every time someone comes here screaming about GMs “not doing their job”, if (and that’s a BIG if) we’re able to get the person to explain the reason why they’re throwing a tantrum, it’s always over something a GM can’t help with.
i’m sure most legit players would be happier if banwaves happened more frequently.
That’s a gross mischaracterization of the contributions made by genuine posters ITT. The discourse has been civil with the vast majority of deviants landing in the camp opposing the OP’s sentiments. In a word: projection, perhaps not of your individual views, but of the knee-jerk antagonism to the OP.
it was absolutely zero relation to anyone in this thread.
it was a reference to people who come to GD and start threads about how terrible GMs are, because they won’t do things which will result in them risking their jobs.
Tell me you never run a company without telling me you never run a company.
$20 hr (not in todays terms so much) but fifteen years ago for just helping people in a game seems like a great gig for some side money.
I found these answers on the forums.
Only, most, if not all, GMs are located in Austin, TX where our minimum wage is still $7.25/hr. (Ridiculous I know!)
The labryinth of federal+individual state tax codes may provide credits towards Acti-blizz for offering employment/internship opportunities, especially if they targetted first-time workers, disabled persons, veterans, or folks on assistance plans/etc. The company is big enough that if they wanted to justify the cost, they would.
Simple answer, they became too “flashy”.
Instead of doing their job, a lot of them would do whatever they could to impress the players to get their GM name on a website list of “cool GM’s that do cool things”.
They would spawn bosses in towns or raids for players to fight, and mess with raids by ccing people on their ruin to the next boss ect. Or teleport people around for fun.
They were making the costumes happy rather than doing their actual job.
So Blizz eventually started not hiring more after people would leave, then they just removed the position all together.
There’s a good video on YouTube about this exact subject.
I don’t remember what it’s called or by who but just search “what happened to wow gm’s” and I’m sure you’ll find it.
Worst Genie ever
My understanding is that number is the federally-set minimum wage, as in, the absolute lowest any employer in the nation could legally go. Individual states(/counties/cities?) can enforce a higher minimum wage but nothing can drop below that $7.25 (excluding jobs that incorporate tips/etc). My experience with this subject is next to nothing but I want to say Austin compels its employers to pay their workers more.
Texas only adopts the Federal minimum wage. Most businesses in Austin probably pay more because the living wage is higher, but the law can’t compel them to.
Well, nvm that. I just found the law they passed recently.
Bobby needed another yacht so they got cut? I mean relocated. Yeah that’s the word.
I wish they still logged in, it’d make my day a bit more interesting.
I miss the days when I picked up my rotary dial phone and was connected with a real live switchboard operator who would then connect me to my intended call. It was more fun and immersive having that human interaction. I could ask them how their day was or comment about the weather.
My grandmother had to yell at the neighbors to get off the party line because she had to make an important call.
Can you imagine sharing a phone call with 10 strangers or neighbors lol.
Cutting costs. They have that automated system in check so that they don’t have to pay a salary or whatever to keep a human in charge of what the automation systems currently do.
It is pretty much corporate greed and nothing more.
because they require paychecks
The paychecks would be for positions that will, hopefully, improve customer satisfaction and boost overall merchandise sales.
I remember when tickets didnt take months to answer. When a cool gm gave me a free faction change cuz all my friends switched without my poor self
3 major key factors here.
1- Players abused GMs, Because GMs were human and empathetic, they would go above and beyond to assist a player and basically fix or refund things that normally should not of been. Making it a $ net loss.
2- HR/PR must have been a NIGHTMARE and I can only imagine all the politics of today and disagreements that were going on making the workplace a toxic environment. (as we witnessed and I won’t even state here).
3- Money $$. From a business standpoint it’s nothing but a loss in money for the company. So much, that even a couple hundred thousand would off-set to just use AI and automation.
Blizzard’s market cap is currently 74.28 Billion. Even if they only had to pay a real human team of 5-10 people in total salary 1-2 million it would still not be worth as a business move.
We the players suffer and the integrity of the game and future for the company dwindles. But they are capitalizing into the new ERA before it’s over.
EDIT: The automation system is actually really good for what it is. The only problem with it is when real player issues happen. So all we can do is adapt and take extra caution in what we do.