Tree of Savior Forum

About Community Management

Suggestions
#1

@STAFF_John, @STAFF_Ethan, @STAFF_Ines, @STAFF_J, @STAFF_Shawn, @staff

Before starting my post, I want to express that I know there have been a lot of posts about “We need Information”, “We need to play now”, or “When is next Beta phase/release???”. However, this thread shall not be similar to those topics, I just want to make sure IMC knows how community management works… Because it seems they don’t.

Also, after all, I post this because I care about this game and I want it to be successful. There is no reason to sweet-talk here or be offended by this, so I want to get it out right here: I think this topic needs to be taken to management level because the forum staff can only give us as much information as they are told to release.

Personally I do not want the game to be released tomorrow. Of cource it would be nice, but I played ICBT2 and I know that, from a design and development POV, there is just sooo much work to do before the game can be released. I don’t even want the next beta to start right now; taking your time and releasing a polished game in the end is the best and safest way for this game IMHO, as long as IMC has enough money to carry on development.

So let’s start. I want to tell you, IMC, that you need to do something about your community. Nexon may be handling the stuff on the korean servers, I don’t care, but this is about the international community. Let me refer to a game that once was in a quite similar situation: Kerbal Space Program

KSP got super hyped in Beta because some famous streamers played it on stream and it looked amazing at that point. They got attention and they used it in a good way. They did something that IMC cannot do right now: Because KSP is an offline game, they could release the game in a playable state earlier and even got money from that. But they also got a community manager whose sole purpose was to post weekly updates, dev blogs and tell the community about design choices that were made. So there was enough material available to keep everybody’s anticipation up and give the community something to talk about. Noone needed to become aggressive or toxic in the forums because they could speculate about actually official information.

Now the situation for TOS is not accurately the same; TOS is an online game. It got hyped because somebody anounced it as the “spiritual successor to Ragnarok Online”, and I don’t care if that is true or not, or if TOS can actually be the successor to RO, but I know that it looks - and felt - awesome and that not only I am super hyped to play it, but also that there are so many people out there who think the same.

You still have the chance to use this hype and have a positive influence on the growth and attitude of your community.

Suggestions:

  • Tell your designers, devs and testers to spend an hour every two weeks on summarizing what they have done since they gave the last update.
  • Find somebody who keeps the community posted about what’s happening in development.
  • Raise the awareness about the importance of this issue.
  • Release a video once a month or when you reached a threshold in development.

TLDR: IMC is responsible for their community and they need to post weekly updates and release official information or video updates on a schedule because this will keep up the community.

25 Likes
#2

I’m in, I really miss the developers’ blog posts, the hype when new classes or features were revealed was a really good thing to keep the hype train going.

I hope they take this suggestion into account and make an effort to keep it up, it would give the game so much good exposure…

#3

These are all great ideas, but unlike KSP and other games that are/were in development phase, iToS is not in development. It’s currently in the localization phase.

The designers, developers, and testers (well there may be a few testers on the Steam Test Server, but that’s for localization) aren’t really working on our version, there isn’t really anything to summarize. They are working on the Korean version, and doing what your saying for the Korean version, since it’s live and development is ongoing.

Example:
2/18 Patch Preview: http://tos.nexon.com/community/dev/view.aspx?n4ArticleSN=35
GOS Magazine, an official post for events, questions, and various things: http://tos.nexon.com/community/gos/view.aspx?n4ArticleSN=29

We do have an active staff member which I’m really glad about, it’s @STAFF_John. Also it looks like we have an @STAFF_Ethan and @STAFF_Ines who are new so we’ll probably be seeing them very soon. @STAFF_John is pretty active for addressing concerns and suggestions, but until the developers focus on our version, there is no update, or summary of progress to be posted.

However, I do agree, that once the website is up (yes they are releasing an official website now, currently this website is just a beta/developmental site), that these steps should be followed during open beta, and all through the live/commercial version.

6 Likes
#4

There maybe little to talk about. But I know at least for myself I’d just be happy with a “We still love you and we’re still working on your version” post every few weeks. Here is a picture of new content we’re translating. Just to set the heart at ease.

And honestly I think I’m only really unsettled by silence because of what happened with Blade & Soul… Setting up a nice website then going dark for years. Though, probably I should just take a break from drooling over kToS and wait for an email or an announcement to crop up on reddit. I would probably be less impatient. I know it’s a different situation and there isn’t a reason for them to delay. But it still sits at the back of my mind.

1 Like
#5

Community managers are in a lot of games now. It’s really nice hearing an update, even if it’s about fixing features, drafting new features, or even community highlights from art to videos about the game. It allows everyone to feel like part of the loop that cares about that sort of thing, and it does nothing but relieve users of haziness surrounding issues.

#6

This post was flagged by the community and is temporarily hidden.

#7

We do get those kind of posts about once a week, you just need to look for them sometimes.

They are not too informative, just “Hey, we are still here and value your suggestions. We will forward your ideas to our dev team” type posts - pretty much what you want.

#8

The next sentence of that quote kind of points at what I want more clearly. I want to hear of progress for our version, the translations… But maybe I should consider John’s activity as something similar… It’s not that different. Or head over to the github and see what’s going on there.

Edit: github is doing things heart at ease. :+1:

#9

In your example, I can see that there are cute petssome User Interface stuff and some more… I wouldn’t even care about the pictures or videos being completely illegible for me, as long as someone gives us information on what they are working on right now. If they do actually do this for the korean guys, it should be even easier to give us a translation along with a description of what the korean stuff is about.

And yes, we do have active staff members who do escalate suggestions to the dev/design teams. But, as I mentioned, they need to be allowed / told to spend time on this stuff. I’m sure John would love to keep us posted, but I think it’s not his decision right now.

#10

Also, thank you to all your feedback guys, I hope this matter gets some attention within IMCs management. :heart_eyes_cat:

#11

Thank you for saying what so many of us before you have tried to say but were not articulate enough to produce in the manner in which you have. good job saying this how to said it. i still dont think they will give a sht even for such a well worded post. the neglect has been super real so far tho.

#12

1 Like
#13

Yes it would be, but that would be irrelevant to our server. Explaining KR events, and KR content patches doesn’t make much sense. What would make sense is an update on the changes between iCBT2 and the next iCB/iOB when the time comes. Just hold on tight, when there is relevant news to give, then they’ll give it. And if they don’t and communication is lacking when the game has relevant news for our version, then we can all complain and hopefully IMC will listen.

I know plenty of people would like to hear “Oh yes, we’re still translating, we’re here!”, but plenty more would be pretty unsatisfied with that message. So long as you visit the forum, you’ll know the staff are an active presence here, and so long as your actively involved in the community, especially the localization on github, you’ll know how much work there is left to be done.

And if your playing the KR server, you know how much development is being done, and saying anything now for our version, might change by the time the game reaches here.

#14

Things will change before the international server is officially opened. Everybody knows that and we all can handle changes. What most ppl can not handle is not getting any information. You can see what’s going on in the forums right now, many people have left, and a great part of the remaining people are toxic / frustrated.

I have mostly stopped myself from toxic reactions and trolling, because I realized what it’s doing to the community and for me, the success of the game and having a better community is more important than posting the first rant that comes to my mind. But it looks like not everybody can, or wants to, do that.

Also, some of the events might be irrelevant, but what’s important is that we know what stuff is possible with the engine / server, what is actually done, and where the game has gone since ICBT2. Some things might not be relevant for us, but most stuff that is developed right now for the korean version will in some form be be relevant for the international server. That’s the information I’m looking at.

I don’t know if you’ve completely understood my point in this. It’s not about getting actually super hot and final information. Primarily I ask from IMC that they realise how important it is to do active community management, starting with it right now, and get a straight policy set on that matter.

#15

They released a status update:

https://forum.treeofsavior.com/t/status-update-on-itos/136467

But as for active community management, that’s already being done. Currently it was just @STAFF_John who replies to suggestion threads pretty actively, among other threads.

But now we have some more staff, and they’ve pretty much just reiterated what I’ve said already in this thread, on that status update. Their current focus is the Steam server stability, and localization, as well as the website.

#16

Well I kind of want to believe that this latest front page post is a reaction to this thread, lol. If it is, then wow, they are fast! If it’s not, then it’s also good because it means they did not need to be reminded about us still beeing here :open_mouth: And TBH I believe it’s a part of both…

Thank you anyways, @STAFF_Ethan, even if it’s not brand new information, posts like that one are exactly what I was hoping for :slightly_smiling: