ZOS, please stop with the "some players" spiel...

marcbf · August 5

Please stop gaslighting us with the "some players" line whenever there's a problem. It's really disingenious to your community. Just drop the word "some". Should "some players" actually not experience issues I'm sure they're just happy and won't complain about being "some players".

@ZOS_Kevin @ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_JessicaFolsom

spartaxoxo · August 5

Some players acknowledges the whole playerbase. There's always two sides to any update they give. Some will like it and some will not. Also, even if it was universally disliked on the forums, the forums are a very small fraction of the playerbase.

marcbf · August 5

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Some players acknowledges the whole playerbase. There's always two sides to any update they give. Some will like it and some will not. Also, even if it was universally disliked on the forums, the forums are a very small fraction of the playerbase.

I actually find the opposite to be true. By stating that "some players" experience issues it downplays the issue and gives the impression of a minor problem ("barely an inconvenience") whereas it usually affects all players or, at the very least, most of them.

Now, I didn't mean my initial post to be taken so much as a criticism or even a sign of disrespect, but as a genuine plea. Problems occur. We understand that. We also understand that the staff at ZOS (usually) isn't at fault and are trying to do what they can with what they have. All the more reason to just state the obvious.

I should perhaps add that I'm talking about the banners at the top of the page. Those will probably be mostly seen by forum members.

Grizzbeorn · August 5

marcbf wrote: »

By stating that "some players" experience issues it downplays the issue and gives the impression of a minor problem

No, it tells the player-base that the issue isn't a global problem affecting ALL players.
If you post of a problem on the forum, I'm going to wonder if I'm going to experience the same thing when I log in.
ZOS absolutely needs to differentiate between SOME players and ALL players when informing people of an issue.

JeroenB · August 6

Is this one of those British English vs. US English things perhaps? Sure, technically "some players" can be interpreted as 'all players less one', but that is certainly not how I would naturally interpret "some players". Rather, in the way ZOS uses the phrase, it indicates to me a small, probably even insignificant, sub-set of all players. Is that different for a US reader? If ZOS wants to reliably indicate a significant subset, or leave it ambiguous, they should use different phrasing. But I'd prefer it if they just fixed the servers...

Kwik1 · August 6

Almost all the performance issues that SOME players complain about in the game are not anything I am experiencing.

So SOME players are not affected and SOME are...

Only a fraction of the playerbase comes to the forums. So people who comes her and complain about some issue whether gameplay or performance could VERY possibly be only a few players.

Erickson9610 · August 6

I'd trust ZOS to have a bigger picture than smaller portions of the community like the forums have. The "universal" opinion on certain matters discussed here on the forums is not so universal when you poll other parts of the ESO community, such as the people in-game.

Seriously, I'd recommend branching out and seeing how different the community's sentiment is. It's accurate to say "some players" when you consider how different each part of the ESO community is. It's also not meant to be an insult.

virtus753 · August 6

JeroenB wrote: »

Is this one of those British English vs. US English things perhaps? Sure, technically "some players" can be interpreted as 'all players less one', but that is certainly not how I would naturally interpret "some players". Rather, that indicates to me a small, probably even insignificant, sub-set of all players. Is that different for a US audience? If ZOS wants to reliably indicate a significant subset, or leave it ambiguous, they should use different phrasing. But I'd prefer it if they just fixed the servers...

It can mean that — but certainly does not need to — in the U.S. as well. If we read “some” as “an insignificant number” when it can simply mean “an indeterminate number,” then we’re wading into territory where we may well be reading something into a word that isn’t necessarily (or even likely) meant. In the case of the recent login issue, for example, many players were already logged in and not experiencing the issue because they had no need to interact with the login server. “Some” was accurate, in the technical sense you mentioned of “between zero and all, exclusive”. (I was locked out, but friends of mine had no issues.)

Being technically accurate doesn’t mean there isn’t also another technically accurate and better choice. There’s room to phrase it differently. For example, to avoid the lack of specificity and the potential connotations of “some,” they could remove any quantitative descriptor and simply say “players.” As long as there are at least two players having trouble this will be factually accurate, and it would be true even if all players were having trouble. But I wouldn’t be surprised if down the line someone then interpreted that “players are having issues” to mean they were being dismissed as “not a player” if the issue didn’t affect them. So (as with many things) I don’t think there’s going to be a solution that makes absolutely everyone happy.

Elvenheart · August 6

For me, the phrase “some players” means exactly that, some players. No more, no less. I don’t see any insinuations whatsoever that it is only a few players with some minor unimportant problem. For example, if they said “Some players are not able to connect and we are investigating” then to me that does not suggest anything about how many players are having an issue, just that some can get into the game and some can’t. But then, I have always been a literalist and don’t try to read anything into what people say, I just take it at face value exactly how it is said.

I work with somebody who is constantly thinking things like, “I wonder what they really mean by that?” They worry all the time about what other people think about them. Honestly, if someone has a hidden meaning in something they say, I literally just don’t care.

MJallday · August 6

“Some” should be used in circumstances where it isn’t “All”

Which is the case most of the time

Don’t get the issue or anger for something so minor

StackonClown · August 6

just add a percentage ?

Versalium · August 6

Yeah, to me "some" means "the game is working normally for most players, but some of them experience issues", which is not true.

Maybe only "some" are actually bothered to complain about the issues on the forum, steam, support or elsewhere, but it's pretty clear that when the issue is happening, it's happening to most, if not all. Not "some".

BretonMage · August 6

"Some" just means "not all", or "an indeterminate number". There is no implication as to proportion of the playerbase. If they wanted to imply it is minor, they would use "few".

marcbf · August 6

Grizzbeorn wrote: »

marcbf wrote: »

By stating that "some players" experience issues it downplays the issue and gives the impression of a minor problem

No, it tells the player-base that the issue isn't a global problem affecting ALL players.
If you post of a problem on the forum, I'm going to wonder if I'm going to experience the same thing when I log in.
ZOS absolutely needs to differentiate between SOME players and ALL players when informing people of an issue.

You DO realize I'm talking about the banners at the top of the page, right? Those differentiate between the different mega servers. So, you would never be in a situation where "some players" affected would mean that you (playing on a different server) would be.

Again, I think they should just remove the word "some" (in the different languages) in those banners.

Northwold · August 6

JeroenB wrote: »

Is this one of those British English vs. US English things perhaps? Sure, technically "some players" can be interpreted as 'all players less one', but that is certainly not how I would naturally interpret "some players". Rather, in the way ZOS uses the phrase, it indicates to me a small, probably even insignificant, sub-set of all players. Is that different for a US reader? If ZOS wants to reliably indicate a significant subset, or leave it ambiguous, they should use different phrasing. But I'd prefer it if they just fixed the servers...

I don't think this is British vs US it's an inflection you're reading into it. I would not interpret it as a slight but a factual statement and I'm a British English speaker.

lillybit · August 6

I agree that "some players" downplays the problem too. Something along the lines of;

"There have been issues reported of difficulties logging in"

would be better. It doesn't imply that it's only a small number of players without giving the impression it's a global problem

Mathius_Mordred · August 6

It doesn't bother me personally. We and maybe even they cannot be certain it's ALL players so the only accurate wording would be SOME. They could say a majority of players but that may not be true. From my experience with the recent 201 errors, it was all players in our guild that we spoke to could not login, those already in the game were playing fine, but for those trying to get in they could not. Do I know that it affected all 500 people in our guild? No, I can only say then that SOME guild members could not login.

spartaxoxo · August 6

Versalium wrote: »

Yeah, to me "some" means "the game is working normally for most players, but some of them experience issues", which is not true.

Maybe only "some" are actually bothered to complain about the issues on the forum, steam, support or elsewhere, but it's pretty clear that when the issue is happening, it's happening to most, if not all. Not "some".

How is it clear it is happening to most?

Edit

Also how is the issue less important if it is openly happening to a few? If it is serious enough to warrant a banner, then it is an important issue regardless if it is only happening to a small amount of the playerbase relatively speaking.

spartaxoxo · August 6

BretonMage wrote: »

"Some" just means "not all", or "an indeterminate number". There is no implication as to proportion of the playerbase. If they wanted to imply it is minor, they would use "few".

Yeah, words like "most" and "few" are one that are meant to indicate proportion. Although, looking at my dictionary, when some does convey proportion it is used for amounts that are large or at least considerable. So even when speaking of proportions, most aren't using some as a synonym for few. They're using it as a synonym for large.

loosej · August 6

spartaxoxo wrote: »

BretonMage wrote: »

"Some" just means "not all", or "an indeterminate number". There is no implication as to proportion of the playerbase. If they wanted to imply it is minor, they would use "few".

Yeah, words like "most" and "few" are one that are meant to indicate proportion. Although, looking at my dictionary, when some does convey proportion it is used for amounts that are large or at least considerable. So even when speaking of proportions, most aren't using some as a synonym for few. They're using it as a synonym for large.

Some is only a synonym for large when talking absolute numbers, for example "he's worked in the industry for some amount of time".

When used with relative numbers, it usually means small, for example "he made some contributions to the project".

Consider this sentence: "We are currently working to fix login issues that aren't affecting some of our users".

SilverBride · August 6

Definition of "some" from Oxford Languages: an unspecified amount or number of.

So using "some" in this context is appropriate.

spartaxoxo · August 6

loosej wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

BretonMage wrote: »

"Some" just means "not all", or "an indeterminate number". There is no implication as to proportion of the playerbase. If they wanted to imply it is minor, they would use "few".

Yeah, words like "most" and "few" are one that are meant to indicate proportion. Although, looking at my dictionary, when some does convey proportion it is used for amounts that are large or at least considerable. So even when speaking of proportions, most aren't using some as a synonym for few. They're using it as a synonym for large.

Some is only a synonym for large when talking absolute numbers, for example "he's worked in the industry for some amount of time".

When used with relative numbers, it usually means small, for example "he made some contributions to the project".

Consider this sentence: "We are currently working to fix login issues that aren't affecting some of our users".

I would read he had some contributions as his contribution was significant but not all encompassing?

I would read affecting some users as a significant amount of users as well.

Like both of those read as "unspecified," rather than "few."

"He ate some of the ice cream," would be a significant amount to me. Not just a tiny taste.

Grizzbeorn · August 6

"Some" denotes neither a significant amount nor an insignificant amount; there is no indication of what quantity it might mean, other than it doesn't mean "all."

Elvenheart · August 6

This is among some of the more “interesting” debates that I can recall on these forums. 😂

loosej · August 6

spartaxoxo wrote: »

loosej wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

BretonMage wrote: »

"Some" just means "not all", or "an indeterminate number". There is no implication as to proportion of the playerbase. If they wanted to imply it is minor, they would use "few".

Yeah, words like "most" and "few" are one that are meant to indicate proportion. Although, looking at my dictionary, when some does convey proportion it is used for amounts that are large or at least considerable. So even when speaking of proportions, most aren't using some as a synonym for few. They're using it as a synonym for large.

Some is only a synonym for large when talking absolute numbers, for example "he's worked in the industry for some amount of time".

When used with relative numbers, it usually means small, for example "he made some contributions to the project".

Consider this sentence: "We are currently working to fix login issues that aren't affecting some of our users".

I would read he had some contributions as his contribution was significant but not all encompassing?

I would read affecting some users as a significant amount of users as well.

Like both of those read as "unspecified," rather than "few."

"He ate some of the ice cream," would be a significant amount to me. Not just a tiny taste.

"He ate some of the ice cream," sounds to me like most of it is still there. "There's some ice cream left" sounds to me like most of it has been eaten.

LunaFlora · August 6

some people experience issues with ESO, not everyone and not nobody.
sometimes people experience issues with ESO, not always and not never.

some is just not all, to me, so i think it is a good usage of some.

some people understand ZOS' announcements and some people do not.

kargen27 · August 6

I see "some" as an unspecified number. Basically it means not all players. You can then get more precise by saying a few, the majority, several or some other word/phrase that better describes the actual number.
I don't see the use of "some" as undermining the players that are affected in any way. They are just acknowledging they are aware of an issue affecting an unspecified number of players.

Iriidius · August 6

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Some players acknowledges the whole playerbase. There's always two sides to any update they give. Some will like it and some will not. Also, even if it was universally disliked on the forums, the forums are a very small fraction of the playerbase.

While „forums are a very small fraction of the playerbase“, this fraction is not cherrypicked but a sample of the playerbase including players from all playstiles.
There is no evidence that most players outside forum have an opposing totally different opinion.

If they have they can come to the forum and write it down. Forum membership isn’t exclusive to certain playstiles but available to everyone if they care to get access and visit it.

Forum is official place for discussions about the game and not some bubble and players making discussion in forum do itin forum for that reason to reach more players not less and cant choose who can answer and who cant.

Elvenheart · August 6

loosej wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

loosej wrote: »

spartaxoxo wrote: »

BretonMage wrote: »

"Some" just means "not all", or "an indeterminate number". There is no implication as to proportion of the playerbase. If they wanted to imply it is minor, they would use "few".

Yeah, words like "most" and "few" are one that are meant to indicate proportion. Although, looking at my dictionary, when some does convey proportion it is used for amounts that are large or at least considerable. So even when speaking of proportions, most aren't using some as a synonym for few. They're using it as a synonym for large.

Some is only a synonym for large when talking absolute numbers, for example "he's worked in the industry for some amount of time".

When used with relative numbers, it usually means small, for example "he made some contributions to the project".

Consider this sentence: "We are currently working to fix login issues that aren't affecting some of our users".

I would read he had some contributions as his contribution was significant but not all encompassing?

I would read affecting some users as a significant amount of users as well.

Like both of those read as "unspecified," rather than "few."

"He ate some of the ice cream," would be a significant amount to me. Not just a tiny taste.

"He ate some of the ice cream," sounds to me like most of it is still there. "There's some ice cream left" sounds to me like most of it has been eaten.

“Honey, I ate some of the ice cream.”

<looks in freezer> “You ate almost all of it! Why didn’t you leave some for me!?”

“I didn’t eat it all! There’s some left.”

“You didn’t leave enough to even feed a squirrel! What were you thinking!?”

“That squirrels don’t eat ice cream.” 🍨 🐿️

Versalium · August 6

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Versalium wrote: »

Yeah, to me "some" means "the game is working normally for most players, but some of them experience issues", which is not true.

Maybe only "some" are actually bothered to complain about the issues on the forum, steam, support or elsewhere, but it's pretty clear that when the issue is happening, it's happening to most, if not all. Not "some".

How is it clear it is happening to most? .

It's clear to me from my observation only. When I log in the minute the server is letting me in again, even the most populated zones like Auridon are empty and it takes some time to see people again.

spartaxoxo wrote: »

Also how is the issue less important if it is openly happening to a few? If it is serious enough to warrant a banner, then it is an important issue regardless if it is only happening to a small amount of the playerbase relatively speaking.

I agree, I never said it's not important. Maybe some misunderstanding. The issue is that ZOS's wording feels like they've been trying to make the ssues look smaller than it really is. Even if it was a small issue, it would still be an issue that needs attention. But when there's literally a big issue, the devs play like it's not that big and only "some" experience it anyway. It's like they're afraid to admit that it's a catastrophy. But, of course, it's business, shareholders, stock market value, yada yada, what do I know.

katanagirl1 · August 8

I always read it as being somewhat dismissive of the severity of the problem, especially when a thread comes up and it sounds like everyone is impacted. That’s probably just my frustration when I am affected. As someone pointed out though, there have been times I logged in and played for hours and because I was already logged in, I could continue to play. In that case, everyone who was not currently logged in was affected but those who were already logged in were not. So, it seems accurate, unless the server has gone down completely.