[Long] Why your feedback is important, but your reasoning isn't

I can't say that I agree on everything, but the basic point is true. Trust the guts, they're also part of your brain and one that often knows way more about you than your own consciousness.

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But is it actually true that playing a challengeless, roflstomping character is more enjoyable than a more balanced one?

Of course it is!(*) How could you even assume otherwise?!

* - if by "balanced" you meant "nerfed to shit"

Good read with some valid points. Unfortunately the people that need to read this simply won't.

ps: edited due to bad English

The opening post is very interesting but I don't think the title is the correct conclusion. When you take the ideal case of someone who has never played PoE before and who provides well reasoned, unbiased feedback on his experiences, regarding how to attract or not to push away new players GGG can gain a lot. It enables them to understand the mindset of such players in a much better way than empirical data could ever do.

If you take less ideal cases, like biased players who favour Diablo 3, there is still a lot to be gained for GGG, in that they can see how they fare against a company who dominates the genre.

People who die in the first act of normal and quit without a word are much less useful than people who die, quit, and tell GGG why they quit. People who run into gear-checks or non-intuitive mechanics and quit are much less useful than people providing feedback about that.

The thing with your examples is that they don't necessarily apply to PoE. If you ask someone about his reasoning for the quality evaluation of a jam, due to social pressure he might feel inclined not to be perceived as a gourmant.
But if you ask someone about a game that, compared to others, has little social standing, the probability that his answer is truthful is much greater.

But besides all that, any feedback can be evaluated. Some are obviously better reasoned and more useful than others.

Make a form, first make people rate 1-10 and after that, ask them to write their opinions, they can either write their own thoughts or leave it blank if they are not willing/can't do it, this way you can have both the cake and the chicken.

Okay i was reading most of this looking for the real point that corresponds to title, never found it but it could have been there in the last 1/3 or so.

Well anyway i found it really funny that it should come from you this one title, because if i know one person that likes to go into enormous detail and complicated suggestions instead of simply giving feedback, that would be you.

Because i very much agree with your title in some ways. Those huge suggestions of exactly how one thinks it should be done, are rarely very relevant.

What devs want to hear, the feedback they want is actually the problems you encounter. They are much more interested in having problems and your experience of playing the game game brought to light so they can work on improving the game, than having people find the solutions for them. If the solution is obvious, chances are they will do the exactly that anway. They are after all game developers, and it is what they do for a living. They are not interested in being drones that carry out the will of the community, they want to build the game itself. Those are also the devs you want, you want them to be driven and creative feeling confident in where they helped bring the game, you don't want devs that have no vision themselves.

That's why the best feedback addresses the actual problems you face, and maybe some light suggestions as to what can be done, but the most important feedback is actually just bringing the problems to light so they can see them and fix them if they feel it needs to be fixed.

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Crackmonster wrote:

Well anyway i found it really funny that it should come from you this one title, because if i know one person that likes to go into enormous detail and complicated suggestions instead of simply giving feedback, that would be you.

Well at least you know I have a sense of humor about it when I do. ;)

My personal aim is to hone my expertise. As such, I am trying to work on the whole "enormous detail" end of things. This doesn't mean that I believe I'm infallible. I think an apparently brilliant forum post can go all New Coke, get believed by devs, and harm the game. I'm probably in a top twenty list of forumers who could make such disasters happen.

Still, I can't help but be for try, for see and for know about the theory of it all. Part of who I am.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

3. Players are a good source of knowing if something about a game is broken or not, but an atrocious choice of providing reasons why something is broken or not... and if you push them for reasons, they might tell you broken things aren't broken.
4. Asking a forumer to explain his feedback is actually counterproductive to good feedback, unless that forumer is an expert.

Roxor is not a journalist, he's a member of the RPGCodex forums who seems to be good at writing entertaining reviews. I agree with many of his points but he "only" played it on hard (where you can basically do what you want and succeed anyway) and it shows, calling the best class in a party of 6, the priest, crap etc. But it's pretty clear that he is an expert of the cRPG genre.

I disagree that gaming journalists give superior feedback.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

This thread is about expert feedback versus layman feedback.

Because those journalists are not experts at specific games. I think experts of Path of Exile are players who dedicated hundreds of hours to this game, theorycrafted builds and engaged in or at least followed forum discussions about game mechanics. Having played other H'n'S games also helps.

Professional game journalist feedback is almost worthless in comparison, just look at all the positive Pillars reviews of major gaming sites.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

5. GGG should care more about getting beta impressions from gaming journalists than from streamers.

What the... You value the feedback of a professional gaming journalist whose job is to "casually" play and review a lot of different games higher than some knowledgable streamers like Nugi or Etup?

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Odoakar wrote:

Pillars is one of the best games to be made in last couple of years. Everything in it is superb, even gameplay.

I wish I could say the same. Everything is easy, generic and boring compared to the BG games with SRS AI mod. Even PotD difficulty which looks cheap on paper with the bloated enemy stats can be facerolled with a decent party, using basically the same strategy every fight.

I also rerolled a few times and stopped playing at some point but I didn't need a review to tell me the reasons. I just needed to remember some encounters from my BG SRS playthroughs to compare them. I would certainly beat like every mainstream gaming journalist in discussions about specific gameplay mechanics of that genre.^^

I think you're wrong about the whole skipping to Merciless and maps thing. The people who are experienced at the game can get there in no time at all. At best, I'd say if you're going to skip content, it should be in the final week of beta since those who just got a key won't have time to get very far.

Somebody else said something about giving people who won't make it to maps a chance to play in them. What's the point? If they can't figure out how to make it to maps, they won't magically become good players by rushing them there.

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mark1030 wrote:

Somebody else said something about giving people who won't make it to maps a chance to play in them. What's the point? If they can't figure out how to make it to maps, they won't magically become good players by rushing them there.

who said that?


Second question: Isn't it the same?