You're bringing it up, so I'm assuming you see some of these comments as being personal attacks.

One of the biggest problems of the Internet is the ability for people to create little walled off enclaves of like-minded folks who never criticize each other. This is not conducive to any kind of creative endeavor. You're not going to find any great artists who didn't have to deal with criticism.

It's really quite difficult to be creative and active on the internet for those reasons - while "happy little echo chambers" are hardly conducive to creative endeavour, the inverse is no more beneficial - it's downright toxic to creativity to be continually confronted with the kind of criticism endemic to the internet. Personally speaking, I've struggled with depression in the past, and it's hard enough facing down hostility from the worst parts of my own psyche without having to withstand it from the faceless hordes of internetland as well.

So yeah, it's a wonderfully well-intentioned notion, but the execution is lacking.

It's nice that lots of game designers post on rpg.net, but the biggest flaw of that site is an inability to call out people for having garbage opinions.

Im sorry if it hurts the designers' feelings to have their product dumped on,

No. There are better ways to express dissatisfaction than acerbic rants on the internet. About the only thing that kind of venting is good for is catharsis, because the signal-to-noise ratio across even the best parts of the internet is appalling - nobody with any sense takes "something they read on the internet" at face value.

@N0-1_H3r3

I agree with you that the flip side of the Internet is having criticism that is completely inflammatory and offensive. I appreciate you opening up about your personal struggles and I'm sad that you've had to deal with depression. It's easy for me to separate a product from its author, but less so for the author to do it. I genuinely don't want people's feelings to be hurt or for my criticism to aggravate issues like depression. Unfortunately, there comes a point where criticism honest to actual opinions is going to be harsh. If someone is saying something offensive and hurtful, whatever their opinion, they should be called out on it. The line has to be drawn, though, between "this is offensive in general" and "this is offensive to me because you said something I made is bad." The problem with Internet enclaves is that dissenting from the general consensus ends up being seen as offensive, or you end up with the enclave bullying out all dissenters.

I truly don't want to imply that people whose feelings are hurt are to blame for that. The review linked in this thread was pretty hyperbolic and exaggerated. It is pretty insulting to the product. That's a legitimate form of criticism, though. Roger Ebert was a renowned critic, in part because he would just tear into things he hated. That cathartic rant of a review is an expression just as much as dark heresy is. It's not aiming to hurt anyone, and is mostly just about trying to write about experiences with the game in a more entertaining way than doing a technical analysis. It's not the creators fault if s/he has his or her feelings hurt, but it's not the critics fault, either (unless the critic is personally attacking the creator rather than the work).

I'm having a really hard time drumming up any amount of sympathy for game devs who literally copy and paste an old product into a new one and don't proofread that what they pasted makes sense. It's really hard to critique this kind of game design as lazy and have that critique not also apply to the developer.

That said, more moderation on this forum would be a good thing. Not so that nobody gets insulted, but for the times when someone posts something hateful and/or vitriolic and takes issue with getting called on it.

They really haven't covered themselves in glory here, though we won't see any response from them. Unfortunately the podcast community that gets interviews with the developers is domonated by people that simply, for whatever reason, don't see the problems with this new edition.

I'm sorry but this issue of attacking developers is nonsense.

Aside from the fact that noone actually is, if you're charging people to playtest YOUR work - and then you still put out a product that's broken complete with dreadful editing (copypasta etc), then you need broader shoulders when dealing with the people that have paid for the fnal product in that state.

That's just the way it is.

They really haven't covered themselves in glory here, though we won't see any response from them. Unfortunately the podcast community that gets interviews with the developers is domonated by people that simply, for whatever reason, don't see the problems with this new edition.

The reason being that they have a different opinion than yours, just like I have a different opinion than the guy who made the earlier mentioned review. I was wrong to go all out against the reviewer since at the end of the day, it's just an opinion. It isn't a scientific paper, it's just subjective material.

It's also a matter of how big an actual issue is personally to you. Some things can be just negligible to one person while being blasphemous to another. As we saw in that critical review as well. The copy pasting errors do mean that the developers have been either a bit lazy, or under extreme deadlines and pressure.

Personally, I don't really have that much of an issue with it, for me these are negligible mistakes. Since the different 40K RPG product lines are very similiar in nature (like the description of skills/talents/...), I don't have a problem with the copy pasting there either. How many times are you going to rewrite the same paragraph blocks that always must mean the exact same thing? Possibly creating inconsistencies in meaning. It's still a stand-alone product and it is different enough personally for me to buy.

Some people simply don't want to go through the effort of converting their Only War and DH1 to DH2. If you can, more power to you. I'll spend my time doing other things.

Wether they're negligible for me depends entirely on the price of the product. FFG's is rather high, which makes their lack of editing less excusable.

Furthermore, charging for a Beta brings with it the expectation one will turn that Beta into something workable. Outright scrapping it, on the other hand, creates backlash, no matter how good what you do afterwards is, simply because people paid for something that is now discarded and effectively "useless".

Not to expect backlash over this is sorely blue-eyed. I personally think death threats are pants off retarded and anyone making them is a crazy person who needs to be locked up, but calling it lazy or sloppy design and saying that it creates the feeling you, as a customer, are being ripped off?

Sorry, but that's entirely fair at this point and a consequence of the release policy, price and lack of editing/product quality.

Customers certainly do have a right to give feedback, including critical one, and a wise company will pay attention to this feedback.

However, the line between criticism and bashing gets very thin sometimes, and even if the criticism is factually nailing the problem very well, it's likely to fall on deaf ears if it's phrasing is too close to that of a personal attack. I'm not trying to point fingers here, but I feel we should all keep that in mind if we want FFG to actually pay attention to what we're saying.

I'm sorry but this issue of attacking developers is nonsense.

Aside from the fact that noone actually is...

Quoting this since we're spending a lot of words talking about something nobody has been able to quote an example of.

Also, I have to say, as one of the most disappointed people here in terms of how DH2 turned out, I'm in no way bitter about paying for the beta. As much as I wish it turned out differently, I do hope they continue the model of semi-open beta testing.

or

or

I take pride in my personal work and a lot of people will like what I do, but there will always be people who just don't. Calling somebody's work "piss poor" isn't the most respectful thing to say, true or not. This is by no means constructive criticism.

*Shrugs*

Those are not personal attacks.

We are under no obligation to be respectful.

Guys, I think you take this InternetZ stuff way too seriously.

If I found a death threat in my e-mail then I would reply with a "1v1 me IRL f@gget" rather than fall into depression. Ifyoucancatchmydrift.

Those are not personal attacks.

We are under no obligation to be respectful.

They are at the very least insults, and insults are a form of attack.

Well if you want to go down that road then in what circumstances are insults acceptable? What would someone have to do to be the recipient of an insult that is deserved , in your mind?

You wanted quotes, you have your quotes. I won't go into another discussion dance about when insults are deserved or not with you.

Well if you want to go down that road then in what circumstances are insults acceptable? What would someone have to do to be the recipient of an insult that is deserved , in your mind?

When you've reached the point where you feel the insults are deserved, you're past the point of having a civil conversation anyway. Uncivil conversations are rarely constructive.

Guys, I think you take this InternetZ stuff way too seriously.

If I found a death threat in my e-mail then I would reply with a "1v1 me IRL f@gget" rather than fall into depression. Ifyoucancatchmydrift.

Oh, I wouldn't take it seriously either. I'd notify the cops anyway, though, because whoever sent it is a bit of a nitwit and deserves a decent scare

Guys, I think you take this InternetZ stuff way too seriously.

If I found a death threat in my e-mail then I would reply with a "1v1 me IRL f@gget" rather than fall into depression. Ifyoucancatchmydrift.

Different people have different reactions. Don't rag on the person for admitting to dealing with depression. Death threats can be accompanied with addresses or Internet detective work that make them much scarier. Or they could just be accompanied by a wave of criticism (that may be more valid) that just sours the whole thing.

The most obvious one is here:

Basically, if this doesn't illustrate a dev attitude of "you shmucks will pay for anything" I don't know what does.

or

Actually, his reasoning for the game being bad is that the FFG is smoking the crack pipe and has zero grip on its own mechanics.

or

I think I'm well within my rights to call this a piss poor job at this point.

I take pride in my personal work and a lot of people will like what I do, but there will always be people who just don't. Calling somebody's work "piss poor" isn't the most respectful thing to say, true or not. This is by no means constructive criticism.

*Shrugs*

Other than the "smoking a crack pipe" thing, none of these are really personal insults, and even the crack pipe thing is more of a "what were they thinking?!" colloquialism than an implication that the devs smoke crack. As I said, valid critics can come in the form of harsh rhetoric. Deathbygrotz could have called DH "poorly implemented in so many ways as to beg disbelief" but "pisspoor" works just as well. This is an expensive niche product, and people don't have to be measured in how they describe its quality.

Well if you want to go down that road then in what circumstances are insults acceptable? What would someone have to do to be the recipient of an insult that is deserved , in your mind?

When you've reached the point where you feel the insults are deserved, you're past the point of having a civil conversation anyway. Uncivil conversations are rarely constructive.

Do you never sit around bull with friends and being fast and loose with grammar and vulgarity? You can have a civil conversation that involves tougher language. You can also have amazing critique using colorful language. Brevity is the soul of wit, after all, and foul language has such a lovely and rich context that it brings to the table in very few words.

Yes, with friends, but not on the internet where, the spirit of the things I say will be more often than not lost if I include this kind of "colorful language" in my text. It might work if you actually know eachother very well, I don't think that's the case here.

If you can't be sure that whatever you say won't be taken as an insult, then don't say anything or do it in a different manner.

I'm going to side with Gridash here. Criticism is one thing, Three threads (Plus who knows how many on the beta threads!) full of some variation of "This sucks and these people suck for doing it!" is little more than Hyperbole! I like the fact that FFG had an open beta! But why would they continue if the result is going to be the same group of people flaming them on a constant basis? (And yes, some of you are doing exactly that!)

There is nothing in the current system that is mechanically unworkable as written. (There was in the 1st beta!)

You may not like some portion of them but after this much discussion I think you've made your point!

I didn't care for the 1st beta but I gave it an honest evaluation both on the forums and by E-mail. I tried very hard to avoid personal attacks when I did that and tried to confine my comments to clinical criticism. (Ask Nimsim for the definition if you don't know what that means! ) Some will note that I often Site Nimsim when I talk about these things. There's a reason for that; While he and I disagree on how the system turned out, I feel he never let that turn into a personal argument! I respect that! Some others, not so much!

I'm really growing kinda bored with the constant attack/defend nature of this thread so I don't think I'll bother with it again. In closing I will say that I (Fairly obviously!) am not displeased with how DH2 turned out overall. It is mechanically sound and fits with my interpretation of the IP's background. Are there things I wish they'd done differently? Sure! But nothing game breaking! There are a few things that I houserule but I don't think there's a game out there where that's not true! (For anybody!)

Having taken a quick read of this review, I can only say that it reaffirms my opinion that reviews ought to be taken with a large grain of salt, as ultimately the writing will be coloured by the author's inevitable bias.

I don't even like DH2 (as a whole and in its current iteration) myself, but even I had to shake my head multiple times upon reading that article. How can you complain about injury charts when DH1 had the very same thing ? His comment about the Hive Desoleum PDF also makes me think he does not know as much about 40k fluff as he likes to think he does.

There were some valid points in the review, but unfortunately they paled in the exaggeration of those elements that were clearly concerning matters of personal taste only.

Probably precisely because DH1 already had them and it still didn't get fixed?

You're not entirely wrong about the rest, though.

Probably precisely because DH1 already had them and it still didn't get fixed?

But in the review it was presented as a change to the worse.

"However, the most significant changes were made to the game's combat mechanics, and it was here that the beta started turning really ugly.

(I agree with the page-flipping being an issue, btw, but at the same time I find simplified HP pools pretty boring. Once again I could point to GW's d100 Inquisitor for a compromise between the two... )

Probably precisely because DH1 already had them and it still didn't get fixed?

But in the review it was presented as a change to the worse.

"However, the most significant changes were made to the game's combat mechanics, and it was here that the beta started turning really ugly.

To begin with, DH1’s hit point system was ditched in favour of wound tables. If you got damaged, you rolled for a wound effect on an appropriate table instead of just slashing off HP. Certainly a noble endeavour, but one that becomes much less appealing when you realise there are 9 pages of tables in total, accounting for every damage type and hit location possible. Can you imagine just how much unnecessary book-keeping that entails, and how it bogs down the system’s already slow combat?"

I suppose if he had worded it differently, the criticism could be based on this problem never popping up in DH1 because the characters in his group never even went below the simple HP pool, so there was no need for flipping pages. That said, I'd say this would have only highlighted a different, unique issue with DH1 in that the Crit tables would be entirely worthless if they never saw use.

The way he presents his review as makes it sound as if he never actually read DH1 tho - which I don't believe is true, but you gotta admit that these sentences are pretty misleading.

Now I'm tempted to ask: did YOU actually read the review?

Actually the part of the review you're quoting is referring to the wound mechanics from the FIRST beta, not the final DH2 release. For that beta, you had to look up what happened on a table every time you got damaged. So yeah, that was a lot of flipping back and forth.

I know, but I still don't see how you can complain about something when it was already in DH1 - regardless of whether this mechanic actually made it into the finished product. It just comes off as extremely biased.

"This wasn't in the final product, but look what a sh*tty idea they had!"

Like I said in a previous post, the only reason this may have been less of an issue may have been if his group's characters never went into Crits - which I see as a mechanical failure all by itself. Doesn't change the fact that DH1 had the very same 9 pages of injury tables, though.

It could just be poor wording - that he is complaining about the injury tables being triggered earlier and more often than in DH1. But then he should've just written it that way instead of acting like these 9 pages were something unique to 2E.

Actually the part of the review you're quoting is referring to the wound mechanics from the FIRST beta, not the final DH2 release. For that beta, you had to look up what happened on a table every time you got damaged. So yeah, that was a lot of flipping back and forth.

I know, but I still don't see how you can complain about something when it was already in DH1 - regardless of whether this mechanic actually made it into the finished product. It just comes off as extremely biased.

"This wasn't in the final product, but look what a sh*tty idea they had!"

Like I said in a previous post, the only reason this may have been less of an issue may have been if his group's characters never went into Crits - which I see as a mechanical failure all by itself. Doesn't change the fact that DH1 had the very same 9 pages of injury tables, though.

It could just be poor wording - that he is complaining about the injury tables being triggered earlier and more often than in DH1. But then he should've just written it that way instead of acting like these 9 pages were something unique to 2E.

He wasn't. He was giving a history of the beta an talked about the isses with te first one. At no point did he claim they were a part of the final product. And having to look up a damage table for every injury IS time consuming. You're complaining about something that the reviewer didn't even do