Wondering % of forum participants really reflect span of actual gamers/players in ESO..

GreenhaloX · September 2019

Same story.. same history. Things change, things get nerfed and buffs with every releases of patches/updates, DLC and chapters. People coming on this forum to complain, rant and moan. No change. Whatever for the better or worst, sure, people just need the release and their voices to be heard. Without complains, companies wouldn't otherwise take the time to look at improving or changing their products. No different with gaming business. However, just food-for-thoughts, I wonder what percentage (as an estimate) of actual in-game players (the multi-millions, supposedly) of ESO are participating on this forum. Probably hard to measure, but, my guess it's could be a lower percentage. I'm just blindly basing it on the amount of responses per thread. Per non-Gina headline threads, there are a couple hundreds (at most) responses to the regular participants' threads. Sure, there are continuously new threads throughout the day and each and everyday; however, the face value response numbers hardly justify or reflect the supposedly tens of millions of ESO gamers.

Good game and all, with growing pains here and there. However, when someone post a thread about how jacked up things are, or things haven't been better, they seem to imply (and certain actually deemed to reflect so) they speak for the grander ESO gaming community; the ESO player-base community. Of course, everyone are entitled to each own opinions, views and ideas, it just hard to measure if the millions of ESO gamers are in agreement or disagreement. Certainly, the low number of responses to poll threads hardly reflect such mass number of actual active players.

I'm just saying, when certain people crying nerf and this and that is too OP so regularly, and then things are actually nerfed over and over again (like magsorc, for example,) per quarterly release of new updates/patch and such. I don't want to go too deep, and I'm sure they have their methods and analysis at the ZOS lounge; but, how much are ZOS and the dev have actually based their decisions (or attempts at "balance") on these forum participants and threads?

Morgul667 · September 2019

I think forum population has more “hardcore” players as opposed to casuals

I think zos has chosen to ignore forum , partially for this reason and partially because they dont like what they read

I think this is bad communication but cant change it for them

Jeremy · September 2019

GreenhaloX wrote: »

Same story.. same history. Things change, things get nerfed and buffs with every releases of patches/updates, DLC and chapters. People coming on this forum to complain, rant and moan. No change. Whatever for the better or worst, sure, people just need the release and their voices to be heard. Without complains, companies wouldn't otherwise take the time to look at improving or changing their products. No different with gaming business. However, just food-for-thoughts, I wonder what percentage (as an estimate) of actual in-game players (the multi-millions, supposedly) of ESO are participating on this forum. Probably hard to measure, but, my guess it's could be a lower percentage. I'm just blindly basing it on the amount of responses per thread. Per non-Gina headline threads, there are a couple hundreds (at most) responses to the regular participants' threads. Sure, there are continuously new threads throughout the day and each and everyday; however, the face value response numbers hardly justify or reflect the supposedly tens of millions of ESO gamers.

Good game and all, with growing pains here and there. However, when someone post a thread about how jacked up things are, or things haven't been better, they seem to imply (and certain actually deemed to reflect so) they speak for the grander ESO gaming community; the ESO player-base community. Of course, everyone are entitled to each own opinions, views and ideas, it just hard to measure if the millions of ESO gamers are in agreement or disagreement. Certainly, the low number of responses to poll threads hardly reflect such mass number of actual active players.

I'm just saying, when certain people crying nerf and this and that is too OP so regularly, and then things are actually nerfed over and over again (like magsorc, for example,) per quarterly release of new updates/patch and such. I don't want to go too deep, and I'm sure they have their methods and analysis at the ZOS lounge; but, how much are ZOS and the dev have actually based their decisions (or attempts at "balance") on these forum participants and threads?

Probably not much. But the developers are finally starting to move in the right direction for this game. So either they started listening to another group of participants - or (and more likely) this new development team just has a better grasp of what amounts to fun game play. In any case: the damage on this game has been way out of control on this game for years - both in PvP and PvE, and with last update combined with this latest one it's clear to me this new team is actually serious about solving the problem. So this game is in good hands currently despite all the groaning on the forums.

Darkenarlol · September 2019

Morgul667 wrote: »

I think forum population has more “hardcore” players as opposed to casuals

there is a lot of clueless scrubs on these forums too

they are usually the ones who cries for nerfs

*cuz it killed me in pvp* or *i can't kill it in pvp*

and not because some ability or set is actually overperforming

Elwendryll · September 2019

Morgul667 wrote: »

I think forum population has more “hardcore” players as opposed to casuals

The "for how long have you been playing" type of polls revealed that most people on the forum are from beta, or even before that. New players are very rare, most have been playing for several years.

Tandor · September 2019

Elwendryll wrote: »

Morgul667 wrote: »

I think forum population has more “hardcore” players as opposed to casuals

The "for how long have you been playing" type of polls revealed that most people on the forum are from beta, or even before that. New players are very rare, most have been playing for several years.

Length of time playing doesn't equate to whether a player is hardcore or casual. That's down to playstyle, and very few forum posters or players overall are likely to be so hardcore in playstyle that the slightest whisper of a skill change sends them into a QQ rage. Most of the time all they've done is read the patch notes (or just been told by someone what's in them), few have actually played on the PTS and submitted reasoned feedback at the point where they're posting on this board - which board being for general discussion is of no real relevance to the development team who are focused on the PTS and ingame feedback. Most of the ragers will claim to be quitting over the changes but will be back to complain about the next update, always assuming they actually leave in the first place.

Kaunas · September 2019

Im a filthy casual ESO virgin (400 hours +) and im here just for the.. insight i guess. But what i noticed in my Long Time in the game is that the people who enjoy and like the game for what it is actually play the game and enjoy it without ree'ing anywhere. On the forums its veteran space that, i believe, feel what could be better for the game and overtime get frustrated to see it go in a direction that is either unwanted or even unexpected, that frustration is usually reflected in the forums. After that the next stage is dissapointment.
Its not just ESO, its most if not every game ever made. Im not saying people who shout NO STOPP on the forums are wrong, but what ive noticed its better to put constructive posts and discuss one, rather than make 40 posts over the same topic.
Game companies do (some of them atleast) listen to the community in one way or.. slower But (and this is my own personal view) i feel that ZOS gets too much uncalled for flack in mindless bashing, than a calm and constructive "hey, listen.."

VaranisArano · September 2019

Its hard to gauge the extent of current active participants on the forums. We can figure out total participation by looking at badges, but those include all posters ever, and don't account for current activity.

1 Comment: 152,210 posters
10 Comments: 37,734 posters
100 Comments: 8,512 posters
500 Comments: 2,459 posters
And that's "of all time", not the currently active amount of posters.

Not only is the drop off pretty significant, the number of even 1 Comment posters is pretty small compared to the ESO accounts in that same time frame (allowing for a certain amount of account inflation, of course.)

Another method is polls. Because of the aforementioned small population, polls are horrible representatives of the forum population, much less the game population. That being said, from what we see on polls, the active forum population tends to skew towards more experienced players, richer players, and players who run PVE group content.

Honestly, I think the biggest distinction is that active forum participants have the time to opinionate AND play the game.

BNOC · September 2019

Elwendryll wrote: »

Morgul667 wrote: »

I think forum population has more “hardcore” players as opposed to casuals

The "for how long have you been playing" type of polls revealed that most people on the forum are from beta, or even before that. New players are very rare, most have been playing for several years.

I know a bunch of players, new and old that would use the forums, but the hassle of getting a forum invitation or finding the one they received 4 years ago to an old email just kills any interest.

Elwendryll · September 2019

BNOC wrote: »

Elwendryll wrote: »

Morgul667 wrote: »

I think forum population has more “hardcore” players as opposed to casuals

The "for how long have you been playing" type of polls revealed that most people on the forum are from beta, or even before that. New players are very rare, most have been playing for several years.

I know a bunch of players, new and old that would use the forums, but the hassle of getting a forum invitation or finding the one they received 4 years ago to an old email just kills any interest.

I randomly received mine two years after starting to play. I'm still unsure about what the process to get one actually is.

GreenhaloX · September 2019

Well, you can't please everybody. Some will like and others will not. It is like another man's trash can be another's treasure. The game is so complex and expansive. Personally, I am not for the nerfs, but they have buff other passives and abilities as well. I think the dev just do it to change things up now and then; keep the game from being stagnant. All and all, I hope the class reps still going good and having good meaningful interactions with ZOS and the dev team, because some of the forum threads aren't looking too productive. Ha ha

kylewwefan · September 2019

Forums would be a terrible indicator of live game playerbase imo.

Practically all of my guild mates look on here every now and then, but very few ever post things. Probably with good reason.

FierceSam · September 2019

Decisions made based on the “who whines loudest” metric rarely work out well.

The forum has many interesting contributors, all of whom share a love/enjoyment of the game, but collectively we are like a bunch of whiney children most of whose contributions can safely be dismissed as rage noise.

Occasionally there’s a sliver of insight but mostly it’s a vast echo chamber of players who think they know how the game should be run because they’ve been playing it. And while there is benefit in getting the insight of players, it’s far better obtained through coherent testing, stats and research.

But as a route for communicating with some avid players it’s super useful and ZOS don’t use it effectively at all, which is a great shame.

carlos424 · September 2019

Kaunas wrote: »

Im a filthy casual ESO virgin (400 hours +) and im here just for the.. insight i guess. But what i noticed in my Long Time in the game is that the people who enjoy and like the game for what it is actually play the game and enjoy it without ree'ing anywhere. On the forums its veteran space that, i believe, feel what could be better for the game and overtime get frustrated to see it go in a direction that is either unwanted or even unexpected, that frustration is usually reflected in the forums. After that the next stage is dissapointment.
Its not just ESO, its most if not every game ever made. Im not saying people who shout NO STOPP on the forums are wrong, but what ive noticed its better to put constructive posts and discuss one, rather than make 40 posts over the same topic.
Game companies do (some of them atleast) listen to the community in one way or.. slower But (and this is my own personal view) i feel that ZOS gets too much uncalled for flack in mindless bashing, than a calm and constructive "hey, listen.."

I think you are right, especially about the criticism. If I worked at ZOS I wouldn’t visit these forums, unless it was in my job description. That being said, I think they bring on some of this criticism themselves. They do not seem consistent with their goals/direction. I think they should come out with statement like, “We recognize that damage has gotten a bit out of control, so we are working on decreasing it by 25-30% (whatever) across the board. This is going to affect every class. While making these changes, we will be auditing class skills and trying to bring more identity to each class.” Something like this. The problem is they are not blunt/concise enough with their statements. They say “re-work,” “audit,” etc. By this point we should all recognize that their main goal is to get damage under control (I think...lol). It’s hard to tell because they are so inconsistent with buffs and nerfs. I think they realized that small changes are just making more problems, and said “Bump it let’s just do everything at once and nerf all dots, as well as sustain. This will get the damage under control. We can make smaller changes later, addressing individual skills and classes.“ At least this is my interpretation of what I’m witnessing.

Kagukan · September 2019

17.35%. Give or take a tenth percentage.

Arkangeloski · September 2019

Nope, just a bunch of trolls

Alienoutlaw · September 2019

Forums probably reflect 0.0001% of the gaming population but thats not to say that some of the players here are very experienced and have a valuable role in the feed back for ZOS there are many other "platforms" in which players provide feed back also

Saucy_Jack · September 2019

Well, think of how many people use these forums, but only about 100 or so vote in the Deity Poll Competition threads. I can imagine the ratio of forumgoers to players being much, much smaller.

PS: THE NON-VOTERS OF YOU ARE DEAD TO ME

Recent · September 2019

Darkenarlol wrote: »

Morgul667 wrote: »

I think forum population has more “hardcore” players as opposed to casuals

there is a lot of clueless scrubs on these forums too

they are usually the ones who cries for nerfs

*cuz it killed me in pvp* or *i can't kill it in pvp*

and not because some ability or set is actually overperforming

Well said 🖒🖒🖒