Especially now that the results have been bloated by special interest groups...

then form your own special interest group?

Especially now that the results have been bloated by special interest groups...

Even bloating didn't change Class Stories' big lead

It is kind of funny how over the first week it leveled out around 500, then suddenly within a couple of days it exploded to 2000.

What's *really* funny is how many days you think are in a week...the poll was posted on 2013-11-04 - -six days ago. Bioware/Eric posted on 2013-11-07, causing it to appear on Dev Tracker, and more than 50% of the replies occurred after BW/E's post.

I agree with you entirely! General Discussion and this forums can certainly be a great representation of the playerbase at large, and its opinions. I don't want you to get the idea that I was saying otherwise. My reasoning is specifically tied to polls. Again, not that polls are bad, just that in many cases players can misunderstand poll results as "undeniable proof" of a point. It is when you can put a tangible number behind an opinion that things get a bit tricky and that is where the "in a vacuum" comment comes in. (like the Warzone type example I made)

 

-eric

lolol give an MMO player a rope, he'll wana be a cowboy ;P

Especially now that the results have been bloated by special interest groups...

yeah, can´t believe how anyone could bloat class stories. It´s a huge scam.

also this

This poll is pointless. You don't really expect EA will listen to you, do you?

I won't disagree with any of the points you have made. Polling definitely has many benefits, and understanding player feedback from the forums is certainly a component of that.

 

You didn't actually hit on the reason we don't do them generally, and that is perception. I realize I just insinuated that there is a perception problem (dirty words!!!) but hear me out first . Unfortunately the forums can exist in a vacuum. That is, that people will often think that what is reflected in the forums is always the reality of how things are for everyone. Polling all too often reinforces that belief. Let me give you an example.

 

Let's say someone posted a poll "What Warzone map style would you like to see next in a new map? Huttball, Alderaan, or Voidstar"

 

After 2 weeks or so of voting, Alderaan has the most votes with 40%, and 300 people voting for it. 3 months later, we release a new patch, and we have a new Huttball map. The general users of the forums, will not be pleased. If you look at the poll and only at the poll you will get things like "EVERYONE AGREED WE WANTED ALDERAAN!" By making the poll, it is implied that the poll is the core metric to a decision being made; it is just one component. That is not to say forum opinion doesn't matter, of course. It is just that it is merely a sampling.

 

Think of it this way... in my previous example 300 people voted for the winning selection. I will spare you the math, but if hundreds of thousands of people play SWTOR, 300 is a fraction of a percent. We can't sway entire decisions based on just that poll. However, people look to polls to justify decisions and unfortunately things just aren't that simple.

 

That is the long form on why we typically don't do polling.

 

TLDR - People assume poll results indicate // guarantee actual majority opinion and assume it will solely affect decision making.

 

-eric

I think that this is completely true and I was starting to think of how one might go about getting a more accurate idea of what people want and it dawned on me, what if when you logged into swtor a poll popped up on the character selection screen or log in screen (I thought maybe the character selection would be best because it would be easier to limit it to 1 vote per account) and basically have it ask the question of what the players want. If you had it run for 1 or 2 weeks then you would be able to get feed back from the majority of active players. I understand that you would likely have to make the game capable doing a poll but with the space battle update coming in 3 or 4 weeks you might be able to include it in that update. Also to deal with the fact that some people would point to it and say "what you are putting out isn't what people want!" you could simply not release the results but instead once the poll ends put something out that says: "Thanks everyone for you feedback, we are glad to announce that over the next [some amount of time] we will be focusing mainly on releasing content relating to X, Y, & Z."

What's *really* funny is how many days you think are in a week...the poll was posted on 2013-11-04 - -six days ago. Bioware/Eric posted on 2013-11-07, causing it to appear on Dev Tracker, and more than 50% of the replies occurred after BW/E's post.

I spent the weekend at Blizzcon, it felt like a week.

A NEW PLANET, a hundred times A NEW PLANET.

A real one, not oricon or CZ-198, one with multiple rep/imp bases, new critters, new (non-daily) missions and stories, one that feels whole (unlike Makeb), one that makes me feel immersed again, one that does not resemble an existing planet too much.

Without new planets, Im fairly certain class missions wont continue. Every chapter had at least a 3 planet arc. So if we get more planets, we get more class quest.

A NEW PLANET, a hundred times A NEW PLANET.

 

A real one, not oricon or CZ-198, one with multiple rep/imp bases, new critters, new (non-daily) missions and stories, one that feels whole (unlike Makeb), one that makes me feel immersed again, one that does not resemble an existing planet too much.

 

Without new planets, Im fairly certain class missions wont continue. Every chapter had at least a 3 planet arc. So if we get more planets, we get more class quest.

I want Naboo so we can kill Gungans.

1. Other: Want speech bubbles more than anything.

2. Class Story: This is probably the biggest advantage i see in SWTOR over other MMOs, so expanding on this is always good.

3. Customization: This is where the vast majority of my cartel coins go, so more is always better here.

Let's say someone posted a poll "What Warzone map style would you like to see next in a new map? Huttball, Alderaan, or Voidstar"

After 2 weeks or so of voting, Alderaan has the most votes with 40%, and 300 people voting for it. 3 months later, we release a new patch, and we have a new Huttball map. The general users of the forums, will not be pleased. If you look at the poll and only at the poll you will get things like "EVERYONE AGREED WE WANTED ALDERAAN!" By making the poll, it is implied that the poll is the core metric to a decision being made; it is just one component.

Also to deal with the fact that some people would point to it and say "what you are putting out isn't what people want!" you could simply not release the results but instead once the poll ends put something out that says: "Thanks everyone for you feedback, we are glad to announce that over the next [some amount of time] we will be focusing mainly on releasing content relating to X, Y, & Z."

Problem solved!

Even if people would prefer to see the results, I don't think the hidden-results approach would drive them away from voting. It's actually pretty standard in a lot of polls/surveys that you don't see the results.

Problem solved!

 

Even if people would prefer to see the results, I don't think the hidden-results approach would drive them away from voting. It's actually pretty standard in a lot of polls/surveys that you don't see the results.

Then people would complain they couldnt see the results and there would be some conspiracy that bioware did this to create the illusion that they cared.

New Classes... new worlds... new sith/jedi history.

New costumization system in how u drees our character... like 1 slot for pve and another slot for pvp gear so u can switch gear and weapons and you can save the slots...

a new slot on the gear for costume...

Bring us hoods why allways helmets or that uggly thing in ur head? something better

New grafics more realistic and more actual like mass effect 3 at least.

2 or 3 world neutral zones so u can encounter with jedi/sith and make battles without "flagged time" or "pvp zone" i mean free world with quests for the 2 sides

Some new guild system... like buy a house, with passive skill... guild wars... alliances... take control of one city or world and can apply taxes or discounts wtih skill bonuses... mounts for skilled guilds only or ships.

improve lvl caps for every player free and sub with new skills and improve the skill three.

Improve skill three for ppl who want to make something different like hybrid classes.

improve the ffree player account with trade (so all can sell items or trade) that thing make ppl quit.

improve the free player account to allow to use bank and gbank so he/she can play more in the game...

Bring us the race of Yoda playable...

Bring us the race of General Grievous....

and ofc some cinematics in the news quests for more realistic roll like an entire war and you in the middle.

bring something to mark the map or able to mark area of interest.

sry for my english and sry if someone get angry with this is just my opinion

Legacy Missions!

Posted this before,

How cool would it be to go on a mission, titled Legacy Mission of course, and according to your family tree who you would meet and how they would react to each other. Say i'm doing a Legacy Mission as my Sith Jugg, start running through the mobs and get to the first boss, which is my brother a Jedi Knight, who says, differences aside let go (because he's light side, if Dark maybe a fight) but also give you the option to choose a Dark side choice not team up and fight him instead.

If levels are also different just boost them to the character's level so i don't injure a lvl 10 when playing as a 55 =D

Just to add to why I had one of my choices as OTHER:

I really think they need to add more to guilds. Communication and perks or events or something. A better way to deal with alts would be a start. I think we should have an option to see account names next to each character name and the limit of 500 should be accounts, not characters.

I still think class stories is needed the most, but something should really be done with guilds. It is very disappointing that they have only really been a chat friends list. I expected much more out of an MMO.

Awright Eric,

 

Here's a challenge for you: implement in-game polling.

It's already available - anyone who was in beta knows they can poll you at any time.

In other words, don't do what I want, do what you want. Not a real argument against, thanks.

That's how he is - ignore the trolls.

It is kind of funny how over the first week it leveled out around 500, then suddenly within a couple of days it exploded to 2000.

Amazing what a yellow name can do for exposure huh?

Especially now that the results have been bloated by special interest groups...

Special interest groups? Customers you mean? I love how much credibility you and others gave this poll after 24 hours when PvP was low on the charts - Eric posts in and suddenly the poll is a sham.

Special interest groups? Customers you mean? I love how much credibility you and others gave this poll after 24 hours when PvP was low on the charts - Eric posts in and suddenly the poll is a sham.

I believe he was refering to the call out in one of the PvP server forums that urged everyone to come vote PvP up.

Which hardly destabilized the poll, as I'm sure other people who favored other things also alerted their friends to come vote for the things they like.

Nature of the beast and all.

It is against logic to make a poll for current subscribers only

Far more interesting would be:

1. What do Ex-Subscribers want (to come back) ?

(See unsubscribers thread for reference)

Those didn´t vote

2. What do F2P players want who are not willing to get a subscription or not paying a dime?

Those didn´t vote either

3. What do MMO players want who read about the game, got a "meh" opinion and didn´t even check it out?

Those didn´t vote either

So, there. Poll flawed, results flawed, given options incomplete, and 5 x multiple choice doesn´t prioritze features. The poll is fun and good for a lenghty drama thread, but that´s about it.

It is against logic to make a poll for current subscribers only

 

Far more interesting would be:

 

1. What do Ex-Subscribers want (to come back) ?

(See unsubscribers thread for reference)

Those didn´t vote

 

2. What do F2P players want who are not willing to get a subscription or not paying a dime?

Those didn´t vote either

 

3. What do MMO players want who read about the game, got a "meh" opinion and didn´t even check it out?

Those didn´t vote either

 

So, there. Poll flawed, results flawed, given options incomplete, and 5 x multiple choice doesn´t prioritze features. The poll is fun and good for a lenghty drama thread, but that´s about it.

Uh oh guys, I think he's stuck in a loop.

Uh oh guys, I think he's stuck in a loop.

Lol! It's like one of those mixing turn tables. Because, becau, becau, becau, beeeeeeeecause, he doesn't like the results.

Lol! It's like one of those mixing turn tables. Because, becau, becau, becau, beeeeeeeecause, he doesn't like the results.

More like "scratching" IMO.