Both the dungeon finder and low dungeon difficulty provide their own set of problems.  

If you ran some of the new Cataclysm heroics at the beginning of the expansion, you would have found yourself running dungeons of moderate to high difficulty through use of the dungeon finder.  As a result, the following situation occurred quite frequently: 

Everyone silently joins the party.  Perhaps someone askes "ready?"  or just "r?"  But probably not.  Pulling commences.  Maybe some crowd control marks are put up, but not everyone is on the same page because none of the symbols have been discussed and all cc gets broken within the first seconds of each pull.  Maybe you wipe once or twice on trash before reaching the first boss, depending on how well your healer is handling the insanity.  Standing before the first boss, the tank may or may not ask "r?" again.  After 3 seconds of waiting for a response, he pulls.  Group wipes because most of them are unfamiliar with the mechanics.  Everyone zones back in.  One person mentions one of the encounter's 5 mechanics.  Tank says, "Ok so don't stand in the red.  Going."  Healer pulls his hair out.   Group wipes again.  1 or 2 people silently leave.  

I've seen this scenario more than once.  It has little to do with dungeon difficulty (as it was actually somewhat "difficult" relative to gear, past WoW dungeons, and other games' dungeons), and everything to do with the anti-social environment created by the dungeon finder as well as players' conditioned expectations for running dungeons from the previous WoW expansion.  

Originally posted by Homitu

Both the dungeon finder and low dungeon difficulty provide their own set of problems.  

 

If you ran some of the new Cataclysm heroics at the beginning of the expansion, you would have found yourself running dungeons of moderate to high difficulty through use of the dungeon finder.  As a result, the following situation occurred quite frequently: 

 

Everyone silently joins the party.  Perhaps someone askes "ready?"  or just "r?"  But probably not.  Pulling commences.  Maybe some crowd control marks are put up, but not everyone is on the same page because none of the symbols have been discussed and all cc gets broken within the first seconds of each pull.  Maybe you wipe once or twice on trash before reaching the first boss, depending on how well your healer is handling the insanity.  Standing before the first boss, the tank may or may not ask "r?" again.  After 3 seconds of waiting for a response, he pulls.  Group wipes because most of them are unfamiliar with the mechanics.  Everyone zones back in.  One person mentions one of the encounter's 5 mechanics.  Tank says, "Ok so don't stand in the red.  Going."  Healer pulls his hair out.   Group wipes again.  1 or 2 people silently leave.  

 

I've seen this scenario more than once.  It has little to do with dungeon difficulty (as it was actually somewhat "difficult" relative to gear, past WoW dungeons, and other games' dungeons), and everything to do with the anti-social environment created by the dungeon finder as well as players' conditioned expectations for running dungeons from the previous WoW expansion.  

The above is a totally avoidable situation.

Either join a guild or explain the fight to the rest of the group.

I've never had any real issues with the DF, but then again - the best way to spread WoW rumors is to have them hold a negative tone towards the game.

2 things are the problem.

1.The know the tacticts shit which makes the dungeons boring . Solution is make dungeons random with random lvl range around the lvl about supossed to be with unepected encouters,stealh enemies patrolling mobs ,random created bosses etc etc .That way  there wont be the do u know the tactics shit issue and dungeons will require abit of caution from players making dungeons more intresting to play.

2.Sadly yes the dungeon finder for al the reasons OP mentions in his thread. If the game is good it will have population and u ll find mates to creaty/join party and go to dungeon. Also if the game is good you ll have plenty of things to do apart go to dumgeons in case x day x time u cant get party to go to dumgeons so u ll have plenty intresting activities to get involved(pvp,raids,rewarding adventuring,rewrding exploration in the wilds,rewarding and intr3esting outdoors quests etc.

Sadly current top selling in the market mmorpgs are dull so u have to farm dungeons since they isnt anythign other intrestingthing to do.

We cannot bring back the Everquest atmosphere now no matter how much we cry and moan and blame tools currently in games to facilitate the community. I myself am from old EQ and simply loved that game for its camaraderie. It is gone I think the last game I experienced it was FFXI. To some extent I caught brief glimpses of it in early WoW. No game since then has ever come close unless I am in a guild group. Occasionally I get a few individuals far and few in between to make me loath what has become of games these days but I do not blame the tools. 

Originally posted by jpnz

Originally posted by Homitu

Both the dungeon finder and low dungeon difficulty provide their own set of problems.  

 

If you ran some of the new Cataclysm heroics at the beginning of the expansion, you would have found yourself running dungeons of moderate to high difficulty through use of the dungeon finder.  As a result, the following situation occurred quite frequently: 

 

Everyone silently joins the party.  Perhaps someone askes "ready?"  or just "r?"  But probably not.  Pulling commences.  Maybe some crowd control marks are put up, but not everyone is on the same page because none of the symbols have been discussed and all cc gets broken within the first seconds of each pull.  Maybe you wipe once or twice on trash before reaching the first boss, depending on how well your healer is handling the insanity.  Standing before the first boss, the tank may or may not ask "r?" again.  After 3 seconds of waiting for a response, he pulls.  Group wipes because most of them are unfamiliar with the mechanics.  Everyone zones back in.  One person mentions one of the encounter's 5 mechanics.  Tank says, "Ok so don't stand in the red.  Going."  Healer pulls his hair out.   Group wipes again.  1 or 2 people silently leave.  

 

I've seen this scenario more than once.  It has little to do with dungeon difficulty (as it was actually somewhat "difficult" relative to gear, past WoW dungeons, and other games' dungeons), and everything to do with the anti-social environment created by the dungeon finder as well as players' conditioned expectations for running dungeons from the previous WoW expansion.  

The above is a totally avoidable situation.

Either join a guild or explain the fight to the rest of the group.

The "above situation" is just the parrot arguement against making it easier to get a group.   The idea is there is some kind of "socially" related dynamic that would make all players great!!   I will admit I am anti social in most MMO's simply because I have to put so many people on ignore or leave chat channels all together.   Yet strangely I still know how to play the game, how to play my class and how this all relates to my role in a group when I do group.

It is an entirely avoidable situation because you don't have to use the "system" at all.   Its entirely optional and if someone really hasn't figured out their class by level 80+...   Then you have a problem far beyond an "anti social" environment.

As far back as you can go in MMO history there have been bad players.   World of Warcraft has more bad players simply because it has more players period.   Some of this simply goes back to game design and that means you can "blame it on the devs".   People don't have a fundemental understanding of 'crowd control" because its not a key to gaming anymore.   If you have players with you that played EverQuest or Dark Age of Camelot.. they may have a very good understanding of CC.

and before I see it as a response.. this has nothing to do with them making games more solo friendly.   I've solo'd in every single MMO I've ever played going back to Ultima Online.   I group with people when I decide I like playing with them.

I know the above does happen quite often in WoW.. I just don't agree with the reason why.   I used to be told quite often by one of the guild Shaman that I was the only Hunter they would ever do instances with...  I liked the way things were when Cata launched (difficulty wise). 

The problem with WoW isnt the dungeon finder as much as it is the shallowness of many of the people that make up the Wow community and play the game and its dumbed down gear grind content..

Grinding up quick and selfishly for both level and for gear is precisely what the game has become and it is likely time for players that dont like it to leave it..

I always enjoyed the extra challenge and burden of helping lesser geared players gear up using DF however there was always the whining overequipped crybabies with no skill that were always more interested in voting them out in favor of a faster and easier run..

And thats pretty much what finished me up on the game, for many its not about the journey, fun or finding challenge its always about gear and the fastest way to jump straight to the end..

Originally posted by jpnz

Disagree.

Giving players the choice of how they wish to play is a good thing rather than forcing them to a specific playstyle. Rather than forcing the issue, offer incentives. 

 

As a person who does shares if a company I have invested money into does the last line (and they are NOT Google/Apple) I'd be fairly upset as an investor/shareholder.

I'm arguing for choice. The fact is that modern MMOs have removed choice from the game. You can only really do one or two things, and you have no ability to change the fundamental playstyle of your character.

As for the second part, that's kind of the point. If games are an artform, the fact that shareholders have a stake in that artform undermines the whole enterprise. How can it be art if the shareholders are telling you what to make? Keep in mind that the blockbuster game phenomenon is a relatively recent thing, and all it's done is give us Call of Duty clones and rpg mechanics in other genres to keep us playing longer with achievements and unlocks. If you tried to pitch the original Half-life to a board in 1997, after the colossal failure of every other FPS that wasn't Unreal or Quake, we may never have seen Half-Life 2 or Portal, or Counter-Strike, or TF2. Shit, if you tried to pitch Civ, Shadow of the Colossus, ICO, or any number of classic games that came out of the late 90s and early 00s, we might never have seen them get made. Hell, the puzzle-gaming genre had been dead for years before Portal came along, because shareholders and producers didn't think they could sell.

The fact is that the two most important games of the last few years were made by indie developers. Yes, I'm talking about Narbacular Drop and Minecraft. The developers are out of touch with the gaming community, and are too busy looking for ways to milk us for our disposable income to care. If shareholders really want an idea that will sell like Jesus' undies, they should manufacture a button that gives you an orgasm when you hit it, and it automatically debits your bank account. We'd all be dirt broke, but at least we'd be having a good time.

Cheers

Before lfd, before cross realm anything, that was the best of times in WoW for me.

Originally posted by jpnz

Originally posted by UsualSuspect

It's just a symptom of Modern MMO's. Content is designed to be soloed except for the dungeons which need a group. People spend their entire time soloing so don't need or talk to other people. When they need to enter a dungeon they have no friends to ask for help, they lack the social ability to ask over chat channels for help, plus they've been playing solo the entire time so really don't want to be bothered with grouping anyway.

And so to help these no-friend skill-less idiots out, they put in a Dungeon Finder to allow the soloers to effectively summon a bunch of people to help them solo through a dungeon.

To be honest, it's really pathetic the way MMO's have gone since their glory days.

I wouldn't call it a symptom but more of a 'control/power' type design.

If your game forces grouping before the level-cap, you are effectively limiting the growth of your playerbase as eventually the existing playerbase levels beyond the grouping content. This leaves any new players at the mercy of existing player's 'goodwill'.

You can kinda of mitigate via mentoring/reward system but at the end of the day, the game developer has now lost control of the growth of the playerbase. This is probably not acceptable for a lot of companies (esp publicly listed ones).

If your game has grouping as optional than the vast majority of the playerbase will not group and solo it through.

 Developers could create content that influences older or higher-level players to help out the new ones. Perhaps the higher levels need something from lower level content, but only the lower levels can "mine" it. In order to mine the stuff, the lower level players need to get to The Mountain of Doom. But, the only way to get there is to traverse areas that would be extremely deadly to any low level player alone. Just an example. I'm sure someoene with more experience could come up with a similar mechanic that wasn't so obvious, particularly in a PvP setting.

dungeon-finder is pretty good in that you get an asshole in a group- you can leave get another, and you don't have to wait going on 30 mins just to create a group. But yeah there is a big problem in that the social aspect has eroded.

Cross-server is a bit of a pain in the ass really. If levels weren't an issue everyone could group with everyone on a server- but can't see a mmorpg coming without a 70 level treadmill.

I think there are several implied or implicit things lost with using an automated system vs. manually putting a group together.

Like the old saying goes, nothing worth doing is ever easy.

I've played MMORPGs that had no in-game facilitation for grouping and I've played MMORPGs that automagically whisked you away into a pre-formed group, and my experience has been that....

Ability to resolve conflicts goes down with automated LFG.  Since there is little effort put in to joining a group, there is little to appreciate in keeping the group together when a issue arrizes.  If all a person knows of grouping is that they can just click another button and wait another 10 minutes to be matched up again....they do less to resolve conflicts.  If it took someone 20 minutes of manually searching /who lists of classes & levels, sending tells, shouting for group members....they may try a few more things to resolve the issue before calling it quites.

Manually putting a team together forces a person to think about the other classes needed for the encounter.  Knowledge of other players characters (and of the game as a whole) creates a better community of informed players (otherwise known as anti-dumb arses)

Cross-Server queueing is doubly hurtful to a community because your getting matched up with players whom you'll likely never see again.  This creates a situation where players express little interest in getting to know one another because there is no value in doing so....you'll never see them again.  Players refer to eachother by their class, not name.  Knowing that you'll likely never see these other players again highlights the anonymity factor...causing the players to act out in ways they wouldn't normally if they were held accountable for their actions.

But the fact of the matter is, things like community aren't the end all - be all of MMORPG gaming for many of the games with things like automated LFG tools, instanced & phased content, etc.  To a game like WOW, you don't need a strong community when your game is about upgrading gear, gaining levels.

I don't think Dungeon Finder kills the community. I think its the players themselves that kills communities.

Each players including myself only cares about our own individual progression, if you are too slow to react to a simple side step, then you will be included in my lists of players I would avoid for future Pugs.

And over a period of weeks, there will be individuals that can't find groups and are in need of Dungeon Finders that are anonymous, so that they can atleast get some playing time.

Dungeon Finders helps those that needs it, and doesn't hurt those that doesn't need it at the first place.

Personally I don't have friends that levels with me, so I do tend to get into PUGs alot until i get into a guild. But thats what MMO's are for, you join Pugs or use Dungeon Finders and find friends that you never knew is there. Whats so bad about it, it gets you in a party quicker and easier than spamming and getting ignored because people don't want to keep seeing " Mage LFG LVL 25 " 

Originally posted by Lucioon

I don't think Dungeon Finder kills the community. I think its the players themselves that kills communities.

Each players including myself only cares about our own individual progression, if you are too slow to react to a simple side step, then you will be included in my lists of players I would avoid for future Pugs.

And over a period of weeks, there will be individuals that can't find groups and are in need of Dungeon Finders that are anonymous, so that they can atleast get some playing time.

Dungeon Finders helps those that needs it, and doesn't hurt those that doesn't need it at the first place.

Personally I don't have friends that levels with me, so I do tend to get into PUGs alot until i get into a guild. But thats what MMO's are for, you join Pugs or use Dungeon Finders and find friends that you never knew is there. Whats so bad about it, it gets you in a party quicker and easier than spamming and getting ignored because people don't want to keep seeing " Mage LFG LVL 25 " 

 Good points, but i contest that there are other game mechanics that are focused on "stream lining" game play that remove some key benefits from manually grouping. 

Atleast in terms of how World of Warcraft has implemented PUGs.....they would serve as a good way to make long term friends.....if people actually spoke to eachother (If in the event you two are from the same server so that you could talk after he raid)

Point being....the Dungeon Finder is just 1 game feature that lends itself to a particular type of MMORPG.....that markets itself to a particular sort of gamer.

I think people complain about thing that they themselves haven't tried.

Dungeon finders doesn't ruin any interactions that you would have with other players, I was in a Pug group the other day, and they invited me to their vent, we talked , chatted. Then i was in another pug group where no one had vent, and no one talked except to explain the boss fights.

Then after the fights everyone left and thats it, but sometimes they stay and we would quest together. But does it destroy the experience of LFM , LF1M , WTB Tank calls, maybe , and for some we would rather not go through all that spam.

Like i said, its good for those that want to use it, but don't make it a requirement, make it into a choice, let those that want to use it, use it, those that want to do manual groups with roll calls, let them. If i am in que for dungeon finder, and i see LF DPS, I will send you tells. More way to group quicker the better .

Originally posted by Lucioon

I think people complain about thing that they themselves haven't tried.

Dungeon finders doesn't ruin any interactions that you would have with other players, I was in a Pug group the other day, and they invited me to their vent, we talked , chatted. Then i was in another pug group where no one had vent, and no one talked except to explain the boss fights.

Then after the fights everyone left and thats it, but sometimes they stay and we would quest together. But does it destroy the experience of LFM , LF1M , WTB Tank calls, maybe , and for some we would rather not go through all that spam.

Like i said, its good for those that want to use it, but don't make it a requirement, make it into a choice, let those that want to use it, use it, those that want to do manual groups with roll calls, let them. If i am in que for dungeon finder, and i see LF DPS, I will send you tells. More way to group quicker the better .

 Again, good points...but...

In all my randomly matched groups....not once have I been invited to someone's Vent, or has it served as a networking activity where i was able to develop lasting relationships with people.  Literally, all of the PUGs I've done ended with people silently exiting the group....or giving the obligatory "Thanks....it was fun" line before quickly disbaring the group.

The game is what you make of it...

If the name of the game is mindless grinding for gear, your going to get mindless grinding for gear.

Hence...we have the majority of the WOW playerbase queueing up for 5 man dungeons to grind out that gear.

I am fine with the dungeon finder tool, and I think its a nice feature, especially for newer players. When new content is released, the player base is lumped together, but as content gets older they tend to become more seperated as new gear is released, so the dungeon finder allows people to find groups for content that they may not be able to find groups for on their home server. Furthermore, no one makes you use the dungeon finder feature. You can still find groups outside of the finder, and then hop right in once you have a group together. Nothing is stopping you from assembling a group of guildees, friends or randoms from your server and riding to the dungeon, if that is the kind of experience you are looking for. The dungeon finder just makes things easier for people who might be new to a server, etc, who may not have anyone to run said dungeon with. I see no harm in it.

Originally posted by Creslin321

A lot of people believe that dungeon finder has been the death of community in a lot of MMORPGs.  They argue that dungeon finder has changed the dungeoning experience from being a social, tactical, and enjoyable experience to one that is just a speed-grinding treadmill where the only time anyone talks is to insult their group mates.  And I do not deny at all that this is the state of many MMORPGs that have dungeon finder (WoW).  I also agree that dungeon finder contributes to this issue by providing jerks anonymity.

But I ask this, is dungeon finder the problem, or is the problem that dungeons have become just too easy?  Currently, most dungeons can be easily rolled through if each player knows the basics of how to play their class.  Very little to no coordination is required, and this really gets rid of the need for players to talk at all.  As such, most players take the path of least resistence and just plough through dungeons like silent zombies.  I feel that this, not dungeon finder, is the main issue with dungeons and the deterioratin of the community.

In the old EQ days, running through a dungeon without communicating would have never worked.  The fights were just too difficult, each player not only had to perform their role, but they had to perform it in a way that benefited the team.  I think if they had dungeon finder in EQ, the community wouldn't be nearly as bad.  Even jerks will be nice when they need to do so in order to succeed.

Thoughts?

no, it's the dungeon finder.

Would work the same in EQ.

It's bad for community.

Originally posted by RajCaj

Originally posted by Lucioon

I think people complain about thing that they themselves haven't tried.

Dungeon finders doesn't ruin any interactions that you would have with other players, I was in a Pug group the other day, and they invited me to their vent, we talked , chatted. Then i was in another pug group where no one had vent, and no one talked except to explain the boss fights.

Then after the fights everyone left and thats it, but sometimes they stay and we would quest together. But does it destroy the experience of LFM , LF1M , WTB Tank calls, maybe , and for some we would rather not go through all that spam.

Like i said, its good for those that want to use it, but don't make it a requirement, make it into a choice, let those that want to use it, use it, those that want to do manual groups with roll calls, let them. If i am in que for dungeon finder, and i see LF DPS, I will send you tells. More way to group quicker the better .

 Again, good points...but...

In all my randomly matched groups....not once have I been invited to someone's Vent, or has it served as a networking activity where i was able to develop lasting relationships with people.  Literally, all of the PUGs I've done ended with people silently exiting the group....or giving the obligatory "Thanks....it was fun" line before quickly disbaring the group.

The game is what you make of it...

If the name of the game is mindless grinding for gear, your going to get mindless grinding for gear.

Hence...we have the majority of the WOW playerbase queueing up for 5 man dungeons to grind out that gear.

I found City of Heroes to be a lot of this as well.

The dungeons were called "missions" and they scaled to the party.

Doesn't matter if you are two, three, five, whatever, the mission will just automatically ad mobs for your party. Adn the combat was so fast, almost no downtime.

Travel was also fast with fight, teleport, super fast run, etc.

So it was a lot of  fight, fight, fight, dungeon done, kthxbye.

Originally posted by Lucioon

I think people complain about thing that they themselves haven't tried.

Dungeon finders doesn't ruin any interactions that you would have with other players, I was in a Pug group the other day, and they invited me to their vent, we talked , chatted. Then i was in another pug group where no one had vent, and no one talked except to explain the boss fights.

Then after the fights everyone left and thats it, but sometimes they stay and we would quest together. But does it destroy the experience of LFM , LF1M , WTB Tank calls, maybe , and for some we would rather not go through all that spam.

Like i said, its good for those that want to use it, but don't make it a requirement, make it into a choice, let those that want to use it, use it, those that want to do manual groups with roll calls, let them. If i am in que for dungeon finder, and i see LF DPS, I will send you tells. More way to group quicker the better .

I think it's silly to say it doesn't affect anything else.

I go into a dungeion finder group. Meanwhile you are LFM. I'm not paying attention, because I'm in a DF group, otherwise I might join you.

You get sick of going LFM, so you join a DF group.

I come out of my DF group.

I go LFM. you don't know that, because you're in a DF group, otherwise you might join me.

So you get bored, join a DF group.

I come out of my DF group, and go LFM, but you just joined a DF group....

People that talk about "choice" in MMORPGs never really mean it.

You mean you have the "choice" to play the game while most people are in a Dungeion Finder group.

Yea, but that's not really a choice.

The choice would be to play a game without a dungeon finder or with a dungeon finder.

THAT is choice.

You're just saying,  I like games with Dungeon Finder, everyone else should too. Because obviously it's silly to claim it has no affect on the game.

If it had no affect, it wouldnt' be there.