A lot of the designs / design goals of Boundless have changed in the past year, without really asking the backers (all of them, not just the few active in the forum) whether they like these changes or not.
So I think that a new backer survey in the format of the 3rd & 4th one would be adequate to see if your backer actually like the changes before you put all those alternative concepts into code
3 Likes
A lot of the changes have been made in accordance with the backer survey though.
In general a new backer survey would be a great idea by my opinion as it gives an idea about what the backers want, though it is important to remember that it is more about allowing the backers to voice their opinion, following all the backers idea is not a requirement really and sometimes the developers just have a better understanding on how stuff will affect the games balance.
11 Likes
I agree with @Thorbjorn42gbf.
Yes, we are providing financial support to them, but thy have a vision for the game, and they are the ones spending hours coding and tweaking it.
They have been extremely open and responsive to our requests and suggestions, but it would be wrong of us to assume that every single change they make will reflect exactly what we want.
There is a lot that goes on behind the scenes that we don’t see, and they have very good reasons for making their choices. Proving some financial support for them does not mean that our demands are the highest power. It simply means that it is much more likely for them to listen to those demands.
I think as long as there is respect for both parties, there won’t be an issue.
7 Likes
Exactly my thoughts.
But often the devs have an idea/concept or make a change to the game that really doesn´t get any support from the community (Last seen in olliepurkiss post about guilds and the ability to not leave them at any time)
@Marlaney
I never assumed nor expected that survey results get implemented 1:1 but as I already wrote above: An idea that the devs like often meets a lot of resistance when it is shared with the community. And if this happens taking a second look at it (or reverting to the previous concept) might be worth considering.
3 Likes
I’m going to have to read that post. I had read part of one where a few different scenarios (regarding the leaving of guilds) was discussed, but I’d don’t realize that you couldn’t leave one.
I completely understand, and agree that our voices should have a lot of weight in the development, but most of the ideas that I’m seeing from the developers are accepted by the majority of the backers here.
Do you have links to the posts that go against the majority?
1 Like
Wow… This is kinda ironic. There has been several changes to the systems or rather “official” reveal of many of the systems. Several of the changes has either been met with acceptance or some backlash and the ones with backlash they have often reconsidered as you said or discussed. The interesting part is that it is often YOU who suggest something like polls and then use that as evidence for “this is what the community wants” now this is a case where there haven’t been too big a backlash and you know it might not turn in your favor so now you want a survey to cover it “because it should include all players not just the forum members”? i’m honestly quite baffled.
@Thorbjorn42gbf. Can you make a poll in a topic with the 3 options “I believe that allowing people to pick a race purely for how they look is a good thing” “I believe there should definitely be racial traits that set the races apart” " I believe that both systems are equally good and I am happy with either"
Ps: my psu just burnt up so I’m writing from iPad until I get a new one. There might be typos
4 Likes
We can live with typos. There are two in my first post. 
1 Like
But this wasn’t implemented. It was one of his development ideas. And he had good reason for this. And it was good that he tested it against the community before we implemented it. But based on the comments from the community and our own ongoing internal discussions we’re now looking at something subtly different.
Interestingly for me, @olliepurkiss, @ben and I still don’t have complete alignment on the final guild features and limitations. (That said, we agree on easily 90%+.) Where we disagree it’s often a very grey area where there are as many reasons for solution X as there are for solution Y. It’ll often come down to personal preference rather than 1 solution simply being right and the others wrong. (Unless I’m right, then obviously I’m right and the sooner people get the message the fewer tears they’ll be.) I think it’s really healthy that we don’t agree on everything, internally and externally - this way all the features are scrutinised and iterated (hopefully) into a better state.
And when this happens we absolutely think again about a feature. Specifically trying to get to the root understanding of any differences. Sometimes it’s because we have a better understanding of the entire game, other times it’s the community that has a better perspective.
HOWEVER - that all said - yes we would like to do another survey as there are many new players in the community who have never been polled. (You might also be surprised to hear that creating the polls can take quite a bit of effort.) @olliepurkiss and I chatted a few weeks ago about beginning to put together a new survey. In response to this thread (and a few others) I’ll start a thread requesting ideas to include in a new survey.
11 Likes
Awesome
My thread might have sounded a bit different from what I´ve intended it to.
I just wanted to mention that it has been quite a while since the last “big” survey and that a lot of concepts have changed since then.
So prompting all backers with a survey about all the changes might make an interesting read (For us as much as for the devs)
4 Likes