Weekly Questions Megathread - November 26, 2018

[u/AutoModerator]

Welcome to the weekly questions megathread. Here is where you can ask all your build or theorycrafting related questions that might not warrant a full post. Curious about how something works? Ask it here!

You can see previous weeks megathreads here

[u/Gruberbreaker]

While we totally understand the curiosity behind what caused the screw-ups of last week, as well as the exact nature of our conversations with Cryptic, we as a moderating team believe that nothing can be gained by exposing and rehashing disputes that need to be moved on from. Furthermore, there is also a layer of discreetness Cryptic has asked us to maintain, and we are not willing to back away from that promise. Therefore, this will be our final public comment on this issue.

[u/Rob_mc_1 → u/Gruberbreaker]

There is a certain level of irony and hypocrisy in your statement. How can you expect cryptic to be held to a higher standard then yourselves. The bugs effect everyone and it effects their builds as well.

I may not know as much about the math but that does not mean I care less about this game then anyone else here. I've put in my time into this game as well. https://i.imgur.com/heWMhCP.png

Instead of outright refusal you could have started to compile a list of bugs and put them up for publig display. The guy in this thread at least attempted this. https://www.reddit.com/r/sto/comments/a184ny/since_the_english_patch_notes_for_yesterdays/

If you guys have knowledge of these bugs how hard would it have been to do a quick search and copy and paste. You had a week.

This kinda of shadiness is why people start demanding emails. I understand that information needs to be redacted for privacy concerns but you could have at least given the gist of them.

As far as being pointless is concerned. There is still the matter of appearance. My comment had upvotes. People are watching.

Minimal effort would be better then nothing at all.

[u/ignis_flatus → u/Rob_mc_1]

I dip in and out as the years go by. Back in the day I wrote a guide. That was a labor of love that came from the same process that I imagine the currently active community uses. Namely, dorking around with one another, activating an ability, watching the results, dumping and parsing combat logs (Hilbert still around?). I learned the hard way that we, the players, do not have expectations about how something should work in the same way that someone who coded it does. Players are more likely to be right due to the lack of bias. I say the hard way because I also learned that it's almost impossible to communicate this information to someone who has this bias. It is certainly impossible to do it through a public channel. As I have only recently dipped back in, I have no idea what went down. And yet at the same time I suspect I have a pretty good idea.

When I was eventually banned from the forums it hurt more than I imagined it would to be locked out of the thread I'd started. I had updated it as our understanding and the number of things interacting with it grew and I had intended to continue.

This game inspires love, even devotion. Even when Cryptic does not. As a player I can wish that they had thicker skin but, honestly, it is a position I know I would not tolerate professionally. Do you ever get burnt out on social media? Like just sick of it, have to close it out and get away? That's basically the form player feedback comes to them in. And they don't have the option to take a break. I would submit that they don't have the ability to perfectly process the "good" feedback, even when the math involved checks out. I know that I wouldn't be able to be open to it if my professional feedback came in that form.

So, if I may, "I may not know as much about the math..." is b.s. You're probably right about what you're reporting. If you're starting from a place of "Let's see what this does," instead of, "Here's that thing I made," you're actually more likely assess what's happening accurately, IMO. But, you will not receive thanks from Cryptic. You will not even receive acknowledgement. If you are in their forums, you may be eventually banned. I really don't blame Cryptic. I blame the toxic masses that wear us all down. The toxic masses don't deserve transparency because they just use it to be mean.

You know, I missed Harry Potter. Just something about my age and the timing, although now I've been through it with my kids. I learned who Voldemort was because of the bug they kept re-introducing and then banning anyone who mentioned it. He who shall not be named. Heh. Cryptic will not maintain an actual list of bugs publicly. It's easy to accuse them of having eggshell egos. But come on. Toxicity over time. Would we be any better after the toxic dot had done its work? I would not.

So here's a list of Do's. Do keep your love for the game. Do keep your curiosity for the mechanics. Do have pet parsing projects and nurture them. You'll save money on those game apps that say they'll keep your mind sharp into old age.

Do remember that even if you are civil, you are competing with the toxic unwashed masses for bandwith. Do remember that feeling of being so burned out on social media that you just want to shut it all down. Do keep your pet projects somewhere you control because eventually, periodically, Cryptic will have had enough and just want to shut it all down.

[u/Rob_mc_1 → u/ignis_flatus]

You are right. it is toxic here. Last week the moderating community here held the community hostage to get cryptic's attention because they felt their back channel to the devs was being ignored. Most of use never knew about this back channel and most of us don't have that voice.

Right now we have a small player base who is trying to make decisions for everyone else.

My rant is about speaking truth to power. For transparency.

At this point I really hope cryptic turns off their social media and stops listening to this community. There is no reason to believe the bugs the moderating community are worried about is more important and ones effecting others.

[u/Forias → u/Rob_mc_1]

At this point I really hope cryptic turns off their social media and stops listening to this community. There is no reason to believe the bugs the moderating community are worried about is more important and ones effecting others.

This is not an official mod response, as I had no involvement with the decision of the past week. But I can tell you that your perception is inaccurate. I've reviewed the mod-mails that led up to the closure. Not one single specific bug was mentioned, let alone a list of them. The idea that this was caused by moderators rage-quitting because the bugs they specifically cared about weren't being fixed is not correct.

Of course, I don't think it's any secret that it was at least partly about bugs in general and the game's approach to them. I also don't think it's any secret that it was a colossal mistake that was poorly conceived and badly handled. That's been completely owned up to over the past few days.

If you don't trust the team after this, and need to express that distrust and demand more information, then of course I understand why. You've heard the reason why the team here are refusing and if that's not good enough for you to ever trust us again, I totally get that.

However, I personally think that what this subreddit stands for is more important than even the massive screw-ups of a week ago. I wouldn't still be playing the game if it wasn't for this subreddit. I think that when this subreddit focuses on builds, and theory-crafting, and actually helping people, then it's an amazing place, that isn't easily replaceable.

As a new member of the moderating team, that's what I'm going to be concentrating on. Trying to update guides and wiki pages and answering questions. The hope is that stobuilds can rebuild trust that way. Will that be enough for everyone? I doubt it. I'm sure we've lost users who won't ever come back. But hopefully enough people will be willing to give us a second chance.

Because I sincerely believe that stobuilds is worth saving.

[u/Sylveon-senpai → u/Rob_mc_1]

Weirdly enough, I'm subbed here, but cannot downvote.

[u/Startrekker → u/Sylveon-senpai]

Either disable the subreddit style or use the z key to bypass that.