Saturday, January 5, 2008

Changes to AV AFK-Reporting

Ah, the goodness that is Alterac Valley. Extremely long queues. AFKers. And even premades! What's not to love? Well apparently, all of it, as many players on the Customer Service forum have been complaining about everything AV. Some have even suggested boycotting the battleground completely, they are so unhappy with it. And while much of us would be inclined to think these individuals nonsensical, Blizzard has indeed taken notice, and is already making changes.

Yesterday, Bliz Blue Bornakk posted about an already-applied hotfix that reduces the number of reports needed to tag a player as inactive. A relatively minor change, but a step in the right direction nonetheless. Still, players are angry that the change doesn't necessarily "fix" the core issue at hand, and note that the exploits people are using to feign activity will still be in play. Valid points for sure, but big-man Drysc explains the reasoning behind this specific change and hints at what to expect in the future, he says:

We want to fix the main issue.

The main issue is not that people AFK, it's why they AFK.
The main issue is not that some no longer queue, it's why they no longer queue.

Asking to make the AFK or queuing system more robust (read: punishing) is really just band-aiding a band-aid and on and on. It will never stop, and we'll only reach a point of total agreement when no one is allowed to play.

We're attempting to put in good, balanced, fun changes that fix these issues at their root.

I'm being a bit hypocritical because the hotfix today did none of this, but it's certainly a positive change in the interim.

In essence, Bliz is working with what they can, when they can. And until greater changes can be applied (via a patch maybe?), they'll tweak whatever they can with hotfixes accordingly, when they see it fit.

I think that's pretty fair, don't you?

1 comment:

Jesika said...

amg log in and give me my lovely black dress back before your account dies, plzkthx.