A new Unity Pro or Paid forum needed?

This service already exists. If you want an actual guaranteed expert answer time, you're going to shell out a lot more than $500 a year. If you don't pay for this service, you can still get this sort of thing by emailing them directly, but you're looking at waiting at least a week instead of 8 - 24 hours.

 

I know that, and we need a middle ground, which is what i'm suggesting. A guaranteed expert answer time is actually included in a lot of software in this price range. Now their business isn't set around it so it may be too large of a cost to incurr but the suggested solution (a forum) would be MUCH CHEAPER for them (they only need to answer, within 48hours, posts that haven't already been answered by other members).

This would work like the MSDN forum, where you're guaranteed a solution by a pro if one doesn't come by the community first, it's very good for them too as if no one could answer first it definately means a gap to fix in the documentation, so it's win win win win

1) they get 500$/year additional subscription for pretty much no cost on their side
2) free members can still read solution and get solutions to problem which the community CANNOT solve
3) they get to improve their documentation and see where the actual documentation / features lack (vs having to parse threads to differ questions vs questions you can't actually answer without an insider)
4) we get guaranteed support which is pretty important for anything commercial, 48 or even 72 hours is fine, potentially waiting monthes for an issue to get picked up isn't.

Really everyone wins here, unity, the non payers, the payers, and the documentation support staff . . .

 

Sounds good, but I'd like the option to pay by answer . So if I just need a 10 answer pack for my small wee unprofitable game I can get that .

 

Pay by answer won't work for them as it's a high risk feature, some answers can be very costly and some others not, paying monthly mitigates that, paying by answer, specially for 10$ as suggested, is a very bad business move for them (good for the community, but horrible for unity's business).

They definately can't sell you people < 100$/hour for exemple if it's staff working on the engine, so that means they'd need to answer those unanswerable by the community question, including reading the question and formulating a good answer, on average, in 6minuts to break even. My bet is that a good answer to most non trivial questions that could be asked requires 30min - 1 hour working on it directly in support (not including the time for bugfixing or documentation if it applies, but those are normal unity costs they need to eat up anyway).

 

It depends, they could always reject my question if they think its too complex . As a noob( been using this for over a year but I still feel like a noob) I have questions a skilled dev could figure out in 5 minutes or so .

 

Which is exactly why they're not really fit for the suggested forum, those questions can be answered by the community, no need to have an actual unity staff working on it.

Go to the commercial forum, tons of people offering their skills at this price range, none of those can answer an internal engine issue question, all of them can likely answer your questions, you're not the target demographic for what i'm suggesting, but there already are solutions for you.

 

Of course you can open up the market , let community members submit answers and then get paid if their answer is accepted .

 

To be perfectly honest, if you have a hard enough time searching through these forums for upper-level topics and support, then you wouldn't belong in an advanced forum. It's really not that hard to find the information you're looking for on here, and the community is incredibly helpful if you just ask your questions in a clear manner.

I've provided Unity with thousands of my dollars, and I wouldn't want to be a part of a group of developers who are incapable of dealing with the general population and who are so arrogant that they believe money breeds intellect. Furthermore, I think you'd be amazed at the number of people you're trying to raise your elitist big heads over who are actually paying users - there are plenty of newbies out there with money to burn.

Quit trying to further damage your relationship with this community and START HELPING. If you're all as skilled and talented as you act, then I'm sure you have a lot to contribute to the growth and and new talent that keeps pouring in. Help us all become better as a whole, and help us all grow to help each other openly.

 

What do you mean "searching those forums", we're talking about complex issues here, the kind you cannot answer, the kind no one EXCEPT unity staff can answer, it's not about searching, it's about being found by the staff.

If you have an issue, that no one has ever had, that is very specific to you and makes you fall either on a very specific bug or corner case, odds are no one except unity can help you.

EDIT: it's also important to know that when you work on something professionally, your goal is "getting support", not "being part of a community", so while the growth of the community is good, it's a goal unity should pursue, not a goal people seeking support should pursue instead of getting support!

 

What are these issues that "nobody but staff can answer" that can't be answered by them through normal support means?

 

What "normal support means"?
Afaik there's no included support with pro except for submiting actual bugs.

 

I am working on something like this, but the biggest problem is only taking payment once the questioner gets a correct answer.

 

Who says it HAS to be included with Pro? It has been pointed out in this thread and the previous one time and time again that you can always rely on email. Unless you're dealing with something where Unity has broken in a completely new and exciting way, it is highly unlikely that you will encounter a situation where your question can only be answered by Unity staff.

 

There are already two solutions to your problem:
1) In Unity, use the Report a Bug feature.
2) http://unity3d.com/support/paid-support_copy

Creating a forum... FORUM (look up the definition)... would only serve to provide you with answers from a more limited set of community members and the possibility of occasional visits from Unity Devs. Basically it would be exactly what you have now, but with fewer people to answer your questions - are larger portion of whom would likely be unwilling to help other members.

 

Included doesn't mean as a tool, email is what i meant, i don't see any "email support" included with unity pro, so i didn't think they offered any email support. Do they? If so i don't see any use for all of this discussion.

And yes i encounted (multiple times) situation where i actually needed help from someone with actual internal engine know how.

 

1) Often it's not a bug, beside reporting a bug doesn't give you a workaround, much less a guarantee that it will be fixed soon (i have bugs in the queue that i've sent >6month ago and are unfixed)
2) i know about that, i'm asking for something in between in price

And you're argueing with the wrong man here, what i'm asking for isn't what the OP is, it's MSDN like forums with GUARANTEED answer FROM unity ON unity, everyone can read, those who pay for a subscribtion (cheaper than the full support sub) can post, if the community doesn't answer within 48H, unity does.

 

Care to elaborate? 5$ via PayPal says you're wrong.

Also, I cannot fathom how you were not aware that the following were not a existing email addresses:
support@unity3d.com
bugs@unity3d.com

Why are you jumping to the conclusion that the support system is broken, when you clearly haven't even looked at it.

 

When you buy pro you are only buying the license, not the support. If you want immediate answers that only Unity staff can answer then simply buy it!
The forum is OK like this if you don't like it then too bad for you.

 

Ok once again
I do know about those adresses, i didn't know that support was included (as in you email support, and actually get an answer except for basic issues of registering sales). Most companies i work with explicitely include support.

However having 1 email adress with no contract is worth well, nearly nothing, what a business wants is a ticket system (even if it's email based) with GUARANTEED answers in SET time. My experience with support has been that time is very random and based on their own priority, and that a bug that affects only a few people can stay forever, this makes perfect sense for non commercial basic support, which is why i want some form of pro support.

For exemple when i purchase controls from telerik, i get GUARANTEED 24hour response time when i submit a ticket, so i know if i hit a bug, i can know how it will impact my schedule and start working around it in 24hour, with unity i don't know if it will be 24 hour or 6 month and if i must work around it or wait for a fix.

And you can keep your $5 lol.

 

Seriously don't mix me with the others! I like this forum as is, what i want is a SECOND support offer at a different price point, seriously i can't make it any simpler than that so try to follow

No support : this stinks
1000$/month support : too expensive
What i want : 500$/year support in another subforum , less good than full support but cheaper, and still reasonable from a business perspective.

I have no interest in a forum limited to chatting with fellow pro users, i'm just suggesting another way for unity to provide paid support, i don't care if it's a forum or a ticketing system but a forum could make it much cheaper as if someone from the community answers first, then unity doesn't need to.

Hell it doesn't have to be a separate forum even, could just be the same old support forum everyone posts too, with paying members having their threads auto emailed to unity for immediate support if they don't mark it as answeres after 48H or something, i don't care, but right now i'm getting 0 guaranteed support for 0$ or full support for 1000$/month, i need something in between.

 

Because you don't actually have any Unity Dev exclusive questions?


Edit:

So you're saying you come up with over 6 questions per month that can "only be answered by Unity"?
The rate is $150 per question.

 

Because
#1 i have nothing to prove to you
#2 what do i care for 5$? i wouldn't give my paypal adress out for so little
#3 i make an habbit not to answer questions of the type of "i don't know you, but i decided i'll bet on you being a lier, so i'll toss you a loaded gun", it's bad taste. My questions weren't complex, but they had to do with unity internal (2 times). I also had bugs (not questions) that were on unity's side (so no help from anyone outside unity here) and didn't get fixed (nor seem to be planned for fixing anytime soon).

 

If you act RIGHT NOW (or at any time at all, really) you can actually get Unity support for a whole 50% less than $1000 a month!

 

But as i said i'm looking at something at the price point of 500$/year not month They may or may not be interested, but i do feel an in between level of service at an in between price point would make sense, works well for visual studio with MSDN subscribtion works well for pretty much every software company i know.

Keep in mind the support makes a lot of sense for large teams (number of people submiting tickets is limited, but if you centralize and are a 30man studio, it's still only 1000$/month, so the cost per user is low, i'm a 1 man shop, i aint shelling 1000$/month of support for something i'm paying 1500$ a year for, it's like paying 2million$/month for a warranty for your sports car . . .)

 

More like 85% less.

 

Where's that? i only saw a flat monthly fee offer, not a price per question, if i missed that then yea 150$/question is just fine if it includes bug fixing in case of a bug.

Edit: would love a link, as this actually really solves all my problem if so

 

Not to offend you but if you are smart enough you'll know why Unity didn't went that route.
Splitting up the forums will make all Pro/Experienced users get away from this forum. This will make all Unity free, hobbyists and future Pro customers look for something else (new engines where community is supportive).
Tell me, how will a child grown up alone by himself? That's how i see new Unity users, they need help, without us they are lost. Elitistic and egoistic thinking is what make our world felt apart.

 

Look through the following links and you will find lots of answers to your questions:
http://unity3d.com/company/support/
http://unity3d.com/company/support/premium-support/
http://unity3d.com/support/paid-support_copy

 

I had already seen premium support (the only one offered in the store); but never the 150$ version which sounds quite attractive, i guess this kinda just solved all of my issues, 150$ for 1 incident is very fair so as far as i'm concerned, all my needs are covered.
Considering the URL name (including copy) and that i never saw it before i'll email them to make sure this still applies, if so this rocks!

 

@ronan.thibaudau,
By the way, can you tell me any of your "Only Unity Staff Can Answer This" questions? I'm curious to see how impossible to answer those questions are.

 

Ooh, I didn't even know there was per incident support.

 

Not really no, the process is customer goes "bwah bwah i want this" and company offers solution that answer both the whining and their own interest, as i said there are alternatives that fix both my "bwah bwah i want better support" and that don't split the community.

I don't think adding the paid option i suggested (same forum as ever, everyone can participate, paid customers can hit a button saying forward as incident to unity team past 48h without community answer for exemple) would be bad, it would even be good as they can bump the thread with the answer instead of letting it die.

Keeping the next generation is good, but it doesn't mean you shouldn't help the current one!

But as i said i didn't know there was a 150$/incident offer, so as far as i'm concerned, i have no needs anymore, everything's good as is.

 

For bugs i have those:
- Cannot use asset store in DX11 mode
- Mecanim crash when (been a while, forgot pattern, could 100% repro it) in editor, full hard unity crash each time

Issues / limitations
- Knowing which graphic card unity uses and setting one, as far as i could see (didn't check that much) not exposed in the API, huge issue for me, out of unity plugins won't fix this (need to control which card unity uses).
- Need to import very large terrain resolution, fine with the speed droping down, currently limited to 8K heightmap, need arbitrary size support (naive is fine, just unlock the size)

There are quite a lot of other stuff, just a few off the top of my head.

 

Maybe what Unity actually needs is more obvious guidance toward the support programs that are already in place.

 

Yup, without this thead i would never have found the 150 per incident thingy, only the premium support is showcased in the store. They've probably lost a good grand of money from me i'd have spent on support that way too already!

 

I never would have found it without google (so yeah, I agree completely)

Actually, I knew to look it up from a newsletter they sent out a while back that mentioned it.

 

First two are bugs (Report them).
I didn't quite got your API issue, can you explain a bit more? Sorry.
For your terrain, you can break your terrains in small parts (stitch them) and stream them as soon as you get close to any terrain part. Maybe your Only Unity Staff Can Answer your question isn't initially solved with the community but there's gazillions people here that will give you ideas and small input enough for you to find others ways to solve your problems. For example the 150$ per issue.

 

The first two are bugs that i have reported, and at least for the first one, it isn't getting fixed anytime soon (been there since DX11 got there)

The API issue, i want to be able to know, through the unity API, which graphic card unity is running on (multi GPU systems) and set it (So there are 3 or 4 gpu on my machine, i want to tell unity, run unity un gpu X, use gpu Y for directcompute, and don't touch GPU Z because i'm already using it through an external plugin)

The terrain, i know, this doesn't fit my needs at all, i need one single terrain, i don't want to stream, i want "all" of it visible at the same time, at 1 pixel error (full resolution). Right now my only solution is an engine fix, or scraping it rolling my own terrain engine, guess it's #2

Keep in mind you don't need to convince me to use the forums, i'm already using them as my post count shows and am happy about it, also got a lot of help on here, just there are times when i either A) don't get an answer or B) know an answer can only come from someone inside (either because it's a missing feature that would take 2 min to unlock, or a bug, or something really cryptic and specific with very few people using it and community help is unlikely) and i'd be happy to pay for help then, but as stated, that 150 offer fits my need

 

I think that's the idea. Some people are willing to take public bus, some willing to pay for a cab. It's not a Pro vs Free users, it's people who are more serious vs those who are dabbling in unity as a hobby. I'm an experienced developer, just not experienced in unity, and I use unity in a full time work. The questions I ask, gets drowned in the forums, so much I don't even visit them (except for Showcase, AssetStore, Gossip). Even if Unity staff or experienced community wants to help, the forums get flooded so I doubt they will visit it too.

They are developers of different skill levels, but not in commitment. This is to give developers who needs more another avenue. The forum is open to read, so free users can learn and benefit as well.

 

Good to know! Good luck then!

 

Use multiple terrains. That doesn't involve any streaming and does fit your needs.

--Eric

 

They might not be 'only unity can answer this' type questions but when a thread gets no community support, i.e.. no answers at all, this is where a Unity rep or dev needs to step in and fill the gap. Take a look at how many threads here and in Answers goes un answered and these are the questions that need unity support.

 

First, what makes you think that a hobbyist is less serious than a professional developer? The goal is the same: to make a game. Ever thought about that all professional developers once started as hobbyists?

Second, it`s a matter of masses and a clear description of the problem that your questions may sink in the forums or not. There is as much nonsense from so called Pros as there is nonsense from free users. It doesn`t really matter if your question sinks in a forum with a million users that contains all users, or sinks in a so called "Pro" forum where your question sinks in just 100.000 Pro users. Where by the way most of the users then just WANTS support, and doesn`t GIVE support anymore. You have paid for the Pro forums, have you? So you have the RIGHT to receive support. And Time is money. I`m curious how this should work

Questions sinks because there are so much users at all. Unity is BIG. That`s the problem. There is no individual support possible anymore. Too much people for that. No matter how much you try to divide the community into "worth the support" and "not worth the support".

And third, also free users have the same right to receive support like the so called Pro users. They are also customers. Unity earns from them at the Asset store. And by making Unity known out there. The free users were what made Unity big. Not the Pro users. Even when the main money comes from there. The problems of Pro users and Free users are to 99% the same. You paid for the extra features with the Pro version. Not for support.

Dividing the community into pro and free users will not solve your dilemma. But make it even more dramatic. And you will add a community killing component by that.

And we are back at the formerly told point: Why don`t you rent a server and make your own paid Pro Forum when you need it so badly? Or why not insert something in the Collab or paid Forum section? Like "Paid help needed". When there is such a dramatic need for individual support then i am sure that somebody will jump onto the table and earn lots of money with exactly that.

The fact that this hasn`t happened, that nobody opened a Pro forum yet, and rarely somebody calls for commercial support shows the real demand for a so called Pro forum. It`s against zero.

 

Have you ever take a look at those unanswered questions? Most of them are already answered somewhere else or simply aren't good questions (features requests, bugs, engine limitations, etc).
You already have an extra paid service in case you need the best and immediate answer directly from Unity staff. Unity community can offer you free support, Unity license gives you the right to develop and distribute Unity apps if you want something else, pay for it, otherwise you can start your own private Unity forum and see how many will follow you.

 

Because a question has to be good to be answered? What makes a good question?

Requesting features has always a reason. Most often something is missing, sometimes it's a question of usability.
Bug related questions aren't stupid or bad, because before being sure that it "might be" a bug, one has to check if the behavior is similar for other users (unless it's a blatant obvious bug).
Engine limitation questions aren't stupid, because it's not always obvious if one hits a limitation with his usage case or not.
and so on and so on...

 

You miss interpret me. By good i mean It have to be "clear and specific" for others to understand it and provide support (answers) to it. Otherwise you end-up with unanswered questions.

 

Well if so i'm back to my original problem
Time to email them to check if it is.

 

Well... yeah, it does.

And a "good question" is one that can be answered, and which hasn't already been answered.

I've often answered questions around here, but there are many that I won't waste my time on. My forum time is limited, and there are more people who want help than I (and others) have time to help. As a result, I'm not going to waste time answering questions for people who don't value it.

If someone values the time of people who help them then they'll write as clearly as they can, they'll make the problem easy to understand, they'll provide a useful title, they'll describe what they've already tried, they'll explain any relevant contextual information, and they'll have done a reasonable job of looking for an existing answer already. Doing any less makes it hard for people to help you, and if you're going to make life hard for volunteers before they've even started with you then what on Earth makes you think they'll want to stick around?

This goes as much for "Can I use Unity to make an MMO?" as as it does for "Why does my FPS character walk the wrong way", by the way.

 

You are again misreading my words. I already say, it's not hobbyist vs professional. There are people who livelihood depends on getting those features work, and that's by definition is a professional (it reads full time dev). I had reported several issues to unity, one of them took 4 months for them to acknowledge and find a workaround. Lucky for me, this was a experimental for a prototype, not my active project. However, something like this, an active community could help and learn too. At present, my thread gets buried somewhere. Perhaps other community members could have help but at present, they couldn't.