Mafia Wars from a Player's Perspective

Mafia Wars from a Player's Perspective

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Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Q&A from tonight's Mafia Wars Live

 This was a very extensive episode of Mafia Wars Live, and a lot of questions were answered. They have posted a list of the questions and their answers on the forum:
 
Igtenos asked: Why is Skill Point Reallocation implemented the way it is? Could you either increase the window of availability, make it a standard feature, or kill it permanently.

It is not a standard feature. It is a bonus option which is available at random times for limited times. Increasing the window of availability may be an option.

Sushivbaby asked: Is the Loyalty Program going to be updated?

This is low on our priority list, but we understand your frustration with it. What we understand is that people love the status of it but want to know the real benefit.

Rev4Life03 asked: Will the $16 Million Hitlist Bounty Cap be removed?

No plans for this currently, but we can look into it.

Here2Trade asked:

Background- Slated July 1, 2011, Facebook has mandated that all Application makers cease in the “free rewards”

What is Zynga going to have to remove from Mafia Wars to make it Facebook Application ready?


We looked into what policies Facebook is planning to enforce starting July 1st, and the only thing I could find was that they would require that all applications support Facebook Credits as a purchasing method. (http://developers.facebook.com/blog/post/451/) We are, of course, already doing this.

There’s no mention of “free rewards” or anything like that. So nothing should have to change by July 1st.


DeltaDocter asked: Why can we not collect our Brazil properties individually?

We understand the desire for this. Originally we found that people did not enjoy collecting individually, so that option was not built. But as the properties Became able to grant additional rewards besides cash, the need for this button arisen but was not implemented in the design. I agree we need to have this, and will try to get it prioritized.

LittleHater asked: Can we have the old fighting back?

There are a lot of positive and negative feedback. As we have stated, we are making improvements on this system.

Vaibhdd861992 said: Button man and Bodyguard top mafia bonuses are useless since their bonuses can easily be build by crafting items in New York and Italy. What is the point of those 2 positions?

Agreed, they have become outdated. While we feel Top Mafia needs some attention and improvement, many players have indicated that they don’t want it changed at all. It is low priority to make any changes at this time.

Iamswaraj asked: When will Crack the Safe rewards return?

Those items have fairly high stats. We will definitely re-use them when we can. Currently there is a plan to include them in an upcoming release, but it is in the approval process now.

MW-India asked: When will new achievements be released?

Achievements will be released with relevant features. As far as releasing a whole new set of achievements which apply to the bulk of the game, no plans have been made to do this.

Bagman15 asked: When will there be another robbing event?

We don’t have a confirmed date for one, but based on popular demand we can see about holding another in the near future.

Not-a-troll asked: Why are there no Live Lobbies in Mafia Wars?

The game was simply not designed to support this originally. We are moving towards synchronous play (live lobbies) with Family tools and the chatroom feature. As we bring more support for live stuff into the game, you should see more features which act this way.

LeoWong asked: Why did the Precious Gems start dropping last week then stop dropping?

There was a bug introduced which was quickly squashed. The higher drop rate was not intentional.

Don Mojo asked: Why is there no testing when releasing new features?

There is most certainly testing, but Mafia Wars as a whole is a very complicated beast. We do our best but managing a live game with millions of players can be very tricky.

AMR GABER asked: Why was the option for non mafia members to assist on wars removed?

To keep it in theme. If you are going to war with someone, you invite your mafia, not random strangers. Also, it was making wars end even quicker, making it less likely for people to be able to react to a war.

Whoohoo asked: When will Smart Phones, Hidden Charges and Cooked Books be made giftable?

It is not something we do until the city becomes an old city. A city becomes old once 2 new cities exist.

LeoHolland said: Not all players have a full mafia of real people. Since some of us use Hired Guns, can objectives that require use to get help from our mafia be reduced?

Mafia Wars is a social game where you strength is measured by stats and also the activity of your Mafia network. As you play the game, you get to know more people and can replace those Hired Guns with real, helpful people. Family Tools should help with finding actual new mafia members.

Eluniunman asked: When will Cuba and Moscow reopen?

No plans for this at this time.

Kevin K asked: Why reward those that used bad strategy in the game by giving them skill point reallocation?

By allowing limited skill re allocation, we are allowing people who have made bad skill point allocations to readjust their character into something they better enjoy. By limiting it, we are still rewarding those who made good choices (because they won’t have to convert any of their skill points or spend RP to make the change).

Gord99 asked: Why are you supporting and encouraging clans?

Families (aka Clans) represents some of the most active players in Mafia Wars. We are reaching out to them to reward their dedication and give them tools to help them do, in game, what they already do. Also, most players agree that having an active group you can join up with makes the game a lot more fun.

The Mighty One asked: When will rejected/unreleased loot items be released?

Be more specific and I’ll look into it.

IsiOwatta asked: When will the size limit for Families be increased? (Are there any upcoming updates to the feature that can be announced?)

There are many reasons why we decided on having a 100 member limit. A lot of work is being done to make sure this is causing people as little grief as possible. Eventually we would like to provide ways for larger Families to split into several 100 person ‘divisions’ and then use some kind of alliance functionality to be part of the same larger group. But as to when this will happen, I’m not sure. We really do understand your frustration.

NGAtti asked: Is there any plan to update Days 1-4 of the Daily Take?

Yes, We would like to improve that system and actually have a plan written up. Working on getting it prioritized.

MartinDrake asked: On what criteria was the decision to extend the Staten Island Challenge based on?

There was an issue which had to be resolved after it launched, and therefore not everyone had enough time to finish it. Specifically, many players were not able to collect the ferry passes needed to complete the jobs.

EricT27 asked: Is there any chance for energy to roll over?

No. Managing this is part of the strategy of the game.

Brighty asked: Any chance Special Parts and Exotic Animal Feed can drop somewhere other than the free gifts page.

Yes, we can consider them for rewards elsewhere.

Missie Johnston asked: Why is there no option to remove ourselves from an operation?

Not sure why this is needed? You are not effected by being part of an operation, and the leader can bump you. If you’re talking about having an operation in your queue that you don’t want, you can hi the red X to remove it.

Jennifer P asked: Can we be notified how many of a specific loot item we are receiving when fighting with the new Module. Currently we only see an image with no quantity.

This is a good point and we will be addressing.

Cornelius147 asked: Why are Platinum players not the first to receive new features and events?

This has to be brought to the PM’s attention. We are looking at the benefits of the Loyalty point status and system. I apologize that we don’t really have a great answer for this as there are system limitations in making this happen and we should have made sure that it was possible before we started promising.

Bad Influence asked: Why are Special Parts removed from the Free Gifts Page again?

This shouldnt happen anymore. The free gifts have been reordered so when new event items are added, the special parts wouldnt be removed.

PercuesSOZ asked: When will everyone have the new Secret Stash?

Everyone should have it now.

Ron the Bam May asked: Can Zynga develop an API to work with scripts and their writers?

The answer to this is no. They’re already doing an excellent job writing 3rd party addons without it.

It is something we are looking into, but would require a huge investment of time and money.


MindyCure asked: When will there be updates to the Family Module and what can we expect?

Releasing new functionality is set to happen very soon and will be ongoing as we work together with existing Families to make the systems as good as they can be.

Bogg asked: When will we get new operations?

We are working on these now, and should be announced with in a month, but is subject to reparation.

Kingpin 1 asked: Why is there so much to keep up with in the game? It’s really overwhelming.

There is talk of slimming down the game and removing lesser used features. The difficult part is that for every feature there are players who want it to stay in the game, so by removing things we make a lot of folks really angry. So we are trying to determine the best way to simplify without breaking things, but I can’t tell you what kind of schedule this process will operate on.

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