Wh33ls

If this were full launch I would 100% agree with "Fixing bugs and responding to customer tickets are BOTH part of customer service and neither should take precedence over the other". But, it's not, and fixing bugs, not band aiding take precedence.

That's the whole point. They only have so many GM's, I would hate to see what their ticket backlog looks like. They get to it when they can. Ask 10 people what their definition of timely is and you will get 10 different responses. You get what you pay for, $25 game, no monthly subs, and you want AAA customer service. Man, I wish I had your optimism.

Yes, that is amazing customer service. Also $14.99 a month.

I never said I was talking about you, your issue was with spam rafts blocking everything. Yes, that also sucks, but as fast as GM's can delete them there will be griefers building them to put right back. I believe fixing the root cause of what is making customers unhappy is the priority. You can never know what fully makes someone happy, but read the forums for 2 minutes and you sure will know what is making them unhappy. You can band aid all day with temporary fixes, (give people their stuff back is just one example, delete parked rafts, delete spam foundations). But if you don't solve the underlying issue, this will never stop, and all you will be left with is a team of 200 GM's cleaning up the servers all day from the constant barrage of griefers.

You were originally arguing something about poor customer service, but have now went to where the money is coming from. My points have been the same and you have not refuted any of them. You have merely changed what you were arguing. I have not once thrown a fish, and to be honest your analogies were poor. I still stand by my view that the customer service the OP received was not bad enough to validate a rant on the forums. Adding more GM's to fix the "now" problems is not going to solve the long term problems which need to be fixed by the devs to assist the many and not the whiny few. And they are not going to use Ark's profits to pay for GM's for Atlas to delete spam rafts and replace lost brigs. Now, since you have been completely distracted and lost the focus of your original argument, I urge you to not be distracted from the fact that in 1998, The Undertaker threw Mandkind off Hell in a Cell, and plummeted 16 ft through an announcer's table.

Making an assumption based on an assumption that has no facts to back the assumption, does not make the assumption true. If every business in the world ran the exact same, we would not have needed to coin the term competitive advantage.

I honestly do not understand your reply. Did you miss the last two sentences when I said. They have went to market, they are working on their own budget now. They are not going to steal from Ark to throw money at Atlas.

Again calling names. I have not once called anyone a name.

And if you are going to assert that they are tied, you are going to have to provide all the same information but in reverse. Since neither of use can provide proof of either, let us not make assumptions.

Last time I checked, Chevrolet did only make Chevrolet's, various models, but still all Chevrolet's. However, GM makes all sorts of brands. So Grapeshot made Atlas, Wildcard made Ark. But, here's the kicker, Snail Games made both. BOOM, wrap your mind around that.

No I agree, one company uses it's profits from one product to fund the development of another product, that's how a company grows organically. They have went to market, they are working on their own budget now. They are not going to steal from Ark to throw money at Atlas.

Want some salt for your popcorn. I have been dehydrating all the tears I have been collecting from the "I want my stuff back" posters.

Yup, I'd rather have game complete in 2 years, than you get your stuff back now.

What the fact the founders of Wildcard split off to make a sister studio Grapeshot to make Atlas? Still doesn't change the fact, Atlas is Grapeshot's only game.

ok, so $50,000,000 / $160,000 ($80,000 per employee for 2 years) = 312.5 full time employees with no other operating expenses. Yeah, I'll take 200 GM's to go through the endless list of "i've lost my blah blah blah", reports. and have the company bankrupt in 2 years. Nope, I'm saying they are not going to use the profits made from Ark to provide support for Atlas.

3 years of a top 10 game? Werid, didn't know Grapeshot had any other game.

That would be piss poor customer service for you, but I think it would be acceptable since I was buying products at discounted prices due to knowing they have defects. You can't make analogies for individuals acceptable levels of risk. Some people go skydiving, some don't. You can't make a 100% true statement about human behavior. 47.32978% off all statistics are made up on the fly. I believe that acceptable levels of customer service are 99% response time and 1% resolution time. I personally would rather the core mechanics get fixed for everyone than me get my stuffs back. Guess I'm just being unselfish.

In both examples you state hire more people. I'm sorry to say that in the real world there is this thing called limited resources. So if they are going to hire more GM's to deal with your temporary problems they are also going to have to let go of the developers who are coding long term fixes. I myself prefer long term fixes that help everyone playing the game and not just short term fixes like give me my stuff and delete these rafts that help a few people.

So you walk into the dealership and the service tech tells you. Ok, you have a problem with your car, a mechanic will fix it shortly. Do you go straight to yelp and flame the dealership for the service tech not fixing your issue and passing it on to someone who has the tools to fix it?. I didn't say she resolved it, I said she responded. I'm fine hearing that if I am getting transferred to someone who can fix my problem. Dollie's job is not* GM or dev, so I doubt she has the ability to fix in game problems. The seriousness is exactly what invalidates the analogy. I would not hop into a test plane (one that is guaranteed to crash) if I would not receive immediate medical treatment upon the inevitable crash, however I did buy an EA game that has bugs that will be fixed sometime.

Apples and oranges. I'm in medical need vs I lost muh items.

Then what is a reasonable level of customer service? In the first example he said, "just this morning", and he has already posted Dollies reply. That seems like a pretty quick response time.

Would you have bought that new car if at the time of purchase they told you "This car is not completely finished, there will be unknown mechanical issues that will cause failure"?

So by your logic, if a game is an MMO, it can't have an EA beta testing phase. Better tell all the MMO's on this list they are doing it wrong https://www.mmogames.com/mmo-beta-list/. Constructive? How about we call each other names instead? They had support, Jat replied and explained their reasoning for not giving back individual items. They could have a team of 1,000 GM's giving back all the items people "lost" in game due to bugs and nothing would would ever get fixed. So instead, they are fixing the bugs that cause the problems. [9:01 AM]JAT: GMs may provide more immediate gratification, but it's our development team that is going to fix the issues with our game in the long term

This is just hilarious. I'm mad GrapeShot doesn't value my time, as I waste my time complaining about bugs I have already reported in a forum about an EA game where I literally go to waste my time. FYI, we are not players. We are testers. Don't like losing stuff to bugs, come back after launch.

Maximum flag countdown timer is supposed to drop from 3 weeks to 3 days depending on the number of claim flags the company has. From the patch notes: v18.15 Miscellaneous - PvE Claim Flag inactivity timer has been adjusted so that it now scales dynamically. A company with a small number of flags will be declaimable after 3 weeks of inactivity, whereas a company with a large number of claim flags would be declaimable after 3 days of inactivity. If you went to any top 10 company, it should have at maximum a 3 day timer.