Right now, most MMORPG are "direct combat" oriented. What I mean by that is in a combat situation, there's a group of players against another group of players or NPCs and they hit at each others until one of the two group is down (ok that's the idea of combat but you'll see where I'm going in a few moment). 

If we transpose it in the real world, we're talking about the infantry in a real army (ok healers are like medics but that's a detail). But there are many other jobs in the army, from the doctors to the guy who's making the meals in the mess. Let's get back to MMORPGs with an example (I like examples).

Let's say we're in an open world PvP situation in a futuristic environement. On one side, there's a group of players (infantry) ready to attack an oponent base but there's a massive wall around the base and a force field to protect it. I think we all agree that infantry guys can't just shoot at a massive wall, it would be a wast of ammo and that base defenses would crush them. To destroy those walls, we need artillery so players have to operate the batteries, here's a job. But we still have that force field around the base that prevent artillery to hit the wall ( that's future, there's surely a good reason for that), so we need someone to deactivate the force field, let's say an infiltrator, another job.

The whole idea around that example is in a combat situation, there could be many more role to play other than DPS/tank/healer so if a player want to make the job of the infiltrator, he could choose to raise the skills that help him to do his job. Something like stealth to not being detected, explosives to destroy the field generator, hacking to pass through the base defense system.

Of course, not so many players would like to play that kind of role but like in a real army, there's way more infantry guys that anything else but there's always some soldiers to do that kind of tricky jobs. And this only one example, think about things like tanks (not the class, the armored vehicules), air support, doctors, recons and spies ( not just to have the stealth ability like in most games but to actualy gathering informations about the oponent), communication guys (what if the chat system is disabled if the comms are down), officers (to coordinates everything, call air strikes, etc...) and I could go on and on.

I think it could be an interesting approach fo a MMO game, RPG or FPS. What do you guys think?

yup.

not only can combat be more intresting, entire games can expan themselves outside of the 'combat' relm. Looking at games only one might think the only human activity that can be virtualized is combat. Well that is clearly silly.

Exactly. And the example I mentioned is about combat but there's so many more aspect other than combat that is not well enough exploited to my taste. In my years playing SWG, I met a lot of peoples that weren't interested at all in combat but were playing anyway because there was other possibilities. There's a potential for those kind of professions, look at how many peoples are playing The Sims.

You're asking to add depth to games.  Not going to happen.  We're headed toward shallow one dimensional games.  Kill the big bad monster and get shiney weapon.

You're also asking for players to work together.  Also not going to happen.  We're headed toward single player lobby games.  The new trend is to play a multiplayer online game but play by yourself.

You're also asking for realism.  Every time that gets brought up players have an aneurysm.  The usual arguements are that it adds complexity for no reason.

You're asking for non-combat roles.  They have become almost non existant.  Players simply don't want to perform those roles.  Everybody wants to be the hero.

See also: Eve.

(at a certain point of complexity in the mechanics, jobs just emerge naturally out of it all on their own)

Originally posted by dave6660

You're asking to add depth to games.  Not going to happen.  We're headed toward shallow one dimensional games.  Kill the big bad monster and get shiney weapon.

You're also asking for players to work together.  Also not going to happen.  We're headed toward single player lobby games.  The new trend is to play a multiplayer online game but play by yourself.

You're also asking for realism.  Every time that gets brought up players have an aneurysm.  The usual arguements are that it adds complexity for no reason.

You're asking for non-combat roles.  They have become almost non existant.  Players simply don't want to perform those roles.  Everybody wants to be the hero.

 

Took the words right out of my mouth. Seriously, i'd love this. I just keep repeating myself inmy post how mmorpg are becoming shallow games with nothing more than combat activities only to get boring a few months later, but it's true. Unfortunalty, masses like shiny awesome coolz action combatz and everything else is too hard and boring.

I agree with you but not entirely. There are still a good amount of player who are asking for that kind of thing but since there's not much around right now that covers those aspect, they are spreaded out here and there or just gave up on MMO games. Look at EVE online for example ( I still like examples), there's not 5 millions players there of course but there's been a steady player base there for nine years, enough of them for CCP to keep the game runing and make expansions.

Since various Sim games have enourmous popualtity, then normal 3rd person full mmorpg's but with bigger 'economy, crafting, etc' component can be succesfull too.

Just a matter of 'doing it right'.

Would be hard to microtransaction it though, since everything should be player made and that seem the trend today.

I agree that microtransaction could be an issue but they came out with it when all MMO were subscription only, I'm sure that one big brain somewhere can come out again with a good idea.

Thing is if it would even have sense to play game like that with cash shop? 

For me it would not.

Well of course noone banned sub only games, so maybe someone would invest in game like that, but well chances are slim.

Who knows thou...world has saw more surprising things.

We could call that kind of game a MMO RPG / FPS / RTS / Simulation. For the first two I'm sure you get the picture and RTS for the officer who are planing the battles, moving the troops, giving orders and simulation for those who are driving the vehicules, piloting the aircrafts, etc... Add some deep crafting and some PvE NPC and contents and we get a game that many kind of player would like.

Of course, the MMORPG purists probably wouldn't like it but hey, no one can please everyone.

When it comes right down to it, exciting games are about conflict, and the most direct expression of conflict is violence. That is why most games are primarily about violence.

There's no reason why an MMO with noncombat roles wouldn't work. Actually, what raid guilds don't have a dedicated crafter grinding out stacks of consumable items for the rest of the guild? It's not all that difficult to find these things happening already in MMOs and other multiplayer games. Objective-based team shooters, especially those with classes, are a great example. Placing a sentry gun or sticky bombs around a chokepoint is a kind of indirect combat. Even a sniper staying away from the main battleground to keep his sights trained on a back entrance is an important role that doesn't have much in common with the running and gunning that everyone else is doing.

Even in WoW and Friends, don't you get the same kind of things? Aren't there raids where several people end up in "indirect combat" where they're assigned to kite mobs or dispell a specific debuff or whatever? And if you don't have someone who can do that (or they try but fail to do their job), then you don't stand a chance.

These things exist but just not in the exact form that you're proposing.

Originally posted by maplestone

See also: Eve.

(at a certain point of complexity in the mechanics, jobs just emerge naturally out of it all on their own)

Originally posted by Disdena

When it comes right down to it, exciting games are about conflict, and the most direct expression of conflict is violence. That is why most games are primarily about violence.

There's no reason why an MMO with noncombat roles wouldn't work. Actually, what raid guilds don't have a dedicated crafter grinding out stacks of consumable items for the rest of the guild? It's not all that difficult to find these things happening already in MMOs and other multiplayer games. Objective-based team shooters, especially those with classes, are a great example. Placing a sentry gun or sticky bombs around a chokepoint is a kind of indirect combat. Even a sniper staying away from the main battleground to keep his sights trained on a back entrance is an important role that doesn't have much in common with the running and gunning that everyone else is doing.

Even in WoW and Friends, don't you get the same kind of things? Aren't there raids where several people end up in "indirect combat" where they're assigned to kite mobs or dispell a specific debuff or whatever? And if you don't have someone who can do that (or they try but fail to do their job), then you don't stand a chance.

These things exist but just not in the exact form that you're proposing.

I understand you point but in my point of view this is still direct combat, a team of soldiers on a battlefield. I was refering more to jobs that could change the combat but without being directly confronted to the oponent or without even being on the battlefield (the infiltrator example, he's making his part without directly confronting the enemy).

Originally posted by dave6660

You're asking to add depth to games.  Not going to happen.  We're headed toward shallow one dimensional games.  Kill the big bad monster and get shiney weapon.

You're also asking for players to work together.  Also not going to happen.  We're headed toward single player lobby games.  The new trend is to play a multiplayer online game but play by yourself.

You're also asking for realism.  Every time that gets brought up players have an aneurysm.  The usual arguements are that it adds complexity for no reason.

You're asking for non-combat roles.  They have become almost non existant.  Players simply don't want to perform those roles.  Everybody wants to be the hero.

Debbie Downer is right, but it doesn't mean it's not completely impossible to disquise any of these facets in a way that tricks the hand-holding generation into doing it.

FoM is probably the worst example to use for basically anything, but it had incredible ideas that can port to nearly anything else. Namely that of societal roles (in FoM they are factions, though) and a mission structure that actually gets people to be social simply to get the goals done. If you give any player a quest to "look for a player with a red had, give him a gift, and wish him merry christmas", and guarantee he gets a reward out of it - guess what - he is gonna do it.

I'll Go with Eve as well if you looking for a second job to do that dosent pay anything for the hours you put in.

Originally posted by Rhavens

Let's say we're in an open world PvP situation in a futuristic environement. On one side, there's a group of players (infantry) ready to attack an oponent base but there's a massive wall around the base and a force field to protect it. I think we all agree that infantry guys can't just shoot at a massive wall, it would be a wast of ammo and that base defenses would crush them. To destroy those walls, we need artillery so players have to operate the batteries, here's a job. But we still have that force field around the base that prevent artillery to hit the wall ( that's future, there's surely a good reason for that), so we need someone to deactivate the force field, let's say an infiltrator, another job.

What you describe reminds me of the original PlanetSide.  You could hack enemy bases to capture or take control of it.  You could pilot transport vehicles for transporting infantry to combat zones.  You could learn to drive a tank, or a mech, or any type of land or air vehicle.  You could train to specialize in ground combat with various different weapons and tools.  There were tons of different "jobs" you could train your character in.  At your faction's base, there was a simulator for training in specific areas.  If you wanted to pilot a transport vehicle, you learn to do it in the simulator.

Many people have never heard of or played PlanetSide, which is a shame, because it really did have a lot of depth.  A really cool game.  I hope PlanetSide 2 has some of this gameplay.

the title made me think that you wanted a mmorpg like the shenmue games where you can earn cash by doing odd jobs such as forklifting, crate carrying and gambling.

That indeed would be an awesome mmorpg.

The title had me thinking you wanted a burger flipping, financial advising, retail outlet working MMO. 

Originally posted by TruthXHurts

The title had me thinking you wanted a burger flipping, financial advising, retail outlet working MMO. 

Same here, but honestly - what would be wrong with that?

I even have a concept on a waaay back-burner that is essentially "Free Realms in the Big City". You do mini-games as a bag-boy at a grocery store, taking orders as a waiter, etc, etc. There is still combat elements and a major story arc, but all the 'little things' pile up into a conglomerate of 'trivial shit' that would likely make for a fun alternative to balance out said combat/story play. Especially if that was the main way to make money as a free player.