TOPIC: Huge props to the customer service being shown at Gen Con 2019

Having an AC debrief the party was an awesome step in customer service and quality control.

I hope it pays dividends in terms of player perception, but I wanted to thank the directors and ACs for doing this.

Matthew Hayward wrote: Having an AC debrief the party was an awesome step in customer service and quality control.

I hope it pays dividends in terms of player perception, but I wanted to thank the directors and ACs for doing this.

I both loved and hated the AC feedback sessions at the end of the runs (mostly loved).

It is great, since many times we on the forums tell people things like "oh, if something like that comes up, you should tell an AC". But let's face it 75% or more of the players have no clue how to find an AC. So bringing the ACs to them is great. And even for experienced players it can be useful to give feedback after each run. And I suspect TD even finds it useful to hear things like "what you did in room 3 with the audio is so much better on this run than it was yesterday".

On the not-so-great side, it added time to each run that we didn't know to plan for (or maybe I just missed the memo). It would be useful to know if the feedback session at the end of each run will be the new standard, so we can plan appropriately (and maybe adjust our GameHoleCon schedules).

Fiddy wrote:

Matthew Hayward wrote: Having an AC debrief the party was an awesome step in customer service and quality control.

I hope it pays dividends in terms of player perception, but I wanted to thank the directors and ACs for doing this.

I both loved and hated the AC feedback sessions at the end of the runs (mostly loved).

It is great, since many times we on the forums tell people things like "oh, if something like that comes up, you should tell an AC". But let's face it 75% or more of the players have no clue how to find an AC. So bringing the ACs to them is great. And even for experienced players it can be useful to give feedback after each run. And I suspect TD even finds it useful to hear things like "what you did in room 3 with the audio is so much better on this run than it was yesterday".

On the not-so-great side, it added time to each run that we didn't know to plan for (or maybe I just missed the memo). It would be useful to know if the feedback session at the end of each run will be the new standard, so we can plan appropriately (and maybe adjust our GameHoleCon schedules).

Unfortunately for me I fell on the side of "mostly hated it". Just being honest here.

I appreciate that TD is trying to collect feedback in a timely manner and attempting to fix things. That is great. But the way I would do it is have AC's stand outside in the hallway by the treasure pickup. That way they can collect feedback from those who want to give it WHILE the treasure pulls are going on. Then individuals can skip giving feedback if they have none to give, or have another run to get to.

In many cases I was held up an extra 10 minutes when I had no feedback to give personally. But I had to wait when the AC asked "what is the best thing" and then "what is the worst thing" and several party members answered each question. I found the epilogue video to be pretty unnecessary too.

I’m staying out of this one. For personal reasons.

I will only say this should not be an AC’s job... at all.

Jeff321 wrote: the way I would do it is have AC's stand outside in the hallway by the treasure pickup. That way they can collect feedback from those who want to give it WHILE the treasure pulls are going on. Then individuals can skip giving feedback if they have none to give, or have another run to get to.

So did you give that feedback to an AC after the run?

FWIW I agree that your method would be a further improvement, but I strongly agree with OP that actively soliciting feedback at all (instead of putting the onus on players to jump through hoops in order to be able to provide it) is a huge customer service win.

Also, I don't know enough about how things work behind the scenes to have an informed opinion about whether it ought to be the AC specifically who does this, but: from a perception standpoint it's particularly powerful that someone "important" is taking the time to listen to you, and from a pragmatic standpoint it's great to give feedback to the person who actually has the power to fix things (of the sort that are fixable, anyway).

I like the idea of the ACs introducing themselves to the players, asking for feedback right away, and explaining that TD can't fix things if they don't know there's a problem. Not everyone knows what an AC is or who the AC(s) for any given run are.

My suggestions would be to tell people: (a) it's fine to ditch if they need to go to another run/event and (b) a good way to contact TD if they come up with feedback later (e.g., it's ok to come back and ask to chat with an AC later in the con, or provide a feedback email address--maybe on the XP card?). Not everyone has their thoughts fully formed immediately after the run, and folks might come up with some good ideas hours or days later. Also, some people might not be comfortable being the lone dissenting voice if everyone else on the run thought X was great, but they had a problem with it for whatever reason.

I liked the message it sent. Once I knew it was coming, I tried to make mental notes about things I heard or said from other party members said during the run.

It would have been tough on E2 if one had a not great NPC, as they were right there.

Rant incoming.

Personally I hated the way this was implemented. It felt like you were being ambushed and not allowed to leave. In principle exit interviews are a good idea but a couple of points.

It's the ACs job to roam the dungeon fixing problems. If they are stuck at the end soliciting surveys they cant do that. IMO surveys should be done by a dedicated volunteer with customer service experience.

Doing the surveys in dungeon isnt great, the space is small, the noise is high, and this year specifically the air quality wasnt great. My wife has asthma and anxiety issues, the exit survey almost caused her a panic attack more then once. If this continues please consider moving it out to the treasure area.


Also if someone had a bad time there's a good chance it was with a member of their party. No one is going to speak up about such issues in the presence of said party and even if they did there is pressure little the AC can do to fix it after the run.

I will also be interested to see if this process results in more or less complaints this year. I kind of get the feeling that if you prompt people to think about their issues they will think of something...

Also while the exit interview text was greatly improved to be more positive during the weekend I felt a little attacked as a veteran player after our Thursday night sessions. The initial wording felt more then a little adversarial between new players being solicited for feedback, and vets being thanked for not ruining things (even though it was hard). I mean if you want to drive a wedge between groups of players this is how you do it.

End of the day IMO the idea is fine but the execution needs to be improved. As is I know that my wife's desire to play TD again has been reduced by the exit interviews (and by knock on effect my ability to attend events will be affected, she will probably forget and I will talk her into it but I dont think that was the desired effect).


Personally I would be just as happy if this never happened again, but I suspect this oppinian will be in the minority (at least so far as people will post publicly).

I do like having someone asking for feedback at the end of the dungeon, especially for things that need to be addressed right away (our coach neglected to write down the Paladin's attack bonus being the biggest). However, it does take up time after the run has "ended" so the exit video, feedback collection, and epilogue can add 15 minutes to the end of the session. I like the idea of having the feedback given during the treasure collection.

David Zych wrote: Also, I don't know enough about how things work behind the scenes to have an informed opinion about whether it ought to be the AC specifically who does this, but: from a perception standpoint it's particularly powerful that someone "important" is taking the time to listen to you, and from a pragmatic standpoint it's great to give feedback to the person who actually has the power to fix things (of the sort that are fixable, anyway).

I had no idea that the guy at the end was an AC. I thought it was kinda cool to have someone interested in my immediate feedback, but now that I know it was an AC, I kinda agree with Picc that they probably had more important things to do.

I admit I only skimmed this, but did talk to several folks about it. I think soliciting feedback and checking on the party is an excellent additional. Broken things in the dungeon are likely to be known so it will be repeat for the person hearing it, but the people telling it don't know that and it will make them feel better that someone is working on it even if it was fixed for their run. I would also recommend taking it a step further though record the feed back. It can just be on a sheet of paper nothing fancy. Don't have the AC take the feedback or doing the recording. Have the person doing this contact the AC when needed like to report something broken the first time or a customer complaint (got to keep the customers happy). You record the data of puzzles liked and disliked and why (short notes) which DM's players were felt were good and bad. You gather data instead of it just going into the head of someone. So after 3 days of frantic dungeoning that data is preserved instead of having to be remembered.

There is one complaint we see a lot though that I don't know how it can be handled. Complaints about fellow party members. Anyone willing to mention something to the AC (or whomever hears their complaint) I imagine would have already said something to the party member(s) they wish to complain about. If they didn't feel comfortable telling a member(s) that they were making the experience less than stellar then I don't know if they would feel comfortable talking about them in front of them to someone else. We do see this complaint enough that I feel some thought should be put into it.

I know I can be an ass and annoying in and out of game, so I would hope if I was in game that someone would say something to me. No you guys don't need to tell me outside of game when you see me, I already know that.

Legion wrote:

David Zych wrote: Also, I don't know enough about how things work behind the scenes to have an informed opinion about whether it ought to be the AC specifically who does this, but: from a perception standpoint it's particularly powerful that someone "important" is taking the time to listen to you, and from a pragmatic standpoint it's great to give feedback to the person who actually has the power to fix things (of the sort that are fixable, anyway).

I had no idea that the guy at the end was an AC. I thought it was kinda cool to have someone interested in my immediate feedback, but now that I know it was an AC, I kinda agree with Picc that they probably had more important things to do.

Also did not know they were AC. Not sure what AC do by the way. Appreciated the opportunity to give positives and negatives about the runs.