Given the extremely fast and extremely comprehensive U-turn, it seems like a lot of people near the top did understand the community very well.

Somehow, one person or one small faction made a different decision, and the overwhelming feedback proved it was the wrong decision.

Well, there were two attempts at more minor climbdowns before this capitulation, so it seems more likely that the immediate financial impact from mass unsubscriptions was a motivating factor than prior understanding from the execs who were largely pushing this strategy if leaks are to be believed.

I think if they actually understood the community then they would not have needed this poll, which demonstrated near unanimous opinions. I would not blame anyone for believing that this retraction is simply a means to avoid larger problems and that there will be similar future attempts to make the same unpopular changes. It isn't just a misunderstanding of the community's opinions, but that they just demonstrated that they have almost no clue what those opinions actually are.

The least they could do is sit down once a month with the game designers for a session of dungeon crawling. The main two in charge have both said they don't play

The only thing worse than obstaining is half-assing it.

Do you really want a bunch of detached people paying just enough attention to something you like that they feel like they can 'contribute' by changing it?

Meeting once a month would be within the normal range for a group playing for fun. On the low side, I think, but it's not "so little attention that it's worse than nothing".

People who are uni vested let things go as they are. People who are a little invested screw them up.

> IMO it's common for people at the top of a hierarchy to be out of touch with those on the bottom.

The issue is that if you're in charge of a product/community/team/country and are out of touch with the needs/wants of that group then you are clearly mismanaging. You are effectively not performing one of the most essential parts of your job. Bad managers and politicians may be quite common but that does not excuse the actions nor the complaints and frustrations of those operating under the conditions that these leaders have set in place. I do think market research is important and needed but when a community's opinions are near unanimous (3 are ~90%!) it should serve as a huge red flag that you're so far out of touch with your core market that it is highly unlikely that you will be able to return given that you've probably gotten here through years of bad practice and not being involved with your community.