What defines thread hostility? (Able commander controversy aside)

Joining this thread late, but that kind of loosely veiled threat to Brian seems out of line. More something a big name publisher would do rather that a kick-started developer. Why not just show how the 2 commander models differ (even if only a little) and make it clear that if you pay $15 you are giving to a charity?

Okay but a re-texture can still be a big difference yes? I mean in terms of the art work involved the texture is a big part of it yeah?

Yes- sadly though when I actually look at the new commander the first thing I think of is 'Progenitor'.

The new textures add lots of detail, they don't however fundamentally change the silhouette of the model. The model needed some physical changes, or textures that brake up the shape such that it looks different.

I think the thing that I cannot get my head around, Uber have been through this once before with Delta and Invictus (and at least there they changed the shoulder flaps).

The issue is it feels that they've given away our exclusive for helping get PA off the ground. I just think that's not in the spirit of the thing. I like Uber and I do recognise they're doing allot with very little so I'm not condemning them for it, however I can't say I'm happy with the situation- it just feels wrong.

At least the money is going to a good cause.

They should do something further, even if it's just some stretching of certain parts of the model to give it some differences, anything.

Yeah, although I guess what constitutes 'enough' changes is a highly subjective thing. Personally I think some physical changes would be required although spoofing physical changes with some clever texturing might suffice (I'm guessing physically chaining the model is the problem as that is probably as hard as just building a new model)?

Why are people STILL wasting devs time, with this crap about commander skins? Its a damn skin, not a important game feature....

Nah, it's easy, just select the vertices and move them! (Or add more parts and attach them to the bones)

Sacrificial lamb seriously looks like an armalisk going through an emo phase.
It's kind of hilarious actually.

Why do I get the felling you people are not following my flowchart?

You can not invite people to your forums and expect to be dealing with a proper Q&A team. All you get is noise. Helpful noise, at times, but noise still.
Crying over that din does not make it go away.

Why can't they just use another commander, one that wasn't given exclusively to the kickstarter backers.

I mean come on, both commanders look exactly the same.

Your flowchart is incomplete and as-is not actually relevant to the situation.

Mike

I don't think it's fair to label things as "inconsequential", as a general term I don't think it fits but anyways, I think the biggest thing of why these scenarios keep happening is that the community isn't properly informed, several times now a lot of these issues were "Discovered" by community members stumbling onto them or the whole thing just being dropped on us out of nowhere.

Mike

My $0.02..

I don't think people take into account what Uber has done for us all. The way they have developed the game and kept us all in the loop. No other game has had this and the way people are so quick to grab the pitchforks and torches I can see why. If people would have just asked what happened about the able commander and let it go at "I wish it was not so close to the design of the other commander" that would probably have gotten a much different reaction. It's been a few days on this now.. and people still will not let it go. And all that is happening is that the Uber employees that frequent the forums are not wanting to do that anymore. There are SO many other things to discuss. The decision was made, get over it and let's move on. You don't have to agree with every decision Uber makes. Ever hear the saying "choose your battles carefully"? This able commander thing is not going to change. All that is happening is that you are making Uber not want to talk to us anymore, and people that were respected by Uber are losing that respect. I saw another negative thread about bots becoming worthless. How about we discuss that and give clear examples of why we think that is, leaving the emotion out of it. Perhaps asking Uber how they see bots being used in the future. You might not think your thread is hostile.. but change that to 200 replies and you can see were negativity gets out of hand and becomes a waste of time for them to even respond.

That able commander decision is not going to change my enjoyment of this awesome game, and the proceeds are going to a great cause. Can we please move on to something more important? Like how to make this game even more awesome to play?

Respectfully

-Devoh

It seems that whole Early Access thing totally passed you by. I recommend you check your premises before posting such unfounded blanket statements again.
And what Uber has done for us all is starting development on a spiritual successor to TA and innovating a lot in terms of RTS engine and monetisation design. That is all there is to it. As awesome as that may be for some people out there.

To be fair, Kickstarter was technically just a donation service. The progenitor was a gift; a reward tied how much you donated.

Because it's ignorant, irrelevant and a little bit pompous.

How many other games have you seen the company have a bunch of livecasts that include questions and answers from the community with the actual developers? How many other company has asked for input like Uber has/is?

I've been a kickstart backer from the beginning(don't take my low thread postings to mean I'm a newb), I don't see your meaning/point. I still think Uber has done something pretty cool overall. I don't agree with all decisions, and there has been some bumpy rides along the way.. I still stand behind them and think this has been a cool experience overall. Uber is a company and has to make some decisions that are what's best for the company. And by that I mean that they make the final decisions and we are lucky to be a part of it in the way we are. It is unrealistic to think you will agree with every decision, but in all honesty does that make the game itself bad? I stand by my original statement.

-Devoh

To follow up on my comment before sleep last night:

We do not discuss or post about suspensions or bans, because seriously? Nothing good comes from it. The majority of people say "Ok" and move on. 5% of the people who always comment on everything will, however, get in a huge raging fight and flame war about whether it was appropriate or not. Thread gets locked, more people DODGE THEIR BANS, like has already happened and will likely result in a perma ban if he's not careful, even more drama gets made, and nothing good comes from any of it.

Which is why we don't discuss bans, suspensions or other forum disciplinary topics. What defines hostility is if we, Uber, or our moderators feel that a conversation is unnecessarily antagonistic, unproductive, or otherwise destructive to the forums, we will lock down or delete a thread if we have to. We try and do it fairly rarely. Given the couple hundred thousand posts just in PA, we've been pretty judicious about it. Other than spam bots, probably a few dozen threads. But it is at our discretion, and we're not going to write up a guide book of exactly what you can or can't get away with. If you're needing to make those distinctions, you shouldn't post.

If you feel that is unnecessarily restrictive for a for profit business to do, there is always the option to take it to reddit. I continue to think we walk the line pretty reasonably about open and transparent discussions about everything we do, while still working hard to keep this from becoming yet another internet screaming chamber.

That not exact. You yourself not long ago banned the user Iron420. He tried to contact you (via other users) but you has been strong and strict with your decision. In fact Iron420 hasn't been seen on this forum since then.

You banned him with no short notice, and you made his IP get locked down as well, so that he can't access the forum, not even for reading as anonimous user.

That's why you say "two pence".