Originally posted by TheStarheart

Originally posted by GrayGhost79

Originally posted by Starpower

Originally posted by grimal

Forced grouping (traditional, not the GW2 coop way)

No solo play.

Increased difficulty.

Sandbox.

 

 

+1

The more solo-centric a game becomes the more disjointed the community becomes. I don't know why you added sandbox in there though

Themeparks are inherently detrimental to community. If they aren't near your level they aren't of use to you and with the forced grouping usually found in these games you must replace them. Same goes for the raid centric side of themeparks, they don't have the right gear, they aren't the right class, they aren't this, they aren't that lol. 

Couldn't you do the level-syncing method from FFXI, or exemplar/sidekicking method from City of Heroes/Villains to allow people to party together in a themepark even if they're at different stages?

Ahh but where is their carrot on the stick for going to lower level areas to group with people they have level synced with? FFXI did ok with level sync because the main goal was xp, but most western MMO's focus on the "phat lewts" which are typically more abundant in higher level areas. 

Originally posted by GrayGhost79

Originally posted by TheStarheart

Originally posted by GrayGhost79

Originally posted by Starpower

Originally posted by grimal

Forced grouping (traditional, not the GW2 coop way)

No solo play.

Increased difficulty.

Sandbox.

 

 

+1

The more solo-centric a game becomes the more disjointed the community becomes. I don't know why you added sandbox in there though

Themeparks are inherently detrimental to community. If they aren't near your level they aren't of use to you and with the forced grouping usually found in these games you must replace them. Same goes for the raid centric side of themeparks, they don't have the right gear, they aren't the right class, they aren't this, they aren't that lol. 

Couldn't you do the level-syncing method from FFXI, or exemplar/sidekicking method from City of Heroes/Villains to allow people to party together in a themepark even if they're at different stages?

Ahh but where is their carrot on the stick for going to lower level areas to group with people they have level synced with? FFXI did ok with level sync because the main goal was xp, but most western MMO's focus on the "phat lewts" which are typically more abundant in higher level areas. 

I would say for group crafting/questing requirements, guild quests/activities, that sort of thing. If your game isn't heavily gear-based than it shouldn't really be an issue who you pick up.

Originally posted by TheStarheart

Would these things appeal to make a stronger community?

• The existence of world bosses, almost like Notorious/Rare Monsters in FFXI/WoW/etc that would require a large group to fell, also requiring coordination and strategy. They would have a rather large loot table, from unique-looking equipment to unique materials for crafting recipes/quests.

 

• Group crafting/Group crafting quests: Crafting quests with large or rare materials that are part of a main storyline/progression. Players would also have a designated area to look for group crafting/questing together.

 

• "Less self-sufficient classes": Classes have specific functions and can't do everything so you have certain roles, but are they limited to a specific profession as well (i.e. all Wizards are also Potion-makers only)? Open all professions to players, or limit the amount of professions and have players choose?

 

• A way to have what you've achieved in-game affect later content.

 

• Most content is group content.

 

• Many important crafting resources to be scarce and found in difficult areas. 

 

• Guild bonuses based on activity as well as longevity

I don't think challenging PvE content should be limited to (field) bosses or 'elite' mobs. You need the average monster encounters to be more challenging than they currently are in MMOs today.

Taking Chronicles of Spellborn as an example, monsters would often be grouped up in 2-3 or more mobs. You'd have some warrior mobs and a caster mob. Their AIs were designed so that the warriors would act as tank, trying to be in the way of your abilities while the caster would prepare his spells to attack you.  (It should be noted that CoS was not a tab-targetting game, you had to aim your skills and attacks).

Group-oriented crafting is a great idea, but they're usually more of a Guild-type of thing than group ones. Building a city is more commonly 'reserved' for Clans where players would work together to acquire all the ressources necessary to build their city. DarkFall is an example of that. ArcheAge (albeit not released yet in Korea, let alone North America) also has more 'group-oriented' crafting (where several players are needed to greatly hasten the process of building a house, ship or city) . But this does indeed encourage communities to come together more, so more group-oriented crafting could be a great idea.

FFXI and FFXIV, although does not have group-craft, did have many recipes (if not most) that would require the ressources created by several other crafter jobs. So for example to craft a spear, I might need a pole created by a woodworker, a blade crafter by a smith, and a cloth by a leatherworker. Each of which would require ressources of their own, so it would develop a pretty solid network of crafters, harvesters and fighters that would exchange ressources to create more items.

By less self-sufficient classes, I refer to how classes today have all become Tank/DPS/Healer in some ways. It's made solo-oriented gameplay that much easier by removing the necessity to rely on other players to fulfill areas you are lacking. Using FFXI again as an example, the White Mage had very little in terms fighting capabilities, but were pretty much a 'must' for any parties hunting mobs. Battles were relatively long (in comparison to today's standards) so sustainability was important.

On point number 4, I'm not sure how you'd do that unless the game was a  Sandbox. Because those later content  would technically be impacted by all other players as well

Point #5, most content should indeed be more group-oriented. Solo play should still exist however, but it should be nowhere near as viable as grouping is.

Point #6  Yes and No. Depends on the MMO in that case I would say.

Point #7 As far as Guild Bonuses goes, I don't view them as necessary. I'd prefer to see more horizontal development (guild housing, activities, etc) rather than vertical ones (bonuses to xp gain, stats, etc) for Guilds. Give players a place to be together as a guild, and give those places some purpose higher than to act simply as a meeting place to encourage players to visit them (Access to certain Vendor NPCs, crafting stations, etc) but that's just personal taste in this case.

Originally posted by LadyEuphei
MAny people are talking about forced grouping and such, which is not what I see happening. I see people starting to be held accountable. If a player can rank a team mate and say, "hey, this guy was really helpful" the community swarms to that. If you make it beneficial to be a nice person the game community becomes even better. Take League of legends for instance. They always had the ability to report and players were down right nasty to eachother. Since the release of the honorable opponent system, you have really seen the LoL scene clean up. Games need to remember that there are 2 sides to the story, if you focus on punishment people will turn evil for some reason, if you focus on rewarding the nice players, people will be nice. 

I like this concept. Ways to reinforce grouping together, ways to reinforce doing good things/being helpful. The question is just how to incorporate this well into a multiplayer / mmo design. I'll also need to look more in depth into this honorable opponent system.

Originally posted by LadyEuphei
MAny people are talking about forced grouping and such, which is not what I see happening. I see people starting to be held accountable. If a player can rank a team mate and say, "hey, this guy was really helpful" the community swarms to that. If you make it beneficial to be a nice person the game community becomes even better. Take League of legends for instance. They always had the ability to report and players were down right nasty to eachother. Since the release of the honorable opponent system, you have really seen the LoL scene clean up. Games need to remember that there are 2 sides to the story, if you focus on punishment people will turn evil for some reason, if you focus on rewarding the nice players, people will be nice. 

Thank you so much.

I agree completely.  I don't think we can have, community-wise, a better game until we have a better gamER.  While there have always been outliers to behaviour patterns, the earliest MMO's were -not- populated by the kind of acerbic trash-spewing infantile 'gamer' that populates them today.  Until something is done about this - be it the LoL method or something new and innovative (and other than a heavy banhammer, I must admit to not having much in the way of ideas) - there can be no real 'community' improvement no matter what tools/resources you use. 

Simply recreating the structures of the past doesn't recreate their conditions.

How more heavily focusing on group-craft, with many of the necessary materials being found in dungeons/zoneacross all of the level spectrums. Entering the dungeons brings you back down to the appropriate level range for the dungeon/zone. If you enter with a guild or volunteer to join a random group, you have the option to increase the likelihood for a certain item of your choosing to drop that's found within the dungeon. You would get to see a table of items and choose to increase the drop rate for a particular item.

Also the possibility of main city crafting/upgrades where buildings improve with player contributions, allowing bonuses to crafting, access to other types of buildings/features. These would be huge amounts of money/resources/crafters/etc needed and all of those who participate get some recognition/achievement/etc for doing so. 

Originally posted by Lissyl

Originally posted by LadyEuphei
MAny people are talking about forced grouping and such, which is not what I see happening. I see people starting to be held accountable. If a player can rank a team mate and say, "hey, this guy was really helpful" the community swarms to that. If you make it beneficial to be a nice person the game community becomes even better. Take League of legends for instance. They always had the ability to report and players were down right nasty to eachother. Since the release of the honorable opponent system, you have really seen the LoL scene clean up. Games need to remember that there are 2 sides to the story, if you focus on punishment people will turn evil for some reason, if you focus on rewarding the nice players, people will be nice. 

Thank you so much.

I agree completely.  I don't think we can have, community-wise, a better game until we have a better gamER.  While there have always been outliers to behaviour patterns, the earliest MMO's were -not- populated by the kind of acerbic trash-spewing infantile 'gamer' that populates them today.  Until something is done about this - be it the LoL method or something new and innovative (and other than a heavy banhammer, I must admit to not having much in the way of ideas) - there can be no real 'community' improvement no matter what tools/resources you use. 

Simply recreating the structures of the past doesn't recreate their conditions.

I absolutely want to recreate mechanics that are rewarding for people to participate with one another. At the same time, I also want to do new things to encourage community, friendliness, being helpful, etc. I just need to find good ways to do so. That's why I'm throwing it out there for the community think-tank.

Where I'm at now is to have a game where things are just hard to find/do, but they're much easier when you're helping other people. helping random groups, helping your guild, being rated as friendly and helpful, etc. will increase the probability of good things happening for you and the potency of your character. how well he performs his job, how well he crafts, etc. The nicer and more helpful you are, the more good things happen to you. Almost like a karma system.

Spent a really long time with the same group? Bonus probability.

Donated items to someone? Bonus probability.

Joined a random group to help with a dungeon you've already done? Bonus probability.

Got a positive feedback from someone? Bonus probability.

Certain thresholds in increased probability would also yield a bonus. 10% inc chance at something because you helped a lot of people? Now you have the chance for increased crits. reached 20%? X ability now has this bonus to it.  Not only are you better at crafting, finding certain drops, etc. but your character performs better as well.

     The best community I ever played in was in early EQ and here is why:

1. grouping- while soloing was feasible with a few classes, the majority were dependant on grouping...Also the best loot was off the bosses which usually required a group to conquer

2. every class has a role- if you want a good community, then everyone in that community needs to have a role...In EQ every class had unique abilities that were either valuable in a group setting or had special buffs that other players wanted.

3. good economy with active trading- often a good crafting system ties in with this as other players need goods you have and there is quality interaction...if the crafting system gives one player the ability to do everything then you dont need other players

   in summary, the best communities are the ones where you/your character are valued and needed.....The problem with too many of the post WoW MMOs is that they are trying to hard to jsut be entertaining, and are not giving players any meaning.... Too many of them are making it so each character can do everything, the content is mostly soloable, and you jsut don't need anyone else anymore.

The real community killer is instancing and solo questing. The main appeal of MMORPGs is the persistant world and community interactions. Instances isolate players from each other. Non-trable loot also hurts the community as well because the second appeal of MMORPGs is a player-driven economy. If you do not like competition and player driven economy then you should be playing single player games and not MMORPGs. Single player games are a much better experience for the soloist.

Things that are good but not completely necissary:

- Sandbox Content with a living breathing world

- Some type of healthy level grind. If someone hits max level on the first day the Devs dropped the ball.

- FFA PvP (No factions everyone is red, no gimicy PvP gear or battlegrounds)

- Death Penalties (Everquest type corpse runs were famous for getting people to work together)

- Difficult content that requires large amounts of players (100+ man raids would be ideal)

- Robust class system that is more than just a trinity (tanks, healers, DPS, Crowd Control, Buffers, Debuffers, etc)

- Complex mechanic system (how many games still use the CHA carisma stat?)

- Lots of Lore but light or no player story (People should understand that Lore and story are not the same thing)

Originally posted by LadyEuphei
MAny people are talking about forced grouping and such, which is not what I see happening. I see people starting to be held accountable. If a player can rank a team mate and say, "hey, this guy was really helpful" the community swarms to that. If you make it beneficial to be a nice person the game community becomes even better. Take League of legends for instance. They always had the ability to report and players were down right nasty to eachother. Since the release of the honorable opponent system, you have really seen the LoL scene clean up. Games need to remember that there are 2 sides to the story, if you focus on punishment people will turn evil for some reason, if you focus on rewarding the nice players, people will be nice. 

I think this is a great start of an idea.  So many of the crowd sourcng and social networking tools could be tweaked to work better in an MMO system.  I know people flip out about Facebook, but you can't deny these tools make it easier to pair up with like-minded people.

• Player and guild ratings, with the ability to offer reviews
• In game system to add public character profile information and guild info -- what you are looking for; add tools to match up interests with guilds
• Add the ability to create informal groups -- not quite guilds, more than playing solo
• Incentives and rewards for participating in group activities, including, but not limited to dungeons, open world questing, crafting, trade, diplomacy, entertainment and RP
• Penalties for bad behavior as judged by the larger community (a karma system sounds great)
• Tools to advertise group events -- bulletin boards and calendar
• Matchmaking tools so that groups with similar interests can find each other
• Difficult content that can best be completed by a group
• No lfd/lfr tools -- instead use bulletein boards and calendaring to sign up for teams
• Improved chat tools, and integrated voip
• Community events -- theater, music, tourneys
• Law enforcement framework if open world PvP is to be added
• More specialization in abilities and gear instead of less (eject the trinity in favor of unique/individual characters) to promote diverse groups 
• Experience for non-combat activities
• Politcal and trade systems coupled with reputation and influence
• Improved communication tools for individuals and guilds - all with the the focus of getting people into a group that fits their playstyle
• Activities focused exclusively on getting new people introduced to other new and experienced players.  Maybe a newcomers guild designed especially to get people up to speed and find them a place within the community.

a clique is a micro-community.

we're decades away (too early or too late) for ebating how to turn cliques into larger communities so let's focus on how to get people into cliques for now.

cliques...are good. unless you're the guy not in one. But tha't strue for communities as well.

Originally posted by Robokapp

a clique is a micro-community.

 

we're decades away (too early or too late) for ebating how to turn cliques into larger communities so let's focus on how to get people into cliques for now.

 

cliques...are good. unless you're the guy not in one. But tha't strue for communities as well.

There is only one game I ever played that tried to build up larger communities over cliques. Yes, this was decades ago in the 90s MUD era.

The main pro-community mechanic was to place a character in a commmunity at character creation. Basically your character was part of a Kingdom or small Tribe of 25 other players. This was randomly decided at character creation. Just like in real life you don't get to choose where you are born or who your parrents are. Fate decides it and you have no choice but to accept it.

Inactives were killed off through PERMA DEATH PvP.  Additionally scripts deleted inactive accounts on a weekly basis. They took the whole tribal thing seriously so active players would always be in a comminity with other active players. If you did not like people you were with you could always defect to another Kingdom but where you ended up was again random. There was no such thing as soloing. It wasn't part of the the game AT ALL.

A lot of people complained about the system though because they couldn't be in the same community with their real life friends. The community generation system was random, which was the whole point of promoting community over cliques. The devs stuck to their guns though and never changed the system. Game was in business for over tens so they made the right choice.

I have often wondered how people would react today under such a strict system.

you don't choose where or from who you're born but you choose who you join and who you fight for.

(e) / (i) migration .

being born in a kingdom and having to fight for it is as unrealistic as being born at adult age and combat-ready, with basic equipment on.

and again, 'clique' is the nascent form of a community. if we have cliques then we have guilds and clans. and when the pvp clan needs items, they go to the crafter. when the crafter needs protection he goes to he mercenary.

as a miner in eve I always find a guy ratting in belt and we instantly make a 'business agreement'. I tell him when rats spawn in my belt, he comes from where he's presently at and kills rats in my belt. He gets to rat I get to mine. win-win. this happens every day and with different people. It's almost like grouping...or cliquing :D

I don't play games for their community. I play for fun ... for the gameplay experience, which may incidentally including multiplayer (or even massive multiplayer) interactions.

Forcing socialization in the expense of gameplay, and convenience is not the way to make a good game (at least for me).

Given how these "community breaking" features like instances, and LFD are popular, i would say most players don't really care about the mythical "community".

After all, all i need is someone to play with ... and they are always a button away (LFD). And if i don't like them .. the quit function is also a button away. ANd if i really want to socialize (which i usually don't play game for it) .. you can use whisper chat and what-not.

And at the end, how many people can you socialize? 50? 100? 1000? Even at 1000, which i highly doubt anyone has time for so many, it is less than 10% what a server can support .. and it drops to almost nothing for games with cross server functionalities.

So i don't really care about a particular community because with so many players (law of large numbers), the chance of not finding someone whom i like to play with .. is approaching zero.

To have a good mmo community you first need players which are interested in such a thing. Read the previous post in this thread and you know why a good community is a rare thing. Does it even exist in newer mmos anymore ? I only remember it from old mmos. Btw, this is not intended as an attack against the last poster. He just said what most people playing mmos nowadays think and do.

You can add any feature you want into a game which promotes a good community. It's useless if players are not interested in such a feature.

     I don't want to say "forced" grouping,, BUT there needs to be more dependant interaction within the community.. I thought EQ was a good mix of solo and group play.. Was it perfect? NO.. but from the games I've played it's the best mix I have seen to date..   Second thing"

STOP WITH THE DAMN EPEEN ESPORT GAME PLAY..

     This is a bigger problem with me then anything.. The games today are NOT uniting the playerbase against a common foe, but putting us against each other..  I would love to see games that promote social community play.. This means getting rid of crap like gear score,  Raid limits and lockouts.. Get rid of instancing too.. I loved how groups close to each other would help each other out in a pinch or buffs.. If this means that 1/2 of the marketshare would never play the game, so be it..  I would rather play with a strong 200-300k community, then deal with 1 million esports wanting to compare their epeens.. NO THANKS..

     There also needs to be stronger crafting from start to finish.. Today's crafting is BS.. It's nothing more then a game hobby to pass the time.. Most of the products made are sold to NPC vendors, once you hit end game (which is TOO fast) only a few recipes are useable for short time..

     Get rid of questing as we have it today..  Very seldom are people on the same timetable, and that actually keeps people from grouping..  I would like to see questlines only be 10% of the game exp.. Questing should be either epic like "EQ epic quest", or use NPC's as delivery missions to help players move from one area to another..  NO MORE "kill 10 rabbits" quest.. Those are not quest to begin with, those are chores.. I would like to see 90% of current quest turn into repeatable turn in rewards like EQ's deathfist belts.. As you adventure in the zone with others, you will eventually loot items that NPC's want.. Once you are done for the day, go turn in your items for rewards. (exp, rep and coin).. This way there are no quest obsticles that keep players from grouping up..

     Summary.. stop appeasing the single player console gamer, and start looking back on past  games on what makes communities stronger, even IF smaller.. Games of the past were not perfect, but they were alot better then today's junk.. Oh, btw.. I also felt that GM's were a HUGE bonus on the server community.. They helped settle disputes, helped trouble players with bugs and were normally social with the playerbase..

Require grouping.  No easy mode WoW type games.

Make it so social interaction is required.  If you suck, good luck finding a group.  If you are an idiot in chat, good luck getting a group. 

Good thing for the producers too as they can make a change name feature cost a fortune, so when the kids log on and think they are funny, and ruin the game for themselves and need mommy and daddy to bail them out by paying an over priced name change fee, they will think about doing it again with their new name or ever in the future.

Originally posted by nariusseldon

I don't play games for their community. I play for fun ... for the gameplay experience, which may incidentally including multiplayer (or even massive multiplayer) interactions.

Forcing socialization in the expense of gameplay, and convenience is not the way to make a good game (at least for me).

Given how these "community breaking" features like instances, and LFD are popular, i would say most players don't really care about the mythical "community".

After all, all i need is someone to play with ... and they are always a button away (LFD). And if i don't like them .. the quit function is also a button away. ANd if i really want to socialize (which i usually don't play game for it) .. you can use whisper chat and what-not.

And at the end, how many people can you socialize? 50? 100? 1000? Even at 1000, which i highly doubt anyone has time for so many, it is less than 10% what a server can support .. and it drops to almost nothing for games with cross server functionalities.

So i don't really care about a particular community because with so many players (law of large numbers), the chance of not finding someone whom i like to play with .. is approaching zero.

Go play a RPG then not a MMORPG.

You are a perfect example of what ruined the community.  Just my opinion.