There are many good things being done for FE, even if the new pipline also requires a bit less back and forth during early development.
Not to put words in your mouth, but is there an implication that, later on in FE's development, there will be more 'back-and-forth' than there is currently? I'm just curious if FE will ever have WoM's level of community involvement - insights into the development process, beta testing the game before it's actually ready for release, asking the forums for feedback, etc. - and if FE's development is going to be different, what will it be like? More like a typical game, small amounts of leaked info leading up to a complete and polished 'beta'/demo just before release (hopefully not), or something in between?
Boogie steps over the lock and says: Yeah, the back-and-forth WILL happen, but it'll be after most of our/Brads/Dereks/Jon/Toby's design vision is in place. During WoM there was early back and forth with the details of the vision itself, and that just turned into a mess, mostly with Elemental being new IP
What we'll want is to polish the vision with feedback, not scuplt the vision with it. And remember, when it somes to player and community input, we received TONS of critical feedback from WoM's launch, all of which was used to establish our FE goals.
Hope this helps 