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Originally posted by Sevey13
Honestly? Why play one cookie-cutter MMO over another? I play WoW but I've been burned out of it for awhile now. I just trundle along wearily waiting for a game to break the mold. Lately, I've had a craving for a game that has both the virgin world aspect of SWG (players craft everything) coupled with a perma-death possible penalty. |
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You got it all wrong ppl. And anyone who has played pre TBC Wow will agree with me. All the prblems in wow these days are caused by the fact that the game has gotten easier and easier with eatch patch. Back in the day when having epic items on you meant something, only uber players were able to run a 40 man raid. There were jokes and kits about how a MC Raider has no life. Get serious today i have a lvl 80 Priest who is fully dressed from Naxx 25 and have barely touched Ulduar and a lvl 80 DK that can't get into any group because 5 man group requirements outvalue the raid requirements. Go try and get in a group for any 5 man heroic with a character with only blue items and you will get a response like "pff with that gear? with that def? with that DPS ?" even if your gear/dps/healing/def is more than enough to go in a heroic dungeon. No .. the players these days want to run a Heroic instance in 10 - 20 minutes in order to be able to go to another. And why not? You can get more marks today doing 3 instances in 1 hour than your get in a raid. Think about it , an instance has 5 bosses, they all drop marks (or badges) and that can be done in 20 minutes with the latest gear from the latest Instances (i'm talking about Trial of the crusader or Tiral of the Champion) so a 5 man super geared group will get 15 badges in the time they would run a 3 -4 boss quester in Naxx ... So in my oppinion, the worse thing blizz could have done, and did, is to make the game easy and accesible to every 10 year old kid who gets a char up in 1 week then begs and cries untill he gets some decent geat only to kick others out of a group just cuz they had a char not so well geared. That's why players are quiting wow. The bigest problem is that most ppl who played wow will not play anything else, because they like the idea of wow, the feeling and everything, just not what it has becomed today. Most players say, oh .. i will put my subscription on hold and wait for cataclysm ... see what that brings. Chani's Rants - http://chanichtau.wordpress.com |
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Originally posted by Unrivaled1
I feel the same man, i feel the same. It's been 2 years now since every mmorpg i tried was a biger and biger dissapointment. Every time, they come with these great ads and presentations and intro trailers .. and then plosh ... down the drain.. Chani's Rants - http://chanichtau.wordpress.com |
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Yoottos'Horg
 Advanced Member
Joined: 2/15/04
To strive, to seek, to find and not to yield. |
Originally posted by Unrivaled1
YES!!! I'm sorry, but that really just clicked for me. I beleieve you are correct about the focus of MMO's being competitive gaming vice true socializing. Sure, people do enjoy socializing in game, hell some even get married in game, but the more I think about it the more I am convinced that true socializing was simply ported over from the table top D&D type of play.
I didn't even know MMORPG's existed when Everquest first came out so I couldn't pretend to speak on what base features were in the original version, but I still think you are correct. Crafting, socializing and the like were added as an afterthough but have now become the focus of the game, of the genre. Unless I specifically state something as a fact, assume it is my opinion. |
Erm, Everquest followed on the heels of Meridian59, computer RPGs and was a huge dose of D&D. No idea about Ultima Online (never played it) but I saw EQ from beta and played it for six years.
Meanwhile back at the actual topic :) Think of the old content - a paladin (or other hybrid) can solo instances that would annihilate an equivalent caster. Are you asking Blizz to redesign every class with scaling (and therefore the possibility of soloing raid content) in mind? Boss abilities like sheep,sleep etc. scale up exponentially with lack of numbers - how would a small group cope if they (or he/she) are all CC'ed? Player abilities also dont scale well - one of the best classes for doing lower instances is resto shaman - merely due to the Nature's Guardian talent. Perhaps a minor scale up would be doable? Conclusion Blizz has enough to do with D3, SC2, "the unnamed MMO", 3.3, Cataclysm, the latest wave of annoying bugs (get rid of pvp flagging inside VoA and let us share daily q inside instances again, please) and all the little good ideas that seem to have gotten lost/missed out in WotLK (everspore fronds etc - tho at least Eng teleporter finally turned up for Northrend) Hmm, getting a bit ranty, best stop now :/ Enjoy. 
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I am not going to copy anyone's post or try and be grammatically correct for any of the spelling police - I'm just going to throw out my 2 cents and hope noone takes this as an attack on their personal beliefs. I played MMOs starting in 2000 with the Rise of Kunark expansion for Everquest. For most people just coming into the MMO genre - it would have been total shock. You played a tutorial to show you the minimal ropes (completely stand alone program) and then you logged into the game and created your character. You started with a note, a candle and 5 food 5 drink and a weapon based on your class. After you maybe did one or 2 starter quests in which you had to actually interact with the NPC by typing responses like "where are these rats?" you were then left on your own to find them (no map) and kill them and no quest log or anything. The game to many might be considered "hard". After level 3 or 4 - you were basically "forced" by some peoples standards to group and it took a skilled group to muddy through orc1,2 & 3 in the commonlands. The game forced you to create relationships - to be a skilled player - to become a part of the games community that was mostly player run. I grouped from lvl 3 - 60. I would only start fighting after the quadrinity were fulfilled (heals,tank,dps,CC) and even then I was reluctant. There was no easy assist - you had to have a macro or hotkey setup to assist a player. I digress to the actual issue of this thread - sorry for the mini rant. Scaling of raids or instances, I don't believe any currently established game with a very established item level system with specific names could be scaled and it make sense. I could however see a new game having the same premise behind it with item levels if when you started an instance it was like LDON, or AO in which you chose the difficulty of the instance based on slider bars and then went in. You could in theory do a team mission or group mission (6 players) and scale it lower to meet your group lacking people or even levels. This would then interpret into item level drops from mobs/bosses and it would just have to be the same named item with item level modifications to the loot itself. I have to agree that it is funny to see a game with so many subs not able to create raids of 25 people. However its a flaw in the games premise from the beginning that from 1-cap you can get there on your own and not teach you how to actually play your class in a grouped environment. You go to cap solo and then you want to raid - well there are millions of other people who did the same - and milions of others that fully understand their classes mechanic in the raid/group setting and as such they won't group with people because they do not have the patience to teach a nub how to play or - worst case scenario someone just sucks at playing their class but the game difficulty gives them a handicap in success. What further increased the issue of forming adequately sized groups to meet the X-man expectation was acheivements in which some people require you have the acheivement before you go with them - regardless of you being skilled you can't go with them. Sorry I'll stop the rant but I think there are more pressing issues as to WHY you can't form a group rather than how the game should adjust to meet that need. |
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Honestly, WoW is already accesible enough. With each new tier of gear, they make the previous tier of badges give you more stuff. The easy mode raids can be done with 8 or 20 people respectively, and if you are doing hardmodes, then you should be in a guild that is organized enough to handle them. People have also suggested the solo instance thing multiple times, and Blizzard has always responded by saying that it is not part of their design goal to make the game soloable, and it completely goes against their vision of what they view an MMO to be. They already have plently of solo content, which can be done well enough with the epics that they make available for people who don't like to group, especially via BoE epics and the Argent Tournament. As for your suggestion to make the instance change depending on however many people you have available, that would be a pain in the ass to implement to the point where it is completely not worth it. They would have to implement Diablo style loot tables that would randomly generate gear based on how many people you have. That would make balancing/theorycrafting a pain, because they would have to take even more item levels into consideration. And let's say you get an epic drop from trash and decide to sell it. Someone may want the item at a specific ilvl, but because it was randomly generated, it is lower than the one they wanted. Also, part of the reason that gear in a 25 man is better is because Blizzard wants to recognize the increased effort it takes to get a group of that size together, which, quite frankly - at peak server activity - isn't that much. If you are missing a raid member or 2, opening up your friend tab and whispering for someone to join or porting to Dalaran and saying "LF3M H ToGC" isn't that big of an issue, unless you are on a New Player server or something. People are already saying that the game is too easy just because Blizzard wants the game to be accessible to more players. Blizzard themselves have even stated that the game has more people raiding than ever before, in terms of percentage of population, cuz they get more players by the minute it seems... Anyway, my point is that I don't think that Blizz needs to bend their necks anymore to make instances more accessible, else they might as well make the whole game solo content. |
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I'd say no to scaling in WoW -- even though I enjoy soloing and often wish I could solo the instances somehow. What I'd kill for, however, in WoW, is the addition of Heroes (as in Guild Wars). This is a much better (and more fun, imo) way to scale dungeons to party size. If Blizzard would just add a pack of 5 NPC Heroes (say, a Tanking Spec Warrior; a DPS specced Mage, Rogue, and Shaman, and a Healer spec Priest) with fairly reasonable AI and customizability, and allow them to be used within roughly the following parameters: --Only to be summonable/usable in dungeons/instances This is basically how the system works in Guild Wars and it is pretty effective. I would vastly prefer a system like this to a scaling setup, as I enjoy the party dynamic without the hassle it is sometimes to find a full group of players. Heck, I'd even pay extra to open a set of NPC Heroes on my WoW account. As it is now, I just skip past the instances nowadays. In my opinion, WoW's single biggest flaw is the inaccessibility of it's group content to people unable to find full groups. Even on my (populous) server, you simply CANNOT find groups for any dungeon in Old World Azeroth or Outlands. |
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I guess something I'm seeing several times from people in this thread is that they want to be able to do things in the game with 1 person that others who actually socialize, meet players, group up and form a community do. If I wanted to have a group of people that are mindless npc drones fighting alongside me - then I'll play neverwinter nights, or KOTOR. If i want to play a game by myself and conquer the world - I'll play Zelda, Fable, Halo, (insert any console game here that I dont have to pay 15 a month for). WTH is the purpose of playing online if you do everything yourself? I guess I'd also kind of find it funny to dump money into a companies lap for something you don't really utilize. Play MUDDs if you want to play solo some times and online others. Not trying to be a dick or talk down but I think its a bit funny. The more i thought about it I don't know if I even agree with scaling in the first place - if you can't meet the requirements - meet more people, form a community, and get out there and conquer the world in the way (I believe) most MMO companies want the game to be played. |
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You really aren't getting it. In Guild Wars, you use mindless drones when you cannot find real players. In WoW, however, you simply have to SKIP content. How is that an "improvement"? As for me, I'd rather actually PLAY content using drones than not play it at all, which is basically what is happening now in WoW. Another thing you are not getting is the fact that, sometimes, I want to play with just one or two players. In WoW, you have to find FIVE people to do anything in an instance at your own level. In Guild Wars, you group up with your friends and fill in the rest with NPCs and actually PLAY. Guild Wars made it possible for people to play solo or in small groups of 2 or 3, the latter of which you CANNOT do in KOTOR, etc. |
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Originally posted by tmr819
No I think you're missing my point. "massive" to me - is not 2 peeps. End of story. And I'm saying wtf is the point of even having drones to work through the content - just make the content soloable then and allow you to hang with buddies to do it. I have never and will never have an issue finding people in an MMO or working with others to get through things. The reason you have to find drones is because you can't find people to play with - its not that they are not plentiful - its that the game caters to players being solo lone emo heroes - so unless a RL friend comes along - you have to use drones in GuildWars - fantastic they've found a solution to your dilema but had that dilema not existed in the first place by making the game group centric from the beginning - you wouldn't be so QQ about it. |
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Garrett Fuller should look at LOTRO. ---------- "No, your wrong.." - Random user #123 "Hello person posting on a site specifically for MMO's in a thread on a sub forum specifically for a particular game talking about meta features and making comparisons to other titles in the genre, and their meta features. How are you?" -Me |
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Personally, I don't give a fat, flying, freaking, Fresno **** what the game company "intends" the playstyle of their game to be. I play it the way that I enjoy. I enjoy pitting myself against other players online be it leveling, grinding, crafting or dungeon delving. I would just as soon murder the character standing next to me in my group than the Boss we are there to kill. I prefer to solo. Period. I am downright sick of all this touchy-feely social community crap. I don't want to chat with other players, I want to defeat them. Eventually, some visionary developer is going to put a game out like this, and I'll be there. You're all welcome to join me, just expect a bloody welcome. |
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Originally posted by Unrivaled1
Everyone is entitled to play a game how they want, be who they want to be, have opinions about who they talk to and who they don't. Thats fine I get that. But don't complain or moan and groan when a game needs to be changed to fit YOUR perception of how it should be. Thats a false sense of entitlement. If the game company made a game to be played with others - don't cry because you can't. To me it isn't touchy feely social community crap. To me its meeting new people, forming friendships and being social. If I had your mentality I would not play MMOs, touch them with your dick - whatever you wanna call it because it would be against everything I stood for as a person. Gladly, I am not you. If you're also anti-social and hate interacting with other players - why join a forum and discuss things? Why not just go to this site to find information and read the site "how you want?" I mean its not like you need their opinions. I am all about competition and if a game comes out where you can kill me - you'll most likely lose - because I'll have a mob - and you'll either be solo or have half retarded NPC bots assisting you. Ciao |
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Your freudian slips aside.. The OP has to do with the possibilities of scaling instances. That is what this discussion is supposed to be about. I chimed in on my feelings about that idea and you among others are flaming the supporting of it, rather than the idea itself. Rather than posting your very own opinion on the matter you would rather jump on Blizzard's (assumed) bandwagon. Blizz can defend it's own stance. Try taking one yourself and defending it. |
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Originally posted by nosto
No I think you're missing my point. "massive" to me - is not 2 peeps. End of story. And I'm saying wtf is the point of even having drones to work through the content - just make the content soloable then and allow you to hang with buddies to do it. I have never and will never have an issue finding people in an MMO or working with others to get through things. The reason you have to find drones is because you can't find people to play with - its not that they are not plentiful - its that the game caters to players being solo lone emo heroes - so unless a RL friend comes along - you have to use drones in GuildWars - fantastic they've found a solution to your dilema but had that dilema not existed in the first place by making the game group centric from the beginning - you wouldn't be so QQ about it. Yep, forced grouping makes people more willing to group (they have to) and at the same time, there are fewer people to group with. Many people will not play a game if they cant solo. Personally im good either way if the game is good but forced grouping isnt as popular as one would think. It has to be true, i have internet links. |
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I stopped reading at the word "scaling".
Any game design with "scaling" or any type of "linearity" in mind dont deserve any interest. |
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Originally posted by Interesting
Linearity, as in leveling from 1-80? That is the very definition of linear. |
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Originally posted by grandpagamer [not to stray super far from the thread but I'll tie it in] I mean we can obviuosly tell that by the responses - a lot of people want to be able to solo - I would say it isn't a drastic amount of people want to solo vs. group. I mean - the hype and love of MMOs (originally) was the idea of a D&D table in which you were interacting with fellow mates who wanted to join in. What happened with WoW was that you got a huge Blizzard fanboi train jumping into the MMO stream and as such they catered to a Diablo 2 play style. Do your jam solo - group if you want. So the focus definitely changed - not because of Blizzard - but because of the people who play their games. I can't say I've never played an MMO solo - I have. I did it in wow, I had a solo toon on EQ1, I rarely grouped in AC. However, I think that a grouping game is superior - if I really wanted to get my jollies off of being Epic Hero Solo #1 guy Jesus - I would have played something different (pretty much anything not an MMO). Going back to the thread topic, if you make everything scaleable I want to ask the players not the game developers, "Why Play it?" I don't see the reason to play a game where the only difference is the people in town are talking about the football game on or politics or chuck norris. To get a feel like you're in a town from the fantasy world - you'd probably want to have only the NPCs chatting or play a game with a lively town life like in fable or something along those lines. To me - if you are going to scale difficulty - allow the player to manipulate it vs. attempting to do your own concrete system where all calculations and decisions are made on your side. That way - you don't get people bitching about it other than the choices they are offered. No game can please everyone and its LOL to think it is possible. For those who want competition and to fight other players and kill them - there are plenty of FPSes and RTSes |
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I still fail to see why your defintion of "MMO", which is grouping and socializing is one whit more realistic of our definition which is solo'ing and competitive gaming. I play plenty of FPS/RTS games and am quite happy when I do. I also would like a persistant online world where I can thrive in player-to-player competition. And to head off someone saying "That is what pvp is for" that has nothing at all to do with this discussion. This has to do with challenging the solo player and offering them the chance towards high-end gear that is presently only possible if they partake in raid instancing. |
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Nice article Garret. And as one of the sole mmorpg.com writers still a real player of WOW (and not ashamed) :))). You have very good points. Friends who casually play and could down all content based on scaled dungeons. It is one direction. I think Blizzard made another choice and it shows in the last months. ------- Remember "no more instances can be launched"? Now BEHIND that sentence was something most of us completely missed .... ----> Suddenly in an almost 5 year old game, ... the programmers had to change things to servers ... because dungeons/raids were played simply TOO much. What WOtLK did was the promotion of Raids (intro levels) AND massively played dungeons in its end game. To do that you need TWO things: find the people that WANT to group and ... motivate them. So the "casual" PUG ... was born in WotlK (no attunements, bring the player to a dungeon instead of a class, dual specs etc ....) Also you only PUG .... IF the content can be .... conquered. So the scaled dungeons/raids in difficutly was of course well thought out. ---- Now comes the next step -------- Clustered dungeon servers. As the latest info is confirmed it will be the same clustering as the Battlegroup servers (arund 20 realm servers clustered together to form LFG's). Add in the new "leveling expansion" CATA and you see already the huge impact it will have on those group playing sessions.
----- So Blizzard chose another solution ---- as oppsoed to the scaled instances (except,for the hard/easy modes). I think they struck GOLD again, as the PUG-able dungeon will always win from the fixed group play in the long run. You see - we as readers of mmorpg.com - may not like it ... BUT video games are still played on an individual basis. Even your OWN son or brother or even wife has not the same "mood settings" at any gven time. With the Blizzard solution of getting the players together in a PUG roll out .... they meet demand: I WANT to play when I want it. So Blizzard already made the choice of putting the groups together for YOU at ANY time without much restraints. It's a complete other solution than the "scaled dungeon" one, but from the very beginning you already see the advantages. >>> You have 2 hours, you hop in, you play that clustered BG( PvP), you enter the LFG tool with 80K concurrent players and do the dungeon... and you log out>>>>. Player satisfed, success assured. BTW: the last "new" achievements introduced in patch 3.3 were ... "grouping up with 10 different players, 50 different players, 100 different players" ... So the above is WELL thought out. EDIT: To counter this and have a counter weight, you need to motivate guild play too. Hence, the new guild awards and guild rating systems. Lesson: keep ALL players motivated.
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I rather like the way scaling, grouping, and the optional use of NPCs are handled in DDO:U, since that game offers players a variety of ways to complete the content. Unfortunately, I do not like the clunkiness of the UI in DDO:U, nor the combat/skill/stats system, nor the lack of a truly persistent MMO world, else I would play it. Nosto, you say 2 people is not "massive" to you, and I see your point. But somehow 5 people *is* "massive"? That's the standard group size in WoW and I wouldn't call it massive. Most MMOs are played out based on probably 80 to 90% solo content and 10 to 20% small-group -- not "massive" -- content. That should tell developers something right there. You say you have no problems getting groups, well, I do. Just try getting a group together for Uldaman or Mauradon on my server. I'd rather at least have the option to solo these dungeons (scaled or with NPCs) than just routinely level past them, with quests not done and eventually abandoned. That's just a broken system, and one that Blizzard and LotRO and many other level-based games (apparently) choose to ignore, although I will say that WoW is getting better about dealing with the "accessibility issue" with each additional expansion. I think games like WoW and LotRO have a problem in basic design: 5- or 6-man instancing works when a game or expansion is just released and popular -- there are lots of people around then -- but I think these games need to make adjustments as a game ages, the population at a certain level thins, and it becomes harder and harder to find groups. WoW made certain accommodations to this problem by "de-elitizing" a lot of its group-oriented areas (Stromgarde in Arathi Highlands comes to mind) a few years ago, so that players can now complete quests on their own that used to require groups. Something similar ought to be done for the lower-level instances. Scaling seems like as good a suggestion for dealing with this problem as any. I think that if WoW and LotRO continue to ignore this problem, they are are going to lose subscribers to games that offer a greater variety of options. |
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LordDmaster
 Novice Member
Joined: 6/06/09
Look inside yourself, before you point out others faults. |
OMG Time to go back to Tic, Tac, Toe. "CAN WE PLEASE MAKE GAMES EASYER!" "YOU SEE I HAVE A REAL LIFE AND CAN ONLY PLAY FOR 10 MINS TODAY" "I DON'T KNOW HOW TO PLAY MY DOT COM( LEVELED) CHARACTER, I JUST GOT HIM!" "I DON'T LIKE PEOPLE, BUT I PLAY A MMO!" See what happens when you bring 10+ mil. into a system that have know idea what thay are doing? Thanks Bizz. …..it’s a guideline, not a rule, as players we must remember: “It’s a Game”. |
Originally posted by LordDmaster
Hah - I got a nice laugh from this - thanks. Yea lets make games basically slightly interactive movie experiences! Lets put a chat function in there so I can talk to my friends even tho millions of chat options exist out there already to do just that. Let me buy a toon because I don't want the fulfilling experience of leveling my own toon. I hate you all but I will pay 15 bucks a month to be around you. This mentality didn't exist 8 years ago. Thank you - you made my day. |
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It really shouldn't be to hard for any developer to add scaleable dungeons to any game instance. SOE did that with one of their adventure packs called The Splitpaw Saga. EverQuest®II The Splitpaw Saga™ - Deep within the Sundered Splitpaw Dwells a Great Threat! In The Splitpaw Saga players will explore the collapsed caverns and twisted tunnels of Sundered Splitpaw. Throughout this adventure, the truth behind the dungeon's mysterious demise is uncovered by using moveable planks, crates and barrels to work through a series of intriguing event-based zones. A ferocious clan of cannibalistic gnolls will stand in the way as players seek to destroy a great threat. Experience the adventure right away and meet additional challenges a second time around as the encounters scale dynamically to match your player level or group size. Unique content with an exciting storyline and plenty of action that solo players, groups and raids can enjoy for months to come. |
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