Separate forum for ED required - but for players only

[dementia]

It is often mentioned that voting threads in this forum are next to useless because of two factors.

1. Any one can join the forum whether they are players or not and therefore vote so you cannot guarantee that all the votes are from players only.
2. Not all players will know about the vote so it is not representative of the player community feelings.

Those being said I propose the following...

1. Creation of an Elite Dangerous forum site that is open only to people who have actually bought the game. How this is done I'm not sure but would require some sort of registration vetting again Frontier records I'm sure. Alternatively automatically create an account in the voting forum using the same credentials as their game login.
2. All the threads have to be of the voting type. There can be discussions around it but people need to have voted before they can make a comment.
3. Both Frontier and players can create voting threads but they are locked to be open for 7 days so as to give players time to consider and vote.
4. Frontier can then use the results of those votes to determine what the player community likes and dislikes when major features and gameplay mechanic changes are proposed.
5. The voting forum is actively promoted by Frontier so as to make sure all players know about it.

This would save a lot of wasted development time by Frontier as they can concentrate their efforts on features that they know the community actually want.

 

[Robert Maynard]

The simplest way to guarantee that current players vote on anything, in my opinion, would be to include polls within the game in some way - whether in the launcher (after login) or within the game client itself (another main menu option).

 

[dementia]

The simplest way to guarantee that current players vote on anything, in my opinion, would be to include polls within the game in some way - whether in the launcher (after login) or within the game client itself (another main menu option).

Indeed however I think this would quickly become unwieldy. Can you imagine the number of different topics players will create? The browser is the best way to display and manage such things I think.

Regardless of how it is implemented there is clearly a need for such a player restricted forum where the game features and direction can be voted on and Frontier pay attention to.

 

[Robert Maynard]

Indeed however I think this would quickly become unwieldy. Can you imagine the number of different topics players will create? The browser is the best way to display and manage such things I think.

Regardless of how it is implemented there is clearly a need for such a player restricted forum where the game features and direction can be voted on and Frontier pay attention to.

While player generated polls are an interesting way for players to see how other players stand on a topic, the last bit - about players dictating the direction of the game - is where it would probably falter. Frontier have, from what we have read, a ten year plan for the game that they are working to.

If a significant proportion of players, of the more than 1,000,000 copies sold from recent estimates, were to vote in favour of a topic that may be enough to get Frontier's attention. We've not seen anything like those numbers in any forum poll.

 

[dementia]

While player generated polls are an interesting way for players to see how other players stand on a topic, the last bit - about players dictating the direction of the game - is where it would probably falter. Frontier have, from what we have read, a ten year plan for the game that they are working to.

If a significant proportion of players, of the more than 1,000,000 copies sold from recent estimates, were to vote in favour of a topic that may be enough to get Frontier's attention. We've not seen anything like those numbers in any forum poll.

Perhaps but it has to be more accurate than the current set up. Frontier might have a 10 year plan but it would be folly to ignore your player community in how to shape that plan.

 

[Cpt_Zap]

and it would be folly for core mechanics or the medium/long term plan to be dictated by short term players, those that play for a few months and then disappear.

 

[DrakeAurum]

Forum polls are highly inaccurate whatever you do. At best, only a small percentage of the playerbase will see or care about the poll, and as forum participants they'll inevitably be influenced by the topics and opinions that become popular on the forum, which may not be at all representative of the playerbase as a whole.

Add more hoops for people to jump through before they can even participate in the poll, and you're now limiting participation to the small handful who can be bothered to find it, sign up for it, read it and vote on it.

The resulting poll will have effectively no chance of being representative of prevailing opinion throughout the entire playerbase.

 

[PiLhEaD]

Honestly, for a long while now I thought broadly the same thing - a 'registered players only' section on the forum.

As long as the email address verifies between forum login and game, then you're welcome in - 'simplez'.

Sorry if this seems a bit snobby, but I've often noticed that the style of discussion during beta, in the beta forum, often seems (sorry) a bit more grown up in tone and content.

EDIT:

...only a small percentage of the playerbase will see or care about the poll...

Quite right, the active player percentage in this forum was (the last time I saw stats) less than 1% of the player base. It may have crept up a bit, but it's unlikely to ever be truly representative.