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...and the time it would take to get it on their schedule would defeat the purpose of a sneak peak.
Unfortunately, it doesn't sound like a "sneak peek" when it's presented to us in a thread titled "Campaign changing announcements being made tomorrow". More like "The world as you know it is coming to an end, you might want to follow along." :)
I’m happy to see so much praise for how this went, and understand a certain amount of the criticism. Obviously I’m coming from a position of bias, but I think the interactive element was last night’s biggest success.
Maybe. I watched part of the video once I found it, skipping around to try to catch the main announcements. (You can tell since I completely misunderstood what was happening to the book boons. :)
I didn't listen to the Q&A part much at all; I expect that all the same questions and responses will come up here in forum threads. Good for instant reactions, I imagine, especially if you did a good job filtering out the..."less useful" questions one typically sees at Q&A sessions.
I agree that there will be the feeling of being out of the loop or playing catch-up. I know when I miss a convention with a big announcement, it’s not a fun position to be in. This is at least a more inclusive version of that situation, because a narrowcast is far more accessible than any convention.
Another difference is that we typically know weeks or months in advance about events where big announcements are likely to be made. For here, it's PaizoCon and Gen Con.
Also, those announcements are usually officially reflected as a blog post or summary forum post from one of the principals quickly afterwards, which is far more accessible than any podcast from a different website which is actually a video on YouTube. :)
The biggest shortcoming it seems was communicating where to participate in the live broadcast. ...
Exactly. Facebook is not paizo.com. Neither is Twitter. Neither are your podcasts. We come here for information about Pathfinder and PFS. Other resources are great, but they need to be used in conjunction with the one people consider official.
(Edit: It's funny because, having just said that, most players don't read this website much either; they'll find out from their local GMs. Hopefully ahead of time, but probably in August when their characters need to change factions.)
I think it's good that they're trying new things and it actually went pretty well. There's just some tweaks that need to be made to help keep everyone in the loop. :)
Good luck with your podcast!
Bugleyman, I'm sorry, but I have to disagree with the way you approached this thread. From reading your comments, you've taken a position that new information not handled through a proper PR machine shouldn't be provided to the community. While I can understand your points, I disagree with your basic premise. Yes, they could have done official blog posts to release the information to the community at large, but that is something they have stated that they will do.
I think the perspective on this is that it was a "Sneak Peek" or an "Intentional Leak", a bit of information provided prior to the big announcements that you are wanting.
By "leaking" this information through the Know Directions podcast, they provided an experience that I felt was exciting, honest and personal. They were people who were excited about the information they were sharing, and they were sharing that information with people who were invested enough in getting that information that they made time to get it. By definition, the people who have made the time to get that information as it was being leaked, are highly invested in Paizo and the campaign. People who were able to get the information as to the location of the "leak" are also likely to be people who were up on the other elements of the campaign. They were people who'd be asking the questions that would help shape what information might need to be included when the news was released to the rest of the community. I'm sure that the questions we asked in that chat gave them some feedback as to questions the community at large would have asked, so that when the post is made that information will be included.
Many of the people in the chat were VOs who were looking forward towards the future of the campaign. It could be argued that they could have given that information exclusively to the VOs, which would have provided that initial sounding out of the player base. I think that providing the information in a manner that allowed anyone interested to potential have access to it was a good move, and far more generous than many companies would be. It also relieved the VOs of the burden of having to keep that secret.
I hate to see someone criticizing a company for being open with their customers. Public Relations is an area where many companies can improve, but I prefer Paizo's PR Policies over any non-co-op company I can think of. Yes, I'm saying that Paizo's Openness of communication is second only in my mind to Co-Ops that are literally being run by a portion of their member base and thus have extremely open door policies written into their bi-laws.
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Also, those announcements are usually officially reflected as a blog post or summary forum post from one of the principals quickly afterwards, which is far more accessible than any podcast from a different website.
Not to target yuo specifically, Parody, just using your post as an example, since it is the latest one with this kind of comment made in it.
BUT
Seriously people? I think you all need to take a step back and breathe a bit before you continue your bashing of how this was handled. It's been less than 24 hours since the podcast, and people are complaining like these announcements are effective immediately or are never going to be mentioned again.
You have about 4 months til this stuff takes effect, and you havent even given the campaign staff time to work up a blog post about what was said last night.
And dont give me a 'they should have had the blog post ready last night' stuff. They have lives outside of work and other stuff to work on here, too. Besides that, they didnt know what kinds of questions were going to be asked, or how that might affect their decision (WBL discussion as an example) on how the changes are being implemented.
Theyll get it blogged sooner or later. Everybody just chill out. :P
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Mr. Brock and Co.- "You can't please everyone all of the time." Kudos for trying something new even though it didn't fly well with everyone. Yes, it was big, big news and while I couldn't watch the podcast at the time, I was able to read the posts about it afterward and it doesn't bother me that I wasn't able to watch it "as it happened".
In my opinion, don't give up the podcast- skim the useful cream from the feedback you are receiving here (that is, follow up with a full blog the next day if possible), and carry on. Hopefully I will find time to actually watch the podcast and give feedback on it itself at some point.
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Agreed. For what its worth, I appreciate the 'sneak peak,' so to speak. It allows an opportunity to know about future chances and open discussions about a few things which haven't been finalized yet...and these are opportunities which may not be afforded to use if the traditional means of communication were used. (And I'm one of those people who have not had a chance to see it yet...I got the news through friends)
And a big thanks to Ryan and Parrim for all their hard work on their very excellent podcast which I enjoy whenever I get the chance. If you guys aren't listening to it, you should try. Aside from this PFS sneak peak, they have regular interviews with other Paizo staff which offers other unique insights into our favorite hobby.
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I, too, want to say how much I appreciate Mike, Mark, and John taking the time to answer questions live with the community. I enjoyed the podcast, and never having been to one of the big cons when any of them were there, it was good to see what they are like "in person."
I understand the frustration for people who couldn't attend, but honestly, I don't see how this is any different than making a big announcement at a con. In either situation, there are people who won't be able to be there. In fact, this is more accessible than a con, and I hope to see more events like this in the future. I'm confident that there will be follow-up on these announcements, and the information will appear in written form well before anything takes effect.
Mike, Mark, and John, thanks for the experience, and keep up the good work!
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You have about 4 months til this stuff takes effect, and you havent even given the campaign staff time to work up a blog post about what was said last night.
It all comes back to managing expectations. Many of us didn't know what to expect or where to find out about it. We knew what was going to be discussed, but not what was said.
For this, I think a summary forum post would have been appropriate: "Here are the changes we're planning to make, these ones are set in stone (factions going away), these ones we'd like to get opinions on (lower tier cash?)" and so on. Those things they already knew and should have been able to write up beforehand. They aren't dependent on discussion during the podcast. It wouldn't have to be long, but would help guide the resulting discussions.
I still think it went pretty well overall. We're just nitpicking at this point, which is one of the things us (overly?) interested, invested folks do. :)
Please don't ever stop the casual conversation about the game. Having some information delivered through non-traditional means, without the polish of a PR department can be valuable and exciting. I also like podcasts (waves to Azmyth).
That said. This effort got tangled and a bit messed up (imo). I was under the impression that this was official "campaign changing announcements being made", I never got the impression that this was a "sneak peek" to future announcements. You might have said so in the podcast (but my audio kept cutting out so I got 30 sec chunks on info with 30 sec breaks). I fully expected to wake up to a summary blog post that detailed these "campaign changing announcements" that were made yesterday. It is clear to me now that the PFS leadership intended this to be a "sneak peek", but the way it was announced and presented did not lead to that impression. And now the information does not seem clear, it is chaotic and spread across many threads and discussions.
Please do this again. But learn from this and please do it differently. Still do the informal "leak" style podcast, but follow it up (almost immediately) with your official announcement. Leaving the information hanging out there in unofficial bits helps no one. Why leave it hanging for future blog announcements (some which may be months out?) If the information was not ready to leak (officially or unofficially) it probably should not have been let out. If there are reasons that the information is still being worked on, let the community know that this is a "peek" into things that "may/will" be happening. I expected to come away excited with clear new exiting campaign changing information, instead I have a "wait for the blog post" attitude. It is not the same thing, but given the run up to the podcast, I don’t feel that my expectations were off.
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I don't see what those upset are even upset about. It was an informal podcast and everything from the podcast would have probably been put up in a Blog post today. Everything was put up unofficially here by posters instead. Welcome to 2013! Information moves fast. I think they did a great job with the podcast and have no issue how things turned out. Folks are never happy it seems.
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I don't see what those upset are even upset about. It was an informal podcast and everything from the podcast would have probably been put up in a Blog post today. Everything was put up unofficially here by posters instead. Welcome to 2013! Information moves fast. I think they did a great job with the podcast and have no issue how things turned out. Folks are never happy it seems.
I agree with you on pretty much all counts, but wanted to reiterate this point.
The information was VERY quickly available on Paizo by listeners. This partially because folks like to pass on info here it seems. It's also in part because MM&J specifically ASKED that threads be started here, so that the topics brought up last night could be discussed. They wanted to have records of the back and forth, so they could peruse, take notes, and be a part of the discussion with the community.
True the initial release was not on Paizo.com. So what? Could there have been a big bold link to the podcast? Sure. Was it hard to find a link to the podcast if you took a minute to search the thread about the upcoming discussion? Nope. I found it in a few seconds while looking on my tablet.
I hope they continue making notices public when and where they can. Personally, Mike's personal availability and willingness to discuss day to day matters here, on Facebook, email, etc. has been one of the reasons I've been sort of re-energized in my desire to be a part of Society play.
Just my 2cp.
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So with the AP's being sanctioned in reverse order am I going to be able to take GM credit for Carrion Crown even though I already ran it and finished it two months ago??
They mentioned that doing so would open too big a can of worms, so they have no current plans to allow retroactive credit.
Their recommendation is you take the sanctioned parts of the module and play them (or GM them) in "PFS mode" (where you only do the set number of encounters like a module)
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[toungeincheek]I think that Mark, Mike and John did a horrible job... I mean they forgot to announce that they're making Thassalonian Specialist legal!
I mean the nerve of them![/toungeincheek]
The campaign staff did an excellent job trying to squeeze a sneak peak of several months of blogs into a 2 hour podcast.
It would be hard to ask for more from a first time attempt.
Sure they can make some tweaks in the future to improve getting the notice out of what is going down and where, but that's an easy oversight to fix in the future.
I want to thank the Campaign staff for the sneak peak, because it has allowed us as a community to have a glimpse at what is going to happen and also is going to allow us to have a say in what we think of a major change [wealth system] that we wouldn't have had without the advance notice.
I truly appreciate the effort the Campaign staff and Know Direction put into this and want to thank them for all the hard work.
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I'm pretty disappointed to see the changes being made to wealth and risk/reward. The wealth awarded is based on the loot gained in the adventure - the WBL tables should be used as guides but not rules.
Of course this would not be an issue if someone had listened and understood my solution a long time ago - the problem with the tiers. The risk and reward is based on a sub tier.
1-2
4-5
3-4
6-7
5-6
8-9
7-8
10-11
for a sanctioned mod, you need to be within one level of the mod's level to play. so a level 5 mod, you need to be 4, 5, or 6.
why don't they apply that rule to the subtiers and eliminate the tiers?
Right now, a level 4 can play up into a level 6-7 subtier, but not a 5-6 subtier. a 6 can play an 8-9, but not a 7-8.
If they held to the rule that you simply have to be within 1 level of a subtier to play, and just ignore the tier segregation to begin with, that would eliminate nearly all the wealth by level problems this rather unfair disbursement of risk/reward is causing. If I'm going to play up into a 8-9 with my 5, I dang well want the wealth that goes with it. if I play down into a 1-2 with my level 5, I shouldn't get more wealth than appropriate to the level played. This is going to encourage people to play down even more, and the scenarios will be "too easy!"
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No sarcasm. I learned first few months only to speak matter-of-factly and not even joke most of the time.
Which I still find as a great lost to our community here. The loss of your humor in your posts has reduced the connection between us and you putting a wall in place that I wish was not there.
Your posts prior to that change were more human and helped us feel closer to you. Without the humor, which I miss, you seem more disconnected from the rest of us.
I still remember when you first started your Job and I told you that you need to show your sense of Humor more in your posts, I am passing along that same advice again... :).
Here I will let you make fun of me as much as you want! Everyone else does...
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The problem with humor in communication is that it's all fine and dandy and we're dashing across strawberry fields while holding hands and then one day you've got to get the bad news out and suddenly it's all hurt feelings, burning sensation in the anal area, "but you were so nice" and so on. Which is super bad in environments such as Organized Play.
And considering that our hobby has its' fair share of people who, for various reasons, have hard time communicating with others, it's better to play safe and be the dour guy. Sad but true.
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Add me to the list of folks that enjoyed the podcast and hope that you do not shy away from this "sneak peak" approach. I'm also one of the folks that did not know about the podcast until after the fact and that does not bother me one bit.
The first step (no pun intended) is always the roughest and I have every confidence that you'll learn and improve from this experience.
I'm excited about the changes and look forward to the faction retirement scenario for my shadow lodge PCs. I know Ron will make it very memorable!
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Pathfinder Society Campaign Coordinator
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The other big thing that a few have complained about is a lack of transcript/details. The intent was/is a sneak peak, that means some info, not all of it. That said, a Paizo Blog post with the bulletpoints, link to the video, and a comment that the details will be in future PFS Blog post should have been ready to go early today.
It took slightly longer than anticipated but it did go up early this afternoon, around 12:30 pm PST. LINK
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We will [...] not do a sneak peak again.
Mike, I really hope you can be persuaded to reconsider this. I really enjoyed listening to the podcast (despite it taking place 01:00-03:00 UK time!) and very much appreciate the three of you taking two full hours to present this information.
The fact that Mark, John, and you got to speak at some length about each topic really helped to give context, and the fact that we could see you and hear your tone gave it a much more personal touch than a blog post.
The only changes I would suggest (other than doing it a few hours earlier in the day!) are to make it absolutely clear it's a sneak peek, rather than the main announcement, and to make sure a link to the Know Direction YouTube channel is included in any communication that happens. That should prevent any complaints from those who seemed to have missed the point this time. Having said that, I personally had no issues finding out about the podcast (seeing both the Facebook post and the thread here) and finding out where to listen to it live (as I know how to do a web search...)
Thanks again!
RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16
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We were just starting our 1st session of Ruby Phoenix Tournament and we sat at the table listening intently to the podcast while everyone read up on Performance Combat. Honestly, it was hard to tear ourselves away to start up the game! I thought the podcast was a great format and I hope you do it again. Blog posts are great and all, but I'm always happy to see the human beings behind the whole thing!
The irony of starting RPT on the day that the Lantern Lodge mission is declared as nearing completion was not lost on the table.
Venture-Lieutenant, West Virginia—Charleston
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We were just starting our 1st session of Ruby Phoenix Tournament and we sat at the table listening intently to the podcast while everyone read up on Performance Combat. Honestly, it was hard to tear ourselves away to start up the game! I thought the podcast was a great format and I hope you do it again. Blog posts are great and all, but I'm always happy to see the human beings behind the whole thing!
The irony of starting RPT on the day that the Lantern Lodge mission is declared as nearing completion was not lost on the table.
It would have been even more ironic if it were Eyes of the Tien.