How much Influence do we as players wield?
- Thread starter TGT
- Start date
Right Hand of God
Mongoose
I think, in my own opinion, the answer to your question is that we as players wield far too much power. The amount of moaning whining and gripes on the threads about this fleet or that fleet, the balance of one ship against another just leads to constant revisions and updates to prove that mongoose is in touch with its customer base. I think Armageddon and the recent release of the Drakh minatures and then the Armageddon miniatures go to show that the customer base is loyal enough regardless of the mistakes made, it isn't necessary to pander to the whim of every megalomaniac with acess to the internet. Personally I don't think that is necesarily a good thing. Look at the rules for fighters which have swung backwards and fowards since the initial rules as a case in point.
You cannot satisfy all of the people all of the time and I believe it to be a mistake to attempt to satisfy the whines and gripes of those that shout loudest and most often from these threads. The gripes often only serve the need of a particular fleet or are an attemp to water down the hard hitters of others.
I think most people are of the opinion that the playtesters didn't do all that they could to thoroughly test Armageddon, but then the rest of us do not know what was submitted by them and rejected or the terms of the playtest they undertook, without knowing that, too much critiscism of them is a little unfair.
I would agree that 5 is insufficient to playtest a system, if you want it played and tested to death open it up to everybody but structure and support the playtesting with stats and results and forms to fill in and send back that are generic and of use to those who will be writing the rules and producing the stats, at least that way everyone has a say and everyone is in on it from the start.
Or do it in secret without the really annoying little hints in dribs and drabs from playtesters with the "i know something you don't know but can't tell you and it's so so cool" syndrome. Nor do I think playtesters should be selected by committee or by common vote. Mongoose use the PM system and ask those you would like to play test for you, just make sure you are asking them for the right reasons, or that they are saying yes for the right reasons, I'm certain you would not be short of volunteers.
Decision by committee is fine if you want no accountability, no responsibility, and a large amount of hot air.
You cannot satisfy all of the people all of the time and I believe it to be a mistake to attempt to satisfy the whines and gripes of those that shout loudest and most often from these threads. The gripes often only serve the need of a particular fleet or are an attemp to water down the hard hitters of others.
I think most people are of the opinion that the playtesters didn't do all that they could to thoroughly test Armageddon, but then the rest of us do not know what was submitted by them and rejected or the terms of the playtest they undertook, without knowing that, too much critiscism of them is a little unfair.
I would agree that 5 is insufficient to playtest a system, if you want it played and tested to death open it up to everybody but structure and support the playtesting with stats and results and forms to fill in and send back that are generic and of use to those who will be writing the rules and producing the stats, at least that way everyone has a say and everyone is in on it from the start.
Or do it in secret without the really annoying little hints in dribs and drabs from playtesters with the "i know something you don't know but can't tell you and it's so so cool" syndrome. Nor do I think playtesters should be selected by committee or by common vote. Mongoose use the PM system and ask those you would like to play test for you, just make sure you are asking them for the right reasons, or that they are saying yes for the right reasons, I'm certain you would not be short of volunteers.
Decision by committee is fine if you want no accountability, no responsibility, and a large amount of hot air.
Whoever said the ancients wouldn't also benefit from redundancy? Each level would have a certain amount of redundancy, eg. raid 1, battle 2, war 3, armageddon 5... ancients 8katadder said:Burger said:Hot-swap redundancy means something does not go offline at all. If it goes offline and comes back very quickly, then its not redundant is it, its "a spare"
nice so you want better redudancy than even the ancients?
The ancients repair crit effects in the end-phase, even when they have run out of redundancies.
msprange said:
You did. This wasn't an attack on the Saggi or wether it's too much or just right, this was in response to Wulf when he said that "most of the ideas here are only to suit the individual", referring to the fact that some ideas thrown up on the boards are totally incompatble with the current system, or that only a few people were complaining that their favourite ship wasn't good enough.
And purely in response to the official statement on the Armageddon Saggi, i feel that the wrong decision was made in that giving a fleet one super ship that renders the rest of the ships in that fleet redundant is not a good way to ensure balance within the list, but others have already said this in other threads and I'm sure their opinions have been taken into account.
thePirv said:
His was a fair comment, if not completely politic
The immediacy of the Internet allows players to say 'hey, wouldn't it be whizz-o-whizz if this ship could. . .'
And that's fine - everyone has their own approach to games in general, and past experiences with other systems will colour perceptions. Some will want more detail and complexity, others will want to stay as far away from that as possible.
Doesn't mean either is wrong
It is our task to pick through all the comments, gauge the general sway of opinion, and see what can fit and what should be left on the forums.
We cannot read every post on every game that appears on these forums (not any more, at least). But we do study areas in detail, and your thoughts do count.
emperorpenguin
Mongoose
thePirv said:
There were never 5 playtesters, that would involve Erik jetting across the atlantic every day to play the remaining 4 of us.....
There were 5 guys with their own circle of gamers and players so you're looking more at (I'll hazard a guess 30) not taking into account Mongoose HQ
There are now 7 playtesting groups too
Plus those at Mongoose itself
emperorpenguin
Mongoose
msprange said:Plus those at Mongoose itself
Pay attention Matt!
Worth saying twice, don't you agree?
emperorpenguin
Mongoose
msprange said:Worth saying twice, don't you agree?
nice recovery!
lastbesthope
Mongoose
emperorpenguin said:msprange said:Worth saying twice, don't you agree?
nice recovery!
To quote Jason Mewes "Don't wanna piss off that Rickman dude!" :lol:
LBH
Glad you have a couple new groups at work. (Wish our group or one of the local ones was part of that. If only because I do not feel the style of play around here is all that similar to what is being played elsewhere.)
I do not think most folks are too cncerned with 'my suggestion for x' was not taken up as with new rules that have big flaws being adopted even after they are discussed at length as being flawed. See the fighters fire first vs anti-fighter/vree/crit'd out large ships discussions.
I have been watching a lot of the polls lately and much like the American electorate we seem to have a roughly 50/50 split on a lot of ideas on this forum. Part of the heat the threads seem full of lately is that we are not getting solid concensus on rules we are getting the 51% solutions. Commitee might not produce exactly what you want, but they rarely produce something you actively hate either.
Anyway, guess I disagree that the concessus of the boards on issues like fighters, Centauri beams, Ancients variants, etc are so far off that they should be dismissed as self serving. Many are pursued because folks feel they will strengthen the game and they find a number of allies among the fan base.
Ripple
I do not think most folks are too cncerned with 'my suggestion for x' was not taken up as with new rules that have big flaws being adopted even after they are discussed at length as being flawed. See the fighters fire first vs anti-fighter/vree/crit'd out large ships discussions.
I have been watching a lot of the polls lately and much like the American electorate we seem to have a roughly 50/50 split on a lot of ideas on this forum. Part of the heat the threads seem full of lately is that we are not getting solid concensus on rules we are getting the 51% solutions. Commitee might not produce exactly what you want, but they rarely produce something you actively hate either.
Anyway, guess I disagree that the concessus of the boards on issues like fighters, Centauri beams, Ancients variants, etc are so far off that they should be dismissed as self serving. Many are pursued because folks feel they will strengthen the game and they find a number of allies among the fan base.
Ripple
When it's a case of larger scale list changes that's the case (such as multiple ships being thought of as over/underpowered, even when there is a consensus between virtually every player). However, from what I've heard, even the playtesters aren't always agreed with on every issue :shock:JayRaider said:
Well i think that the people here hgave some power yes.
But often we have heard about stuff from playtesters being miraculously changed back from last playtest draft to finished product.......
And on fighters, well that was a bad case of overcorrecting. PreSFOS was far too strong, ACTA had become a fighters (tank rush) game rather than ship combat. SFOS fighters were weak enough to be 90% ignored. No need to buy em, cause battlefield influence was way too low, my Narn were never caring about enemy fighter tactics, even when hotshots like Sinclairs alpha flight were present......
Armageddon is too new for a good assessment.
But often we have heard about stuff from playtesters being miraculously changed back from last playtest draft to finished product.......
And on fighters, well that was a bad case of overcorrecting. PreSFOS was far too strong, ACTA had become a fighters (tank rush) game rather than ship combat. SFOS fighters were weak enough to be 90% ignored. No need to buy em, cause battlefield influence was way too low, my Narn were never caring about enemy fighter tactics, even when hotshots like Sinclairs alpha flight were present......
Armageddon is too new for a good assessment.
