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1/26/09 4:33:00 PM#41
Originally posted by TheHavok
Not really. I think I am the only person on this damn site who thinks a class system works better than a skill based system... Damn site eh? Well the way I look at is, the top mmorpgs right now are all based on a class system. Therefore, it is easier to automatically assume that class system is the most successful. But, hopefully, a game will come along and break that mold...SWG I think was a prime example of this before they drastically altered it. I personally could go either way with class or skill based systems. Anyways to go back on topic, Ive played ALL class roles and loved and loathed them all at one point or another. Tanking was great because my role was so vital and I found little to no competition when fighting over a spot in the guild or upgrades. Healing was similar except, in my own personal opinion, it is the hardest role to play and also the most important; if you mess up, the whole group messes up. Dps will always be the most fun (all you do is kill stuff In my opinion, allowing diversity to the classic roles (tank, heals, and dps) is the best way to keep up the fun factor of playing. WoW has been doing this very well. In vanilla wow, ONLY warriors tanked in raids. Druids, shaman, priest, and pallies were the only healers.....dps specs were ignored if you raided. Now in wotlk... ALL classes have viable dps specs. Hybrids no longer need to be confined to one role, they can choose from 3. It really helps keep players coming back for more.
Sorry but WoW does not do a good job on the class system. If you say one class can play multiple roles? Okay, fine, but as a whole that class system is bad times. |
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1/26/09 4:54:19 PM#42
Originally posted by Eronakis Damn site eh? Well the way I look at is, the top mmorpgs right now are all based on a class system. Therefore, it is easier to automatically assume that class system is the most successful. But, hopefully, a game will come along and break that mold...SWG I think was a prime example of this before they drastically altered it. I personally could go either way with class or skill based systems. Anyways to go back on topic, Ive played ALL class roles and loved and loathed them all at one point or another. Tanking was great because my role was so vital and I found little to no competition when fighting over a spot in the guild or upgrades. Healing was similar except, in my own personal opinion, it is the hardest role to play and also the most important; if you mess up, the whole group messes up. Dps will always be the most fun (all you do is kill stuff In my opinion, allowing diversity to the classic roles (tank, heals, and dps) is the best way to keep up the fun factor of playing. WoW has been doing this very well. In vanilla wow, ONLY warriors tanked in raids. Druids, shaman, priest, and pallies were the only healers.....dps specs were ignored if you raided. Now in wotlk... ALL classes have viable dps specs. Hybrids no longer need to be confined to one role, they can choose from 3. It really helps keep players coming back for more.
Sorry but WoW does not do a good job on the class system. If you say one class can play multiple roles? Okay, fine, but as a whole that class system is bad times. I think a class system is better than skill also. I've posted before too about such. With skill, I end up seeing less diversity because everyone is getting the same 2-3 optimum skill set. A skill based ends up being a hybrid class basically that most people gravitate towards. If people do focus on certain skills, they end up just making a class. It really is all the same, skill and class. Imagine looking for someone to tank some bad ass boss. Everyone can tank, but theyre not specialized enough to have that extra blocking because they can all dps and heal to have the optimum skill set. The the monster hits so damn hard, that weaker healing everyone has is useless. I guess you can have someone respec, but then they are playing something and using new skills they haven't before. If you have people already with those specialized tanking and support skills in a skill based game, then people don't want them when they pvp, or why bother grouping when they can solo, thus those people aren't around. I like classes and the diversity and dynamic different classes bring to a group and gameplay. I hate seeing everyone running around as a freaking tank mage. LF1M. Must have these skills, this spec. Bleh Could be similar to LF healer, but at least most likely you got someone who wants to play a healer, while someone else has certain skills because they can't play otherwise.
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1/26/09 6:24:18 PM#43
Originally posted by Glamis
Do you have actual stats? Personally I am DPS and most people I know are DPS. Very few want to heal. That is why WOW (and most other games) are balanced on groups with fewer healers than other classes.
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1/26/09 6:26:10 PM#44
Originally posted by Vynt Damn site eh? Well the way I look at is, the top mmorpgs right now are all based on a class system. Therefore, it is easier to automatically assume that class system is the most successful. But, hopefully, a game will come along and break that mold...SWG I think was a prime example of this before they drastically altered it. I personally could go either way with class or skill based systems. Anyways to go back on topic, Ive played ALL class roles and loved and loathed them all at one point or another. Tanking was great because my role was so vital and I found little to no competition when fighting over a spot in the guild or upgrades. Healing was similar except, in my own personal opinion, it is the hardest role to play and also the most important; if you mess up, the whole group messes up. Dps will always be the most fun (all you do is kill stuff In my opinion, allowing diversity to the classic roles (tank, heals, and dps) is the best way to keep up the fun factor of playing. WoW has been doing this very well. In vanilla wow, ONLY warriors tanked in raids. Druids, shaman, priest, and pallies were the only healers.....dps specs were ignored if you raided. Now in wotlk... ALL classes have viable dps specs. Hybrids no longer need to be confined to one role, they can choose from 3. It really helps keep players coming back for more.
Sorry but WoW does not do a good job on the class system. If you say one class can play multiple roles? Okay, fine, but as a whole that class system is bad times. I think a class system is better than skill also. I've posted before too about such. With skill, I end up seeing less diversity because everyone is getting the same 2-3 optimum skill set. A skill based ends up being a hybrid class basically that most people gravitate towards. If people do focus on certain skills, they end up just making a class. It really is all the same, skill and class. Imagine looking for someone to tank some bad ass boss. Everyone can tank, but theyre not specialized enough to have that extra blocking because they can all dps and heal to have the optimum skill set. The the monster hits so damn hard, that weaker healing everyone has is useless. I guess you can have someone respec, but then they are playing something and using new skills they haven't before. If you have people already with those specialized tanking and support skills in a skill based game, then people don't want them when they pvp, or why bother grouping when they can solo, thus those people aren't around. I like classes and the diversity and dynamic different classes bring to a group and gameplay. I hate seeing everyone running around as a freaking tank mage. LF1M. Must have these skills, this spec. Bleh Could be similar to LF healer, but at least most likely you got someone who wants to play a healer, while someone else has certain skills because they can't play otherwise.
You know, I do agree with you. From what I have seen is, you still make that archetype style of a class, but you do it instead of having the classes already lay out for you. For GROUP play for me, I can see this really frustrating. This is why I wanted to make this thread to see how a skill based system can out perform than a class based system in GROUP play. Let me ask this for those perferred standbox players... Would it be reasonable to say there are four archetypes, you can choose, from, such as fighter, priest, theif and mage. Maybe, once you picked that skill set from that archetype there is a massive veriety of skills to choose from with penalties for choosing others over some. Maybe down the road, you can mix abilities from different trees, and if you decide not to, you can some kind of bonus for being that pure style. Or is this way still leaned towards a class system? (Pretty much, there are set skills for the archetype and different players will have different skills within that archetype so it's kind of sandboxed) |
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Moaky07
Novice Member
Joined: 2/24/07
MMO sandbox games are as exciting as watching paint dry. |
1/26/09 7:26:41 PM#45
For directed content type games, I really dont see how you tune it to skill based games. Having the ability to be different is good to a degree....but full skill based takes it too far IMO. Classes with added skill points is the way to go AFAIAC. Have didfferent trees, and only allow folks to take one of them. Or ala EQ...allow folks to get AAs. The amount of them is dependent on how much time you wish to put in. That gives the "hard core" their leg-up so to speak. Those that have limited play styles will tend to fall behind the top AA grinders over time. Not that those playing less wont be able to get thru content...they just might not be as efficent at it. All the debates around here always seem to mention the easy vs hard mindsets. They never seem to take into account that there can be shades of things in lots of things when it comes to MMOs. The only thing that you really cant blend IMO is putting a loot oriented game with a tradeskill based one. The tradeskillers want the best items to come from them, and the adventure types wanna kill for them. Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget. |
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1/26/09 7:38:04 PM#46
It really depends on the game. Normally I do enjoy the support type role, but not in a game like WoW, where it is solo dependant, and PvP is rather impersonal and solo as well.
L2 I really enjoy it, because leveling 90% of the time involves group work, and supports play their role in PvP with a frantic and most important role, and they win fights when you are playing competitively with team work. WoW can have some of that but 90% of the time you'll be running around in a BG with people you don't know, and healing them would be kind of boring. |
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Zorgo
 Hard Core Member
Joined: 12/05/05
Who did wrong? The advertiser hired to sell the game or the consumer who put faith in advertising? |
1/26/09 7:46:35 PM#47
Originally posted by Glamis Yep, that's the problem exactly. "Some" like it, but not enough. The largest grouping problem by far in every mmo I have played has been a lack of healers. I don't know if it is because people are scared of being a non-dps'r or tank or whatever, the fact is, there are not enough - period. So kudo's to developers for playing around with the support classes to make them attractive to more than just 'some'. If you have a game with a six person 'basic' group, then healers need to be roughly attractive to 1/6th of the total population of the game. If you have a five person basic group, the number jumps to 20% of subscribers should be attracted to the healer class. I would assume, they know what their real percentage is, and if my gaming history is any indication, it is much, much lower.
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1/26/09 8:37:10 PM#48
I always choose the full-support class, if a game offers it. Having other people depend on you, and being praised for your abilities is always a plus. I also try to help noobs as much as possible, and being a support class is definately the easiest way to accomplish that. |
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1/27/09 1:06:26 AM#49
Originally posted by Zorgo Yep, that's the problem exactly. "Some" like it, but not enough. The largest grouping problem by far in every mmo I have played has been a lack of healers. I don't know if it is because people are scared of being a non-dps'r or tank or whatever, the fact is, there are not enough - period. So kudo's to developers for playing around with the support classes to make them attractive to more than just 'some'. If you have a game with a six person 'basic' group, then healers need to be roughly attractive to 1/6th of the total population of the game. If you have a five person basic group, the number jumps to 20% of subscribers should be attracted to the healer class. I would assume, they know what their real percentage is, and if my gaming history is any indication, it is much, much lower.
Well not kudos enough. Take LOTRO for example, when they upgraded the Minstrel to have the new War-Speech stance and gave us a bunch of AoE attacks and increased melee that didn't work at all. There is still a major lack of us and it gets annoying sometimes getting 80-100 tells every play session begging to join groups. Even on Anon, players can clearly see that you're a Minstrel running by or have you on friends list and bug you till you give in or put them on ignore. Then with the recent changes to the combat system for MoM not only did they reduce our healing output from -50% to -80% while in War-Speech but now our melee and AoE dmg was severaly reduced along with our defences. Now were weak once again, and we can't stay in War-Speech for long while solo cause we can't heal ourselfs enough to stay alive and with our defence so low now we have to drop out of it to heal and survive. We used to be able to solo 3-5+ mobs even lvl while in War-Speech and now we can barely survive 1-2! I would rather developers stick too us being great healers, weak DPS and defences and require groups to advance, and don't bother trying to make us a hybrid!  |
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1/27/09 1:45:27 AM#50
Unfortunately for us, there aren't enough people that enjoy the role. From a developer's standpoint, it's a bad design to put content reliance on a pure (but heavily underpopulated) class. If you make the pure class mandatory, then the wait for a group for a considerable amount of the game population becomes increasingly frustrating. If you balance the content over the hybrids (so as you don't run in the above problem), you trivialise the challenge whenever a pure class is part of the group. That is why developers are moving away from the pure healing aspect and differientate healers by giving them utility toolset, instead of stronger heals. I've played the part of pure healer for years. If there was a happiness gauge, when I'm inside a team, it would show 100%, when outside 20%. As a DPS class I was sitting at a 60% in or out of team. And that's the reason you don't see many people in the pure healing/tanking role. If you can keep yourself in the 100% happy zone most of time you spend gaming, then it's worth it. When it starts moving to a 50 in/ 50 out territory, then the pure role becomes unbearable and you start regretting the pure role decision. It would be interesting to see what role all these advocates of forced grouping are interested in performing in a group. |
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1/27/09 4:15:04 AM#51
I love support healing and games that dont have a needed healer.support person I dont stay long. |
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) , yet you compete the most with other dps and you are easily replacable. 
