Custom Skill Enhancers

[joeteller]

Originally posted by MisterVimes
Wellllllllllllll. I have owned a business and managed a few as well and you forgot Customer Relations 102 : We have the right to refuse service.

You were repeatedly rude and when you got it thrown back at you, you got pissy.

If it was a store, I'd have tossed you out.

Sorry but they already took the money. And that makes the difference.

I never refused service when I was managing a business to anyone. Refusal of service without appropriate reasons (such as violence, intoxication, criminal record, threat of physical violence, damaging store property etc.) can get you the loss of your license to operate your business in many fields in many states.

And you certainly can't take their money and then do such. In most states that would get you a nice law suit, loss of license, possible criminal action, etc.

I have no interest in playing legal games over state lines, and the software business has been for years a 'buyer beware' situation. I'll depart and not be doing business with them anymore.

Joe

[MisterVimes]

Originally posted by nblade
Actually this leads into my favorite business rule, you can't make 100% of your customers happy. It just doesn't happen. Sometimes, you have to "FIRE" a customer, because there is no other way.

Thank you... exactly right

[MisterVimes]

Your statment is only partially correct. Since the product performs as presented, there's no lemon law on this one.

[JmOz]

There are two types of support for a product, there is (for lack of better names) customer support, and product support.

If I was to do a report card on Dan in these two catagories he would get the following (with notes) grades, first letter is the grade, the second letter is effort

Product support: A /A+: Product support is how quick bugs get fixed, new and reasonable features are added, how well customer feedback is used to update a product. He is short of an A+ by the smalledst margin, and is probably me projecting my issues with how Damage Shield. Megascale and charges on to him...

Customer Support: D/F: I do not give him an F do to the simple fact that he does not normaly turn venomous until the second or third comment comment, but even on his first comments he is usualy short and to the point, that can seem rude (Where I do not think it is intended to be at this point), however after he gets vexed he starts lashing out. When confronted his general attitude is "I don't care, I'm not changing", thus the effort grade.

See I think this is one of the issues people are not understanding, they see all the hard work he does (And he is very hard working, and he does do a good job, and I trust him to make a good product) and says how dare anyone get upset on how he treats them, after all they had it coming (and admitingly to a degree they do, but this does not mean dan SHOULD give it to them). While others say how can he be so rude, does he not realise that this will alienate customers (and it WILL alienate customers). When this happens they are talking about two distinct types of customer service, and one dan does excel at, the other he needs help with.

Something for all to consider, after reading this over I found the first Paragraph to be insulting (and with no honest critique involved) so I deleted it...

[Derek Hiemforth]

Originally posted by ogier300
I think what you're missing here is that joeteller actually does honestly think Dan has no interest in helping out the customers of HD, and thus believes Dan called him a fool.

Given that Joe has posted two threads in this forum, and that Dan had responded to each of them within two minutes of their posting, makes it easy to see why Dan would come to that conclusion, IMO. What's he supposed to do? Answer questions before they're asked?

I can see it now... Psychic Dan, the Software Man!

- Derek

[Monolith]

Originally posted by JmOz
See I think this is one of the issues people are not understanding, they see all the hard work he does (And he is very hard working, and he does do a good job, and I trust him to make a good product) and says how dare anyone get upset on how he treats them, after all they had it coming (and admitingly to a degree they do, but this does not mean dan SHOULD give it to them). While others say how can he be so rude, does he not realise that this will alienate customers (and it WILL alienate customers). When this happens they are talking about two distinct types of customer service, and one dan does excel at, the other he needs help with.

What does all of that have to do with the fact that Joe wants the program to do something it was not designed to do?

The program Joe bought was designed to operate using the HERO System rules. What Joe wants is a program that operates using JOE System Rules. To do that he must alter the template himself. Dan said this at the beginning of this whole fiasco. Joe does not want to do the work himself; he wants Dan to do it for him. I am sure that if Joe wants to slip Dan a couple of hundred dollars Dan will be happy to do it for him. If not, Joe should just do it himself.

Dan is not our personal programmer. He is not at our beck and call. Joe does not seem to understand that, or maybe he is too lazy or childish to understand that (the fact that he posted a condemnation directed to Steve on the Hero List instead of sending it privately to Steve indicates childish to me).

Dan's customer service issues have nothing to do with the fact that Joe wants Dan to customize the software to do something it was not designed to do; and Joe is throwing a temper tantrum because Dan will not do it.

Grow up Joe. You have been given plenty of alternatives on how to do what you want done. I even offered to do one of them for you. If you cannot deal with that, then that is your problem, not Hero Games'.

[Crimson-Hawk]

Originally posted by ogier300
This is such a weird thread. One guy is asking the program to be changed to accomodate his personal need. So far, in this thread, he's the only one asking for this. Nearly everyone else here is either posting a way for him to do it with the existing program, busting Dan's balls, or supporting Dan.

Just plain weird.

Amen, Ogier, amen!

JmOz: Dude, buddy, pal! I love you like a brother, really! Okay, maybe that's TMI, but seriously. Continuously making comments about Dan's social skills isn't going to change him, it's only going to piss him off. Let up a little, will ya?

Dan: You've made a great program. Don't let the nay-sayers get to you so bad. This guy Joe has said his say. You and everyone else on this thread have failed to sway him and in fact have moved to increase his ire. There's nothing else you can do. Let him go.

Joe Teller: Dude, while I wish I could say I feel your pain, this whole thread has touched off my Social Phobia Disorder in the worst possible way. You did go through the "proper channels" for support; you came to the HD Support Thread here at the Hero Games website. If Dan has failed to meet your demands to your satisfaction, the next step of the "proper channels" is to speak to Darren Watts directly.

Everyone Else: Mr. Vimes, Monolith, Archermoo, EternityShard... despite the exceptional level of maturity I've seen in your contributions to this thread, I fear your efforts have been wasted to feeding a roaring flame. And this is never good. And, yes, I am just as guilty now that I've posted this.

Ben Seeman: I'd ask you to lock this thread so that this nonsense will cease... but that would be unforgivably pissy on my part. So just ignore me.

Please, people! Can't we all just get along? Please?

[archermoo]

Originally posted by JmOz
See I think this is one of the issues people are not understanding, they see all the hard work he does (And he is very hard working, and he does do a good job, and I trust him to make a good product) and says how dare anyone get upset on how he treats them, after all they had it coming (and admitingly to a degree they do, but this does not mean dan SHOULD give it to them). While others say how can he be so rude, does he not realise that this will alienate customers (and it WILL alienate customers). When this happens they are talking about two distinct types of customer service, and one dan does excel at, the other he needs help with.

But I don't thing that what Joe was refering to was the second type you refer to. He gave Dan an earful of how poor his customer support was before Dan was anything but polite. He seems to have been reacting to Dan's response that "It's probably a feature that will not be coming. I have no plans to add it at this point." At this point, his flame seems to have been directed at Dan's unwillingness to customize the program just for him. Granted, after Dan posted "If you honestly think that I have no interest in helping out the customers of HD, then you're a fool." he also started b!tching about Dan's customer interaction. But his first flame, and the one that set off Dan's response, was about how Dan not only isn't supporting the product, but since he can't apply his house rules within the GUI that the product hasn't even been provided as claimed.

[lemming]

Phew! Some of the fallout from this thread drifted by me elsewhere so I had to go put on my LF: Flames and check this out.

IMO, Joe is a bit out of line. He asked for a feature that is not part of the rules. I think it would be a nice addition to be able to add that flexibility, but I'm guessing this isn't feasible right now. I think Joe could of dropped it at that point.

Dan: He's definitly a developer. Responds fast to problems, but if it's not something that is an actual mistake or makes sense and fairly easy to add, is rather blunt about saying it's not feasible.

I think it would be helpful to have a filter between Dan and the public, but at the size of Hero, that's not feasible. Dan is doing an awesome job of killing bugs when they're reported.

He's certainly not a customer support trained person (or he was and got burned out. )
However, I've got no problem with how he's handling this. Problems are fixed and occasional enhancements are done. It's one of the best 1.x products I've seen.

Ignore this: I've been involved in SW Dev, QA, and Customer Support for 15 years. We've got it pretty good.

[JmOz]

Originally posted by archermoo
But I don't thing that what Joe was refering to was the second type you refer to. He gave Dan an earful of how poor his customer support was before Dan was anything but polite. He seems to have been reacting to Dan's response that "It's probably a feature that will not be coming. I have no plans to add it at this point." At this point, his flame seems to have been directed at Dan's unwillingness to customize the program just for him. Granted, after Dan posted "If you honestly think that I have no interest in helping out the customers of HD, then you're a fool." he also started b!tching about Dan's customer interaction. But his first flame, and the one that set off Dan's response, was about how Dan not only isn't supporting the product, but since he can't apply his house rules within the GUI that the product hasn't even been provided as claimed.

I agree with what you say there, And I did not get involved in this discusion until after, as you put it, Dan started B!tching. I think the request was unreasonable to begin with (well not unresinable to ask, but to demand it). And once again, like I said, dan has done a great job.

[archermoo]

Originally posted by JmOz
I agree with what you say there, And I did not get involved in this discusion until after, as you put it, Dan started B!tching. I think the request was unreasonable to begin with (well not unresinable to ask, but to demand it). And once again, like I said, dan has done a great job.

Somewhat minor, but I'll point out that I never said anything about Dan b!tching. I mentioned Joe b!tching. Dan simply treated Joe in the same manner Joe was treating him. A perfectly reasonable thing to do, in my opinion.

And for the record, I agree that his initial request, had it been made as a request rather than as a demand, would have been perfectly reasonable. Just as Dan's response that he was not currently planning on adding any such feature was perfectly reasonable. Even in the face of Joe's actual posted demand (not request): "Thats annoying and definitely a feature I want improved on.", Dan still had what I feel is a perfectly reasonable response.

In any case, we'd probably be best to take Crimson=-Hawk's advice and just let it drop...

[JmOz]

agreed

[MisterVimes]

*SNIFF*
I need a hug

[Chaosliege]

Man, you guys have been busy. when I left for work this morning, this thread was only 2 pages. Now it's 4. This thread would do my namesake proud

[Chris Goodwin]

Regardless of who is right or wrong, Dan isn't representing Hero Games very well (and, like it or not, that's how he's seen). And, whether it's $4, $40, or $40,000, people have a right to feel good about the purchases they've made.