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Hello!
First of all I would like to say that I'm in love with the second edition, I already have great plans to migrate from edition a year from now when the final version comes out.
I would also like to say that I am a big fan of Paizo and all their material and staff.
However, I would like to make an appeal ... I feel that the answers to the questions and the interactions with the people here have been minimal. Sometimes I see Mark trying to clarify something or trying to explain some concept of desing that was done.
By this (Mark clarifyng) we know that some monsters and the difficulty table are with some wrong content because they carry an old design concept.
What I mean, and I want to make it clear, that I do not want this to become a Q&A. But there are topics that are generating doubts since the beginning of the playtes (shields for example) and so far no one from the team appeared on the topic or to lighten up or just to say: "Hey we're listening to you, we're thinking like team how could this be changed after analyze our data "
Ans see, doubt generates fear and angry! Many posts are made because people have fear that the system will not hold together or angry because some things changed and they don't even know why they changed.
I'm really excited about 2ed. GMed the first and second part of DDD and also the first scenario of PFS. Me and my players loved! I have too made a person that never ever played RPG to like the creation system of her character
But sometimes I'm feeling in the dark, you know? I really want this game to be the best (and I've loved the concepts you've created), but please share a little love with us here!
Do not understand this as criticism, just as an affectionate request!
I am pretty sure there are some pretty specific rules governing what the team is allowed to share outside of designated channels. I don't really get the specifics on how it works, and I only vaguely understand why such rules are deemed necessary, but I'm pretty sure this is the case.
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We're seeing regular blogposts, rules updates and videos. Compared to any other previous playtest, this is probably the most engaged the design team has been with the playtesters of their rules on the forums.
Addressing each poster's questions individually would be a massive time sink that could be better used for data collection, internal design discussion and formal updates.
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I am pretty sure there are some pretty specific rules governing what the team is allowed to share outside of designated channels. I don't really get the specifics on how it works, and I only vaguely understand why such rules are deemed necessary, but I'm pretty sure this is the case.
I'm not asking for a bug report of all things!
For all I care are that small problems be easily discussed and resolved so we don't waste like a month debating how do shields works.
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I feel like how spotty the forums have been for like 3 weeks now has a pretty significant impact on how much the devs are posting.
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I'd like them to clear up the intent on some rules. They are reading, it would only take a sentence or two. I'd rather them respond to that than opinion posts.
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I'd like them to clear up the intent on some rules. They are reading, it would only take a sentence or two. I'd rather them respond to that than opinion posts.
And have the answer to an issue be buried on page 3 of some random thread where no one else will know of it?
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That would be a step up from "I think they explained it somewhere in a Twitch video I saw".
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Example from another thread:
In the Twitch stream tonight (Aug 31) with designer Stephen Radney McFarland, he clarified that a shield can take multiple dents with the same blow. I asked the question,
“A fighter with a wooden shield of 3 hardness performs a shield block, and is hit for 100 damage. (1) how much damage does the fighter take, and (2) how many dents does the shield take? “ his answer was that the fighter takes 97 damage and the shield is destroyed, as in “took multiple dents at once”.
Later someone else tracked down the actual quote (at "about the 46 minute mark")
"Now the shield is gonna take AT LEAST one dent, and if I were the GM, though this isn't really codified, it would just shatter... But yeah, you'd take AT LEAST one dent."Because this 'ruling' was made in a video, it was (a) an off-the-cuff statement, not carefully considered or fact-checked, and (b) misquoted later, and (c) something you have to watch for 46 minutes if you want to find out what he actually said.
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And have the answer to an issue be buried on page 3 of some random thread where no one else will know of it?I'd like them to clear up the intent on some rules. They are reading, it would only take a sentence or two. I'd rather them respond to that than opinion posts.
You are misunderstanding what I'm asking...
I don't want they make erratas in forum posts. I just wanna say that woul be nice to see they interact more with the community!
Something like:
"Hey we get that this is generating confusion, we will issue this in next errata! Now go find us another problem!"
/\ this eliminates confusion
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Can Jason Bulmahn come to my house and review this list of questions that I have? I'll keep it short.
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What I'd like to see would be a brief list of areas that they're thinking about since they know there MAY be issues. Nothing more than them acknowledging that they've seen the criticisms and are thinking about those areas
E.g (using my personal peeves as examples. All are subjects with considerable discussion online)
Skill DCs too high
Assurance
Hidden knowledge checks
Need for more interesting skill feats
That would at least let me know that I've been heard and my opinions (and those of countless others, of course) have been heard.
Although, typing this in and glancing at the threads, its quite possible that the union of everybodies concerns would be absurdly large.
The main issue right now with dev interaction is the forums are moving way too fast to keep up with. Even the server has had trouble keeping up, which is why the site has had so much downtime lately. For the devs to try and keep up with everything would mean taking time away from actually fixing the problems that are coming up.
I'm sure the devs are reading your questions and taking note of them for the next errata. If they were to "clarify" rules willy nilly on every post it would start getting confusing. "unofficial" dev rulings never end up well as a concept.
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What I'd like to see would be a brief list of areas that they're thinking about since they know there MAY be issues. Nothing more than them acknowledging that they've seen the criticisms and are thinking about those areas
This is my thought too. With the devs being so quiet, we have no real way of knowing if something is being looked at as a potential problem or not. The last stream had an off hand remark about how many feel spells were nerfed too much and that it's a concern they're at least thinking about. It was a very brief statement, but it at least reassured me and at least one of the members of my group who has that concern, that they're at least thinking about it. Little things like that can help us feel like we're at least being listened to. Silently watching threads, like they tend to do, leads to a feeling that we're talking into the void. The streams and blog posts help a bit, but they're only once a week each, and they tend to dance around any contentious issue.
Judging by my group and much of the tone of things on here, it seems that there is a lot of need for reassurance. The combination of defaulting to the most extreme changes and going so quiet about the rules, has lead to a feeling of abandonment and/or betrayal. More engagement with us can really help with that.
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I agree with you. I asked multiple times clarification about rules, and the only answers I got was from other players - which is still cool, but I can't trust a non-dev on any rule.
I have also seen some concerns adressed by devs in the forum, but which did not get adressed in an update (like the infamous "Monsters level 14+ have 3 points too much to their skills" who was known before Update 1.0).
Plus, there are also some concerns the community made that seem to be completely ignored by the devs (like their comment about Resonance in the latest blog which generated an uproar in the comments).
Truly, I'd like the devs to at least answer a sentence or two when the question is about rule understanding (without interpretation needed), or saying "this thread has been seen and noted" before the thread get 5+ pages for nothing (remember that thread about the Bag of Holding which stopped the moment we learned the Bag of Holding Activation cost was a mistake ? The debate was pretty heated between the ones who thought it was a bug and the ones who thought it was a feature, and in the end it was just a typo. This debate could have been ended page 1 or 2 if a dev said it). Even if they answer to a question only once, the players on these forums will naturally repeat that answer if they see duplicate questions (for exemple, now, every time someone adresses the shield problem or the monsters' skills problem, someone immediatly repeat what the devs has said about it, without the devs having to do anything).
As Dante Doom said, with seeing a dev post only once in a week, it feels like they are not reading us, and we get more and more worked up and angry. I know it's ridiculous : devs are listening to what we are saying. But it's frustrating when you aren't sure and have to rely only on faith. It's like trusting someone not bond by contract to deliver an important package in time.
Also, I think infos said in the streams should be reported on the forums. Some of us can't watch the streams for various reasons (I don't have the time to check a 1 hour long interview about the Bard to understand what Occultism is).
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Actually, Jason, James and Mark and I'm pretty sure other developers said at the start of the playtest that they wanted to be active on the forums. This seems to have fallen by the wayside. Now a good part of that is surely the forum downtime during the last two weeks, but by this point it would really be nice if they would start participating again.
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I agree with you. I asked multiple times clarification about rules, and the only answers I got was from other players - which is still cool, but I can't trust a non-dev on any rule.
I have also seen some concerns adressed by devs in the forum, but which did not get adressed in an update (like the infamous "Monsters level 14+ have 3 points too much to their skills" who was known before Update 1.0).
Plus, there are also some concerns the community made that seem to be completely ignored by the devs (like their comment about Resonance in the latest blog which generated an uproar in the comments).
Truly, I'd like the devs to at least answer a sentence or two when the question is about rule understanding (without interpretation needed), or saying "this thread has been seen and noted" before the thread get 5+ pages for nothing (remember that thread about the Bag of Holding which stopped the moment we learned the Bag of Holding Activation cost was a mistake ? The debate was pretty heated between the ones who thought it was a bug and the ones who thought it was a feature, and in the end it was just a typo. This debate could have been ended page 1 or 2 if a dev said it). Even if they answer to a question only once, the players on these forums will naturally repeat that answer if they see duplicate questions (for exemple, now, every time someone adresses the shield problem or the monsters' skills problem, someone immediatly repeat what the devs has said about it, without the devs having to do anything).
As Dante Doom said, with seeing a dev post only once in a week, it feels like they are not reading us, and we get more and more worked up and angry. I know it's ridiculous : devs are listening to what we are saying. But it's frustrating when you aren't sure and have to rely only on faith. It's like trusting someone not bond by contract to deliver an important package in time.
Also, I think infos said in the streams should be reported on the forums. Some of us can't watch the streams for various reasons (I...
Thanks for understanding what I'm trying to say... I stopped trying to explain
Actually, Jason, James and Mark and I'm pretty sure other developers said at the start of the playtest that they wanted to be active on the forums. This seems to have fallen by the wayside. Now a good part of that is surely the forum downtime during the last two weeks, but by this point it would really be nice if they would start participating again.
I remember when we were having the preview blogs and they said that developers would be active in the boards...
I've gotten more direct interaction from the devs during the lead-up to, and since the begining fo the playtest than ever before! But I think they're just bereft of time to post. From the sounds of it Mark's job is intense, and posting here is a luxury.
I am unsure if they've already considered this but:
Hero Games maintains a thread dedicated to rules questions. Anyone may post a question, but only the company's official 'rulesmaster' can post replies, and such replies had a lot of credibility being written by one of the ruleset's most recent authors. Anyway the point is that such a system could work for Paizo too, at least during the playtest. It would allow playtest participants to get the credible answers they need faster, and said answers wouldn't get lost in the din because the Q&A Threads would only be a few posts long each, and easily searchable for through the account(s) given reply-rights there.
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I’ve often thought an “Ask the PDT account anything!” thread would be useful with the same rules as James Jacobs thread - ie only one question per post, no debating the answers (in that thread) and no answers from anyone else.
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Actually, Jason, James and Mark and I'm pretty sure other developers said at the start of the playtest that they wanted to be active on the forums. This seems to have fallen by the wayside. Now a good part of that is surely the forum downtime during the last two weeks, but by this point it would really be nice if they would start participating again.Yeah, I have a feeling the reaction to PF2 has surprised them, not quite what they wanted, and maybe now they are scrambling for damage control, as we type!
I can only hope you are correct.
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Actually, Jason, James and Mark and I'm pretty sure other developers said at the start of the playtest that they wanted to be active on the forums. This seems to have fallen by the wayside. Now a good part of that is surely the forum downtime during the last two weeks, but by this point it would really be nice if they would start participating again.Yeah, I have a feeling the reaction to PF2 has surprised them, not quite what they wanted, and maybe now they are scrambling for damage control, as we type!
This wouldn't surprise me: they seemed to be under the impression that a barbarian could keep a party healed up. From what I've seen, even multiple non-cleric healers struggle.
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They’ve also spoken publically about not wanting to contaminate the discussion. I would expect that listening is if more value to them than talking. For a game designer, I suspect there’s something to be learned from how people interpret the rules (as well as from having those rules tried out).
I think it’s worth bearing in mind that this isn’t a finished product, this is part of the testing, revising and retesting stage where what makes sense to them makes first contact with the community at large. Once they clarify, resolve or change something the test is altered.
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I think their main issue with keeping up is sorting the various forms of feedback.
We have people that have read the rule book posting.
We have people that have read and played posting.
We have people that have read and run simulations and algorithms on the numbers posting.They have to decide which group to take feedback from, which order of import they should be ranked in. There has been so much postong that I gave up trying to keep up.
In my opinion, all these people should be seen as viable feedback. Maybe give to the people who only red a lesser rank, but it's hard to tell from just a post if the person themselve don't say if they played or not.
Many people bailed out when they red the rules before playing (plus, the reading experience is part of the playtest, and you need to understand/like what you red to properly play), and simulations and algorithms are important, first because that is how min-maxers will think and you need to make rules that prevent min-maxers from spoiling all the fun for everyone, and second because a D20 RPG is basically statistics with a narrative.
They’ve also spoken publically about not wanting to contaminate the discussion. I would expect that listening is if more value to them than talking. For a game designer, I suspect there’s something to be learned from how people interpret the rules (as well as from having those rules tried out).
The problem I see with this approach is that all your datas will be corrupted by people not playing the rules the same way. You can't compare someone stating you become conscious again when you lose the dying condition thanks to a successful save and someone stating you have to wait 10 minutes unless you were magically healed. It's the same as houseruling during the playtest.
Now, seeing how people understand a rule sure in interesting to know how to correct it if they misunderstood it, but you don't have to wait a week before saying "you're wrong" to know the rule was badly written. Just say "okay, we noted that you misunderstood the rules : here is how it was supposed to be", note somewhere that the rule was wrongly understood, and update it officialy next Monday.
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I know Jason has been at Dragoncon. That probably had an impact too.
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I wouldn't be surprised if the vocal hostility that seems to fill every single thread had something to do with it. They have tried to get player and customer feedback before and the forums were so lacking in constructive criticism that it all seemed to stall.
I know reading these forums makes ME less likely to take part in the playtest process.
Hopefully it is just the just con schedule and technical problems.
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Actually, Jason, James and Mark and I'm pretty sure other developers said at the start of the playtest that they wanted to be active on the forums. This seems to have fallen by the wayside. Now a good part of that is surely the forum downtime during the last two weeks, but by this point it would really be nice if they would start participating again.Yeah, I have a feeling the reaction to PF2 has surprised them, not quite what they wanted, and maybe now they are scrambling for damage control, as we type!
Based on what I'm seeing, it's probably more likely that they are extremely busy both with analyzing playtest data as well as a lot of other job requirements; for example, Jason Bulmahn was at DragonCon this past weekend, leading panels on the playtest. For all we know, SRM or Mark Seifter are winging their way to another convention to represent Paizo, or making adjustments to a PF1 product, or working on the next errata document, or any of twenty other things that people in a company who wear many hats are wont to do.
They might WANT to be more active on the forums, but are too jammed to the wall to succeed. I'm just happy to see 'em pop up from time to time to let us know they're still focused on it.
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Personally, this process is pretty different than any of the playtests I've participated in from the design end before due to the incredibly wide scope. I'm used to having one or two classes that I am the only person involved in running their playtest until I take the results back to everyone at the end for an encapsulated meeting about that one class. But when the whole system is in playtest? Every change can and will cascade to other areas, and there are situations where something I see on the boards might be covered elsewhere by something someone else remembers better. As such, where I would just reply on my own for my classes in prior playtests, here I instead mark forum posts with important ideas for design team discussion (I currently have nearly 100 different things on my list) and then when we resolve them, we have tended to put them in errata docs and blogs. At time of reading, though, I don't really have something I could say beyond something like "I've noted this." Would people prefer if I posted something very basic like "I've noted this" when I note something? Keep in mind that sometimes it turns out that after noting it, there's a lot of possibilities so it wouldn't be an indication that whatever I've noted is going to change. I tend to prefer posting when I have something interesting to add and have time and ability to engage in the conversation more, but that's tougher for the reasons above (plus the time thing you guys mentioned; if I'm not posting like this, that means I can read 2-4 times as many of your guys' posts and add them to my list).
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Personally, this process is pretty different than any of the playtests I've participated in from the design end before due to the incredibly wide scope. I'm used to having one or two classes that I am the only person involved in running their playtest until I take the results back to everyone at the end for an encapsulated meeting about that one class. But when the whole system is in playtest? Every change can and will cascade to other areas, and there are situations where something I see on the boards might be covered elsewhere by something someone else remembers better. As such, where I would just reply on my own for my classes in prior playtests, here I instead mark forum posts with important ideas for design team discussion (I currently have nearly 100 different things on my list) and then when we resolve them, we have tended to put them in errata docs and blogs. At time of reading, though, I don't really have something I could say beyond something like "I've noted this." Would people prefer if I posted something very basic like "I've noted this" when I note something? Keep in mind that sometimes it turns out that after noting it, there's a lot of possibilities so it wouldn't be an indication that whatever I've noted is going to change. I tend to prefer posting when I have something interesting to add and have time and ability to engage in the conversation more, but that's tougher for the reasons above (plus the time thing you guys mentioned; if I'm not posting like this, that means I can read 2-4 times as many of your guys' posts and add them to my list).
Yeah, actually I personally would. I put up a thread which cost me about 20 hours of research, writing comments on each arcane spell and then writing and redacting a large post to put in front of that. Having a developer just comment that they took note of the thread would be a huge morale boost to me, because at least I'd get the direct impression that you guys are looking at what we write.
I don't expect any discussion from you and the other developer on those topics, because of the things you noted above. It's clear that you guys have to consider a ton of aspects and how they correlate to each other. That has to be a huge workload in of itself. But having your work acknowledged would help a ton. At least for me.
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Personally, this process is pretty different than any of the playtests I've participated in from the design end before due to the incredibly wide scope. I'm used to having one or two classes that I am the only person involved in running their playtest until I take the results back to everyone at the end for an encapsulated meeting about that one class. But when the whole system is in playtest? Every change can and will cascade to other areas, and there are situations where something I see on the boards might be covered elsewhere by something someone else remembers better. As such, where I would just reply on my own for my classes in prior playtests, here I instead mark forum posts with important ideas for design team discussion (I currently have nearly 100 different things on my list) and then when we resolve them, we have tended to put them in errata docs and blogs. At time of reading, though, I don't really have something I could say beyond something like "I've noted this." Would people prefer if I posted something very basic like "I've noted this" when I note something? Keep in mind that sometimes it turns out that after noting it, there's a lot of possibilities so it wouldn't be an indication that whatever I've noted is going to change. I tend to prefer posting when I have something interesting to add and have time and ability to engage in the conversation more, but that's tougher for the reasons above (plus the time thing you guys mentioned; if I'm not posting like this, that means I can read 2-4 times as many of your guys' posts and add them to my list).Yeah, actually I personally would. I put up a thread which cost me about 20 hours of research, writing comments on each arcane spell and then writing and redacting a large post to put in front of that. Having a developer just comment that they took note of the thread would be a huge morale boost to me, because at least I'd get the direct impression that you guys are looking at what we write. I don't expect any...
I've read that whole post and marked it to reference it for the spells pass. I generally read things but don't post unless there's something I feel I can safely say that's useful to say. I would worry that a "Noted" seems dismissive to people with a negative filter (I try to think about how a post could sound with a negative filter before posting to make sure I don't give the wrong impression).
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I think we would all appreciate a confirmation that our thiughts and concerns are being heard.
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How bout this: I will try to remember to drop by with a quick "Noted" whenever I take a note (not going to go back for the 100 I have now because it would take too long to find the threads). You guys who have read this thread are crucial to this though: I need you to post in any of those threads if someone takes that the wrong way and thinks it's dismissive (you could link them here, explain it, etc but do so as a polite ambassador of this thread please, not combatively).
I think knowing that things are being paid attention to is enough. I could see people getting upset or annoyed that they weren't directly acknowledged with whatever minimal response was granted. As a guess, it would encouraged people to be more incendiary in hopes of gaining that response. And anytime that response did show up, others would dogpile into the thread trying to get their idea witnessed. It would disrupt conversation and make the forum a little more prone to hyperbole.
Thanks for letting us know you're listening.
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I've read that whole post and marked it to reference it for the spells pass. I generally read things but don't post unless there's something I feel I can safely say that's useful to say. I would worry that a "Noted" seems dismissive to people with a negative filter (I try to think about how a post could sound with a negative filter before posting to make sure I don't give the wrong impression).
Thanks, man. That's all I can ask for. At this point. ;) Again, thanks. :)
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Just to pipe in and agree with what Mark said, keep in mind that we are reading and digesting all the bits of feedback we get from here and other sources. During the website issues, I was active on a Facebook group of players answering rules questions when I could and such. Other folks at Paizo were scouring the internet for other areas where playtest discussions were occurring, listening, and being helpful when we had the time.
In my mind, this is the point where we do the most listening. We listen to you here (and on other forums when we have the bandwidth) and through surveys. I talked to a good amount of folks (though much, much smaller than the set here) at PAX West this weekend. Even then I did more listening than talking.
While we tend to share our opinions and observations in blogs and on Twitch, coming into the various threads here and doing that is often not the best way to disseminate such information and sometimes can be counterproductive. Small notes can be seen as dismissive and longer ones often get misinterpreted as argumentative. That said, Mark does an amazing job of posting here. The man's a trooper.
In short, if we don't respond to your post or thread, you can still bet that at least one person from the team has read it (and usually many folks on the team did) and we are discussing any issues that come up from that discussion.
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Do you have the ability to favor posts like the rest of us? Maybe a simple plus could be a good enough indication that a topic has got your attention?
. I would worry that a "Noted" seems dismissive to people with a negative filter (I try to think about how a post could sound with a negative filter before posting to make sure I don't give the wrong impression).
I agree that "Noted" can be easily misinterpreted. Maybe some other wording would help? "Bookmarked" or "I'll keep an eye on this" or "The team will discuss this" maybe?
I appreciate seeing you guys around, though!
Thanks guys! That's what I was talking about! I would gladly appreciate! Really!
I agree that something like, "This seems worth bringing up in our meeting in the next few weeks." on big/common idea would be really helpful. It also helps ease the gnar spiral. Once we know that it's on the docket for Devs to discuss we kind of just wait to see the answer than wage war over which interpretation is maybe more correct as of the current text and presumed RAI.
An example is Shields. If a wooden shield takes 6 damage on a shield block how many dents does the shield have. What about a 9 damage attack blocked?
If there was a comment in one of the many shield threads just said,
"I want to make sure I'm right before answering, I'll bring this up in one of our meetings soon and get an answer out in a few weeks." It'd really settle down the anger of shields to know it'll be looked at and isn't being avoided cause it seems like it should be a simple answer.
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I agree seeing them would help with morale. As for wording, I find adding "Thanks" or even "! Thanks!" helps removing the dismissive charge, as in "Noted! Thanks!". Even canned replies that can be copied and pasted from a template would help, and could clear the data as some people are arguing that some things shouldn't be discussed (that's how the game is, etc) or posting that our reports won't be listened to.. I would worry that a "Noted" seems dismissive to people with a negative filter (I try to think about how a post could sound with a negative filter before posting to make sure I don't give the wrong impression).I agree that "Noted" can be easily misinterpreted. Maybe some other wording would help? "Bookmarked" or "I'll keep an eye on this" or "The team will discuss this" maybe?
I appreciate seeing you guys around, though!
I like "Noted, thanks!" I'm going to try that. Thanks for all the suggestions; I think some of the others might give too much of a connotation that "This is definitely going to change to the way I (the reader of Mark's post) most hope it will, and we'll hear back on the results very soon" that can lead to disappointment when that isn't always the case (discussions need to be prioritized, some changes are marked for the final and not an errata doc if they won't disrupt the playtest to limit the errata load on the average playtester, etc), so I'm going to stick with something simpler like that, but the thanks definitely seems friendlier.