The forums aren't fun anymore

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ghamadvar wrote:

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I really don't get it. This is not a fan-forum.

I disagree a little here - GGG doesn't have paying customers, by dint we're all here because we are fans. The game lives or dies on its entertainment value, and the forums can possibly work as an extension of that by providing people with entertainment and value. The shit posting diminishes those, but so do empty forums :(

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DestroTheGod wrote:

I'd like to state the implications of this scenario:

- You can't come to the Official Game Forums for help or to find useful information.
- You can't come to the forums for entertainment.
- Individual forums lose their purpose. If Bug Reports doesn't get bug reports, then it's useless. Forum traffic overall most likely heavily influences individual subreddit forum traffic.

If you genuinely are happy with those implications, then that's cool. But you're basically just saying you would prefer a dead, useless, empty forum. And I disagree with, and would not want, that.

No, I am not happy with those implications. But then again, I don't agree that any of those are correct at all in the first place.

-helpful or useful posts aren't likely to get removed in the first place. Even the ones saying the game is bad are fine as long as you can do so at least somewhat politely and/or give a rational argument as to WHY it's bad. The problem is half the people on here seem incapable of expressing a negative opinion on something without saying "shit" every other word...

-You certainly CAN come here for entertainment as well. As long as your "entertainment" doesn't come at someone else's expense. If someone can't have fun without insulting other people, trolling, or generally speaking being a jerk, then yeah...I think we're better off without them. If your idea of entertainment is more along the lines of having an intelligent, rational, civilized discussion about the game, then the new rules will do far more to encourage that than to stop it.

- Removing all the trolling and other negative posts will have no effect on legitimate bug reports either. And if some of the forums DO lose enough traffic to not be needed any more, the correct solution would be to combine a few of them and have less forums(which is probably needed in any case at this point...), not to keep all the toxic posts they had before as "filler".

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ghamadvar wrote:

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I really don't get it. This is not a fan-forum.

I disagree a little here - GGG doesn't have paying customers, by dint we're all here because we are fans. The game lives or dies on its entertainment value, and the forums can possibly work as an extension of that by providing people with entertainment and value. The shit posting diminishes those, but so do empty forums :(

Hey Nait, appreciate your comment as always.

But think about it: First, GGG has paying customers. MTX, supporter packs, stash-tabs etc. That's all bought and that is what matters. F2P IS a business-model.

Let us see: MTX are bought by everyone or none. Supporter packs are bought by customers who are happy. Stash-tabs and stuff are bought by everyone, but in the future: mostly by newbies. I don't need the 30th stash tab (or whatever) as much as the newbie needs his 5-8th ;)

So, in short: customers are there. And in most cases, they need to be happy AND / OR newbies.

Now let us see: A Newbie asks a question in the good ol' forum. Reactions: Sarcasm, trollism, gifs, one-liners. In many cases. Newbie never shows up again (want proof? Watch the newbie-OPs). Other newbies read it. Read that and some other stuff. Get scared. As one of the coolest Youtubers would say: poor lil bambies. Gone.
Happiness: I would call myself a normal player. And i was not happy with the manners shown here. I hated the troll posts. I hated how everyone made a sandbox out of this forum while telling everyone that "POE is waayyyy better than D3, GGG rulz, i loves this game, here, have my money". While acting like this forum right here is fucking Youtube. While acting like fucking spam-bots, making one bullshit-OP after another. This forum became a place where a few dominated the many. And that is NEVER good. There were times (i know you know them) where you couldn't post one thing without risking to start something totally chaotic. Not bad, but chaotic.
Now: Moderation is a little bit of the track. Yes. But the liberal stance and the good humor of this "little company" were tested long enough. How would you feel when you would run a business. And this business turns out to be good? And while you try to run this business, some act like your business still is a 50/50 chance. And that you have to be proud of those who act like jerks. They don't get that you need more professionalism. That you need help. Not supporter packs, not MTX. no stash-tabs. Just help, right here. More professional employees, but also more professional fans, customers, users.

But no: As soon as you turn on the brakes and just get a little bit more professional (or at least: try) and maybe fail in the first place, all the so called hardcore-fans act like you are North-Korea (still: worst comparison ever) or a shitty company like U**soft. And they run away. They scream and shout and throw dirt. At first sight. It is a shame. Not that some have a problem with the forum-moderation (i have one, no worries). That is okay. Everyone has his or her flaws. But when the things become ugly just for the FIRST time (as i know), people run away, abandon the ship, form groups, post shit, rebel. This is just ridiculous.

It is a company's forum. A forum of a company that is great. And i don't get why some are acting so hysterical. GGG always was a trial and error, a communication-based company. But now: Nobody seems to care. "Goodbye forum" somebody said. Yeah well: Good bye then ;)

edit: And about the empty forums: I say this is summer plus a calm phase of POE (except for beta and season there is nothing great to do) plus clumsy moderation that scared some people plus yeah, well, less trolls and spammers. Nothing to worry, i believe.

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Tom_GGG wrote:

Hi there!

Just thought I'd drop in to address a few concerns regarding the new guidelines.

Please know that this revision has been brought in due to the excessively large amount of hostile and defamatory posts aimed at individuals on the forums. We are in no way aiming to censor or cull the community's opinions or freedom of expression.

However, it is our hope that this can be done without the need for aggressive content or by directly attacking any individual who chooses to use the forum, regardless of their background or playstyle.

Our community manager is working very hard to meet the needs of everyone who uses the forums, both current and prospective. The team will only action where completely necessary after warnings and repeat offenses.

Should you have any concerns regarding moderation, please feel free to contact us directly at support@grindinggear.com

I hope this information helps, as we are here to help in any way that we can. Have a great day in Wraeclast!

Totally we all know that trying to cull the community whitout good gear is totally useless, next time try it with at least with 550/120 in 6 players party you'll be WAY more successfull. .tough I cannot figure what would the drops be. Period ( she has period o_o leave her alone!!!)

I feel like the actual game itself is in limbo right now. Theres 1 person online on my friends list atm out of 98 people, 3 weeks into a new league there would be at least 20 people online right now. Some are over in beta, but I bet if I sign on there right now itll be like 3 people online. I think the forums inactivity just mirrors the games inactivity, we were expecting act4 already, its not here, this gap is just dragging on, more and more people are just giving up paying attention to the game daily until its actually released.


Ive managed not to get put on probation at all since the new guidelines were put in place, Im not sure Ive even had a section of post removed by support. Ive not even been consciously trying to change how I post, so I feel like it cant be that bad. Ive seen a lot of other people on probation so theres that I guess lol, Ive yet to witness why theyve gone in the sin bin, I usually creep into their recent posts to try and find the source of the shenanigans and am left clueless.

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ghamadvar wrote:

But think about it: First, GGG has paying customers. MTX, supporter packs, stash-tabs etc. That's all bought and that is what matters

Part of what keeps me paying is the fact I use the forums so much. They make me feel like part of a community. I don't know whether there is a correlation of any kind between people being active on the forums and buying supporter packs, but it wouldn't surprise me if there is. I am aware that a lot of people spend money on the game and never even use the forum, but for me personally it's part of why I spend money on GGG.

Once upon a time, people were relatively civilized to each other here, and it was when there were far less rules. It was more about basic respect. When you posted anything, you knew Chris n Co would be reading, possibly responding directly, and you wouldn't write anything on the forum that you wouldn't be willing to write to them directly. I think that did a lot to help keep people in line, whether it was intentional or not.

Rather than just deleting asinine comments and putting the commenter on probation, maybe we could go the route of having a mod simply respond to the comment by pointing out what makes it asinine and asking whether the person could reword it in a more constructive way.

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Bex_GGG wrote:

Please do engage the team. Talking to you guys is the best way for us to find the right line for the Forum Guidelines. At the moment, they are slightly harsher than intended, but for now I'm okay with that. It's good to find the upper limit of what's too severe so we know where it is and can pull it back to a comfortable place while keeping the core intention of the changes.

Just like Ice Crash :D

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MonstaMunch wrote:

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ghamadvar wrote:

But think about it: First, GGG has paying customers. MTX, supporter packs, stash-tabs etc. That's all bought and that is what matters

Part of what keeps me paying is the fact I use the forums so much. They make me feel like part of a community. I don't know whether there is a correlation of any kind between people being active on the forums and buying supporter packs, but it wouldn't surprise me if there is. I am aware that a lot of people spend money on the game and never even use the forum, but for me personally it's part of why I spend money on GGG.

Once upon a time, people were relatively civilized to each other here, and it was when there were far less rules. It was more about basic respect. When you posted anything, you knew Chris n Co would be reading, possibly responding directly, and you wouldn't write anything on the forum that you wouldn't be willing to write to them directly. I think that did a lot to help keep people in line, whether it was intentional or not.

Rather than just deleting asinine comments and putting the commenter on probation, maybe we could go the route of having a mod simply respond to the comment by pointing out what makes it asinine and asking whether the person could reword it in a more constructive way.

Nothing against it. This is the ONE side that needs to get better. Now the other side, the users, have to think about what went wrong, don't you think? The toxin not only came from GGG's side. As you can read here: Some want to "relief stress", "push the boundaries", "see how far they can get" and so on. If this mindset does not change, it is more than unfair to demand the mods to be more liberal and clear. And most of the users that went or stopped posting just left. At first shooting, they left ;)

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ghamadvar wrote:

The toxin not only came from GGG's side. As you can read here: Some want to "relief stress", "push the boundaries", "see how far they can get" and so on. If this mindset does not change, it is more than unfair to demand the mods to be more liberal and clear. And most of the users that went or stopped posting just left. At first shooting, they left ;)

I don't think the "toxin" came from GGG's side at all. I'm just saying that people used to push boundaries and relieve stress in a more respectful way, because they knew they'd be called out on it if they didn't. Now their stuff just gets deleted and everyone is left to wonder what was said. As more rules have been introduced, the community has become more toxic. It's precisely because there are so many boundaries now that people seem to feel compelled to push them. Take away the boundaries and replace them with common sense, and there is little left to push.

"A lot of people like to fool you and say that you’re not smart if you never went to college, but common sense rules over everything. [Removed by Support]" - Snoop Dogg

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MonstaMunch wrote:

I'm just saying that people used to push boundaries and relieve stress in a more respectful way

[Removed by Support]

Anyway most people will trade their freedom for safety so majority vote will always be "All hail rules"; it's pointless to argue with history of mankind.