Quote from: Ladybird;710214That's a really insightful comment that truly explains the writer's complaints... Oh no, wait, it's pithy grandstanding snark that doesn't actually explain anything or provide any constructive feedback.

"I tested it, I didn't like it, but I didn't want to do anything that might actually improve the end product".

He's a writer. Writing is kinda his job. I'm sure he could have provided something useful.

When scrapping the end product and starting over is the only fix, how many words do you want to waste saying that?

Ha! Jim Butcher is an edition warrior. Who woulda thunk it?

Quote from: Ladybird;710214That's a really insightful comment that truly explains the writer's complaints... Oh no, wait, it's pithy grandstanding snark that doesn't actually explain anything or provide any constructive feedback.

"I tested it, I didn't like it, but I didn't want to do anything that might actually improve the end product".

He's a writer. Writing is kinda his job. I'm sure he could have provided something useful.

True, but on the other hand part of the job of a playtester is to not just provide constructive feedback, but also to provide honest feedback, not pull your punches. Given a choice between providing constructive feedback at the cost of misrepresenting your response and saying "Honestly, guys, I don't have much constructive to offer - I think this project is utterly wrong-headed and needs to be completely rethought", it's best to go for the latter.

Why, after all, rack your brains to cook up "constructive" suggests which at the end of the day will make an experience you despise and don't have any fun with drag itself up from "actively irritating" to "this bores me and I'm not really interested"? Unless you can actually envisage a version of the game you're presented with which you'd actually like, it's best to say "You know what? This whole project really isn't for me".

He could have gone into more detail about why he felt that way, though to be honest "New Coke" actually has fairly direct and clear connotations anyway so I don't think anyone reviewing his feedback would find it ambiguous or mysterious.

Quote from: Ladybird;710214That's a really insightful comment that truly explains the writer's complaints... Oh no, wait, it's pithy grandstanding snark that doesn't actually explain anything or provide any constructive feedback.

Actually, those two words provide a wealth of feedback.  His feedback (those two words) proved very accurate.  They predicted the outcome based on the product he had in his hands at the time.  The execs concerned decided to IGNORE his feedback.

Quote from: One Horse Town;710217Ha! Jim Butcher is an edition warrior. Who woulda thunk it?

I don't know if "warrior" is the right term to describe a person who reasonably concluded 4e was an interesting system that didn't maintain enough key continuity with its predecessors.

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;710226I don't know if "warrior" is the right term to describe a person who reasonably concluded 4e was an interesting system that didn't maintain enough key continuity with its predecessors.

Stop ruining my fun with your so-called "facts"

Quote from: Ladybird;710214That's a really insightful comment that truly explains the writer's complaints... Oh no, wait, it's pithy grandstanding snark that doesn't actually explain anything or provide any constructive feedback.

"I tested it, I didn't like it, but I didn't want to do anything that might actually improve the end product".

He's a writer. Writing is kinda his job. I'm sure he could have provided something useful.

I agree the attacks on 4E can be reduced to "it sucks!!!!!!" But the new coke criticism is somewhat apt. He was basically saying the changes were enough to make this feel different from the prior editions and that people might not all be on board for that. New coke is something people instantly grok. Sure, comstructive feedback is always helpful, but if you feel the underlying premise is unwise it's equally okay to say so. And they are entirely free to ignore you if they think your wrong.

One thing I will say about Butcher, he supposedly landed the dresden files books by proving to a publisher that he understood his audience. If they specifically went to him looking for playtest feedback (and he didn't just sign up for the playtest like the rest of us) then I think coming from him, "new coke" has a bit more weight because they probably went to him thinking "here's a writer who has a feel for the community". With Salvatore its interesting as well because he wrote through the transitions from 1E, 2E, 3E and 4E, and the last one seems to have caused him the most difficulty as a writer (at least that is my take based on interviews i've read). Given that he was writing basically the same characters across all four editions, i think it does speak to how different fourth was fron its predecessors. Neither of them have called 4E a bad game, they just both seem to think it doesn't fit with 1e-3e so well.

Quote from: Arduin;710221Actually, those two words provide a wealth of feedback.  His feedback (those two words) proved very accurate.  They predicted the outcome based on the product he had in his hands at the time.  The execs concerned decided to IGNORE his feedback.

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;710226I don't know if "warrior" is the right term to describe a person who reasonably concluded 4e was an interesting system that didn't maintain enough key continuity with its predecessors.

Exactly.  "New Coke" summed it up well.  It might be, in blind taste tests and focus groups a "superior" product (in fact, Diet Coke is still based on the New Coke formula, IIRC, and it does *very* well), but when people pop a Coke, they have certain expectations of what they'll get.  And you ignore those expectations at your own peril.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;710258With Salvatore its interesting as well because he wrote through the transitions from 1E, 2E, 3E and 4E, and the last one seems to have caused him the most difficulty as a writer (at least that is my take based on interviews i've read).

I don't know about "as a writer", but the one interview I've heard with him about the versions as *game systems*, his stance generally seemed to be "I like 1e/2e, 3e is for munchkins, 4e is an okay game, but it's something totally different."

I'll see if I can dig it up.  And yes, I do believe "munchkins" was the word he used.  And I'll definitely acknowledge that this, and his opinions of the systems from a writer's perspective, may be pretty different and don't really contradict one another ("how I fit the game mechanics into the fiction" vs. "how does this actually play as a game" being the key axis here).

Quote from: YourSwordisMine;710089"But yeah, I did the playtest for D&D 4th Edition, I wrote a two-word review. "New Coke" and sent it in to them. I hoped that would get through, but it didn't seem to."

Ouch.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;710258I agree the attacks on 4E can be reduced to "it sucks!!!!!!" But the new coke criticism is somewhat apt. He was basically saying the changes were enough to make this feel different from the prior editions and that people might not all be on board for that. New coke is something people instantly grok. Sure, comstructive feedback is always helpful, but if you feel the underlying premise is unwise it's equally okay to say so. And they are entirely free to ignore you if they think your wrong.

One thing I will say about Butcher, he supposedly landed the dresden files books by proving to a publisher that he understood his audience. If they specifically went to him looking for playtest feedback (and he didn't just sign up for the playtest like the rest of us) then I think coming from him, "new coke" has a bit more weight because they probably went to him thinking "here's a writer who has a feel for the community". With Salvatore its interesting as well because he wrote through the transitions from 1E, 2E, 3E and 4E, and the last one seems to have caused him the most difficulty as a writer (at least that is my take based on interviews i've read). Given that he was writing basically the same characters across all four editions, i think it does speak to how different fourth was fron its predecessors. Neither of them have called 4E a bad game, they just both seem to think it doesn't fit with 1e-3e so well.

"New coke" is not just a critique, but a warning.  "Go in this direction and follow this path at your peril" is a longer winded way of saying the same thing.  But hubris has its own blind spots.

Quote from: Warthur;710219True, but on the other hand part of the job of a playtester is to not just provide constructive feedback, but also to provide honest feedback, not pull your punches. Given a choice between providing constructive feedback at the cost of misrepresenting your response and saying "Honestly, guys, I don't have much constructive to offer - I think this project is utterly wrong-headed and needs to be completely rethought", it's best to go for the latter.

There's a difference between "honest" and "useless". "New coke" is a useless comment.

QuoteWhy, after all, rack your brains to cook up "constructive" suggests which at the end of the day will make an experience you despise and don't have any fun with drag itself up from "actively irritating" to "this bores me and I'm not really interested"?

Because that's the job that you signed up to do. Playtesting is not a happy fun land of playing your favourite game before everyone else, it's work.

I have playtested horrible things; we did The One Ring. It was awful. It made one player hate her favourite series of books. But we sent our damn feedback because that was our job, and our feedback was both comprehensive and honest.

When I met the author, then I got to tell him just how much I disliked his game.

All that said, if the playtest was so unstructured that "new coke" was a potential valid answer, and the playtesters weren't told the design goals and what to playtest for, Wizards gone done fucked up.

Quote from: Ladybird;710273There's a difference between "honest" and "useless". "New coke" is a useless comment.

It's only useless if you don't understand it.  But that is true of any advice.  

As it was, no amount of detailed feedback would have changed the outcome as the foundational principles of 4E were so flawed as to make it unfixable.

Quote from: Arduin;710288It's only useless if you don't understand it.  But that is true of any advice.  

As it was, no amount of detailed feedback would have changed the outcome as the foundational principles of 4E were so flawed as to make it unfixable.

Depends on what you're into. Evidently it's not for us, we can all agree on that, but there obviously was an audience there. In it's own right, it did well, just not well enough for WotC.

Quote from: Ladybird;710306Depends on what you're into.

Not at all.  I'm talking BUSINESS not opinion.  And, the "New Coke" observation was correct from that standpoint.  Actually turned out worse.  So, while YOU may have liked 4e (actually an neat system) for the BUSINESS it was a disaster.  As predicted and ignored.

Quote from: Ladybird;710273There's a difference between "honest" and "useless". "New coke" is a useless comment.

Er, not even slightly. It draws and direct and apt comparison to a very well-understood disaster in branding which most people (including literally everyone in this thread except you) instantly grasps. "Fuck you" would be generic and useless: "New Coke" makes a concrete connection to a specific incident and says "this thing feels like it's going to wind up like that thing".

QuoteBecause that's the job that you signed up to do. Playtesting is not a happy fun land of playing your favourite game before everyone else, it's work.

I am fairly sure Jim Butcher didn't actually sign up to the 4E playtest as part of a 9-5 job. He's making ends meet just fine.

QuoteI have playtested horrible things; we did The One Ring. It was awful. It made one player hate her favourite series of books. But we sent our damn feedback because that was our job, and our feedback was both comprehensive and honest.

Again, you can give honest and fairly detailed feedback and at the same time be quite terse, and drawing the "New Coke" comparison is actually an artful way to do just that. Just as a picture paints a thousand words, citing a specific past incident makes an analogy which is, again, remarkably clear to everyone here except you.