Dev Tipping Program

Community General Discussion
1

It would be nice to have a record of all work tickets that blizzard has done, for example, quests, class design, engineering design etc. Associated with each work ticket is not the name of the dev that worked the ticket, but a bitcoin address. We could send the ticket number in the notes section of the btc transaction.

This way, we can anonymously tip the devs for their hard work, and we can reward good work over and above the compensation that the devs get from blizzard.

For example, I think that the dev who designed the alchemy silas stone deserves a free beer. That’s just me. If he had a btc address, and I knew it, I would give him $5 worth of btc right now. Free.

The reason is that compared to other professions, the dev who made the alchemist silas stone did very good work. It’s engaging, it is useful, and it is fun. By rewarding this dev for their work (and hopefully letting other devs see that this dev is getting paid a bonus for doing good engaging design that the community likes) we can encourage the devs to make content and design that we the players find to be engaging.

Whoever designed engineering and leatherworking tools of the trade was not putting their heart into it, compared to alchemy. I think Dev Tipping could fix that, and it could incentivize Devs to be the best they can be for the community. They might be good enough for their managers, but at the end of the day, blizzard is working for the customers. Right now, we can only reward the devs by paying subscriptions. Its a question of voting with your feet right now if you don’t like something, and if you do like something, you get no way to give meaningful feedback that is listened to. Dev Tipping would be meaningful feedback, and devs would probably go study tickets that generated a large number of tips.

Also, this is a straight up revenue stream for blizzard. They could pocket 5% of the dev tips and easily make more money. Please blizzard, let us reward good devs.

2

Okay real talk, everyone keeps talking “Dev this, dev that”, devs are just an average guy coding what they are told to code, they don’t do any executive decision. The ladder goes higher than that for decisions.

Sub to the game.

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3

OK but he can only drink it if he can roll a ‘6’ on a die… otherwise he has to wait an hour and try again

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4

What an interesting idea. I’m afraid you’re about to be torn apart by GD though.

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5

I’ll donate to anyone in blizzard who made warlocks OP. who keeps them OP. and every patch where OP warlocks are not nerfed, i’ll refresh all my donations.

Depending on situations, i’ll have a rolling list of class that id like to see nerfed. and i’ll donate to anyone who nerfed them every time i see a patch note hitting the ones i want.

P.S. Silas is garbage. this RNG bs is entirely stupid. But i am not going to claim i did not make a large amount of gold using it

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6

They already are paid. No.

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7

Le cringe. Le epic cringe.

Get outta here dude. Eww.

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8

They might be paid, but they are paid the same for good design and bad design. All design is just design, by blizzard management, and so long as they are being “productive” they get a paycheck. Their paycheck is not determinant on whether or not their “productivity” is actually good design, or just mediocre poor design. And that is the reason that triple AAA game companies tend to have worse and worse design as they age compared to indie companies. If an indie company makes a bad game, the company goes bankrupt and the devs lose their job. If a triple AAA company makes a bad design choice in a large game like wow, the devs don’t lose their paycheck at all. It is mediocrity. And it shows.

Addressing this is not something that management is capable of doing, because rating the design choices in a game is what consumers do when they choose to keep paying the sub.

The dev tipping idea is about making the devs strive for better, and to be better. This is the ultimate form of feedback. Its an incentive that would make them be better devs.

9

Well then pay them $2.13 an hour give them a real incentive to do good work if they’re going to get tipped.

10

Developers are just dudes paid to implement things that the game designers and higher ups like Ion tell them to do.

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11

This guy works at a communal barista establishment most likely, I get the sense he doesn’t understand how dev environments actually operate.

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12

What is the point of doing that? What purpose does reducing their pay serve? From an economic standpoint, having enough money to reliably pay your bills is important. If a dev is worrying about their bills instead of focusing on their work, we will get bad results.

And also, devs are doing skilled labour. Unskilled labour like waiting tables is free, but devs had to pay for college to learn the skills to do the work they are doing. $3 is not going to make ends meet.

Adding tipping on top of competitive pay solves the problem. Also, consider that lowering dev wages just means that more money gets to be sent to the CEO bobby Kotick, and the private shareholders of activision blizzard stock. They don’t do ANY work to make the game better. I would much rather my money went to the people who are actually working hard to make my game better, rather than investor type leeches that are sucking blizzard dry. If blizzard didn’t have to pay dividends to shareholders, they could afford more servers.

13

okay it is more and more obvious you don’t know what you’re talking about.
A lot of coders don’t get hired because they went to a school or whatever, having a good portfolio will be a much better entry way. Same goes for art.

lol that’s just greed / laziness from their part.

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14

Fine. we both know who I am talking about when I say devs. I am talking about the people who are making the design decisions for the game. Also, if you look at blizzard documentaries, they have quest designers, and from what the interviews say, the quest designers are pretty free in what they are allowed to create.

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15

The only ‘tips’ devs, or any other Blizzard employee, deserve are the ones they get here.
Tips such as ‘FIX THIS BROKEN GAME ALREADY’ or ‘QUIT FIXING WHAT AIN’T BROKE’.
They already get paid to do their job.
Skäl
:beer:

16

are you sure?

17

As long as you sub to the game, it won’t be fixed. Can you quit wow for more than a year, and go without the wow itch being scratched? Also, wow was fixed pretty good for a while in wrath and MoP, and then it got worse. Your logic really does not float here.

18

Not our problem.
This is a GAME; not a charitable works program. If they can’t cut, believe me when I say there are lots of others waiting to step in.
To foist their internal problems on us, as some kind of a ‘justification’ is nothing but an excuse.
Skäl
:beer:

19

Activision merged with Vivendi Games, culminating in the inclusion of the Blizzard brand name in the title of the resulting holding company, in 2008. (That was WOTLK)

20

No company that works with code is going to publish how their internal work systems function publicly in a million years, nor are they ever going to associate specific people with specific functions in a way that allows the public to see exactly what work that person does.

That’s just asking for harassment, and for individuals to be stalked, and all sorts of other bad activity.

“Oh Developer Bob is the one who implemented the nerf to my class? I hope Developer Bob likes 5,000 anchovy and pineapple pizzas!”

Or worse.

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