The Blizzard Conundrum

They say never meet your heroes. Well, I haven't met any -yet-, because most of them are dead or/and fictional. But that saying, when applicable to gaming, should read "Never trust that a company has your back", because, the sad truth is, it doesn't. But what I do have, to quote Spider Jerusalem, is the Truth. And what the Truth is, fellow readers, is a gun with one bullet. Only one, lonesome bullet. But if you aim it right...you can blow the kneecaps off the world.

I guess I have some explaining to do. But before I do, I have one request from you: forward this to every gamer you know. Doesn't matter if it's a World of Warcraft player, or an FIFA enthusiast or anything. Gamers need to stick together, in any case, and that's what we need to do now. Please, read to the end, sign the petition, and help make a change for your fellow gamers. Tomorrow, they might be called to help you.

Now, where were we? Ah, yes, Blizzard. You're all familiar with this company, and how much I've, on occasion, spoke favorably of them. A week ago, a post appeared on the Warcraft EU forums, in the Support section, made by yours truly, when yours truly had finally had enough and snapped like a mad cat on acid with the fury only a snarling, demented feline ball of slobber and claws can summon.

This isn't an impulse thread, nor is it bitching, nor is it anything of the sort. What it is, is the culmination of several, several posts over the years, only few of them mine. I'm posting it here because, it would seem, no matter how many tickets I open up so I can actually talk to someone in a position to do anything/pass it along or how many threads crop up in the realm forums, nobody seems to care. But, perhaps, the issue does gets addressed here as it has, ultimately, boiled down to a support issue. If it's summarily moved to another section of the forums without so much as an answer from "the people upstairs", well...I'll have had my answer.
I know I'm not the only player suffering from WoW-fatigue right now, and I'm more than sure that, for the most loyal players, the long-time subscribers, keeping us interested and hooked is the one thing that really keeps us coming. However, this is an increasingly tall order, especially when we feel we're being ignored. Two expansions ago, my realm (among others) was subject to an FCM which completely changed the playing field. We're now a pvp realm with something like 1:8 ratio, whereas others are equally ridiculous (such as Stormscale, being a pvp realm with 1:12 ratio and so on and so forth). Ever since Wrath, when the situation formulated, there have been realm forum posts about it, and not once have I seen a blue post in them. Now I *know* ours isn't the only realm out there suffering from a ratio problem, and when I finally chatted with a GM about it, he said they keep a close eye in the forums for such things. I have to wonder, though...do they? Do they really?
To make the game playable again, we'd have to shell out 20 euros per character to either faction change or realm transfer. Now faction change? Doesn't work for everyone. I chose to play alliance for a reason, and to be forced to play as something I don't want to just so the game won't be broken is not, by any stretch of the term, ideal. And realm transfer, sure, we'd realm transfer out of those doomed realms in a heartbeat in an FCM. I don't think we can hope in any major influxes of players in the low-population factions; it's a daunting thing, making a toon on a doomed faction or realm transfering on an imbalanced server. We stuck it out for years and got nothing but grief for our solidarity, got nothing but group ganks, nothing but the cold shoulder by the GMs whenever we pointed out the ratio. We shouldn't have to deal with the mess you created and refuse to acknowledge now. And, more importantly, we shouldn't have to pay for it with our time, money or honor points. And the players on the other side of the faction fence? They got nothing but super long queues for everything. I'm speaking of course about the ones mature enough to care, and not the ones who see group ganks and honor kills as an e-peen extension. 
You have not done any major FCMs to address these issues. You have not chosen to merge realms with counter-balancing ratios. You have not so much as addressed them verbally. It's a situation *easily* redeemed, if only you care to fix it. Take a stroll through the realm forums. See just how many (mainly pvp) realms are unbalanced to the point they're unplayable for one faction or another. See how far below on progression factions are in imbalanced servers just because there simply aren't enough people on that faction. See something, do something. Anything. 
We're living in an era major MMOs come without subscription fees out of the box, major releases choose to do without them, and WoW is getting increasingly old, and we're *still* sticking it out with it for whatever reasons. The least you could do is pretend to care.

Can you at least do that?

Needless to say, the post was indeed, swiftly, transferred to the Gameplay section of the forums, sentenced by the unknown moderator who never bothered to reveal himself to die a lonely, undignified death. But I vowed, then and there, that this wasn't going to be the case. I'd get some answers, and I'd at least try to change things for the better. I wasn't gonna idly stand down and take this dismissal without a fight. Damned if I was. I did, however, try to keep my posts as civil, if angry, as possible. I wasn't going to give anyone the excuse to delete my words and, as of yet, they haven't.

A few sample points raised by the posters on the thread include (you might choose to skip these, but good points are raised in everything quoted):

It's exactly this attitude that makes this situation as it is. It is a company, yes, but one that depends on us. All it takes is for the players to realize this. End customers (ie, gamers) in the last years have managed to actually demand things from companies (DLCs, bug fixes, realm merges et al). We should not, *must* not just sit down like good little golems and take anything we can get for an end product that is, in the end of the day, faulty. Because I struggle to think of a more polite term to describe more than half the pvp realms wildly imbalanced. To just sit around and say "they're never gonna do anything" won't change a thing. To actually demand to know *why* they're not changing a thing is another thing entirely. It might be an issue we're not aware of (or so they'll claim). It might be an admission of neglect. Or it might be an admission of greed. Either way, it's time they actually answered this question.

I do intend to keep bumping this thread indefinitely till someone, anyone, explains this mess.

PS: And before the "cool" kids get in with the "roll pve brah" posts...I rolled on my realm in the early days of vanilla, when it wasn't imbalanced, and currently clocking on 11 toons. Should I really have to reroll or personally pay a ridiculous amount of money to personally fix an issue that's game-wide and has (to my knowledge) caused several people to quit the game altogether? Think about this before you suggest it.

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And to convince a whole bunch of people to go to a server like that isn't much of an easy task either. However, to convince a whole bunch of the overpopulated faction to go to another realm would be much easier. This is the only way an FCM would currently help, if it's implemented both ways, resulting in an exodus from the overpopulated faction and an influx on the underpopulated one.

Still, this wouldn't really solve the problem as much as be a band-aid on it. The only thing that could really,really help here, would be to merge some realms. On my realm, we have one alliance player per 8 hordes, and that's a direct result of an FCM back in Wrath that made us the underdogs and has caused, over the years, several people to quit playing altogether. There's realms out there with a similar ratio but with the factions reversed. Wouldn't they make a singular, cheaper to maintain, balanced and all in all more viable realm?

I'm seriously appalled at the "we refuse to acknowledge the problem" attitude.

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So, since there's, still, no answer, let's talk legalese, shall we?

Blizzard is currently facing a lawsuit on the authenticator issue. For those of you unaware of it, here's the quick rundown:

World of Warcraft creator Blizzard Entertainment is on the receiving end of a class-action lawsuit filed this morning by players who allege that the company is unfairly forcing players to purchase Battle.net authenticators in order to keep their accounts secure.

The two plaintiffs claim that in lieu of providing account security to Battle.net players, Blizzard puts the burden of protection in the hands of the subscriber and encourages the purchasing of authenticators. The suit alleges that the sale of authenticators has earned Blizzard $26 million and that Blizzard is profiting "unjustly" from players looking to secure their accounts.

The suit mentions several examples of Battle.net accounts being compromised, specifically noting the hack of Battle.net that occurred in August and Blizzard's confirmation of a rise in compromises in May. It also notes that the free authenticators for smartphones were compromised, which the plaintiffs say makes buying a physical authenticator the only true way to protect an account from theft.

Activision Blizzard hasn't offered a response as of yet. The two plaintiffs seek damages and an injunction that would prevent Blizzard from adding what the suit describes as "undisclosed fees" to ensure the security of Battle.net accounts (in other words, no more selling of authenticators). -taken from joystiq.com

I have to wonder...in what way, expecting people to pay extra money to secure an account actively being pursued by goldfarmers is better than refusing to fix an issue that makes the game unplayable for a wholelot of players? If expecting us to pay for a little extra peace of mind (and yes, I have purchased an authenticator) can be misinterpreted as "undisclosed fees", then how should we interpret game-breaking actions that force people to pay extra money for the experience promised? Isn't that an undisclosed fee that, while technically optional, becomes enforcement purely to get the end product to be experienced as intended, as advertised? And, furthermore, the absolute and total disregard for complaints, pleads or even acknowledging the issue, how should they be interpreted if not forcing us to heed those undisclosed fees? Isn't that...well...illegal?

I'm not going anywhere, Blizzard EU. The sooner you answer the more face you'll save.

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We are paying customers and are being treated like nothing of the sort. I wonder, all these people who decide not to answer our questions about our gaming experience being nothing like it's supposed to be, what will they say to their bosses to justify their inaction, their contempt even, when the playerbase abandons them as they have seemingly abandoned it themselves?

There's only so many slaps in the face we can take. I'm not saying "I'll quit if you don't fix it" yadda yadda, that would be juvenile and wouldn't actually accomplish a thing. I'm saying that if this situation is perpetuated, a whole mess of people will quit. Not a threat. Common sense.

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There was support from other players as well: 

I agree 100%

Too many people are happy to take it in the rear these days.
I paid to move to Outland hoping it would fix things for me as my previous server is a ghost town.
While Outland is very busy it is still very unbalanced therefore as you say "broken"

If half the people on these forums who actually say they care about the game took a stand about this and showed Blizzard we want these problems fixing i am sure Bliz would sort something out.

Imagine a game with fairly equal sides. Daily raids on both capitals instead of just 1 side picking on the other because the other side has already learned how pointless it is to even attempt to attack the other. 
Imagine how good it would be to be able to have a full auction house and torun around and see full capital cities again. 

We could get this back if we all only stood our ground instead of just shrugging it off.

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As probably one of the longest running still "alive" Alliance guilds on Zenedar, and as the Guild Master, I can testify to how hard it is right now. We're losing some of our longest-serving, most loyal, players mostly due to the state of the server and the lack of fun now. Most of these people have quit WoW altogether, some have changed server. We have such a tight group of raiders that when someone has to take a day off for RL issues (work, holidays etc) then we simply don't have the regular raiding numbers to replace them. And this is not for want of trying! We've spammed for members, posted on forums, searched individually for people. There is no one out there! Of the people we have found, most aren't really up to raiding standards, and a lot tend to join for a short while .. then move server themselves!

Star Wars recently made a change similar to this where a bunch of servers were 'closed' down and merged into one. The game is now much more populated, much more active and much more fun.

The way I see it ... I've been playing since Day 1, and we just hit 8 years. So let's say about £9 a month for 8 years. I make that about £864 that I've paid to play this game as a loyal subscriber for many many years. And now I am having to consider paying another 20 Euros to move my characters to a realm where the game is actually playable ... and after 8 years, I have a lot of characters. Blizzard - Take my £864 and give it to one engineer for a few hours work to merge realms? Ta!

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Burning Steppes has been struggeling for years. There have been posts on the realm forum. In spring I saw a blue post saying, they are aware of it and don't have a solution at this time.

In the mean time heir smaller competitor in a sci-fi mmo was able to setup and finish a server merge closing down all low population realms down and create a few high population servers. Resulting in a more people, lower queue times and a populated Auction house equivalent.

At this time it is almost impossible to find groups for dungeon challenges, normal/hard raids.

The auction house is dead, having maybe 1/20th of the high pop realm in goods and charging like 10x the price.

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It's just weird that a small startup mmo gives away free server transfers for all toons and the company with the biggest success has no answers and technical difficulties.

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Let's make a list here!

Realm Transfer - €20 is the price it takes for them to, essentially click your name in a collumn and move you to another collumn of names. That's actually making it seems harder than it is. 

Faction Change - €25 to move the name a much, much "shorter distance," so to say. Oh yes, that's right, some tags about your character will need changing, I'm sure they don't have automated processes (read: a click on the keyboard) for that.

Race Change - €20, look above. Except now they have to change your racials. By clicking "this dude/dudette is now X instead of Y." Amazing work.

Appearance Change (Optional Name Change Included) - This one is my favourite. €15! This is nothing more than a click on the "allow player to do his thing." 

Name Change - €8, I'm actually amazed that this isn't higher. Bravo, even if it should be lower.

EDIT: Woops, wasn't even done yet.

Here's a bit of comparison for you guys! 

€20 will get you this!

Estonia - 10 packs of cigarettes (they're bad for your longues, but better for your stresslevels).
Malta - 30 Newpapers (and those might actually make you smarter).
Spain - 7 litres of olive oi (Seriously, that shiz is ridiculously necessary when cooking)!
Portugal - 24 glasses of beer AT A BAR!
Italy - 5 bottles of red wine (not great red wine, but better than WoW whine).
Belgium - 3 kilos of cammembert cheese (and that's some good stuff right there).

Really, consider for a moment that, while Blizzard is a company that needs to make a lot of money ('cause it is quite a sizeable company), the money they make on transfers are not even remotely necessary for them to maintain a good revenue. You, the player, the consumer, need to man up and tell them that, if they want your money, they have to earn it, and ask reasonable prices instead of ridiculously grotesque ones.

Now, I know that'll never happen, 'cause you're probably 17-20 and spend way too much time on 4Chan, but at least I can rest easy now, knowing that I at least tried to enlighten you.


Now, a whole week has passed, and while I'm positive that some moderator has been in this thread (it got moved to another section by one right at the start, remember?), no one has deigned to give us an answer, any answer. Which lead to this:

 I do find very interesting, if not telling, that other, newer threads apparently warrant a blue popping in for some input, but this one, being a week old (and to reiterate my promise, won't be going anywhere) still hasn't. 

Let me make this clear: This is an issue currently dampening, in some cases outright ruining, the experience of a quite large percentage of players. Maybe not all of them are vocal, but if you ever checked the trade chat logs of the realms affected, you'd notice that while not everyone gets on the forums, they areall very much disgruntled at the situation.

Inaction, let alone verbal inaction, only adds to the sense that we are currently being milked for cash, being served a product without the slightest inclination on the company's part to make this product accessible or properly experienced by the end consumers, through no fault of the consumers' themselves. 

You want to talk logistics? A paid transfer, in my experience, takes a whole lot of 15 minutes, often less, so I sincerely doubt it's that complicated a procedure. A realm merge might be slightly more complicated than that, mostly because of the realm first achievements, but I'm pretty sure it's no rocket science either. My question is: if this is truly the level of care you showcase for your devoted players of years, how can you expect them to start subscribing anew to your next MMO? At this point and level of service, personally, I'm only sticking around because of friends online and time invested. 

WoW sure is great on paper, but you forget that what it's like on paper...well, it doesn't matter. That's not what will keep the players coming. Not the graphics, not the pet battles, but the experience, and this experience, for a whole lot of us, is not being able to do dailies (which the game is now heavily relying on), not being able to level, not being able to farm, not being able to explore. 

When your "Titan" comes out, don't expect us to come rushing if our past experiences are that sour. Like I said...time invested and friends online. "Titan" won't have either, and we now also know that you, the company we've supported all these years...you simply won't have our back. No matter how good the game is, when the developer breaks it and never bothers to fix or even acknowledge the break, it becomes a bad game for those affected.

Some people claim you've made WoW better than ever, but we, the unlucky ones, the ones who happened to roll on one of your first servers years ago, one of the servers you and you alone ruined, will seemingly never find out.

Which, in turn, lead to this post and this petition. Like I said, I don't care what kind of gamer you are, and I know this started in the Warcraft EU forums, but I know it affects WoW in general and is a problem faced by many, many WoW subscribers right now. Forward this to your friends. Sign this petition and show this developer that they cannot treat their players like shit just because their future plans possibly involve the launch of an another MMO. Demand the respect consumers should, by rights, get. Help me blow the kneecaps off of this situation.