is by no means the "whole last generation or two." Aside from awards for participation, I don't even think any of the things you mention are even particularly common. I played games with winners and losers when I was in school. Kids younger than me played games with winners and losers in school.
Kids my ex babysat played games with winners and losers in school last year.

Moreover, even if it were the case, it really wouldn't be relevant here, at all. If we are to accept, for the sake of argument, that my entire generation was brainwashed to believe that "everyone is right," wouldn't we not respond to others' opinions with hatred, elitism, and dismissal? The essence of the idea that "everyone is right" is not that "I am right and everyone else is wrong." One might go so far as to claim that the two viewpoints are in nearly diametric opposition. If we had been brainwashed by this idea that "everyone is right," the designers would respond to criticism by acknowledging the subjective correctness of the critics' positions while apologetically pointing out that their vision for the product, alas, was different; the critics, in turn, would accept that the designers had their own beliefs to which they were entitled and encourage them to follow their own vision for the product. People who believe "everyone is right" don't ban people for disagreeing with them, just as people who believe "everyone is right" don't hurl personal attacks at those whose viewpoints differ from their own.

Well obviously when someone voices their judgement that somebody else failed at a task they forfeit the protection offered by the Everyone's a Winner Pact of 1973.

[Big Fau]

Hold as many grudges as you want, that's not the point. The point is that people are not being civil about it and people were not being civil about it back then. You were not banned because you gave feedback. You were banned because of personal attacks.

To this day I wonder what was deemed offensive about my post; although it's been nearly 5 years and I don't remember the details, I do know that I was highly civil. People far more vitriolic than I were left unphased (Crusader of Logic, for example, remained unbanned for years).

I recall posting a detailed, concise look into the magic item section and noticing several... unbalances. Items like the Dust of Choking and Sneezing and the Candle of Invocation were left unmolested, or (in the case of the Candle) outright buffed by the removal of XP in crafting. I noted issues like the weapons and armor enhancements still being overpriced (thus retaining the indirect nerf to TWFing, ranged combat, and S&B), and other miscellaneous things I thought could have been improved.

I even offered praise on their allowing noncasters the ability to craft items, amongst other positive points (one of the few things they changed that I agreed with, although I made magic item crafting a part of the Craft skill long before the PF alpha). I also expressed some joy to see that the Druid and low-level spells were nerfed (although I didn't provide any critique about that section, I did point out that Pyrotechnics was as powerful as Glitterdust used to be).

I also recall waking up the next morning and seeing a PM from a friend on Gleemax saying that my post was gone. I tried logging into the Paizo forums, only to find out that my login information wasn't working; when I checked my emails I saw I had received a ban notice. I tried to create a puppet account and discovered it was an IP ban. Paizo lost all support from me when I discovered that, and I have made no efforts to return to their forums for any reason.

It may not be SKR's fault (or JB's for that matter), but my post was directed towards him. I am honest and fair when providing a professional critique, and the fact that this kindness resulted in an IP ban and an account deletion is something that offended me. I try to avoid using words like stupid, dumb, crap, and other negative connotations when I professionally critique a work, as I know people can get insulted very easily.


People disagreeing with you does not make them hypocrites.

People asking for any and all critiques others can provide and then rejecting valid points about it are hypocrites.

Two final notes:


I know a person IRL who refuses to incorporate any points from a critique into his works, and such behavior is not uncommon in the design industry (be it game design, advertisement design, or other works). SKR displays similar behavior in the quotes people have reposted (both here and over at BG). The man may authentically be offended if people don't tell him "I liked it and had fun with it" as their only commentary on his designs.
The CoI was eventually nerfed, but in the wrong direction (it's ability to summon is more restricted, but the price and fact that it can still augment spells/day and spells known still exist).

[AMFV]

Game enthusiasts have less than normal emotional intelligence. As a group gamers don't recognize when their words have gone too far, and in some cases simply don't care.

For anecdotal evidence, see: That insane DM (the one who actually ended up getting arrested, all because he didn't like the drawing on a players character sheet).

I have normal emotional intelligence and am a gaming enthusiast. There I've countered your anecdote with another one, just as good in fact. So we are no forever locked in a stalemate where both of our lack of evidence will doom us.

[jedipotter]

I hear this all the time, but I really don't buy it.

I have a response, but as it does not fit in with what others want to her and want to see posted, I'm just going to skip it.

Though just note how whatever I post is ''wrong'' in their eyes, and that is what I was talking about. Your only free to post things that everyone else agrees with, as to them, there is no other side and they are always right.

Sits out side their big tent in my own small tent.

[TuggyNE]

I have a response, but as it does not fit in with what others want to her and want to see posted, I'm just going to skip it.

Don't self-censor and then complain about how people are stifling your freedom of expression or whatever.

As far as I know, no one in this thread has asked you to stop posting (which is good; that isn't allowed anyway). So either post, or don't, at your own discretion, but don't claim you're not posting because you're getting stifled here. Disagreement, for the record, is not censorship.

[SillySymphonies]

The reactions were not pretty, and I wish these threads hadn't been lost during the shift to the Gleemax Boards. Many posts were met with derision and condescension. Mentions of the phrase, 'In real games,' or 'real players' happened. Eventually the designers left that playtest in a huff...at which point myself and a few others, hopped up on righteous indignation, went to the Paizo boards.
Wait, so Pathfinder started out as a 'homebrew' by WotC designers on Gleemax.com? :smallconfused:

[Lord_Gareth]

Wait, so Pathfinder started out as a 'homebrew' by WotC designers on Gleemax.com? :smallconfused:

First: that was my quote.

And no, the CharOp guys on the WotC boards volunteered to playtest and stress-test the new rules after Jason announced that one of the goals for PF was to fix 'em.

[SillySymphonies]

My apologies: apparently I mixed things up there. :smallconfused:
Anyway, thanks for addressing my question. :smallsmile:

[Vanitas]

First: that was my quote.

And no, the CharOp guys on the WotC boards volunteered to playtest and stress-test the new rules after Jason announced that one of the goals for PF was to fix 'em.

Psyren has already pointed out they never said that. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=16057764&postcount=41)

[Lord_Gareth]

Psyren has already pointed out they never said that. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=16057764&postcount=41)

Psyren and I have very different interpretations of what that paragraph means and I'll leave it at that.

[Studoku]

I have normal emotional intelligence and am a gaming enthusiast. There I've countered your anecdote with another one, just as good in fact. So we are no forever locked in a stalemate where both of our lack of evidence will doom us.
Please don't lock Pickford in a stalemate again. Not after the fighter vs druid debacle.

[LordBlades]

Even if Psyren was right about that bit (Paizo's statement about fixing 3.5 is interpretable to say the least), the fact remains that a lot of people (me included) understood it as 'we're going to fix 3.5' and began acting as such.

A simple 'no guys, you misunderstood, we don't really plan to fix 3.5; not to the extend you guys expect anyway' statement from anyone in Paizo would have settled the matter and spared everyone a lot of bad blood.

And yet, no such statement was ever made, most likely because it would have lowered the interest in Paizo's new product.

[The Insanity]

Psyren and I have very different interpretations of what that paragraph means and I'll leave it at that.
Sorry Lord_Gareth, but I kinda have to agree with Psyren. The quote gives examples of things they wanted to fix and those things were fixed. It's just a matter of different definitions of "suboptimal choices". The devs (at least some of them) made it pretty clear in their answers on Paizo Boards that they don't think PF is imbalanced. Which is a shame. SKR even prescribes it to "ulterior motives" or something like that I remembered wrongly. I'll try to find the posts.
EDIT: Jason Bulmahn about balance. (http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2pn0z&page=3?Ask-Jason-Bulmahn-ALL-your-NonRules-Questions#150)

Depends heavily on what you mean by balanced. In terms of combat effectiveness, no, they are not, nor were they designed to be. We understand that each class has a niche to fill and sometimes that means better advantages in one area of play over another. A lot of folks get really hung up over combat effectiveness, and for them, there are certainly some classes that rise above the rest. That is ok. I can live with that so long as we are also providing a bounty of options for players that are more interested in other parts of the game.

James Jacobs (http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2l7ns&page=528?Ask-James-Jacobs-ALL-your-Questions-Here#26380)

I think the martial/caster disparity is mostly present in the view of folks who favor martial characters who are jealous of casters, or from the point of view of folks who favor caster characters who are jealous of martial characters.

AKA: I don't think its as big a deal as the internet makes it out to be. In my games, casters and non-casters tend to be equally valuable to the party, and equally dangerous in various situations as enemies. I've seen parties get into big trouble when their only strong spellcaster wasn't at the game, and I've seen them get into big trouble when their only strong non-spellcaster wasn't at the game.

To a large extent as well the responsibility to keep things fair and fun for all involved lands on the GM's shoulders. If every single fight is against flying creatures that use ranged attacks, the characters who focused on melee stuff are going to be cranky. Likewise, if every single fight is against golems or high SR foes, the spellcasters are going to be cranky.

It's a balancing act.

[olentu]

Psyren has already pointed out they never said that. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=16057764&postcount=41)

While that may be true, and I am not agreeing that it is, I did not notice any real effort to disabuse people of the notion. But, then again, I did not really notice them telling people the "playtest" was not really supposed to do much beyond being a marketing gimmick.

Well, maybe that is not giving them enough credit. Eventually there was a rather strong statement to that effect around about the time of the banning people and whitewashing threads.

[Vanitas]

So some people fail at reading comprehension and it is somehow Paizo's fault. Riiiight...

[LordBlades]

So some people fail at reading comprehension and it is somehow Paizo's fault. Riiiight...

When a significant number of people 'fail at reading comprehension' in regard to something somebody says, shouldn't that be taken as a hint that maybe what that particular somebody said isn't quite clear?

[olentu]

So some people fail at reading comprehension and it is somehow Paizo's fault. Riiiight...

Perhaps, perhaps not. It rather depends on if they were deliberately fostering the impression to further their own goals.

But in either case one reason it matters is to do with their later response. If they really did intend that pathfinder not fix 3.5 to any measurable degree they should merely have said that clearly and directly to the people that were giving feedback for that purpose. It might not have mollified everyone but a simple statement that they were leaving the various imbalances of 3.5 in the system by choice would have been much better then the banning spree and coverup that did happen.

[Vanitas]

When a significant number of people 'fail at reading comprehension' in regard to something somebody says, shouldn't that be taken as a hint that maybe what that particular somebody said isn't quite clear?

Except it's not a significant number of people. It's a half a dozen guys who keep nursing a grudge about something that was never said. On the other hand, you got thousands of happy customers.

Which side would you pay attention to?

[SiuiS]

Yeah, I think it's this. It created all sorts of problems for me when it spread from gamer forums to RL. I needed therapy and everything.

That would actually be the fault of Xbox, I think. A bunch of people on headsets swearing at each other, attitude spread. It's just sort of how 'cool kids' act nowadays.


Some people just want every conversation to be accompanied by smiles and unicorns and rainbows. Their personal belief is that anything that does not sound like it came from an over-medicated Care Bear is somehow inherently wrong and must be immediately discarded else the sad clouds appear and ruin everything. Well, the real world is not a Saturday morning cartoon, and valid criticism can come in many forms. Continuing to delude oneself that only positive feedback is truly valid encourages the attitudes of a cartoonish caricature and creates a resulting product that reflects an immature mindset.

Being a smiling unicorn, though, let's you get away with a lot of talking smack :smallsmile:

More seriously, it relates to two things floating around the Internet. One is an essay, and the other is a pithy phrase, and they both have the same spirit; "nothing you cannot spell will ever work".
If you don't have the presence of mind to clearly articulate your idea, you aren't giving the concept or the people you are communicating with the respect necessary. If your response is so full of swearing and angry typos that I can barely read it, well... You obviously didn't respect your opinion well enough to buy it new clothes for the first day of school, and make sure it washed behind its ears and brushed its teeth. So why should I care about it? It's such a poor opinion it can't even bother to stir it's creator to tidy it up.


Seems to be it, yeah.

Ooh, cute avvie~!


I'm risking crossing the line here, but I think you took this stuff way too seriously. Internet discussions about games should not influence your life in this way.

I took that more as "people started talking this way in real life all the time and it sucked", as opposed to brigig baggage with him off the net.

Presumed him, at least.


I don't know about you guys, but where I come from part of being a professional (which Paizo designers arguably are) is to take all (constructive) criticism into consideration, especially if you are specifically asking for it. How much better could PF be if the devs swallowed their pride and actually considered points raised by those that were banned?

I find that a lot of folks in the 25 and under range don't actually know what professional behavior is. Haven't been exposed to it.


It wouldn't be that hard, considering that they would have input from hundreds if not thousands of experienced players that would want nothing more than to improve their favored game.

I dunno. I've seen a lot of home brew from experienced players that I think is attrocious, simply because of the base assumptions involved.


Game enthusiasts have less than normal emotional intelligence. As a group gamers don't recognize when their words have gone too far, and in some cases simply don't care.

For anecdotal evidence, see: That insane DM (the one who actually ended up getting arrested, all because he didn't like the drawing on a players character sheet).

I don't know. I point to role play as a psychiatric tool to help correct and stabilize mental imbalances as my evidence to the contrary.


Don't self-censor and then complain about how people are stifling your freedom of expression or whatever.

As far as I know, no one in this thread has asked you to stop posting (which is good; that isn't allowed anyway). So either post, or don't, at your own discretion, but don't claim you're not posting because you're getting stifled here. Disagreement, for the record, is not censorship.

Word.


When a significant number of people 'fail at reading comprehension' in regard to something somebody says, shouldn't that be taken as a hint that maybe what that particular somebody said isn't quite clear?

It should! Communication has four parts; the idea, how you frame and phrase it, how the other person recieves it, and what idea they get from that. If something consistently comes off as wrong, it's often beneficial to proceed as if you are the one who messed up just to explore what's going on.

[LordBlades]

Except it's not a significant number of people. It's a half a dozen guys who keep nursing a grudge about something that was never said. On the other hand, you got thousands of happy customers.

Which side would you pay attention to?

Except that half a dozen is much larger than half a dozen. I can now think of at least 15-20 guys who claim they have been actively involved in the PF beta 'playtest' and feel they've been treated unfairly. And I'm wlling to bet I haven't met all the guys in this situation. Then there's all the guys in my situation (read what Paizo said, took it as 'we're going to fix 3.5' but didn't contribute actively due to lack of knowledge, time etc. and then were put off by Paizo's reaction to criticism). Yes, it's a minority, but it's much larger than you seem to think. And it's a minority that could have been easily appeased by a simple statement.

So either Paizo didn't care enough about a segment of their potential playerbase to think they were worth 2 lines on a forum/website (big minus in my book) or they deliberately let the (you claim wrong) impression that they were indeed going to fix 3.5 (or actually listen to the playtesters whatsoever) continue, despite them having no plans to do so (an even bigger minus in my book).

[MirddinEmris]

Except it's not a significant number of people. It's a half a dozen guys who keep nursing a grudge about something that was never said. On the other hand, you got thousands of happy customers.

Which side would you pay attention to?

To unhappy customers and unhappy people who could be customers in a future, of course. As someone who is working in analytical team (no, not at Paizo :) ), i could tell that you that we couldn't care less about happy customers and positive reviews aside from overall statistic. It's the unhappy and angry ones we care, doesn't matter constructive or not, because if significant number of people showing concerns about certain parts of our product (even in form of "i hate all of you, you f*****g c***s") than we should think about changing this part somehow.

It's a little more complicated than that, of course, but that's the idea.

[Vanitas]

Except that half a dozen is much larger than half a dozen. I can now think of at least 15-20 guys who claim they have been actively involved in the PF beta 'playtest' and feel they've been treated unfairly. And I'm wlling to bet I haven't met all the guys in this situation. Then there's all the guys in my situation (read what Paizo said, took it as 'we're going to fix 3.5' but didn't contribute actively due to lack of knowledge, time etc. and then were put off by Paizo's reaction to criticism). Yes, it's a minority, but it's much larger than you seem to think. And it's a minority that could have been easily appeased by a simple statement.

So either Paizo didn't care enough about a segment of their potential playerbase to think they were worth 2 lines on a forum/website (big minus in my book) or they deliberately let the (you claim wrong) impression that they were indeed going to fix 3.5 (or actually listen to the playtesters whatsoever) continue, despite them having no plans to do so (an even bigger minus in my book).

Oh, my god. You're telling they lost 20 potential customers with that? They must be devastated!


To unhappy customers and unhappy people who could be customers in a future, of course. As someone who is working in analytical team (no, not at Paizo :) ), i could tell that you that we couldn't care less about happy customers and positive reviews aside from overall statistic. It's the unhappy and angry ones we care, doesn't matter constructive or not, because if significant number of people showing concerns about certain parts of our product (even in form of "i hate all of you, you f*****g c***s") than we should think about changing this part somehow.

It's a little more complicated than that, of course, but that's the idea.
You're missing context here. These guys were not customers. They were potential customers who wrote themselves out of their target audience.
Also, twenty out of hundreds of thousands is hardly a "significant number".

[Lord_Gareth]

Oh, my god. You're telling they lost 20 potential customers with that? They must be devastated!

You are aware that this is the exact kind of condescending derision we're complaining about, yes?



You're missing context here. These guys were not customers. They were potential customers who wrote themselves out of their target audience.

Emphasis mine. Paizo could have had more customers and now they don't. They could've had all the customers we'd attract by converting our gaming groups over and buying modules and now they don't. More than anything it was the sheer insulting ingratitude that made the people involved angry and that continues to fuel the fire of our hate.

[LordBlades]

Oh, my god. You're telling they lost 20 customers with that? They must be devastated!


You're missing context here. These guys were not customers. They were potential customers who wrote themselves out of their target audience.

1. it could have easily been avoided . It would have taken SKR less time to write 'we won't fix 3.5' than it takes hm to post his usual random crap on Paizo forums, and yet nobody bothered to do it.

2. It's not just 20 guys that decided they don't care about Paizo anymore. It's 20 guys that decided they now care about Paizo in the negative way so much they actually spend their time more or less actively perpetuating a rather large (for the RPG forum community) negative current of opinion toward Paizo. I don't think I've seen a thread on PF on any gaming forum where this issue doesn't get brought up at least once,and there's some RPG forums out there where the 'Paizo sucks' attitude is the dominant one. Negative publicly makes you lose customers, and Paizo is getting (most likely an entirely unanticipated at the time amount of) negative publicity from their actions back then.

[Vanitas]

You are aware that this is the exact kind of condescending derision we're complaining about, yes?
Is it? I'm not claiming he should die, I'm not saying I hate him, I'm not calling him stupid, I'm not saying I don't respect him as a human being and (most important of all) I'm not doing it because of some perceived slight from 5 years ago.


Emphasis mine. Paizo could have had more customers and now they don't. They could've had all the customers we'd attract by converting our gaming groups over and buying modules and now they don't. More than anything it was the sheer insulting ingratitude that made the people involved angry and that continues to fuel the fire of our hate.
They are #1 in the market. Big difference you guys made.

[olentu]

Leaving aside Vanitas's made up statistics I will say that having X number of happy customers in no way justifies Y number of bad actions. Well unless we are looking at things from a completely profit driven perspective, but that is not necessarily a good way of looking at things.

[MirddinEmris]

You're missing context here. These guys were not customers. They were potential customers who wrote themselves out of their target audience.
Also, twenty out of hundreds of thousands is hardly a "significant number".


Emphasis mine. Paizo could have had more customers and now they don't. They could've had all the customers we'd attract by converting our gaming groups over and buying modules and now they don't. More than anything it was the sheer insulting ingratitude that made the people involved angry and that continues to fuel the fire of our hate.

Swordsaged. Also, it's not "twenty out of hundreds of thousands", because twenty is only those who gave publicity to their opinion, there are MUCH more that didn't like it and decided silently not to buy any Paizo product anymore. How much people was involved in that playtest?

[MirddinEmris]

They are #1 in the market. Big difference you guys made.

What market are you talking about? Because they are #1 only in the market of "former 3.5 fanbase". And even that is a stretch.

[nyjastul69]

...They are #1 in the market. Big difference you guys made.

Do you have evidence to support this claim? To my knowledge neither WotC or Paizo release their sales figures. I seriously doubt PF outsells D&D.

[Averis Vol]

Do you have evidence to support this claim? To my knowledge neither WotC or Paizo release their sales figures. I seriously doubt PF outsells D&D.

See, I kinda thought the OP was actually a Paizo rep on an incognito account for a while, which would validate that statement. Also, not that I'm happy about it in the slightest, Because wizards doesn't put out new material (in terms of tabletop gaming) anymore, at least until next is out, Paizo very well could be outselling wizards.

Onto something related to the topic though. The pathfinder team, from what I have seen has only really one thing going for them; the third party company Dreamscarred Press. This is part of the bigger thing that they actively accept 3rd party material and that it is well crafted unlike some of the ludicrous 3.5 3rd party stuff (Green Ronin, you know I'm talking about you), but I digress. DSP is 90% of the reason I actually play in pathfinder campaigns; it's well balanced and of a similar fluff quality to the rest of the system, so not atrocious in its own right. While they had a couple neat ideas and races and such, the public appearance I've seen from the development team is enough to completely put me off of their game, to the point where I probably wouldn't buy any of their products.

Honestly, and I can't be alone in this thought process, the way Paizo's more outspoken staff present themselves as representatives of their company, whether the content was infallible in design or not, alone is enough to make me not even consider purchasing their product, very similar to how the idea release for the xbox1 was.

[facelessminion]

Well, talk about missing the point. Yeah, I should have known this would not go well.

Personally, I see your point, but I wholeheartedly disagree with it.

[Vanitas]

What market are you talking about? Because they are #1 only in the market of "former 3.5 fanbase". And even that is a stretch.

Do you have evidence to support this claim? To my knowledge neither WotC or Paizo release their sales figures. I seriously doubt PF outsells D&D.

Leaving aside Vanitas's made up statistics I will say that having X number of happy customers in no way justifies Y number of bad actions. Well unless we are looking at things from a completely profit driven perspective, but that is not necessarily a good way of looking at things.

Made up? That's very offensive.
Here (http://www.geeknative.com/22529/pathfinder-outsells-dungeons-and-dragons/), let (http://cyclopeatron.blogspot.com.br/2011/11/paizo-spanks-hasbro-pathfinder.html) me (http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?308161-Pathfinder-outselling-D-amp-D) do your research (http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/20743.html) for (http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/27068.html) you (http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/26215.html). Happy (http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/24224.html)?
I think apologies are in order.

[MirddinEmris]

At this point i usually warn people about inaccurate use of statistics, but in this case i suspect it being delibirate.

[Eldest]

Made up? That's very offensive.
Here (http://www.geeknative.com/22529/pathfinder-outsells-dungeons-and-dragons/), let (http://cyclopeatron.blogspot.com.br/2011/11/paizo-spanks-hasbro-pathfinder.html) me (http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?308161-Pathfinder-outselling-D-amp-D) do your research (http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/20743.html) for (http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/27068.html) you (http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/26215.html). Happy (http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/24224.html)?
I think apologies are in order.

That's... one source. Repeating itself. Yay for a barrage of links? One company saying that it sells more Pathfinder than D&D does not constitute proof.

[MirddinEmris]

That's... one source. Repeating itself. Yay for a barrage of links? One company saying that it sells more Pathfinder than D&D does not constitute proof.


This chart of the Top 5 Roleplaying Games (hobby channel) reflects sales in Summer 2012. The charts are based on interviews with retailers, distributors, and manufacturers

Basically it's this: "We talked with some guys, who remotely related with this hobby industry and drew you this nice chart. May be information from talking was used when we did this, may be not"

[Vanitas]

That's... one source. Repeating itself. Yay for a barrage of links? One company saying that it sells more Pathfinder than D&D does not constitute proof.

I'm sorry, but you are completely wrong about ICv2. They don't sell D&D or Pathfinder. In fact, in the links themselves it is stated where their info comes from.
CBR uses their info for comics every month. Wizards of the Coast used their info to declare D&D as the world's most popular RPG.
It is a reputable source who is been doing that for years. Please try to research at least a little bit before trying to dismiss evidence just because you don't like it.


Basically it's this: "We talked with some guys, who remotely related with this hobby industry and drew you this nice chart. May be information from talking was used when we did this, may be not"
Remotely related? You are clearly not familiar with anything in the RPG industry. I can now dismiss your opinion as pure ignorance.

[eggynack]

Have they presented any of the underlying stats and figures for their claim of Pathfinder as the top selling RPG? Presenting Pathfinder as #1 without any of the actual data seems rather premature.

[MirddinEmris]

I'm sorry, but you are completely wrong about ICv2. They don't sell D&D or Pathfinder. In fact, in the links themselves it is stated where their info comes from.
CBR uses their info for comics every month. Wizards of the Coast used their info to declare D&D as the world's most popular RPG.
It is a reputable source who is been doing that for years. Please try to research at least a little bit before trying to dismiss evidence just because you don't like it.


Remotely related? You are clearly not familiar with anything in the RPG industry. I can now dismiss your opinion as pure ignorance.

So, nothing changed, right?)

For this i don't even need to know about gaming industry, i just need to know a little about statistics.

[MirddinEmris]

Have they presented any of the underlying stats and figures for their claim of Pathfinder as the top selling RPG? Presenting Pathfinder as #1 without any of the actual data seems rather premature.

Well, of course such respected people cannot lie to us, or fiddle with numbers, using such things like simpson's paradox. After all, do you even heard about corporations lying to their consumers? Preposterous!)

[Vanitas]

Have they presented any of the underlying stats and figures for their claim of Pathfinder as the top selling RPG? Presenting Pathfinder as #1 without any of the actual data seems rather premature.

I would agree with you, but ever since the late 90s scandals due to White Wolf sales data being leaked, they keep their data to themselves. Since distribution with RPGs is not as simple as comics, this data is the only one available and has been that way for almost 20 years now.

[eggynack]

I would agree with you, but ever since the late 90s scandals due to White Wolf sales data being leaked, they keep their data to themselves. Since distribution with RPGs is not as simple as comics, this data is the only one available and has been that way for almost 20 years now.
This could easily be the only source of data, and they could easily have perfectly good reasons for not sharing their underlying numbers, but that doesn't make the data good. In fact, that was the main point you were disputing. The available data is kinda lacking, and we have no real way of knowing if PF is truly the top seller.

[Vanitas]

This could easily be the only source of data, and they could easily have perfectly good reasons for not sharing their underlying numbers, but that doesn't make the data good. In fact, that was the main point you were disputing. The available data is kinda lacking, and we have no real way of knowing if PF is truly the top seller.

Well, yeah, you can choose not to trust in any data. The company has a good reputation, so I choose to believe them (as well as pretty much everyone in the business). I posted in response to the claim that I had "made up" the #1 in the market thing, so I think I have already dismissed that claim anyway.

[Person_Man]

For what it's worth, years ago when Pathfinder was in it's initial public play test, I (under another forum identity that I have long since forgotten) was banned for "being disruptive to the community" or something similar. I made a number posts related to basic math and balance issues.

Examples: It's much more elegant and balanced to simply give the Monk full BAB, instead of keeping it at 3/4 BAB but creating an exception for Flurry. Breaking up Feats into smaller more granular benefits (Combat Expertise->Improved Trip->Greater Trip) nerfs the Fighter, whose main class feature is Bonus Feats. By keeping the AoO triggered response and by making some of them Standard Actions, most Combat Maneuvers are terrible options for any character who does not invest in the appropriate Feats, and even then it usually requires 3 Feats to become a mediocre action less useful then a full attack. And similar such comments.

I consider myself a fairly polite person, I try never to make ad hominem attacks, and although I occasionally had people vehemently disagree with me, most of the time there was agreement or acknowledgement of my points.

Though insulted at the time, I actually don't bear Paizo any umbridge whatsoever. If a Designer has decided that he's going with X, then repeated negative comments on X aren't helpful to the design process. It would be more constructive to just reply or PM me with a polite message saying "hey, it looks like you don't agree with the direction we're going here. But suffice to say, we've made a decision to do X. So additional negative comments about X are not helpful on this topic. Thanks for your interest though." But moderating a forum well is a difficult art that requires a thick skin for negativity and a light but decisive hand on the keyboard.

[georgie_leech]

Well, of course such respected people cannot lie to us, or fiddle with numbers, using such things like simpson's paradox. After all, do you even heard about corporations lying to their consumers? Preposterous!)
So in context, it's possible that Pathfinder is currently outselling D&D Products, but that the total population playing D&D is larger than the total population playing Pathfinder?

Also, thanks for mentioning simpson's paradox, I just had to google that and now I'm lost in Wikipedia links.

[Big Fau]

Depends heavily on what you mean by balanced. In terms of combat effectiveness, no, they are not, nor were they designed to be. We understand that each class has a niche to fill and sometimes that means better advantages in one area of play over another. A lot of folks get really hung up over combat effectiveness, and for them, there are certainly some classes that rise above the rest. That is ok. I can live with that so long as we are also providing a bounty of options for players that are more interested in other parts of the game.


I think the martial/caster disparity is mostly present in the view of folks who favor martial characters who are jealous of casters, or from the point of view of folks who favor caster characters who are jealous of martial characters.

AKA: I don't think its as big a deal as the internet makes it out to be. In my games, casters and non-casters tend to be equally valuable to the party, and equally dangerous in various situations as enemies. I've seen parties get into big trouble when their only strong spellcaster wasn't at the game, and I've seen them get into big trouble when their only strong non-spellcaster wasn't at the game.

To a large extent as well the responsibility to keep things fair and fun for all involved lands on the GM's shoulders. If every single fight is against flying creatures that use ranged attacks, the characters who focused on melee stuff are going to be cranky. Likewise, if every single fight is against golems or high SR foes, the spellcasters are going to be cranky.

It's a balancing act.

These two quotes tell me quite a bit about those two developers and their experience with D&D: They stick to the "iconic" roles of the classes and do not see past those roles.

The CO boards attempted to provide insight from people who have extensive experience with the "thought outside the box" games, where Casters are truly Tier 1 and noncasters are stuck mucking around Tier 4 at highest. We were ignored, and then we got things like SKR's ruling on FoB/TWFing and Improved Natural Attack.

IMO it's fine if the developers wanted to encourage the iconic roles of Fighter/Mage/Cleric/Thief, but outright ignoring things that made defying that style of gameplay trivial was a mistake. This was the "balance" that the COers were talking about, and PF's developers do not see anything wrong with the idea of a Spellcaster being a near-demigod while the Fighter just hits things with a pointy stick. Damage output was not the only thing we were concerned about, although the nerfs in that department certainly did give us a reason to bring it up.

They gave us their go-ahead to critique the Beta by virtue of it being an Open Beta. While some of the bans were deserved for flaming, several (such as mine) were not and the fact that Paizo completely ignored legitimate, well-constructed posts (or outright flames from some of the more vitriolic posters) is what I hate about PF.

Truth to be told, I'd have a better opinion of them if they listened to people who posted genuine concerns. I'd care less about my ban if they incorporated peoples' concerns about high-level spells, the Cleric, or the Wizard. As it stands, the PFCore Cleric is more powerful than it [3.5 Core Cleric] used to be even with the nerfs to spells.

[Vanitas]

For what it's worth, years ago when Pathfinder was in it's initial public play test, I (under another forum identity that I have long since forgotten) was banned for "being disruptive to the community" or something similar. I made a number posts related to basic math and balance issues.

Examples: It's much more elegant and balanced to simply give the Monk full BAB, instead of keeping it at 3/4 BAB but creating an exception for Flurry. Breaking up Feats into smaller more granular benefits (Combat Expertise->Improved Trip->Greater Trip) nerfs the Fighter, whose main class feature is Bonus Feats. By keeping the AoO triggered response and by making some of them Standard Actions, most Combat Maneuvers are terrible options for any character who does not invest in the appropriate Feats, and even then it usually requires 3 Feats to become a mediocre action less useful then a full attack. And similar such comments.

I consider myself a fairly polite person, I try never to make ad hominem attacks, and although I occasionally had people vehemently disagree with me, most of the time there was agreement or acknowledgement of my points.

Though insulted at the time, I actually don't bear Paizo any umbridge whatsoever. If a Designer has decided that he's going with X, then repeated negative comments on X aren't helpful to the design process. It would be more constructive to just reply or PM me with a polite message saying "hey, it looks like you don't agree with the direction we're going here. But suffice to say, we've made a decision to do X. So additional negative comments about X are not helpful on this topic. Thanks for your interest though." But moderating a forum well is a difficult art that requires a thick skin for negativity and a light but decisive hand on the keyboard.

That was a very insightful post and I envy your forgiving demeanor. I think we could all learn from you.

[eggynack]

Also, thanks for mentioning simpson's paradox.
Indeed. That's a pretty frigging cool thing right there.

[Psyren]

This could easily be the only source of data, and they could easily have perfectly good reasons for not sharing their underlying numbers, but that doesn't make the data good. In fact, that was the main point you were disputing. The available data is kinda lacking, and we have no real way of knowing if PF is truly the top seller.

It's pretty telling that your only response is "well, maybe the numbers are bad." Which rather dodges the obvious question of "what if they're good?" Particularly given that we have no reason to consider them bad as this is a reputable source.


Basically it's this: "We talked with some guys, who remotely related with this hobby industry and drew you this nice chart. May be information from talking was used when we did this, may be not"

All sales figures derive from "talking with some guys and drawing a chart." These guys, being retailers and distributors, would probably know what they're talking about.

[eggynack]

It's pretty telling that your only response is "well, maybe the numbers are bad." Which rather dodges the obvious question of "what if they're good?" Particularly given that we have no reason to consider them bad as this is a reputable source.

It's less, "The numbers are bad," or, "The numbers are good," and more, "I don't even know what the numbers are, and I have no idea what they mean." I don't know the basis this site is working off of, or how much better the sales are, or how they're judging the numbers, or anything. I just know that this website said a thing. I don't really think it's enough.

[Psyren]

You have a clear metric for how good they are - they are compared to D&D sales, which common wisdom has held as king of the roost for over a decade.

[eggynack]

You have a clear metric for how good they are - they are compared to D&D sales, which common wisdom has held as king of the roost for over a decade.
But I don't even know that. I don't know what the actual sales figures are, or exactly where they're getting that data. It's all very murky, and it leaves me without a clear picture of what's happening here, or why it could be happening.

[Psyren]

If you're truly concerned about the veracity of their rankings there is a Contact Us link where you can reach out to them.

[eggynack]

Fair enough, though from vanitas' description of the situation at hand, that seems unlikely to yield much in the way of results

[Psyren]

I'd do it myself, but you probably wouldn't believe me either :smalltongue:

[eggynack]

I'd do it myself, but you probably wouldn't believe me either :smalltongue:
I probably would. It really has less to do with the respectability of the source, and more to do with not knowing what the source is saying. Anyways, the whole thing is really a side issue, I think. PF's actions apparently make a whole bunch of people happy, which isn't in dispute no matter what the numbers behind that are, but they also make another bunch of people pissed off to a big extent. It seems like both groups came by their opinion fairly, regardless of the game's sales figures.

[olentu]

Made up? That's very offensive.
Here (http://www.geeknative.com/22529/pathfinder-outsells-dungeons-and-dragons/), let (http://cyclopeatron.blogspot.com.br/2011/11/paizo-spanks-hasbro-pathfinder.html) me (http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?308161-Pathfinder-outselling-D-amp-D) do your research (http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/20743.html) for (http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/27068.html) you (http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/26215.html). Happy (http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/24224.html)?
I think apologies are in order.

Yeah, so you know how you said things like "You're telling they lost 20 potential customers with that?, and "Also, twenty out of hundreds of thousands is hardly a "significant number"." None of that source you have provided demonstrates the relative distribution of happy customers to lost potential customers. If anything my statement seems more accurate now then ever.

[Psyren]

Lost potential customers are always regrettable, but being number one even without them shows that they weren't vital to the success of the product anyway.

[Big Fau]

Lost potential customers are always regrettable, but being number one even without them shows that they weren't vital to the success of the product anyway.

A product's success and it's quality are not always related.

[olentu]

Lost potential customers are always regrettable, but being number one even without them shows that they weren't vital to the success of the product anyway.

Huh, was that directed at me. If so it really does not address what I have said at all.

[MirddinEmris]

All sales figures derive from "talking with some guys and drawing a chart." These guys, being retailers and distributors, would probably know what they're talking about.

Well, i'm just familiar with this language and notice small things like "based on interviews" instead of "based on sales", which is always a red flag for me to double check information source. Of course it could be just be a bad speech token.

[Psyren]

I probably would. It really has less to do with the respectability of the source, and more to do with not knowing what the source is saying. Anyways, the whole thing is really a side issue, I think. PF's actions apparently make a whole bunch of people happy, which isn't in dispute no matter what the numbers behind that are, but they also make another bunch of people pissed off to a big extent. It seems like both groups came by their opinion fairly, regardless of the game's sales figures.

I think many of the demands of the unhappy group are unreasonable.


A product's success and it's quality are not always related.

They are not always unrelated either.

[eggynack]

I think many of the demands of the unhappy group are unreasonable.
I don't really understand that. It seems completely reasonable to expect a game that's produced after what amounts to years of play testing to not effectively return to the balance level of core. It also seems reasonable for people to expect to not be banned for expressing their play test based opinions in a play test. It's fine if you lack these expectations, but to expect other people to lack these expectations is utterly unreasonable.

[Big Fau]

I think many of the demands of the unhappy group are unreasonable.

Is it too much to ask that they take a look at the points raised by the COers regarding magic and magic items and tone those down a little?

[Psyren]

I don't really understand that. It seems completely reasonable to expect a game that's produced after what amounts to years of play testing to not effectively return to the balance level of core.

And how has it done that? Clerics, Wizards, and Druids can no longer start with 6 Str and out-melee the fighter. Bards can longer convince the BBEG to give up his life of crime with a single roll. Monks, with proper wealth, actually stand a chance at feeling cool. These were all core problems that no longer exist. So tell me what we've returned to.


It also seems reasonable for people to expect to not be banned for expressing their play test based opinions in a play test.

That depends entirely on how those opinions are expressed, and based on the conduct I've seen from some of those same folks here (Answerer, anyone?) I firmly believe that the vast majority of those bans were deserved.


Is it too much to ask that they take a look at the points raised by the COers regarding magic and magic items and tone those down a little?

There are limits to how far they can turn those dials without removing the backwards compatibility selling point of the game. Which is one reason why new base classes are such a good idea, they give you more ways to have all T3/all T4 campaigns if balance is so important to you.

[eggynack]

And how has it done that? Clerics, Wizards, and Druids can no longer start with 6 Str and out-melee the fighter. Bards can longer convince the BBEG to give up his life of crime with a single roll. Monks, with proper wealth, actually stand a chance at feeling cool. These were all core problems that no longer exist. So tell me what we've returned to.
In later parts of 3.5, they designed casters that were approximately at the same level of mundane classes that were also designed. In PF, casters are once again significantly more powerful than the mundane classes. The balance problems aren't functionally identical, but they're pretty similar, and they're still there.


That depends entirely on how those opinions are expressed, and based on the conduct I've seen from some of those same folks here (Answerer, anyone?) I firmly believe that the vast majority of those bans were deserved.
On this topic, we're still kinda arguing around the issue. I'm still not sure what percentage of these posts were expressed in a hateful manner, or what a hateful manner is being defined as. Some people have said that plenty of reasonable posters were banned for normally expressed opinions, and other people have said that plenty of word-crazed posters were banned for crazed-word opinions. Both groups are likely correct to some extent, but I don't know the extent, and I don't think that a justified banning necessarily justifies an unjustified one. Thus, while some of the bannings may have been deserved, I'd need more information to agree with your claim of a vast majority, and the percentage might not matter all that much anyway, because banning someone for a reasonable and reasonably expressed opinion sucks no matter what (unless, I suppose, if that opinion goes directly against explicitly stated rules, like political opinions here).

[Psyren]

In later parts of 3.5, they designed casters that were approximately at the same level of mundane classes that were also designed. In PF, casters are once again significantly more powerful than the mundane classes. The balance problems aren't functionally identical, but they're pretty similar, and they're still there.

First of all, as I said before, there is an extent to how far they could turn those dials without making the game cease to be backwards compatible. It is widely acknowledged that most of the balance issues are in core, and most of that had to come over intact (the core spells and items for instance) in order to attract as many 3.5 fans as possible. So they made a judgment call, and (rightly) valued compatibility over balance.

Second - these "balance problems" are not realized in actual play nearly as much as message boards would have us believe they are. So long as the most straightforward holes like Divine Power, Polymorph and Wild Shape were plugged, the more circuitous ones like spell balance and wealth could be left up to individual tables to address. So going to far in trying to address them would have been a waste of time and resources that could have gone to more profitable areas, and curtailed creativity to boot. As I've pointed out multiple times with OotS, game mechanics can inform narrative every bit as much as plot.



On this topic, we're still kinda arguing around the issue. I'm still not sure what percentage of these posts were expressed in a hateful manner, or what a hateful manner is being defined as. Some people have said that plenty of reasonable posters were banned for normally expressed opinions, and other people have said that plenty of word-crazed posters were banned for crazed-word opinions. Both groups are likely correct to some extent, but I don't know the extent, and I don't think that a justified banning necessarily justifies an unjustified one. Thus, while some of the bannings may have been deserved, I'd need more information to agree with your claim of a vast majority, and the percentage might not matter all that much anyway, because banning someone for a reasonable and reasonably expressed opinion sucks no matter what (unless, I suppose, if that opinion goes directly against explicitly stated rules, like political opinions here).

I guess there we'll just have to disagree, because I'm the kind of guy who is much more likely to give the designers the benefit of the doubt. I see GIFT (http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2004/03/19) pop up in just about every gaming community online that has a forum, and I have no reason to believe the trend is playing out any differently here. Not saying that the majority of community members are like that - but then, the majority don't get banned either.

[eggynack]

First of all, as I said before, there is an extent to how far they could turn those dials without making the game cease to be backwards compatible. It is widely acknowledged that most of the balance issues are in core, and most of that had to come over intact (the core spells and items for instance) in order to attract as many 3.5 fans as possible. So they made a judgment call, and (rightly) valued compatibility over balance.
See, you can think they made the right judgement call where that's considered, but that doesn't make it objectively the correct one. Perhaps they made the right decision from their perspective, but people who dislike PF for having balance problems have a perfectly reasonable grievance with the game. So, they chose compatibility over balance, and they attracting some amount of fans, and they alienated others. It is what it is.


I guess there we'll just have to disagree, because I'm the kind of guy who is much more likely to give the designers the benefit of the doubt. I see GIFT (http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2004/03/19) pop up in just about every gaming community online that has a forum, and I have no reason to believe the trend is playing out any differently here. Not saying that the majority of community members are like that - but then, the majority don't get banned either.
Plenty of people here, folks I trust the judgement of, say that people were banned for saying reasonable things. Sure, some people may have gone too far, and that's an inevitability, but I somehow doubt that Person_Man suddenly went crazy and shot up the PF message boards with insults.

[Psyren]

Only time will truly tell if it was the right choice. It seems to be working, is all I can say for certain, because they haven't all been laid off or gone bankrupt yet.


I agree that Person_Man is a benign poster and shouldn't have been banned, but that's just one example out of many. I won't bother listing the (at least 9) users I can think of between the Playground and there who have been overly insulting and vitriolic not just to Pathfinder itself, but to the Paizo developers, their families, and even to supporters like myself.

[eggynack]

Only time will truly tell if it was the right choice. It seems to be working, is all I can say for certain, because they haven't all been laid off or gone bankrupt yet.
Well, it probably was the right choice, from the money and fan making perspective. They're doing pretty well for themselves. However, they made the wrong choice from the perspective of making the people who currently dislike it like it. Just because something's doing well, and just because some people like it, that doesn't make the dislike from other people unjustified.



I agree that Person_Man is a benign poster and shouldn't have been banned, but that's just one example out of many. I won't bother listing the (at least 9) users I can think of between the Playground and there who have been overly insulting and vitriolic not just to Pathfinder itself, but to the Paizo developers, their families, and even to supporters like myself.
It just leaves us in a really "he said, she said"-ish situation. It'd be nice to have actual records of what happened, but I somewhat doubt they exist, and if Pathfinder went on as much of a post deletion spree as was claimed, then even surviving records would likely be incomplete in the very places that we'd want the opposite of incompleteness.

[Psyren]

Well, it probably was the right choice, from the money and fan making perspective. They're doing pretty well for themselves. However, they made the wrong choice from the perspective of making the people who currently dislike it like it. Just because something's doing well, and just because some people like it, that doesn't make the dislike from other people unjustified.

As far as I'm concerned, those folks were either a lost cause anyway, or the effort it would have taken to win them would have yielded insufficient returns. Either way, not an issue.

I know that sounds dismissive, and it unfortunately is. Trying to please everyone is a waste of time and resources for any business.



It just leaves us in a really "he said, she said"-ish situation. It'd be nice to have actual records of what happened, but I somewhat doubt they exist, and if Pathfinder went on as much of a post deletion spree as was claimed, then even surviving records would likely be incomplete in the very places that we'd want the opposite of incompleteness.

All I can go off is how the posters in question conduct themselves now. If they were even-tempered and reasonable today I'd have much more cause to believe they behaved that way back then, too. But they don't, so I don't.

Yes, their bitterness over the past may be part of what is coloring their attitudes today - but the simple fact is that they're not doing themselves any favors. If Person_Man could overcome this traumatic event to become the respected and courteous poster he is today, others could do so as well and I'd have much more reason to believe that the greater fault lies with Paizo. But the fact that a number of these folks got moderated and even banned here as well tells me that the problem does not just lie with one judge's style.

And to be fair, I acknowledge that SKR bears at least part of the blame there. I can see how his attitude can put people's backs up and escalate a situation rather than defuse it. But I can also easily imagine what the Paizo boards were like in the beginning, when 336 and all their gallons of machismo flowed over en masse, ready to rake the designers over the coals as part of their "tough love."

[eggynack]

As far as I'm concerned, those folks were either a lost cause anyway, or the effort it would have taken to win them would have yielded insufficient returns. Either way, not an issue.

I know that sounds dismissive, and it unfortunately is. Trying to please everyone is a waste of time and resources for any business.

Perhaps, and also perhaps. That still doesn't make the distaste that people have for the system unjustified. I'm honestly pretty doubtful that the system could not be balanced to some greater and reasonable extent, particularly seeing how balanced a lot of the classes made in the later years of 3.5 are, but it's kinda irrelevant.

[Pickford]

Psyren:

Lost potential customers are always regrettable, but being number one even without them shows that they weren't vital to the success of the product anyway.

It's not always just about pole position, but also by how much one is ahead. i.e. Did Paizo make gains or losses before and after these events? Even if they maintained #1 status, if they lost 10% market share from these events, that's significant.

However, that being said, I think from what's been posted here, it would appear the response was more on the order of acknowledging that although serious min-maxers can cause problems, the average player is not a min-maxer and will not suffer unduly from perceived flaws in the system.

Big_Fau, yes, at some point it becomes an issue of cost-effectiveness. How much time and effort will it require on the company to restructure or even resolve the issues raised? How much, in concrete gains, will this investment return? Nothing? Making a tiny percentage of players happier, assuming they even noticed it in the first place? If there are only a few malcontents, then this becomes a waste of time and money vs. developing new products.

[Sewercop]

I was one of those banned from paizo back in the day, and i probably deserved it. From the get go i didnt, but the snark the developers did answer with just threw fuel on the discussions. In the end I did deserve being banned.

Even thou paizo is a succesful company, the success would probably be even higher without the playtest debacle.
How much higher? That depends, but my opinion is 30%. You may disagree, but compare what bad publicity does to other businesses.
That speaks volume of how much wotc dropped the ball with 4th.

So kudos to paizo for making it work, but my view on the company are biased.
I stand by my stance that playtests are mostly for hype and garnering interest.
It is not just paizo that bans vocal critiquers, ICE,WOTC,S.J games,Paizo etc the list is long.

Without the playtest, paizo would not have been so succesful.

[Psyren]

Admitting that took a lot of integrity and I salute you.

[LordBlades]

Psyren:

Big_Fau, yes, at some point it becomes an issue of cost-effectiveness. How much time and effort will it require on the company to restructure or even resolve the issues raised? How much, in concrete gains, will this investment return? Nothing? Making a tiny percentage of players happier, assuming they even noticed it in the first place? If there are only a few malcontents, then this becomes a waste of time and money vs. developing new products.

Even if they felt addressing certain concerns was not cost effective, a polite 'thank you for your concern, but this is not the direction we want to go' would have gone a long way. You can't please everybody anyway; as a recent thread on this forum discussing some guy's blog post showed, there still are people that genuinely like the linear fighter quadratic wizard paradigm for example.Even if somebody is not in your target audience right now, it doesn't mean he won't be in the future (either his preferences might change, or your product might evolve); not alienating him by horrible attitudes costs next to nothing, and can yield some long term benefits.

Personally, I feel SKR has the social and game balance skills of a brick and that having him posting in public hurts Paizo's image quite a bit.

In regards to PF succeeding, it all depends on how you measure success.

If their goal was to not go bankrupt, they certainly succeeded.

If their goal was to outsell WotC, then they probably succeeded as well (that source might not be reliable, but it's the best we've got).

However, if their goal was to attract a majority of 3.5 players toward Pathfinder, I believe they failed horribly. On most RPG forums where PF is discussed alongside 3.5, PF threads are a (rather small) minority.

[Kudaku]

I see where you're coming from on SKR and I agree that he can be a bit snarky, even brusque at times. This is unfortunate. However I also find that he makes insightful, interesting, and genuinely helpful posts on the paizo forum every day (often in the AMs as well as the PMs), and so does most of the other members of the paizo staff.

Personally I vastly prefer a gaming company that often and eagerly interacts with, and appreciates, its fan base and community to the companies where developers are gagged and the only (typically one-way) interaction you get is with super-slick PR representatives and consumer-polled press releases.

[Psyren]

However, if their goal was to attract a majority of 3.5 players toward Pathfinder, I believe they failed horribly. On most RPG forums where PF is discussed alongside 3.5, PF threads are a (rather small) minority.

This is a very odd assessment. When I go to ENWorld for instance, I see 51 pages of 3.5 discussion and 32 pages of PF. 3.5 is still ahead, but considering that it had a near 8-year head start I think PF is catching up pretty well. Certainly it isn't a "small minority" by any stretch of the imagination.

The front page of this subforum is fairly PF light at the moment, but on the second page over half the discussions are either PF or system-neutral. It varies day to day, so again I'm not sure where this statistic is coming from save wishful thinking.

[LordBlades]

Personally I vastly prefer a gaming company that often and eagerly interacts with, and appreciates, its fan base and community to the companies where developers are gagged and the only (typically one-way) interaction you get is with super-slick PR representatives and consumer-polled press releases.

Appreciate as in 'ban people who offer constructive and well thought out posts that put their products in a bad light?'



This is a very odd assessment. When I go to ENWorld for instance, I see 51 pages of 3.5 discussion and 32 pages of PF. 3.5 is still ahead, but considering that it had a near 8-year head start I think PF is catching up pretty well. Certainly it isn't a "small minority" by any stretch of the imagination.

The front page of this subforum is fairly PF light at the moment, but on the second page over half the discussions are either PF or system-neutral. It varies day to day, so again I'm not sure where this statistic is coming from save wishful thinking.

D&D might have an 8 year headstart, but has also been out of print for around 5 years (4E was launched in 2008 according to wikipedia).

If after 4 years of existence PF still is behind a system that has been out of print for so long, then that's not 'catching up pretty well' in my book.

And again, it's not an exact statistic, just my personal impression, which you seem to confirm, so I'm not sure what you mean by wishful thinking.

[Psyren]

Appreciate as in 'ban people who offer constructive and well thought out posts that put their products in a bad light?'

That's a lot of words for "trolls and jerks." Though I will say that this doesn't apply to every single person who was banned.


D&D might have an 8 year headstart, but has also been out of print for around 5 years (4E was launched in 2008 according to wikipedia).

"Out of print" is irrelevant. Your books do not vanish simply because the company who made them has moved on to a new edition. There are still forums dedicated to 1e and 2e (and spiritual spinoffs, like OSRIC) even, and those were out of print for far longer.



And again, it's not an exact statistic, just my personal impression, which you seem to confirm, so I'm not sure what you mean by wishful thinking.

You said "rather small minority" which I did not confirm in the slightest.

[Kudaku]

Appreciate as in 'ban people who offer constructive and well thought out posts that put their products in a bad light?'

Mind showing me those posts? Because at the moment I see posts, threads and concepts like this (http://paizo.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/Store.woa/wa/browse?path=paizo&tab=paizo), this (http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2l7ns?Ask-James-Jacobs-ALL-your-Questions-Here#0), this (http://paizo.com/prd/) and this (http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2mjiz?Overheard-at-the-Paizo-office) and frankly all of them are fantastic.

I'm sorry you feel that Paizo ate your Fruit Loops eight(?) years ago, but isn't it about time to move on?

[Kelb_Panthera]

Actually psyren, out of print doesn't normally mean their books just disappeared but WotC actually did pull 3.5 products from retailer shelves when they launched 4th. Removing the entire first party supply and leaving only second hand sales available certainly had some noteable impact on 3.5's ability to gain new customers right when an alternative that's virtually the same product was at the beginning of its life.

[LordBlades]

That's a lot of words for "trolls and jerks." Though I will say that this doesn't apply to every single person who was banned.

To me at least, Paizo in general and SKR in special don't seem to be able to handle people that disagree with their position very well, even if said people argue their position in a civilized manner.




"Out of print" is irrelevant. Your books do not vanish simply because the company who made them has moved on to a new edition. There are still forums dedicated to 1e and 2e (and spiritual spinoffs, like OSRIC) even, and those were out of print for far longer.

But the supply of new books stopped. D&D 3.5 books are increasingly hard to get. Most FLGS and cons no longer organize 3.5 events. All in all the fact that the game is out of print means it's harder to get into playing 3.5, which should lead to a dwindling fan base (in theory)



You said "rather small minority" which I did not confirm in the slightest.

It's still a minority, that much you confirmed. 'small' is a relative term
For example, I'd consider 'The front page of this subforum is fairly PF light at the moment, but on the second page over half the discussions are either PF or system-neutral' as a small number of PF threads.

[Psyren]

To me at least, Paizo in general and SKR in special don't seem to be able to handle people that disagree with their position very well, even if said people argue their position in a civilized manner.

So the solution then is to be uncivilized, get banned, and ***** about it for nearly a decade?


But the supply of new books stopped. D&D 3.5 books are increasingly hard to get. Most FLGS and cons no longer organize 3.5 events. All in all the fact that the game is out of print means it's harder to get into playing 3.5, which should lead to a dwindling fan base (in theory)

But that won't necessarily translate to a dwindling online presence, since the kind of folks who went online to talk about 3.5 likely still do. The digital dropoff should therefore be minimal.



It's still a minority, that much you confirmed. 'small' is a relative term

With an 8 year head start I'd expect no less.

[LordBlades]

So the solution then is to be uncivilized, get banned, and ***** about it for nearly a decade?

Some people that got banned weren't uncivilized in anyway. I feel those people have the right to bitch about it for as long as they please.

[Psyren]

Some people that got banned weren't uncivilized in anyway. I feel those people have the right to bitch about it for as long as they please.

The irony is that the truly civilized ones - again, like Person_Man - aren't doing this.

But hey, free country and all that. So long as they complain about stuff Paizo is actually doing wrong (instead of provably false statements like "they didn't fix anything!") I have no reason to respond to them.