When players take it too far ft. Community Manager John Lloyd
(You can also watch this episode on YouTube.)
Today’s guest is John Lloyd, Community Lead at The Path, a UK-based games marketing agency. John’s journey into community management began long before his first professional role—he spent years building and nurturing player communities in games like Age of Empires II, RuneScape, and Guild Wars 2. His passion for fostering player connection eventually led him to a career at Ubisoft before joining The Path, where he now manages communities across multiple studios and titles.
We chat about how early online experiences shaped his community philosophy, the emotional toll of working in highly visible roles, and how he’s learned to protect his mental well-being after facing severe community backlash—including receiving death threats over in-game balance changes. John shares how he handles these difficult situations, the importance of empathy in community work, and why open communication between players and studios is vital.
We also talk about his involvement with Limit Break, a UK mentorship program helping underrepresented people find guidance and opportunity in the games industry, and his perspective on mentoring the next generation of community professionals. Finally, John explains what it’s like working at an agency versus a studio, and how he balances multiple clients while staying authentic and transparent.
Games mentioned in this episode:
Find John on:
Email: john@thepath.agency
The Path – the games marketing agency where John works.
The Community Lounge is brought to you by Feature Upvote – Painlessly collect feedback from your players. More insights, less noise.
Subscribe to the Community Lounge newsletter and get notified of new episodes and articles.
Transcription
Steve McLeod
Today I’m joined by John Lloyd. John (NOT LLOYD) is currently Community Lead at The Path, a games marketing agency. I’ve had the pleasure to meet John in person a couple of times at games industry events. Welcome to the show, John.
John LLoyd
Thank you very much for having me on the show.
Steve McLeod
You’ve been earmarked on my list of people to invite ever since I first met you at the event in Malmö, in Sweden Nordic Game. And I think you came at the last minute, right?
John LLoyd
Yeah, it was very much at the last minute. I prodded one of my clients, because they were up from an award, and I was like, any chance I can come? And they were like, yeah, sure, you can come along. And I was like, Yes! I’ll come along there. Very last second.
Steve McLeod
Sounds like a nice client. Hey, let’s talk about you and not about your clients at this point. Tell us about your path into community management. Where did it start for you? You can start from when you were a little kid, or when you’re an adult, or somewhere in between — as you choose.
John LLoyd
Sure. For me, probably I didn’t really know for a long time that I wanted to go into community management specifically. I knew I wanted to work with IT specifically, you know but if I look back at my actual history, it was something I’ve always done. As soon as I was allowed on the internet and was playing Age of Empires II, RuneScape and all these kinds of games that were online and had communities forming in various different places like MSN Gaming Zone, GameSpy.
Unfortunately, they don’t exist anymore, but they had the ability to create your own sub-servers or channels. I did a lot of these kinds of things where I would go in and pick something I wanted to do. It was very much a selfish kind of starting point, but I wanted to find other people too. I want to do the same thing. I built them up to be like the primary place to go for those specific game settings or whatever it was. So I started there, and then every game I went into through my childhood, into my teenage years, even into my young adult life, I always started my own community — whether it was clans in MMOs so I could do the high-end content, or PVP tournaments for things like the standalone Gwent game for example or The Elder Scrolls TCG as well. So there was a lot of these different places where I always built up my own community.
Somewhere along the line, I realized it was something I wanted to do and effectively make a living from it, because I really enjoyed it. And so I continued to do those things until I found my way in, in 2017, at Ubisoft for a kind of in a direction that for… what exactly what was it that happened… I applied for customer support because I had some experience in professional experience in customer support. I didn’t get the job, but they actually said, we actually think you’re going to be better for doing community management.
Steve McLeod
That’s fascinating.
John LLoyd
They interviewed me for that, and I was like, yes, of course! It’s what I want to end up doing anyway. So I had the interview, and the same day they called me back saying, “Yeah, you’ve got it.” So it very much a thing that, that was my entry in. Since then, I’ve been jumping from place to place doing what I’ve been doing, and now I’ve landed here at The Path. So it’s been pretty, it’s been all over the place, but it’s been really good for me, lots of experience. Its been, good memories. Good memories.
Steve McLeod
Whoever was interviewing you at Ubisoft — kudos to them for having the judgment to realize that although this guy’s not right for the role he applied for, he’s perfect for something else, and we want him. That’s really amazing.
John LLoyd
Yeah, I think I was very lucky as well in that sense because they were only hiring at the time internally for that. So it was very much a last second think of they have a few people internally that they were going to potentially bring into that role. They already had those interviews done, but they brought me in very much last second to do that. So yeah, very lucky.
Steve McLeod
It’s been a recurring theme in this series of podcasts of people who were doing the job of a community manager before they were community manager, like as a volunteer. And that’s exactly what seems to have happened here with you.
John LLoyd
Yeah, I say I definitely did a lot of volunteering as well along that path where like as soon as I realized I wanted to do it, and it did take me a very long time, in all honesty. It probably took me from the point where I realized to when I got my first professional job in specifically community management, it took like seven years.
So I was doing a lot of, yeah, volunteering. I volunteered at a few online events. I volunteered at a few of the kind of in-person events where obviously they don’t have the manpower to do everything themselves. They do need the help, and I had a little bit more of an actual experience in creating a hosting and in some cases even just knowing, XSplit, for example, back when they were starting to look at broadcasting it online with specifically that program at the time, but trying to find cheaper ways to do the broadcasting basically because obviously Twitch just about was forming in like 2012. So yeah, it was a lot of conscious decisions that kind of led me down towards my final destination, basically. And thankfully not the one that is the movie!
Steve McLeod
That’s amazing though. It takes so long. It really does take a long time. There’s something a little bit tragic about the one part of the story when you mentioned that MSN Games and GameSpy don’t exist anymore and there’s many of us today. Building up things online, building up tools and sites and applications and communities. The reality is 10 or 20 years time people will be telling the stories, oh, I was using that thing back in the day, but that doesn’t exist anymore.
John LLoyd
Yeah, and it is very sad because, especially when you think about the potential of some of these tools as well like MSN Gaming Zone and GameSpy if you think about it, those in particular — they were very easy to use. Where literally, “Okay, I want to play this game” you click on the game, and it would take you to all the servers being hosted, and then I want play servers or chat rooms hosted for those games. And then you just join a server and then you done. But it went away for a time because people just wanted to get in quick and easy, and now people are slowly wanting these server lists so they can find exactly what they’re wanting. So it’s coming back again and it’s, I think part of it is probably because of Discord, right? People are joining these servers to try and find people to play with, but only in specific ways, so they know exactly what they’re wanting. But they can’t quite find that with Discord, but they can narrow it down with it. So this is why I think Discord’s had the rise it has had, because of exactly that.
Steve McLeod
It enables you to be in the community with the people you want to be in the community with.
John LLoyd
Yeah, exactly.
Steve McLeod
Let’s move on. I asked you in advance if you were willing to share a story of a challenge you faced as a community manager, and you asked me that if it would be okay to share something particularly dark, and I am happy to hear that because I think these stories have to be told. Would you like to tell us about this particular challenge you’ve faced as a community manager?
John LLoyd
Sure. I would say a bit of a trigger warning for people might be listening in around death basically. So with that kind of mentioned, there have been multiple times in my career where something’s happened that a very select few within a community are very opposed to a decision that has impacted how they have played a game which has resulted in them for whatever reason deciding to send death threats.
Steve McLeod
This is a decision you’ve made, or a decision that the game studio or publisher has made beyond your control?
John LLoyd
Completely out of my control. This was like a balance change for a weapon, for example. So, for a lot of people they might be annoyed at that, but generally speaking a lot of people can be incredibly passionate about the games they really like, which is great. But unfortunately there are these certain times – on the thankfully rare occasion – but it happens more often than you’d like, where you know this change is done and their first reaction is pure anger and frustration. That kind of then scales to them sending death threats. They’ve never mean it. They say it in just pure anger, or very rarely do they actually mean it, I should say.
But it is just coming from a place where they’re so angry. Where they feel like it is the right thing to do. It can unfortunately, in certain times, kind of especially if it’s done in public. All the people who are similarly, as frustrated about a change, might jump on that and also start sending these death threats.
And it is generally very direct towards a studio, but every now and then, when you are kind like the known face of that game, they are directed at you specifically. And it’s difficult, right? Because there is this point and you’re in your mind. You have to try and pass it in such a way you go, that it’s not real in the sense of they’re not gonna come knocking on the door with a weapon or a way to hurt you.
But it’s very hard to move away from that and actually get your brain to remember that because you are getting these threats to your life. Or in some cases, even them saying, we’re going to bomb your studio which we’ve had as well.
Steve McLeod
They write this publicly or in private communication?
John LLoyd
Publicly, in some cases. It’s not always private. A lot of the time it is public, and say for a studio, death threats have to be taken seriously, even on the small chance they’re real. That ends up impacting everyone in that studio. Or if it’s a remote studio or remote team, then you don’t have a place to evacuate for the day — in some cases, it’s literally my home.
Steve McLeod
So how do you feel when you’ve received a death threat, and especially if it’s been personal? What feelings, what emotions are you experiencing at the time?
John LLoyd
Multiple levels to it — at least the way for me is, the way I process it. There’s that brief moment of at least for me where I’m going, “Okay, what do I need to do?” So I would take evidence of what was said. And I was then go, “Okay, is there any public information or private information, depending on where I’m working at the time, that I can potentially gather?”
To then effectively either depending on the process. Pass it along to someone who will then use that information to effectively alert the local authorities both in you know the location where the studio is. And but also where the person doing the threatening is based. Because obviously, if we do have that information, then we can literally just reach out to the local authorities to where they are and say, we don’t know where this person lives. Sometimes we do, because obviously people buy things online and it’s a physical thing, you have to send it to them. But sometimes we don’t.
So we have to say, Hi, this person, we don’t know where they live apart from it’s in your city or town, or whatever it is, has done and said these things, can you please make sure it’s not a credible threat?”. Once that’s done or in, if it’s very much a public outcry movement, and I’ve said my piece where, a couple of times I’ve literally had to say to people like, “Look, stop sending death threats to each other” because that has happened in the past and to me and my team on Discord or on social media, wherever it is, just please just stop. It’s not right to do, or whatever I say at the time. And once I said that, or in some cases just locked the server down so no one can say anything.
In some cases, I will literally then step away from my computer. Let the team that I’m working with know that I’ve just gone through that. If they, they’re not, it’s my manager kind of thing, that they may not necessarily know the extent of what’s happened until I tell them. So I’ll tell them and go ”Look, I need to basically take time away and I’ll let you know how I feel tomorrow, depending on when it happens”.
I will then take a step away from my computer, social media, literally all these different places, and go out of my house and send a message to my friends and say, “Hey, can I come round and literally just spend some time with friends?” And I actually just to try and just distract myself away from it to try.
Steve McLeod
That sounds like a very healthy approach. Very healthy.
John LLoyd
It very much helps a lot. The problem then comes down the line where it’s, okay, I need to go home again. I now need to, I’m in my own space where, in some cases I don’t have anyone else to talk to. I’m alone with my thoughts — and that’s where it starts to dwell. And it starts to, you get those kind of thoughts of, I actually safe. And it very much becomes a difficult few days mentally, even if consciously going okay, I feel okay, subconsciously you are not because you’re not sleeping as well.
And if it’s really if you are able to notice that it’s affecting you, like you have to have days away. Like I ended up having, like the last time it happened, I ended up having to have effectively a week away from work and reaching out to a professional, a therapist and say, “Look, I’ve gone through this. I need counselling for it.” It might just be one session to talk about it, but it can also be in some cases, it could be one to several months of counselling to move past it and be fully mentally healthy again — or at least to a point where you can function normally.
Steve McLeod
And no longer being triggered by every noise you hear outside at night.
John LLoyd
Yeah, exactly.
Steve McLeod
The closest I have had to that feeling was so when the house I was living in by myself got broken into. And that night I couldn’t sleep all night. I actually had to call a friend and say, please come over because I feel I just need someone else here in their house with me so I can at least get through the night. But that’s not even a touch on death threats.
I guess the common thing here is that your feeling of safety is being violated.
John LLoyd
Yeah, I think especially in those situations, the people sending those death threats don’t actually understand the impact it is having on someone. And almost every time it’s happened, and the process has fully gone through and all the rest of it, we generally get a message literally the next day to them apologizing.
Because they obviously the police have come, come and said, they basically checked that, no, it wasn’t a credible threat. Unfortunately a lot of the time it’s teenagers. that have said this without thinking. Then they end up having to explain to their parents why the police have knocked on their door at midnight.
And I would like to think that kind of almost shock moments of “Oh, there is this genuine consequence to something I’ve said online” has made them realize that not to do, it’s to treat people online how you would treat them in person. These kinds of thoughts.
Steve McLeod
A learning moment for them, but you’ve paid a heavy price for them to have that learning moment.
John LLoyd
Yeah, and that could be just one person. So if this happens on a day-to-day or week-to-week basis—which it does in some places right?
Steve McLeod
Don’t you wish you were a community manager for cosy games? The ones in which there is nothing that can upset people?
John Lloyd
Yeah, obviously I would like people not to get upset ever anyway at any point. And I would imagine there will always be a subsection with a cosy game even, I would like to think it would never happen with cosy game, but I also know in reality that might not be realistic. It might have a significantly lower chance that it probably has actually happened. I would hope so.
Steve McLeod
With a game like Stardew Valley that has a big enough player base and the game is comprehensive enough, surely there must be one or two people there.
John LLoyd
Yeah, well, it’s a question of numbers right at that point. You could have a million people, and it only takes one.
Steve McLeod
Exactly to ruin your day and your week.
Let’s move on to something more positive. You told me also that you’re doing some mentorship work with an organisation called Limit Break. Do you want to tell me what that is and what you’re doing there?
John LLoyd
Sure. So Limit Break is a place for generally speaking, disadvantaged people to find a mentor to help them in their chosen career. So this is, predominantly within gaming, but it is almost every avenue within the gaming sphere. So it could be from voice acting all the way through to community management, to managerial.
It could be someone who is doing one thing. So for example, community management for me, but say if I wanted to move into being a story writer, then I could try and find someone to mentor me on how to do that going forward. But it’s a way for people to – whether it’s new or already in the industry – to get kind of one-to-one support with someone who already have already has experience in the role that you are trying to move into. And I think it’s incredibly valuable and it’s a way for me personally to pass on my skills experience and hopefully help someone find a job to make a living off it and, be better at it because they had the support from myself to do that.
Steve McLeod
This is UK-based?
John LLoyd
Yes. So it was started by a lovely person called Anisa, and she started it from scratch. I believe by myself, but don’t quote me on that, to, as I said, help people. And so it’s all started in the UK. We do have people from around the world but it is primarily UK based.
Steve McLeod
Okay. And you are mentoring people who want to become community managers — your specific role?
John LLoyd
Yes, exactly. So I’m purposely only mentoring one person to begin with, just so I can ease myself into it. Because, I’m not someone that has actively talk to someone before or anything. So I was like, I’ll start with one and kind of go from there just to try and help this person to hopefully get to work in the future. And so far it’s been a positive experience on my side. I would hope it would be the same thing for her as well.
Steve McLeod
Perhaps as a consequence of this podcast episode, you’re going to get a few more people ask you for mentoring.
John LLoyd
Very welcome to help in that case.
Steve McLeod
I do a little bit of mentoring and some formal paid coaching, and I have to say, I find it so satisfying helping someone else get better at what they’re doing. Really satisfying. And one-on-one doesn’t scale, and I’m fine with that — one-on-one is the best sometimes.
John LLoyd
Yeah, and it becomes a lot more personal that way, in my opinion. So I tend to prefer one-to-one. But in the kind of the state the industry is in at the moment, I do slightly worry for programs like this because I’m sure there are ones based in America and other places around as well that are probably struggling to get donations or sponsorship, because they’re all charities, right — the vast majority of the time especially this type of one.
So like, just as a general thing, if you have a way to support these programs to those that are listening in, you definitely should. They’re so valuable and it helps. In a practical way it helps us all in the long run brcause we’d end up having more skilled people that will end up creating the next Stardew Valley or, helping us on our teams or whatever it ends up being. Because we will know that there’ll be better at the job and they will have, these skills and experience that how they’ve been helped develop by mentors and the other mentees. If I can say that correctly.
Steve McLeod
It’s always struck me as a strange word — “mentee.” Now, this is an audio-first podcast, but we also have video available on YouTube, and the people on video should be able to see that you’re wearing a badge of Limit Break there.
John LLoyd
It’s not very clear because it’s quite small, but yes, I’m very proudly wearing my badge.
Steve McLeod
So we’ll have a link to that in the show notes where people can go and check it out — and maybe even sponsor if that’s something they’re able to do.
I want to move on to talk about The Path, which is the games marketing agency you work at.
I think you’re the first person I’ve had on this podcast working for an agency rather than for a studio or a publisher. I’m not a hundred percent sure, but I think that’s the case. So I wanted to talk about that a little bit.
Now, this is what I got from The Path’s website: “It’s a games marketing agency built on a simple belief that brilliant people do brilliant work.” So I assume you are the brilliant people it’s talking about! Tell me what it’s like being a community manager at an agency rather than specifically at a studio.
John LLoyd
Sure. So obviously,there are quite a few difficulties in being agency as a community manager and other roles as well. I would imagine, but at least for myself, a role that is very entwined with both a studio and its fan base and I’m having to slot in between those two can be incredibly challenging. Because a lot of these times where – obviously we have multiple clients, right? So it is balancing these multitudes of clients with their needs and wants while also obviously in community, balancing the needs and wants of their communities as well, while trying to ensure that the bridge between the studio and the player base is as robust as possible.
So like that’s one of the main like challenges that I currently – and will always – face. But for me, I one of the things I always say to a client during a kickoff, or the first meeting or whatever it would end up being is I want to be transparent. I will tell a client or a member of the community if they need about whatever it ends up being.
So I would say, for example, this is what I personally believe in what community management is. Because everyone has their own differing opinions and also different clients, as I said, will want different things. So I always say, this is what I believe community management is, basically making sure that we’re on the same page. Once we are on the same page, I would then say, okay, I want to be a part of any relevant meetings around the game.
So I know what’s happening with the game. So I can then develop anything around the community that they may want based on the information I’m getting internally. So I have to be a part of effectively the studio or the indie, because they’re not necessarily all studios. Just so I can make sure that I’m giving the correct information to the community, but also it means that I can raise up any issues or struggles that the community may be currently facing in that specific moment to them directly as well. Generally in a format that I would’ve previously asked what they want that format to be in. So in some cases it would be just a basic word doctoring. Other cases it would be an Excel doc depending on what exactly a studio may be wanting. So, yeah it’s a lot of work.
Steve McLeod
So you’re coming in as the expert. Would you typically go and work full-time on one game for three months, or would you work on three games all of longer — one for two days per week, another one for two days per week, and one for one day per week? Which is the way you tend to juggle your time as a community manager working at an agency?
John LLoyd
It honestly depends and changes depending on the needs of the client. Some clients may only need me to be working full-time a day a week — or at least that amount of hours a week. So it could be as little as 5 to 10 hours a week, but obviously there will always be situations where they’ll need me to work more. Because someone’s happening, there’s a launch, there’s a beat, or whatever it is where I need to be more active.
So, obviously in that situation, I still have my other clients that, you know, if things align badly or badly is not the right word, but coincidentally at the same time, then I can’t be in multiple places at once. So there would be that situation where I would reach out to one of my trusted other community managers in the industry that are primarily work freelance. Or are in between jobs at that moment and be like, “Look, I need support for a week or two, this is what we can pay you. Is that in the right range for what you are? Looking for that kind of work”. But we would know, generally speaking, if things are lining up that way in advance.
It’s not a last minute thing. Very rarely is it a last minute thing. So we can actually plan and prepare, but it’s just project management right at that point where it’s just making sure that, okay, we need this for that. So we make sure we have this for that. And thankfully I’ve got a network of people I can rely on for that. Not needed it yet, but I’m sure I will do.
Steve McLeod
It’s such an industry built on relationships and knowing people and making sure you keep meeting up with people. As has been my experience with you, like you helped me at Develop:Brighton, get into an event I didn’t even know about. And actually it turned out to be a very useful event for me in the way that I actually ended up spending a lot of money with somebody who had the services I needed.
I was actually going to Develop, trying to get customers that ended up going there and becoming a customer. But that’s a story for another day.
John, John, John, we have run out of time and haven’t even got through half the stuff I wanted to talk to you about, but I do want to leave the conversation with one final question. The most important question: what game have you been playing?
John LLoyd
Past week or so… Actually, last few weeks, I’ve been kind of diving back into Guild Wars 2, personally. I’m personally excited for the new expansion. It’s a massive and great community in that game, and it’s pretty respectful of the amount of time I can put into it. So I don’t feel rushed to do all the different things. So it’s a nice relaxing game that I can spend as much time in as I want, and that’s nice.
Steve McLeod
I think you’re getting back into Guild Wars 2. Does that imply that you’ve played it a lot in the past?
John LLoyd
Yes, definitely. I’ve been playing it on and off since the game originally released, and I played the first one as well. It was one of those games where I built a community in back in the day. We ended up one of the best clans for a few weeks — where we managed to win the right game. So we just ended up at the top for a bit. That didn’t last very long.
Steve McLeod
It never does, it never does.
John LLoyd
Just very much a thing of “We’ll do it for a bit of a laugh,” and it ended up doing really well. I’m like, oh, cool. We’re not actually bothered about it; we just thought it was fun. So yeah, I’ve come back into it — as I always do, multiple times a year — because it’s very respectful of my time. I enjoy it a lot.
Steve McLeod
I think more people in the industry and outside of the industry than we would care to believe keep coming back to the same game over many many years. I have one or two that I, well, for more than 10 years I’ve kept coming back to them. Because there’s the familiarity and sometimes you just have half an hour you wanna play games. You can’t put in more time than that because we’re busy people.
John LLoyd
Yeah, exactly. And I think it’s even better when you know these games can accommodate that as well. Because not every game can, and not every game does, but the games that you know are able to respect your timeline of that will always have people coming back. And I think that’s fantastic. And in some cases, you even end up bumping into the same people you maybe haven’t spoken to for many years—and they’ve come back at the same time. It ends up being, “Oh hey, how have you been doing?” So I think that’s really nice. So I think that’s really nice.
Steve McLeod
Well, that’s all we have time for today, John. Thanks again for being on the show.
John LLoyd
My pleasure. Thank you for having me.
Steve McLeod
Where can listeners get in touch if they’d like to know more about what we’ve discussed today?
John LLoyd
Sure! So you can find me on LinkedIn at /seriax. That’s S-E-R-I-A-X. Alternatively, you can reach out to me via email which is john@thepath.agency. So you can find and talk to me at those places.
And then obviously for Limit Break, it’s simply limitbreak.co.uk.
Steve McLeod
I’ll have all three of those in the show notes. Bye, John.
John LLoyd
Thank you for having me.
Steve McLeod
Bye, everyone.