Requiel wrote:We have official communication channels. Those channels are Rightnow and direct communication with GMs ingame. If you have queries in future you can direct them there. I shall also continue to monitor and respond on FH. I shall no longer be participating in this forum.
I'd challenge the adeqacy of those communication channels.
Reporting something to RightNow may get an immediate problem resolved for a specific player. The communication from GOA in RightNow is typically concise to the point of being terse (for good reason, given that it is a helpdesk). On larger issues, like the XML, the player gets a non-commital and vague response (i.e. GOA refuses to communicate on the subject).
In game GMs are slightly less terse but suffer the same drawbacks. Ask one about the XML and at best you'll get a response to the effect of "I don't know what the status is on that, I'll check up".
Neither of these channels communicates anything about the status of long-term issues.
Maybe that's as GOA wants it. Maybe GOA feel that players do not need to know when the XML is going to be fixed or when a particular patch will be delivered. That's a risky strategy these days, though. DAoC has an increasingly hard time to gain and retain players in the competitive MMORPG market. A large portion of the player-base consists of long-term players who stay in large part through loyalty. If you make them feel they are not valued, or give them enough little reasons to become disaffected (e.g. leave the XML fix on a timescale that is rapidly becoming "never"), you'll lost them.
Once upon a time, the novelty of DAoC was enough to retain these people and a lack of competition in the market conspired to keep even disaffected players in the game. Now that those things are no longer in your favour, GOA's relationship with the playerbase is playing a larger part in player retention.
Communication is the key to having a good relationship with the players. Leaving it up to ad hoc replies from Requiel on important (to the players) subjects is probably doomed to failure. You need a clearer long-term vision of how to convey information on sensitive subjects.
(flame inc! :mojo: :thand: )
