Communication Plan

Unchartered Poster Joined: Feb 05, 2005 Posts: 28

The key to successful stakeholder and expectation management is communication. It is interesting to me that, in two weeks, there has not been a single official update to the consumers. A regular or even inaugural post to the site explaining at a high level the current plan and expectations would be well received, if the discussion on Chatzy is any indication.

It seems that the ten minutes required to post something would do a lot. It would, for example:

* Lessen the amount of inquiries from players, which means Lee could concentrate on the problem
* Lessen the sense of players currently that calling up or stopping by is the only way to get information
* Lessen the feeling that only certain people are able to get updates and that the rest of the community is dependant upon peers rather than RSI.
* Lessen the muckraking that flourishes in the absence of informed discussion.

We've always played by RSI's rules, literally and figuratively, so perhaps this approach is not surprising. But we must acknowledge that this sort of outage is unprecedented and thus, perhaps, a different approach by the company is warranted. If I had to guess from the Chatzy discussion, the key questions are:

*. Has data been lost?. The current consensus seems to be "no".
* Assuming an eventual fix of the issue and no data loss, what is the thinking around a restart?. Catch up on all the current missed turns on an accelerated schedule or start with whatever area would have been due at the time of the fix?
* What is the current thinking around the tourney? Delayed or cancelled?
* What is the current thinking around people who busted warriors in anticipation of the tourney? Reset the FE and learns/trains or tough noogies?

Anyway, after two weeks of little, piecemeal or outright misinformation among the consumers, some official information would probably be well received.

Advanced Expert Poster Joined: Apr 11, 2005 Posts: 113

I agree. The lack of any kind of statement is a head scratcher. I disagree with those that say, "This is how RSI has always ran DM, we shouldn't be surprised, and just accept it for what it is." I agree this is how they always have been, but that doesn't mean I have to accept it and not voice my displeasure.

This was going to be my largest tourney ever, probably well over 100 guys. Now I'm kind of "meh" about it. Just kind of indifferent about it. It's hard to care and spend money on a game for a company that can't even take 5 minutes out of their time to inform this customers of what's going on. But whatever, this is how they have always run their company.

Posted: Sun Apr 03, 2016 8:24 am

I agree with Vlad as well. I'm in a similar position as Wolf, my interest is waining, I don't get excited and I haven't looked at any of my duelmaster stuff in a week. Any longer with no sense of when I can play or expecations, I will leave. I don't want to quit, but I too had plans in place, now they seem to be moot.

Posted: Sun Apr 03, 2016 1:27 pm

Yeah. I agree with Vlad. ***Wait...what...Who said that? Laughing

***

But seriously. A Sticky post on the forums should be mandatory.

I can honestly say I have never seen RSI run like this. But I am from the old guard. I played from '87-'93. I don't ever remember the game being run like this. And that was with regular mail, more warriors, and more larger arenas.

Posted: Sun Apr 03, 2016 4:12 pm

I actually started writing a post like this at one point and then the compute had a problem and I lost it. I never got it up.

The lack of any statement is a problem. Even if their computers aren't working, there are plenty of ways to get a post on the site. And what about the people who never get to the site - are they just waiting and wondering? Perhaps RSI can't access their address files right now, but otherwise something should have been mailed out.

I am more than willing to sit back and wait. This is a slow game anyway and I'll give them the time needed. But not being given any indication at all about what is up and what the timeframe might be? Completely unacceptable.

Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2016 1:42 am

I suspect that Lee is in the "really don't know" mode and unsure what she might say, except to trust and be patient.
We are.

ArchMaster Poster Joined: Sep 13, 2006 Posts: 1020

I wish she would even post a trust and be patient thread. If it wasn't for TMM we would all be lost.

Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2016 8:43 am

Grimm wrote:

I wish she would even post a trust and be patient thread. If it wasn't for TMM we would all be lost.

What Grimm said. I understand problems. I understand a lack of definitive knowledge. I don't understand a complete failure to get the word out - even if that word is "We don't know." And I don't get out to chatzy much, so that doesn't help. I have no idea what TMM has said.

Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2016 9:51 am

Nomad wrote:

Grimm wrote:

I wish she would even post a trust and be patient thread. If it wasn't for TMM we would all be lost.

What Grimm said. I understand problems. I understand a lack of definitive knowledge. I don't understand a complete failure to get the word out - even if that word is "We don't know." And I don't get out to chatzy much, so that doesn't help. I have no idea what TMM has said.

This is what TMM said:

TMM wrote:

I spoke with Lee some this afternoon and I have an update.

The power outages caused some hardware failures. Replacing the machines also forced the necessity of RSI system upgrades, which are still ongoing.

As of right now, Lee isn't planning on moving the tourney back, but it sounds like she could be open to it. It really depends on when all the systems are back online. If she does move the tourney, it would most likely be to the weekend of May 7th-8th.

Any warriors that have busted can have their trains reverted once games are running again, if their managers so desire.

Lee sounded optimistic on the phone, so it's possible we might see stuff start running again this week. Since this was an unplanned (and essentially forced) complete system upgrade, the timetable is really unknown still.