The ultimate forum question:

#1 - Oct. 30, 2015, 2:25 p.m.

Someone made a post and had this to say:

10/28/2015 10:05 AMPosted by Moxmox
Instead, in my extremely annoyed state, I wrote this. Quite a few hours later, it's in 9 pages and I get blue response.

Yet for every other well thought out post, where myself, or someone else took a long time to carefully word, and format, some type of suggestion, or constructive feedback, no blue EVER responded.

The irony here is astounding.

Later on someone asked the question:

10/28/2015 12:59 PMPosted by Walternate
Why can't we get a blue post on relevant things?
I would love to hear some real reasons for why WoD patches were trash and not the time old excuse that "it just didn't work out"

And there is nothing new here...Just reworked systems and bosses from other expansions

To which a blue responded:

10/28/2015 01:31 PMPosted by Nethaera
You're not really asking a question. You want us to agree "x was trash." We're just not going to do that. We do however try to make sure we're taking feedback and game experiences (on many fronts) to note so that we can continue to find ways to improve on the game.

We're not always going to agree on what that means, but we'll keep trying to find ways to give people fun experiences within the game.

We've seen a lot of these, "just admit" posts. They're not questions. They're statements of opinion that we take note of, just like we take note of those that say, "we are enjoying x." We do our best to keep learning and growing whether you believe it's the 'right path' or not is just a matter of preference. That doesn't stop our bid to do better where we can as a goal for the overall health of the game.

My question puts it a little differently but still has the same basis:

Why is it thoughtful posts that are well researched with thought, time, and effort put into them, not only almost never get any blue response, but normally get laughed away by the community, but a troll thread or a blue bashing thread gets loads of attention?

This is an honest question that many have thought and have asked about, yet we still receive no response.

TBD

#1 - Nov. 1, 2015, 8:25 a.m.

Please see source post at http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/19650315071?page=7 for detail.

Nethaera

Community Manager

#26 - Oct. 30, 2015, 4:23 p.m.

10/30/2015 07:55 AMPosted by Cyonan
It's more that a lot of the well thought out stuff aren't quick and easy posts to make in response to, and they may not be allowed to even say anything.

If somebody makes a post about concerns for the future of PvP in Legion for example, somebody like Neth is almost assuredly under a NDA and can't actually say anything without approval from somebody else at Blizzard.

As to other things, a lot of the times comments would boil down to "Yeah I read it, and told the developers about it" to which people would probably still be upset that they didn't go more into it. Keep in mind Neth is a CM and can only really pass information onto the dev team, which I imagine she already is just without telling us about it. Blizzard has never really been in the habit of making posts just to indicate that they read a thread.

As for the comment in the OP, notice how no real information has been given about the game itself. It was a pretty "safe" comment to make, relatively speaking.

We've actually said things like this many times before.

We often leave the "well thought out" posts alone not because we aren't aware of them but they often end up in our internal reports and we don't want the thread to get derailed just because one of us shows up.

Posting or not posting isn't a hard science. We have to make calls on things all of the time. The larger 'well thought out' posts aren't going to get short quick answers either. We could do that but then we get "you don't understand" or people assume our involvement means we either agree or are going to make something happen "soon" based on their post. Design is both a fast and slow process. We do what we can to keep on top of the thoughts and ideas of the community and our development teams do too. They read and are aware of far more than you realize. But again, sometimes people take our responding to something as a promise to take action based on what they said. We'd rather wait to respond when there is a response worth sharing.

Again, it's not a cut and dry thing as much as people think it is. People are complex. They want different things. They interpret words and tone in text differently based on their personal state of mind, wants or desires.

Nethaera

Community Manager

#33 - Oct. 30, 2015, 4:51 p.m.

10/30/2015 09:38 AMPosted by Zugrus
10/30/2015 09:23 AMPosted by Nethaera
Again, it's not a cut and dry thing as much as people think it is. People are complex. They want different things. They interpret words and tone in text differently based on their personal state of mind, wants or desires.

I think many times people just want to feel acknowledged, especially when they put a lot of thought into something many stand behind. But it's a big community and I'm sure challenging, to say the least.

Some people are OK with just having their thoughts acknowledged. Others aren't unless the "I read this" is followed up by "and we did/are doing something". Some people would rather us say nothing than post as I am now unless there is a hard answer to something. Others like just knowing we're here.

I would much rather be visible (when I can be) in little ways than be invisible for long streaks of time– though I often need to be since my job is much larger than posting here. I do miss getting to speak with you all more often, but I'm doing a lot of behind the scenes work that (hopefully) results in you getting information too as well as relaying information to the developers. There's a lot of planning, excel sheets, project tracking, meetings, writing, etc. that happens on a daily basis.

Nethaera

Community Manager

#39 - Oct. 30, 2015, 4:59 p.m.

10/30/2015 09:58 AMPosted by Rýuk

So Neth...you are saying something is going to happen soon? lol just kidding.

*sigh* ;)

Is that code for hanging out at the coffee machine ;P

Only for brief moments of expressing empathy for each other for the many tasks we're all juggling right now. ;)

Nethaera

Community Manager

#42 - Oct. 30, 2015, 5:02 p.m.

10/30/2015 10:01 AMPosted by Dethlore

Yes we are all different, but all of us want a response that isn't just a response for sake of a response.

I think there are people that will agree with you and those that will disagree and are OK with having any response at all. So, "all of us" doesn't apply. "Some of us" though or "many of us" will though. I get that.

Nethaera

Community Manager

#56 - Oct. 30, 2015, 6:23 p.m.

10/30/2015 10:59 AMPosted by Edlarel
You know what might go a long way to ease the tensions and nerves of the posters with good threads (or any threads, really)? A check box on the Blue Poster's version of the forum where they can indicate the thread was read by them without typing out a reply. Anybody who jumps onto the thread would see the flag at the top of the original post (Oh, a blue saw this!) and know that they weren't ignored or forgotten. You could even set it to auto-populate the flag when you click the link if you were so inclined.

Granted, I'm sure you read most, if not all posts over time, but this would be attract a more psychological response from others rather than them being left to assume and/or think the worst. :)

The only problem with the "this has been read by a blue" flags would be that people would say, "This was read by a blue but they didn't say anything! No response! When do we get a response?" etc.

Sometimes we "blue" things by responding so people know we were there, but again, that has it's own issues. There's no "perfect" system, but we will keep doing what we can.

Nethaera

Community Manager

#60 - Oct. 30, 2015, 6:40 p.m.

10/30/2015 11:32 AMPosted by Exorrt
Neth, I just wanted to say how nice it is for you to be posting here.
You guys at Blizzard must be going crazy with work now that Blizzcon is 1 week away(hype!).

Lots of looming ponderous deadlines to hit. We're working on it!

Nethaera

Community Manager

#65 - Oct. 30, 2015, 7:04 p.m.

10/30/2015 11:49 AMPosted by Viinsenpai
[quote]

Why add another step to the CMs' already busy schedule?

How hard is it to send a forum post link to a certain email within the company? Literally one button with maybe a drop down menu to send to different sections.

You underestimate the vast amounts of emails we all receive on a daily basis. Trust me... it's a lot.