Communication (or lack thereof)

[Mythryndel]

I have, like many others, been feeding my PS addiction on the forums since the server went down. I have tried to post constructive criticism and refrain from doing nothing but B****ing and complaining. I have also tried to be patient. Please understand that this complaint is not about some downtime or even a criticism of the game itself. My problem is simply with the way people communicate in this community. Follow along with me if you will...

- Server goes down for any number of reasons.
- People start posting on the forums about the server being down.
- (only recently) someone associated with PS (usually Xordan) will post something vague about the server.
[EDIT: PLEASE note that vague only implies that not much is known, not that anyone is trying to hide details]
- Server continues to be down.
- People don't hear anything more about what is going on.
- People start posting hypothetical solutions to the unknown problem.
- Mods and the like start getting irritated that people won't stop posting or caring that the server is down.
- Community members start getting irritated that they haven't heard anything and that their advice is getting discarded out-of-hand.
- Mods start getting frustrated at getting bashed and start locking threads.
- Community members start rallying into two camps... One defending the game and telling people to piss off... and another telling everyone the game is crap and that they are leaving.

I personally am very appreciative of the efforts of the dev team (and all the other "teams" that make up PS)... but i gotta say... the communication with the Community sucks.

Do you "owe" us anything? no.
Do you "have" to tell us anything? no.

Do you ask something from us? yes. If we don't like it, help change it is a frequent retort on these forums. If you can't get involved, at least file meaningful bug reports.

I for one, file bug reports as often as I find new ones. I also have offered to help in the capacities I am allowed by my current employer (no coding... sorry). Only problem is, during this server outage, people were trying to help by posting possible resolutions. These remedies ranged from getting donations to changing servers/hosting companies. Without more details about the exact nature of the problem, people couldn't be more specific with their advice. Instead of being seen as trying to offer their expertise, they got told how ungrateful they were being.

Now... here is my whole point....

Do you, meaning PS officials, really care about the community? Not just in making the game, not just in mechanics and such... but really value the community? If you do, then you should show it by treating us like part of the community. Keep us in the loop when major things happen. Don't tell someone who is genuinely trying to offer constructive advice/$$/alternatives a reply that either implies or outright states that they are being ungrateful. If you don't want wild speculation going on about what the problem might be, tell us what you know. Why is it that nobody can take a few seconds to post something official? If you don't know anything, post as much on a daily basis. Laanx forbid, use the "news box".

All we want is for things to better and get back to playing. If you notice the thread Xordan started, everyone started out nice, civil, appreciative. Then everyone started asking for an update. Why is it that someone obviously not connected to PS was relaying info from someone officially connected to PS? Instead of simply saying, server still down, nothing we can do at the moment... we get mixed messages when someone does finally respond, and tempers start flaring on both sides because everyone is frustrated.

I will not claim that some of the community members didn't long-jump over the line of good taste in some of their responses. However, they were/are not the majority of people posting about the outage.

*** on a side note to the community (not going to name names) but GIVE IT A REST with berating people that get frustrated with the lack of communication. Just because someone would like to know what is going on doesn't mean they are just being an @$$, requiring you to come to the devs defense. ***

[Xordan]

Okay, from now on we can send mass emails to all members every 10 minutes containing

"No more news."

Because that's exactly the news we have to report. Would that be often enough for you?

Or you can pay for my plane tickets and accommodation so I can sort things out myself. $10k should do it.

If we don't have any news worth telling then we won't post. When we do then we will. Most of us are in the dark as much as the players.
It's rather insulting that people suggest that we just don't care.

[Mythryndel]

I'm sorry that you are the one to respond to this first, because I have been very grateful for your posts. I am not implying that there is anything that can be done, that isn't being done. I am simply saying that we want to know what is going on. Daily, once every 24 hours, is a good interval when things are down this long.

[Xordan]

For several days in the last week there has been nothing going on though. I've heard 3 or so bits of news myself, spread out over the week.
Two of them were very vague. Everything we know so far as been posted.

[Mythryndel]

I am going to make an assumption, that you, Xordan, are not the one on the phone/keyboard communicating directly with fragnetics. I will make another assumption, that the person who is in direct communication knows more than "it is down". If you are the "face" of the PS team when things go down, then they should keep you in the loop better too.

[Xordan]

Actually I've been doing most of the contact with fragnetics. We only found out in the last day or two that the problem is probably overheating. They haven't been terribly quick in sorting it out unfortunately - it caught them at a bad time (in the middle of a datacentre move, and two of the main guys are really busy with weddings and other RL stuff). So until yesterday or so, all we knew was "it is down".

[Mythryndel]

That info would have put an end to a LOT of speculation going on in the other threads.

I was dealing with a similar situation recently... the IT person taking care of my server at the corporate office... didn't notice that the server room was getting a bit toasty... and all I had were logs showing that the system came back up all by itself...  very annoying... but I digress...

[Under the moon]

You mean the info that we had no info until yesterday, and it is only 'probably' info? Perhaps you missed it the first time in the posts of Devs saying "We will tell you when we know something."


http://hydlaa.com/smf/index.php?topic=33501.msg385619#msg385619
http://hydlaa.com/smf/index.php?topic=33501.msg385732#msg385732
http://hydlaa.com/smf/index.php?topic=33501.msg385819#msg385819
http://hydlaa.com/smf/index.php?topic=33501.msg386326#msg386326

[Pang Tong]

Well it's not like I'm about to say anything that hasn't been said before, but as a new member I feel a strange need to say it.

So to the developers (especially xorden.).... Thanks.

I've spent a while cruising the so called "free mmorpg's" out there, and every single one of them was a huge disapointment after figuring out how their Premium account system worked.

So long story short, PlaneShift is a breath of fresh spring clean air after nearly drowning in clogged sewer pipe. In short it is worth the wait.

(god I hope I don't sound like a total newb right now  )

[Edig]

(god I hope I don't sound like a total newb right now  )

Oh Talad Almighty how I detest that word newb, noob, n00b, or any derivation thereof.  It's a grotesque bastardization of what once meant someone who was  inexperienced.  Now it means someone who is totally without brains.

You are NOT a "Newb".  You are inexperienced.  And no you didn't sound like one!

You'll do fine here Pang Tong.  Don't forget to ask questions and let people help out.

Read the forums, and most important, have fun!

[Under the moon]

So long story short, PlaneShift is a breath of fresh spring clean air after nearly drowning in clogged sewer pipe. In short it is worth the wait.

Welcome, Pang Tong. Over here we have the Plaza. Over there is the Tavern. Oh, and you will not want to miss the sewers... they will make you feel right at home. 

[Pang Tong]

thanks for the vote of confidense Edig.  

First post on a new forum has always been a bit unnerving for me.  

[Pang Tong]

So long story short, PlaneShift is a breath of fresh spring clean air after nearly drowning in clogged sewer pipe. In short it is worth the wait.

Welcome, Pang Tong. Over here we have the Plaza. Over there is the Tavern. Oh, and you will not want to miss the sewers... they will make you feel right at home. 

well if a quest demands it then I'll just have to go grab my scuba gear. 

[Mythryndel]

UTM... even by the links you posted... 4 days went by without an update. That is when people started getting frustrated. Then a post was made that the server was up and the thread is locked. Well, as we all know now, the server wasn't "up" at that time or stable. But the thread remained locked, and the mods seemed to get frustrated that people were still wanting to know what happened... and just kept locking all threads where anybody asked what was going on...

This isn't the first time this has happened, and I am sure it won't be the last that there is an outage of some sort. I have noticed that there is more communication than when I got here early this year, but it is still frustratingly sparse sometimes.

[Lolitra, Celorrim Purrty Twins]

Lolitra scowels "Don't you hate the sort of passenger in a car that is constantly saying 'are we there yet?'"