I don't want to get into this again, other than to say some really problematic rumours were flying around - that this was done for a member of staff, and that it was done due to OOC connections of some kind.
When I read that I was, of course, super concerned - and checked. Both these accusations, being reported as fact, were untrue.
Instead it was the second of two separate occasions where players, not staff members had approached Action Replay about changes he then made. He also told me he had nerfed said ship, would do so again if there were major issues, and that the addition itself was temporary.
As for how they knew he was 'the ship guy', I can only presume from the update thread?
Asking devs or DMs for changes, based upon RP isn't new, and has gone on for many years. Sometimes it is an area change, sometimes a quest.
Ships, are something different though, due to their mechanical/pvp power so I fully understood the concern, indeed I shared it, but what I could not tolerate, and will not in future, is specific staff members being called out by name and wrongfully accused, or people posting that this was an 'inside' job, without even bothering to ask me first.
I also don't agree the development staff, in this case AR, 'dropped the ball' on this at all. He is entirely at liberty to make changes to his system as he sees fit, and has an established history of listening to, and responding to polite player feedback. Had I been able to point him towards such a thread, rather than a string of tin foil hat accusations as to his character and motivation I expect this would have been resolved already.
No other members of our development staff are versed in his system at all; this is a pet project of a professional developer who otherwise has very little involvement in the day to day of Arelith, as a staff member or player.
At a guess? I doubt he will respond to any other player requests after this, and may well end up taking an indefinite break from Arelith development. I know from experience that doing volunteer work of this kind loses its lustre if those one is doing it for start behaving as if they are entitled to it, grow insulting, or fighting over it. In this case all three of those boxes have been checked.
Perhaps the better question is to ask me whether I would consider handing his project over to somebody else? Or if will, in future insist his work and choices are supervised by a third party? The first would be a huge insult, even if it were possible (it isn't btw), and the second would be a massive overreaction to what is, I believe, an issue that has been blown out of all proportion.
It may help to understand one of my philosophies when dealing with volunteer developers: they have no obligation to work, it should be something that is fun, and to be done only when they find their motivation. What projects they work on are their own choice, so long as they have been approved, and I will very rarely assign tasks to them. In short - work on what you want to, when you want to. That is why ships are AR's project, that is why I cannot offer a timetable, and that is why I cannot simply ask another developer to take over.
It is also why Arelith enjoys such active development.
