The new Guild UI and Permissions...yikes (Part 1)

CHEERS TO XAKOPANE!!! Thank you for the follow up, in person no less, that is outstanding.

"I am hope" - Sandman
all my clients ever need to hear is that, "I understand your concerns, and I'm working toward a solid solution as quickly as possible."


Yes please Blizzard.

Posted by Xakopane
While at Blizzcon I was able to have a nice, mostly private discussion (those halls are loud and busy!), with a Blizzard engineer and a couple other Blizzard folks. I expressed the collective displeasure of the changes to the guild interface, most importantly the permissions. I walked them through how the current settings violate basic security thinking in how one provides permissions to a varied group. I also described/reported the calendar sorting bug (sorts on level but no secondary sort on rank).


Many sincere thanks from this weary poster and concerned guild leader.

I feel there may really be some honest to goodness hope.
11/08/2018 10:42 AMPosted by Venjin
That's it. I give up.

I just can't do it anymore.

I simply cannot tell the difference between Roguewit and Mceuan.


It's easy.

I'm the more handsome one. Light and all. ;)
11/08/2018 10:59 AMPosted by Xakopane
I want to be very clear that my conversation was not ignored. I even think notes were taken. Blizzard does listen. What they do not have is unlimited time and resources to tackle every problem. Sometimes you have to rack-n-stack.


First off: THANK YOU for the positivity.

Secondly, I would add that the changes needed are mostly minor. For the most part, people who were already running secure guilds, were not affected. I could not get traction on my server about this issue...only one GM posted here about it from our server, and I established our only existing Guild Leader Community.

Finally, it's time to sift through the wants and needs. About 50 pages here are wants, not needs and how in the heck is Blizz supposed to know what's important?

Xakopane, thank you *so* much for stepping up. I think now it's in the hands of this community. Can a clear message be communicated among us?

At this point I would give Blizz a pass and say: they really don't know what we want. Revert back is clearly not an option...what can be done, like the mute status being returned, that Blizz can do quickly and easily? That's what I'm interested in.
/thread
11/08/2018 06:42 PMPosted by Cheheals
how in the heck is Blizz supposed to know what's important?


If Blizzard can't figure that out from 105 pages {that's just this thread, there are others} and several months of many many Guild Leaders posting their "needs" and what's ultimately important to those Wow's Guild Leaders, they aren't paying attention.

Hopefully, now they are.
Look at that.. BlizzCon has come and gone...and still no official response from Blizzard...the “ignore til they stop complaining”strategy is in full swing..
11/08/2018 06:42 PMPosted by Cheheals
Finally, it's time to sift through the wants and needs. About 50 pages here are wants, not needs and how in the heck is Blizz supposed to know what's important?
Blizzard asked us to post, specifically, what sorts of guild improvements we would like to see in addition fixing the problems with the guild permissions. Sorry you missed that link when you read all the posts in this thread. You did read them, right? Which is how you know how many pages are "wants", right?

You keep saying that the all-in-one permissions aren't a problem because they aren't a problem for you. Well, they aren't a problem for me, either, because of how tiny my guild is. That doesn't mean they aren't a problem for a whole bunch of guilds, especially those who used the ranks and permissions as a reward system for active, helpful members. It's kind of a shame you're so myopic that you can't see the problem and therefor assume there isn't one.
11/08/2018 06:08 PMPosted by Mceuan
11/08/2018 10:42 AMPosted by Venjin
That's it. I give up.

I just can't do it anymore.

I simply cannot tell the difference between Roguewit and Mceuan.


It's easy.

I'm the more handsome one. Light and all. ;)


Aye, and I'm the one with the beard... oh, wait.

You're not any lighter than me, ya silly paladin, what are you trying to say? ;-D
1 Like
Continuing my read-through. I'm looking for a meatier post (most are just asking for reversions, etc.) but I decided this short one from page 46 was different enough to warrant highlighting. The poster mentions they used to use add-ons for many things, but those got broken. (Not necessarily in this latest round of breakage.) The poster doesn't care as much about a reversion as they want a new and improved guild UI, presumably with the functions of the broken add-ons.
08/02/2018 10:06 PMPosted by Zaranthosdk
I don't necessarily want the guild interface reverted, I just want it fixed and improved.

I never liked clicking like, what, 6 times to remove an inactive member after you broke all the guild pruning addons.

Promotions and demotions were no better after you broke the addons that used to let me do that automatically based on rules.

Why not make GM's lives a little easier instead of harder?

The guild changes with BfA are disappointing, frustrating, and mostly a step backwards.
I wish the poster had been more specific about the actual add-ons. It seems they were ones that helped with management in terms of promotions/demotions and removal of inactive members.

I think many guilds would like a function that automatically promoted/demoted members based on rules defined by the GM (and presumably known to all members). Of course, many other guilds would prefer to do things personally, which is why any changes to the UI need to allow flexibility. Flexibility, of course, is what the all-in-one permissions utterly fail to provide, and its lack is why this thread exists.
After careful examination and taking into the account this "light" thing.

I still fail to see a difference between them.

This is what happens with "Is a Plate Wearer" is checked. Everything is the same.
11/08/2018 10:59 AMPosted by Xakopane
While at Blizzcon I was able to have a nice, mostly private discussion (those halls are loud and busy!), with a Blizzard engineer and a couple other Blizzard folks. I expressed the collective displeasure of the changes to the guild interface, most importantly the permissions. I walked them through how the current settings violate basic security thinking in how one provides permissions to a varied group. I also described/reported the calendar sorting bug (sorts on level but no secondary sort on rank).

While I said I understood these changes came about because of the new Community feature, I opined the community feature, as implemented in game, is a thorough pain to use as you must invite individual characters and not via battle tags. While for groups set up outside the game you can use battle tags, the whole thing was set up not to accidentally allow horde into in-game alliance communities and vice versa. I suggested there must be a way to set a flag while using a battle tag in game to not invite horde toons into an alliance community and vice versa.

I also suggested that while the community feature was nice, Blizzard should just have bought Discord ;)

I was absolutely listened to and I suspect some items may be acted upon. Some of the fixes we want are running into resource constraints, I expect. Time will tell on if there are fixes or changes.

I want to be very clear that my conversation was not ignored. I even think notes were taken. Blizzard does listen. What they do not have is unlimited time and resources to tackle every problem. Sometimes you have to rack-n-stack.


Thank you, Xakopane! It's good to have a reason for a bit of hope.

While I agree with others that we're seeing a lack of resources for dealing with all of BFA's various issues, I also tend to be of the opinion that guilds have waited long enough. At this point, we should have a bit of a priority status for the simple reason that a healthy active guild can retain players even when the game itself is in a particularly weak state. I've seen it happen many times, and my guild actually tends to become more active during content droughts.

Maybe I've played a healer for too long, but Blizzard needs to triage this BFA situation. And one way to do that is to make sure that guilds, the primary form of socializing, are strong and have the tools to reward (and retain) players.
11/10/2018 07:27 AMPosted by Takoda
While I agree with others that we're seeing a lack of resources for dealing with all of BFA's various issues, I also tend to be of the opinion that guilds have waited long enough. At this point, we should have a bit of a priority status for the simple reason that a healthy active guild can retain players even when the game itself is in a particularly weak state. I've seen it happen many times, and my guild actually tends to become more active during content droughts.

Maybe I've played a healer for too long, but Blizzard needs to triage this BFA situation. And one way to do that is to make sure that guilds, the primary form of socializing, are strong and have the tools to reward (and retain) players.
During my read-through, I'm seeing more and more posts that can't believe the problem's gone on "this long"--and these are months old posts.

/sigh

What I think we need right now, is some confirmation that they've seen the problem and are looking into it. I think we're all pretty much resigned to this not being fixed during a Tuesday maintenance. But I also think most of us here, and most who posted in the past but have left the thread, are pretty much expecting 8.1 will include a fix. It's the first major patch, and this problem is a big one that needs to be addressed before everyone just throws up their hands and leaves.

Blizzcon aptly demonstrated that proper timing is something Blizzard hasn't quite mastered yet (along with sufficient communication), so I'm offering this advice in order to help avoid making things worse. If the permissions issue is solved in 8.1, no problem. But if a fix isn't going to be implemented then, we need to know NOW. Timely communication NOW will go a long way toward stemming outright fury later.

We don't need promises. but we do need knowledge. If nothing is said before 8.1, and nothing is done by then, people will assume all is "working as intended" and act accordingly. If guilds go away, then the doomsayers will be right, and WoW won't be far behind. Because guilds are the glue that keeps WoW intact, and without them, the tenuous strands binding the community and game together will disintegrate.
Having a lack of resources to look into this is kind of frustrating. I would have figured the people that make the UI are somewhat separate from a lot of the other teams? IDK how things are setup.

Maybe a lot of the UI people are over in Blizzard's mobile game department now.
My favorite part of the new Guild UI is how in the Voice Chat options, there is only "change volume" and "leave guild" like wut? Why is leave guild an option there?
11/10/2018 12:15 PMPosted by Fumel
Timely communication NOW will go a long way toward stemming outright fury later.


To be fair, outright fury seems to be the default state of some forumgoers. XD

But yes, just, any sort of response here would do wonders for the reasonable people (and would probably benefit Blizzard in the long run).
Still on page 46 on my read-through. I'm quoting a quote-within-a-quote here because they're both relevant.
08/03/2018 07:18 AMPosted by Takoda
08/02/2018 11:09 PMPosted by Irannia
I personally would not have minded the change IF there was an "Advanced" option tab, or check box that unbundles the Officer privileges. So that way you can have a simple version and the original version with all the options.

The fact that I have to resort to addons to circumvent the change that was made is sad. I'd rather not run 101 addons if I don't have to.


I'm actually ok with an Advanced option too. My issue is that I don't want the loss of functionality that we're seeing in the current iteration of the permissions.

If it's easier from a technical perspective to revert, then I'd support reverting. If it's easier to just start over and restore what we used to have while adding in a few new things (like inviting offline characters), then I would support that.

I mostly just want the old functionality back asap. Improvements can be step two.
I definitely like the idea of an "advanced" tab option if that's easier to do than simply breaking up the permissions. Even if it's a little harder, it would be a good thing. There are likely some Guild Leaders who prefer having all the permissions lumped together. Giving people the choice of how they want to manage the permissions is entirely what this thread is about.
BREAKING NEWS - BREAKING NEWS - BREAKING NEWS
https://us.battle.net/support/en/article/breaking/22764995

Well, this thread will be history on Tuesday. All threads made more than two weeks ago will be removed. Post histories will be wiped. There will be no way to continue what I've been doing.

We can start a new thread, of course, but all that's been put into this one, good ideas and bad, will be nuked.
11/11/2018 01:31 PMPosted by Fumel
BREAKING NEWS - BREAKING NEWS - BREAKING NEWS
https://us.battle.net/support/en/article/breaking/22764995

Well, this thread will be history on Tuesday. All threads made more than two weeks ago will be removed. Post histories will be wiped. There will be no way to continue what I've been doing.

We can start a new thread, of course, but all that's been put into this one, good ideas and bad, will be nuked.


Which has been the intent of the developers all along. They knew that this was coming. They knew that they only had to wait it out.
11/11/2018 01:35 PMPosted by Merridae
11/11/2018 01:31 PMPosted by Fumel
BREAKING NEWS - BREAKING NEWS - BREAKING NEWS
https://us.battle.net/support/en/article/breaking/22764995

Well, this thread will be history on Tuesday. All threads made more than two weeks ago will be removed. Post histories will be wiped. There will be no way to continue what I've been doing.

We can start a new thread, of course, but all that's been put into this one, good ideas and bad, will be nuked.


Which has been the intent of the developers all along. They knew that this was coming. They knew that they only had to wait it out.
What if we...make a new thread now, and fill it with quotes from this thread?