A few thoughts about the recent dev diary responses

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podcat

Game Director <unannounced>
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I want to take this opportunity to address a bit what happened with the Poland part 2 diary yesterday.

First of all the purpose of dev diaries is to show off in progress stuff so we can get feedback from the fans - you guys. I feel like people have started expecting something more like a release feature highlight and that is not what they are or should be.

This time we have gotten a lot of valuable feedback, but also quite a lot of rudeness and borderline personal attacks. That shit is not acceptable. This is a place where passionate devs share stuff with you. If people can not be civil and respectful like adults and keep in mind that there is a hard working person on the other side of the screen it doesn't work.

Communicating online can be hard, but that doesn't mean you can be lazy when you do it. Read your post and think about the person its directed at. The devs take time away from critical work to talk to you guys and we we do that because we are gamers too and know that nobody likes talking to marketing drones, but this comes with a certain amount of expected respect from your side.

This isn't 4chan or twitter. Be respectful, constructive and open minded. Don't be bullies and we wont have to bring out the big flammenwerfer.
To the people who helped with constructive and respectful suggestions - thanks a lot! We have been discussing the feedback and will look into where we want to go with it. You guys will be the first to know if and when we change stuff. This is why we have weekly dev diaries.
 
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The devs take time away from critical work to talk to you guys and we we do that because we are gamers too and know that nobody likes talking to marketing drones, but this comes with a certain amount of expected respect from your side.
Thanks, Dan! You have worked so hard for us from 2016 (and for longtime HoI fans, even from 2000s), and well, in this trying times, i hope you guys can get your burden lightened up a bit, especially for such big project like Barbarossa Patch.

My personal hope for your team is to have your numbers swelled up by the company since HoI4 is one of the flagship games of Paradox Interactive.

20 artists instead of 11, 10 content designers instead of 6, at least 6 tech designers instead of 2, and 12 programmers instead of 8.
To the people who helped with constructive and respectful suggestions - thanks a lot! We have been discussing the feedback and will look into where we want to go with it. You guys will be the first to know if and when we change stuff. This is why we have weekly dev diaries.
Niceeee, much love! And we would try to help y'all as much as we can, like doing more constructive criticism and appreciations where they due. Hope for the next week's Dev Diary to be more civil.

By the way, noticed me already, @Meka66? Don't forget to settle the score between us regarding that Middle Eastern formable, thanks!
 
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I am sorry people behave like children, that is unacceptable and unconstructive. It's great to hear your reassurances, though, and there was a fair share of constructive feedback in the original thread, which I am glad has been noticed.
 
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I am noticing other fora are becoming a bit less polite as well. It is probably due to lockdown frustrations, though that is an explanation not an excuse.

Just try not to let it get to you, and remember that (almost) everyone on this forum posts because they love the games you make.

Edit: I am kind of curious why some people disagree. :p
 
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I am noticing other fora are becoming a bit less polite as well. It is probably due to lockdown frustrations, though that is an explanation not an excuse.

Just try not to let it get to you, and remember that (almost) everyone on this forum posts because they love the games you make.
Hahahaha, but on the other hand, playing HoI4 has been my way to relieve my pandemic and college-related stresses.

But indeed, some of the playthrough can frustate me at times (cough... forming Arabia in Ironman Vanilla... cough...). Nevertheless, would love to keep playing HoI4 in the future.
 
I have a suggestion regarding Polish nuclear focus, maybe that could pop up an event regarding on how you want to use your nuclear scientists, and you would have 3 options, first one being using them to support the UK and making them receive one off map nuclear reactor as well as you gaining legitimacy, the other one could be supporting the US, which could give them maybe 2 offmap reactors as historically they offered more funds for nuclear research, but no legitimacy. The third one could be "We will make use of our scientists when we liberate home" which gives you a nuclear research boost as well as a in map reactor when you LIBERATE your homeland, which historically didn't really happen as the soviets never allowed the London exiled government to return, but could still be used if you want your own polish nukes but without being too hard to believe if you manage to liberate your polish cores as the exileds!
 
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Just try not to let it get to you, and remember that (almost) everyone on this forum posts because they love the games you make.
we know that :) Just felt it needed to be said at large
 
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It was said in comments to the DevDiary that Poland is moving out of implementation phase and much changes are unlikely at this point.
Could these considerations mean some delay to that to implent changes (ones which are considered)? Or it'll be limited to basically cosmetic changes and that content for Poland is pretty much decided?

Apologies for the rude tone of feedbacks.
 
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I don't post here much, usually just stop by to read the Dev diaries. Seeing the reaction to the latest one gave me secondhand embarrassment.

I'm looking forward to the upcoming Barbarossa update and really appreciate the continued support PDX gives it's games after launch.
 
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Could these considerations mean some delay to that to implent changes (ones which are considered)? Or it'll be limited to basically cosmetic changes and that content for Poland is pretty much decided?

Apologies for the rude tone of feedbacks.
Looking at the historical development in the devdiaries, the devs would change the existing national focus tree branches if the fanbase has sufficient support to demand it.

The Dutch tree has been finalized and pretty much concrete, but then the devs add "Wilhelminism" and changed some of the Allied-related focus for the shared Democratic/Monarchist branch to spice things up.

Portuguese tree has been finalized too, but then the devs added Estado Novo path when fanbase thinks that balancing the competing interests in Salazar's Estado Novo is not interesting enough.

Turkish focus tree too, which has some of the foci shortened in time taken when one of them previously has 210-days length.

Surely this time, they would listen too. For Prometheism and Ukraine!
 
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To keep things in a constructive manner, what I would expect from the polish (and any other) NF-tree is the following:

1. The historical part works and is actually historical
2. There are at least some alt-history branches which are both fun to play and sufficiently plausible.
3. The custom AI-ruleset is sufficiently detailed (and technically working) so that I can exclude the meme-stuff if I wish to.

From that perspective, I guess the stuff which was presented yesterday works.
 
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I want to take this opportunity to address a bit what happened with the Poland part 2 diary yesterday.

First of all the purpose of dev diaries is to show off in progress stuff so we can get feedback from the fans - you guys. I feel like people have started expecting something more like a release feature highlight and that is not what they are or should be.

This time we have gotten a lot of valuable feedback, but also quite a lot of rudeness and borderline personal attacks. That shit is not acceptable. This is a place where passionate devs share stuff with you. If people can not be civil and respectful like adults and keep in mind that there is a hard working person on the other side of the screen it doesn't work.

Communicating online can be hard, but that doesn't mean you can be lazy when you do it. Read your post and think about the person its directed at. The devs take time away from critical work to talk to you guys and we we do that because we are gamers too and know that nobody likes talking to marketing drones, but this comes with a certain amount of expected respect from your side.

This isn't 4chan or twitter. Be respectful, constructive and open minded. Don't be bullies and we wont have to bring out the big flammenwerfer.
To the people who helped with constructive and respectful suggestions - thanks a lot! We have been discussing the feedback and will look into where we want to go with it. You guys will be the first to know if and when we change stuff. This is why we have weekly dev diaries.
I look forward to the dev diaries every week, and I love the dedication of the team and their engagement. I know I am not the only one, but for the record, I love and appreciate y'all ap damn much for making my Wednesdays awesome.
 
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What a pointless post, though understandable on a public forum

The people who know that personal attacks are not acceptable won't be acting that way in the first place and the people who don't, won't change their minds/attitude to be more pleasant anyway, just like Nazi sympathizing crooks won't acknowledge that the Holocaust exists or that Hitler did despicable things.

Though that feedback should still be taken on board, not because of the vitriolic nature but because it shows that the players care for the game you make and want it to be better no matter how emotional they may seem in their initial posts or how many swear words they spout.
 
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Hello @podcat , I applaud the initiative to share your thoughts and have an open discussion on what happened with yersterday's DD, allow me to offer mine:

I feel like people have started expecting something more like a release feature highlight and that is not what they are or should be.

In my personal opinion, this is missing the point completely of what disagreeing people were trying to convey yesterday. We don't expect a finished product, we understand a DD is just showing what you guys have been working on and giving us an overview of what we might expect. That was not the main problem.

The main problem was that we are seeing that after all these months where hundreds of bugs have been reported, mechanics not working properly or in serious need of a rework, and you guys letting us know you are aware of those and are in your priority list, we see that a lot of that work and resources went into creating meme paths with close to no basis on reality or common sense instead of any of the many issues that are currently in the game.

I don't claim to speak for the community nor anybody else than myself, and I'm sure that following that path you will still make good money on the DLC because the customer base for this game is as diverse in their preferences as any, but I think that continuosly ignoring the wishes and preferences of the more hardcore players with thousands of hours in this game and that have supported its economic viability since the beginning, is a mistake.

You guys have for free something many companies spend millions of dollars for: knowing what your customers want exactly to the smallest of details. This can be overwhelming, not everything can be included, and not everyone can have everything exactly to their liking, but I think you have a pretty good idea of the main issues and additions people want to see worked on.

Having more dislikes than likes in yesterday's DD, or facing some sarcasm about meme paths, or criticizing the historical research that went into it, shouldn't be considered bullying or a borderline personal attack, but a blessed warning on avoiding mistakes before the release of your product that can cause your sales and reputation to drop. I implore you guys take this approach and listen to what the community is demanding instead of a "do you guys not have phones?" one if we react with disagreement.

You say:
Read your post and think about the person its directed at.

And now consider what a person who spent over a $100 and thousands of hours of their life on this game might feel when, after months of silence and promising bugs and issues are in a priority list, see you guys announce nukes for exiled Poland (made in a "shadow realm" :) ), Russian Cossacks leading a Polish Falangist International with Carlist Spaniards and South Americans, a Polish colony in Palestine, or 1400s kingdoms.

Thanks for your time.
 
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It was said in comments to the DevDiary that Poland is moving out of implementation phase and much changes are unlikely at this point.
Could these considerations mean some delay to that to implent changes (ones which are considered)? Or it'll be limited to basically cosmetic changes and that content for Poland is pretty much decided?

Apologies for the rude tone of feedbacks.
Even if stuff comes in late with feedback it doesnt mean that it can never change. I mean we have been updating the game for 5 years now soon. In this case if its the 3rd dev diary you can kinda expect that we can tweak things, in fact I like to put diaries early so we CAN hear feedback before it gets too late
 
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I feel like much of the negative reaction to the Poland dev diaries is due to "opportunity cost" concerns. For people who weren't Economics majors, "opportunity cost" is the idea that the cost of doing project X isn't just the time you spend working on X, but that you could have instead spent that time working on project Y or project Z.

Hoi4 only gets a finite amount of development in a given year. Many are disappointed that dev time is spent on alternative history focus trees. That time could have been redirected toward whittling away open bug reports, upgrading peace conferences, or addressing other gameplay mechanics that would benefit every playable nation in Hoi4.

I am looking forward to experiment with the new Polish focus tree once this DLC is released. But I hope that isn't coming at the expense of broader-based improvements.

Since the first Dev Diary was on supply improvements, which definitely needed the attention, I am hopeful that this means we will get BOTH a buffed Poland AND many other enhancements outside of new focus trees.
 
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I myself apologize if I sounded rude both this and previous diary, to me HOI4 is the game that I go to to turn off and relax and with +1000 hours in it, naturally I do really care about it.

However, not justifying any behavior but Meka to me seemed to joke at times with our opinions a little too much instead of addressing them.

For example when asking him why Poles get a 15 percent bonus in industry as a soon to be killed off minor, why does Germany's MEFO in return give em only 5. instead of addressing this clear imballance (at least from my POV) he proceeded to say "if you lose to Poland as Germany, that's your problem."
 
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Hello @podcat , I applaud the initiative to share your thoughts and have an open discussion on what happened with yersterday's DD, allow me to offer mine:



In my personal opinion, this is missing the point completely of what disagreeing people were trying to convey yesterday. We don't expect a finished product, we understand a DD is just showing what you guys have been working on and giving us an overview of what we might expect. That was not the main problem.

The main problem was that we are seeing that after all these months where hundreds of bugs have been reported, mechanics not working properly or in serious need of a rework, and you guys letting us know you are aware of those and are in your priority list, we see that a lot of that work and resources went into creating meme paths with close to no basis on reality or common sense instead of any of the many issues that are currently in the game.

I don't claim to speak for the community nor anybody else than myself, and I'm sure that following that path you will still make good money on the DLC because the customer base for this game is as diverse in their preferences as any, but I think that continuosly ignoring the wishes and preferences of the more hardcore players with thousands of hours in this game and that have supported its economic viability since the beginning, is a mistake.

You guys have for free something many companies spend millions of dollars for: knowing what your customers want exactly to the smallest of details. This can be overwhelming, not everything can be included, and not everyone can have everything exactly to their liking, but I think you have a pretty good idea of the main issues and additions people want to see worked on.

Having more dislikes than likes in yesterday's DD, or facing some sarcasm about meme paths, or criticizing the historical research that went into it, shouldn't be considered bullying or a borderline personal attack, but a blessed warning on avoiding mistakes before the release of your product that can cause your sales and reputation to drop. I implore you guys take this approach and listen to what the community is demanding instead of a "do you guys not have phones?" one if we react with disagreement.

You say:


And now consider what a person who spent over a $100 and thousands of hours of their life on this game might feel when, after months of silence and promising bugs and issues are in a priority list, see you guys announce nukes for exiled Poland (made in a "shadow realm" :) ), Russian Cossacks leading a Polish Falangist International with Carlist Spaniards and South Americans, a Polish colony in Palestine, or 1400s kingdoms.

Thanks for your time.


Thank you for these well-put words!

For me, you have hit the nail in expressing the sentiments that the seeming - and astounding in itself - change in game development philosophy of the HoI series has incited in my very self.

If i had wanted CK3 or any other fantasy meme stuff, i would have bought it. If HoI - blessed with a wealthy and well-respected tradition as well as a dedicated fan base- is about to turn into "CK3 in a nutshell" and / or some odd fantasy meme stuff it may be due time to move along and look out for something else for some people, including myself.

To me, this admittedly would be sad after more than 15 years of being a stark fan of this specific kind of game and the series in particular.

Please devs, reconsider what you are actually about to do to this game series.
 
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Another thing I think people are not fully realsing.
Dev Diaries are mostly written by a single person, with content made by that one person, especially with Focus Trees and Content Desginers.

So if you are critiquing harshly, you are not criticising Paradox as a whole, as a company and the abstract direction they are going. You are argueing with a single person, human like everyone else doing his stuff and presenting it. Content Designer Devs really are not that different from modders that create Focus Trees, they have a full 8h per day to work on, and they get help from coders and colleagues, but they can't for example publically ask for nation specific feedback early on, so mistakes in priotizing can happen. Also HoI 4 exists for 5 years or so, but I think beside podcat there isn't a single dev in the current team since release. Even with 2 year experience creating focus trees, there is still alot to learn and improve.

There were some valid criticism of the tree, some of them I shared. Like off-map nuclear reactor being to unrealistic, although not to strong.
colourisation of generals slightly wrong.
Ahistorical focus branches that start decent, but then become annexations and coring around with Romania and Baltics, but this is something that the customer-base, although not the forum, loves. As a customer I would like to reign the devs in now and then with their ahistorical branches, that feel much more balanced to make a "fun game with WW2 as a backdrop setting" than a realistic alt-history path. But for this I don't need to be an ass to a specific person how they handled a branch with lots of work. There I can argue against Management and use it as one example of many, of something I don't like that much. No need to attack the content designer directly.
Although personally overall I don't really care about the ahistorical branches, aslong as the historical ones are decent.
 
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