Announcing The Old Republic Guild Summit

Agreed. You'll note it's just a Q&A followed by a PR presentation what they've already designed (and who knows when they'll implement that). I doubt very much if player feedback will have much effect at this point (did it ever?). I hope I'm wrong, but I doubt it.

I agree that Guild support & expansion will make or break this game and if they don't do something soon, folks aren't going to pay monthly for what is realistically a single-player game.

The post I'm quoting is a good example of the kind of thing you can expect at a "Guild Summit".

1.) WoW peaked in popularity during the same expansion as the "easy and candy like" complaints: Wrath of the Lich King. Yes, epics were easy to get. The game was also more fun, not because it was easy to obtain gear, but because everyone could find things to do, and goals to achieve for their character.

2.) Making a game hard doesn't attract players. Vanguard: Saga of Heroes was one of the hardest MMOs. Have you heard of it? No? That's because it wasn't popular. Now it's free to play and no further content is being developed. That's what happens when you cater a game to the hardest of the hardcore: 95% of potential players can't even level, so they get mad, so they quit.

This approach to MMO design is rather like building a car that takes a Ph.D. in Engineering to understand. Sure, you CAN do that, and for those few people who comprehend its operation, it'll probably feel awesome. But what's the sales forecast look like for that business model, exactly?

3.) WoW began to lose popularity precisely when they decided to make raids hard again (Cataclysm). There's your second counter-example. They're still making hard raids and they've lost around a third of their subscribers. That was even before they announced their "kung fu pandas" nonsense.

In fact, this is exactly why you shouldn't listen to anyone willing to attend a "Guild Summit". Leading a guild and being a hardcore player doesn't mean you have the slightest clue about how to make a game marketable (or lend it staying power).

Well said.

The current and last tier of raid content in WoW is actually much, much easier, relative to the first two tiers. It seems that Blizzard has learned its lesson, and realises that making things too challenging will just scare people away. Adding the Looking For Raid tool with its face-roll difficulty further appeases the majority who aren't really looking for a challenge, but even the normal 10-man content is pretty easy to get through.

So it seems you're right, and I'd guess the raid content that comes with the pandas will be pretty accessible.

Blizzard made a game that's accessible to casual players, yet still retains modes of play challenging enough for most other players. THAT is why is grew in popularity. Over the course of seven years, it's grown and shrunk with the ebb and flow of various market forces, yet overall, it's maintained a massive edge over its competition, due to the simple fact that Blizzard listens to their testsrs and customers.

BioWare AUSTIN released a game to the market that *IGNORED* major forms of input from the majority of their pre-release testers, and fell victim to 1) developer arrogance, and 2) developer comfort, due directly to 3) gushing fanboy's that fawned and praised every aspect of the game, and vehemently shouted down even the most minor forms of written or vocalized criticism. Accessibility, feature sets, mid game content, end game content, and storylines, were all shredded, repeatedly. Now, after the fact, BWA may finally be doing something about it.

I certainly hope they do. Too bad they've lost 1.25 years of development time and have to play catch up.

And for the record, "WoW Pandas" is probably the most widely requested "missing" feature from original Warcraft lore. Pandarens aren't new. There were legal reasons why they were missing.

To all of those whining that this should be more "open to everyone" stop and realize for a moment what you are asking:

1 million players

All of them given 1 minute to express an idea to bioware

1 million minutes is 16,666 hours... which is 696 days

You just asked bioware to spend 696 days of continuous face time to give every person in the game a chance to give 1 minute of feedback

This is a ludicrous ignorant suggestion completely devoid of any logical mechanic capable of creating a functional event in the real world

Instead you know what works? Having maybe 100 or so dedicated members of the community who are themselves representatives of smaller communities (ie. guilds)

How else do you expect them to do it? They can garner useable feedback from a few dozen people who themselves have collected feedback from hundreds or thousands. Which is what they are doing. A conference like this is helpful.

Allowing a million people to chatter at them at once, would not be.

As for answering the question of why they need this feedback at all? Its pretty freaking simple and obvious: they get a million suggestions a day, 90% of them are contradictory. Its more important for them to figure out the most useful and important ones to focus on rather than let themselves be over whelmed with ignorant noise.

Anyone not understanding that this event is a good thing for the game has no foundation in logic or reasoning and is more interested in making noise than in helping improve the game. And before you argue against that sentiment, look very closely at the logistics required to make anything like this happen with any substantial number of people.

Ive worked in and around the game industry from time to time, I've been an MMO player for more than a decade, I've been a guild leader in various MMO (and currently hold a senior position in a SWTOR guild). Having feedback sessions like this is a rare and important step for a company that actually wants to think long term. Far too many companies are operating in a vacuum or worse they are trying to listen to a million voices at once.

I wish I could go (but I haven't been invited and probably wouldnt have the extra cash on hand even if I was), but I have friends in Austin (who work in the game industry) and I am hopeful at least some of them will be going, if not myself.

I ask all of you to stop and think before making suggestions that are not realistic (like having this be open to everyone as a few people have suggested).

----
Good Luck Bioware, you are gonna need it.

regards,
Vince
http://www.linkedin.com/in/vincentbeers

It makes more sense to invite guild leaders to this summit than random players. In order to lead a guild, the guild leader has to have some measure of communication skills, which is a prerequisite for a meaningful dialog with the developers. A random player might very well not have that, making the money and time spent on said person a giant waste.

Guild leaders also represent a number of people. Any guild leader worth a damn will gather issues and questions from his/her guild-mates and bring them to the summit. Any guild-member could conceivably do this, but the guild leader is more likely to already possess the organisatorial skills needed to gather and present these issues and questions in a constructive manner.

The summit is a good opportunity for quality feedback and dialog. Good opportunities like that don't come everyday in life. This opportunity doesn't cost anyone who doesn't want to go anything at all. Bug-fixes and game development will still be rolled out on a weekly basis.

I disagree... Wow began to lose popularity cuz the game was at the end. Experienced players after 6\7 years (but even 3\4) have had enough to do always the same things... yeah you have new classes new races but the game is always that...
All the content from lvl 1 to 85 is too simple now (you can level at triple speed tahn previous..) The so called "heroic raids" are diff just for the first 3 try.. after become a piece of cake.. (BT and Karazhan were difficult.. not FL...)
I think the sweet pandas are just a try to find some asian follower before the end...

It feels like people who don't to support the summit will often turn to this argument. However Bioware already stated they invited guild leaders of all types. That would include casual guilds.

Bioware has already done a great job in making operations accessible to everyone (Normal modes are pretty easy). I doubt that model will change. The main thing I want to see changed with that is gear scaling with the level of difficulty. They have three sets of gear, I always wondered why the three sets did not drop per each mode of difficulty.

Anyway Bioware already stated that they will have a way for it to be open to the public as well (I would guess by a live stream and chat system) so everyone has a chance to submit their own feedback at the summit.

As well as there are always other means to get your voice heard. When has Bioware had a history of doing things only a select few wanted? Never. People have complained that previous summits were too closed off. And now they are more open. If there is enough support for this summit perhaps it can be even more open the next time around.

You guys are a bunch of negative nancies

The most basic flaw of the entire "Guild Summit", is the underlying belief that Guild Masters 1) WILL represent viewpoints other than their own, and, 2) CAN represent viewpoints other than their own. The logic of GM = Capable and Objective Representative is seriously flawed. The fact that subscriber money is going to be spent to fly an individual out to Texas and put them up in a hotel, when the only viewpoint they are humanly capable of actually representing is one they themselves believe in, i.e. "personal viewpoints", is rather insulting to every single individual not invited to participate in "event".