The Gold Road Chapter – which includes the Scribing system – and Update 42 is now available to test on the PTS! You can read the latest patch notes here: https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/656454/
A Lesson in Good Business Practices, Because Apparently We Need One Here
Crafts_Many_Boxes
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So, in light of the two most recent blunders by ZOS (Nerfmire and now this Dungeon Finder Fiasco), I feel as though certain people would benefit from a good ol' lesson in proper business practices.
Lesson 1) Keep the customer happy, not your ego
You may have your own opinions on what will make your game "great". That is fine, but if there are a plethora of your customers who disagree with you, the majority of which are all more advanced users of your product than you yourself, then maybe you are wrong. And even if you are right, maybe it's not worth it. Being able to swallow your pride and leave your ego at the door is an important part of succeeding in any business venture, especially the gaming industry where the most dedicated end users inevitably have far more experience in your product than the developers.
This of course refers to Nerfmire. I'd like to hope that the gameplay changes have resulted in enough of a population drop that some positions within ZOS are seriously being looked at. Any responsible company would do so.
Lesson 2) Strive for the best, but plan for the worst
So, I work for a multi-billion dollar company in supply chain planning. I don't have an especially important role, but I have a pretty good idea of what works and what doesn't from a pipeline perspective. In our planning, the "golden rule" we follow is to plan for the peaks. This is an important concept, because our inbound shipments fluctuate wildly throughout the year. If we did not allow for peak shipping capacity in our plans, there could be dire consequences for our division as a whole. We're talking millions of dollars in revenue lost.
What we're seeing right now in this event is what happens when you don't plan around the peaks. If the dungeon instance servers are only designed to handle "average load", with no allowances and no plan for a massive spike, you can't simply have an event that encourages all players to use the dungeon finder and expect nothing to go wrong. That's literally setting yourself up to fail. I have to wonder how much revenue they've lost during this event, simply because players see the dungeon finder isn't working and find another game they'd rather play. In any other business sector, there would be mass termination over something like this. But hey, I won't pretend to understand how game development land works.
Lesson 1) Keep the customer happy, not your ego
You may have your own opinions on what will make your game "great". That is fine, but if there are a plethora of your customers who disagree with you, the majority of which are all more advanced users of your product than you yourself, then maybe you are wrong. And even if you are right, maybe it's not worth it. Being able to swallow your pride and leave your ego at the door is an important part of succeeding in any business venture, especially the gaming industry where the most dedicated end users inevitably have far more experience in your product than the developers.
This of course refers to Nerfmire. I'd like to hope that the gameplay changes have resulted in enough of a population drop that some positions within ZOS are seriously being looked at. Any responsible company would do so.
Lesson 2) Strive for the best, but plan for the worst
So, I work for a multi-billion dollar company in supply chain planning. I don't have an especially important role, but I have a pretty good idea of what works and what doesn't from a pipeline perspective. In our planning, the "golden rule" we follow is to plan for the peaks. This is an important concept, because our inbound shipments fluctuate wildly throughout the year. If we did not allow for peak shipping capacity in our plans, there could be dire consequences for our division as a whole. We're talking millions of dollars in revenue lost.
What we're seeing right now in this event is what happens when you don't plan around the peaks. If the dungeon instance servers are only designed to handle "average load", with no allowances and no plan for a massive spike, you can't simply have an event that encourages all players to use the dungeon finder and expect nothing to go wrong. That's literally setting yourself up to fail. I have to wonder how much revenue they've lost during this event, simply because players see the dungeon finder isn't working and find another game they'd rather play. In any other business sector, there would be mass termination over something like this. But hey, I won't pretend to understand how game development land works.
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Sotha_Sil✭✭✭✭✭
✭The thing is ZOS has been doing this since the start and it worked pretty well for them, they got away with it. So I don't think they plan to invest in things that take time to fix without substantial revenue.Edited by Sotha_Sil on November 30, 2018 3:09PMRestoration is a perfectly valid school of magic, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise! - Spells and incantations for those with the talent to cast them!0 -
gp1680✭✭✭✭✭The thing is ZOS has been doing this since the start and it worked pretty well for them, they got away with it. So I don't think they plan to invest in things that take time to fix without substantial revenue.
This is likely true, but you could also look at it from the perspective of the OP. Imagine how much more amazing this game would be if more attention was shown to good business practices. It seems their only interest these days is jamming 20lbs of crap in a 5lb bag. The consequences of this is quite evident in the performance. As others have stated, as long as the clown store continues to pay their salaries, it’s the only part of the game that will work flawlessly.1 -
moonio✭✭✭✭I get the impression that over the past couple of years or so ZOS has been implementing the 80/20 rule (conspiracy lol) to their business practices.
In that your top 20% of clients will drive 80% of your profits..
I worked for a company that implemented this principle... they went bust..
Why?
Because they neglected 80% of their customer base / clients... they didn't nurture the small people and let them fall away..
Years down the line they realised that their top 20% was in continual flux.. usually being fed by the 80% that they had chosen to ignore...
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