Pan'Theon: Rise' of th'e Fal'Len - #1 Thread in MMO

"challenging, engaging, and social"

The point is back in eq, my group had 2 necros, cleric, shaman, rogue, and enchanter. That group was totally viable and worked well. After pretty much vanilla wow and eq that doesn't work well. Some people are basically saying "you can't play with your friends" because one didn't choose a tank, healer, cc. I'm not saying we need GW2 route, as I felt like that was pretty much a disaster on all fronts. But we need to have it so people can play with who they want to play with. Not reroll because you picked warrior in ff14. Examine that class for pretty much a example of horrible class design. I'm in agreement with tmac, and denaut.

The next mmo that will be great won't have maps with arrows. It won't have quests hubs or anything of that bs. By having all these things we take for granted now dumbs down our experience and it pulls us out of the game. There can't be a world if you login and have map showing you exactly where something is. That doesn't leave anything to wonder. I posted pretty much this same thing years ago. You can't have a datamined game where you know what drops before you even step foot into the raid zone. That's just not any fun knowing your plus betterererer item will drop. That moves me on to the plus betterererer issue. These devs have no idea how to itemize shit. Things should be unbalanced because that what makes shit great. Having your gear set with +3 to whatever your stat is hugely bland. People need to do different dungeons to collect the best gear for whatever their build is. Gear sets are garbage, and I can't think of one reason why we should still have them, beyond dev lazyness. We need a mmo again that has dungeons instead of 3 hallways. People make the comment about how if you don't instance you can't allow everyone to experience places. Everyone shouldn't be able to experience everything. When we instance places we let everyone get everything and then they all quit 3 weeks later when there is no content to look forward to. The though process now days is nothing more than create a pos where you can sell a box to the most people possible in the ruse of a game they want to play.

Let's look at TSO, 3 factions with 4 races each? Who thought that was a smart idea? Lets create 3x the content for everything, good work! Your friend didn't play one of the four races in your faction, FUCK YOU. I'm just at a loss now days looking at these games. FF14 was extremely good looking low level, but once you get to 50 it turns to shit. You figure out that the netcode is cans and strings and there is no end game. The endgame you get requires you to reroll a class which can do the single 4 bosses of content, not even a raid zone, 1 L50 dungeon you need to run 70 times. D3 is getting rid of the auction house that pretty much anyone with a fucken brain cell still working knew would be a disaster. What the hell is going on.. I could give a shit less what Brad's done in the past. This thread to me is nothing more than "one more mmo which might the good". We are in short supply of those after all..

You can't have an MMO that has mystery in it anymore. Not possible with datamining and the existence of google.

Yeah someone will decompile your stuff and extract information out of your install files. Unless it is completely server side and ran in a browser people will get the information.

Miele_sl said:

Going back to Kunark (2000) or WoW vanilla (2005) I used to do groups for dungeons with pet classes and no real healers (necro+mages) and/or duo/trio in dungeons with the most absurd setup of classes. It doesn't work in raids, but raids are shit anyway and should be deleted, but I disgress.
The main reason behind this kind of grouping was to prove it could be done, to prove it was very fun (most fun ever) even if it wasn't superbly efficient and possibly risky, meaning pretty much nobody was going to even give a try in case they'd be losing time without getting loot shat on them (instant gratification?).

This brings us back to the reason why grinding a dungeon in 7 minutes instead of 15 is even a fucking concern in these games.
Efficiency? Currency? Farmability? It's a load of crap, no wonder these games nowadays last months instead of years. You have to hide the hamster-wheel relationship behind a layer of adventure, exploration, slot-machine effect (drops, rare spawns) and general content depth. Instead we get mass AE pulling to speed up things or worse, skip trash that resets after a few meters by running/stealthing, whatever method is used in such game/dungeon, no loot worth talking about, but a fixed predictable and daily/weekly capped amount of currency.

It's a job, isn't it? Boring, grinding, salary, buy goods with salary. Somebody forgot adventure, fun, emotions, pride, achievements (real ones not the artificial shit we're being fed nowadays).

So, before analyzing in depth why the need for a set of roles, e.g. healing, is better or worse than going all together randomly dpsing whatever is moving, maybe, just maybe, somebody with a bit of talent should think about making something more interesting than a 3d version of diablo3 over and over.

Who I play with? Why is that even a concern? If I'm in a tight group of friends, we decide beforehand who is playing what, more or less covering what's needed, if I meet randoms, I look for those covering the roles I need. I don't really see the issue with that. Every game has a LFD system nowadays, seems to me that waiting 15-20 minutes to do something has to be a terrible experience for somebody, the same somebody who won't even say hello and treat everyone like bots or targets for insults should things not go his planned way.

I just don't think it's such a big deal to be honest.

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You kind of squished a bunch of different things into this post so I wanted to pull out the most salient point you had,"why grinding a dungeon in 7 minutes instead of 15 is even a fucking concern in these games". This point doesn't come up enough in these discussions.

A golden rule of MMORPGs is you should never underestimate the ability of a player to ruin their own enjoyment. This may sounds strange, but one of the biggest challenges for a designer in an MMORPG is not just to make a game where players can have fun, but to create one where they can't not have fun.

This sounds kind of strange but there is something about the nature of a social game that makes people chase efficiency at the cost of fun. It really doesn't make any sense, and I even catch myself doing it (although less now, maybe I've mellowed in my old age). And, interestingly enough, the same people will behave differently in a single player game.

ZProtoss_sl said:

You can't have an MMO that has mystery in it anymore. Not possible with datamining and the existence of google.

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You actually can! You just have to think outside the box, and toss away old ideas like static content and scripted events.

That has trade-offs too though - generated / randomized content is rarely as memorable or as high quality. And depending on how it's generated, while it won't be datamined, people will still quickly enough throw up a wiki that says "So you'll enter a dungeon and it'll be comprised of one of these four tile sets", and so-on.

As everyone knows, you cannot hand-author quality content anywhere near the speed it can be consumed (and this applies to more than just video games). That's another reason games are trying to introduce player-authored content.

I think in this day of wikis and data-mining, sure, it's difficult, but only because of how attached to old methods we are. Minecraft goes a long way to forcing you to actually explore your game to enjoy. Sure, you wiki up recipes and stuff, but you can't see a map of a cave system. That's a step in the right direction.

Tmac47_sl said:

The two quotes are certainly exclusive.

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"Mutually exclusive" means they cannot both be true. Are you saying that a game in which each player can do everything and each player is not unique cannot exist? You really seem to be arguing that they are unrelated, but don't let me put words in your mouth.

Tmac47_sl said:

The diversity of a class really has nothing to do withlimitingthe uniqueness of individual players...

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If there are 5 possible states for a character and each character can comprise all of them, then it clearly limits the uniqueness of a character because there is basically only 1 character type. The difference between abilities and item selection and talent trees and whatever else is a bunch of handwaving, though. They're just ways to differentiate characters, with different auxiliary systems and parameters attached. If the class system is flattened, then you'll have fewer possible states (character types), so less "uniqueness." The thing that really matters is how many states a character can encompass, including the number of actions any character can perform in a given moment.

It is true though that a class system with distinct roles is not the only way to promote interdependence or cooperation.

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Denaut_sl said:

This sounds kind of strange but there is something about the nature of a social game that makes people chase efficiency at the cost of fun.

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Yep. You see games tapping into our preoccupation with social status a lot lately by including overall leaderboards and more contextual leaderboards populated by our friends and acquaintances.

Denaut_sl said:

You kind of squished a bunch of different things into this post so I wanted to pull out the most salient point you had,"why grinding a dungeon in 7 minutes instead of 15 is even a fucking concern in these games". This point doesn't come up enough in these discussions.

A golden rule of MMORPGs is you should never underestimate the ability of a player to ruin their own enjoyment. This may sounds strange, but one of the biggest challenges for a designer in an MMORPG is not just to make a game where players can have fun, but to create one where they can't not have fun.

This sounds kind of strange but there is something about the nature of a social game that makes people chase efficiency at the cost of fun. It really doesn't make any sense, and I even catch myself doing it (although less now, maybe I've mellowed in my old age). And, interestingly enough, the same people will behave differently in a single player game.

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The competitive nature of mmo's drives vertical progression at the expense of lateral exploration; at the expense of everything really.

Denaut_sl said:

You are missing the point entirely. Finding a different person because they have the right class means excluding one of the people you were going to play with in the first place. The point is that a good MMORPG isn't like a single player game where the game components are what matter most, the strength of an MMORPG ispeopleyou play with.

A well designed MMORPG will make it easy to find and meet new people, yes, but will also make it easy for you to play with the people you want to play with when you want to play with them. Requiring a holy trinity impairs that by forcing you to either exclude someone you like and enjoy playing the game with or possibly forcing you to include someone you don't want to play with simply because of the class/combat system.

Ultimately this decreases the enjoyment of the game and doesn't play to the strengths of the genre.

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Aren't you a dev? Makes me sad that devs actually think this way...ughh

Denaut_sl said:

You kind of squished a bunch of different things into this post so I wanted to pull out the most salient point you had,"why grinding a dungeon in 7 minutes instead of 15 is even a fucking concern in these games". This point doesn't come up enough in these discussions.

A golden rule of MMORPGs is you should never underestimate the ability of a player to ruin their own enjoyment. This may sounds strange, but one of the biggest challenges for a designer in an MMORPG is not just to make a game where players can have fun, but to create one where they can't not have fun.

This sounds kind of strange but there is something about the nature of a social game that makes people chase efficiency at the cost of fun. It really doesn't make any sense, and I even catch myself doing it (although less now, maybe I've mellowed in my old age). And, interestingly enough, the same people will behave differently in a single player game.

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Yes, I tend to rant over too many things, must be that I'm turning 40 in a couple months and this world is going to the gutters (or so they tell me... but who are "they"? ), but when I unleash my fake hatred towards modern game design it's just because I don't understand it, or better, I do understand it from a financial point of view, broader appeal, more potential customers, etc. so the gamer in me dies a little inside. Then a good game comes out and you see it making money so quickly your brain melts, GTA-V for example (I heard it's good at least). I'm 100% convinced that some current and past mmo-games could have made a load of money with a few changes in their design docs.

I played D&D for the first time in 1985, still do it nowadays, quite rarely to be honest (it's hard to organize a decent game night when everyone is married with kids), but it's still fun. There is a certain excitement of the unknown still, the little trick the DM can put in to make everything more spicey. MMOs were a bit like that, now they are 100% predictable, easy, snack sized content and the sole reason veterans play them is because of friends. I still have a couple friends that dabble in 2-3 games, I assure you that the whole class/role thing was never a concern for us, it's small group content after all and the efficiency one has been hardly mentioned in years. Probably we're just a disappearing breed, better get on good terms with it.

Tenks_sl said:

In the modern day in age if your quest description is "Go left at the giant oak and stop at the rock" someone will just google that quest and get a nicely drawn map saying what to do. So why not just integrate that anyways?

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Ultimately people can use outside means to do anything, beyond maps and quest guides, we can see all loot, watch videos of all content, even purchase items and full accounts. The logic can't be to integrate everything because then why have a game at all?

I'm fine with maps, but could do without all the circles and arrows and quest waypoints that lead us around like babies. In a well designed game, with legitimate dungeons and far fewer but more significant quests than typical MMOs, there could still be a real benefit to those who have firsthand knowledge of the game over relying on some wowhead equivalent.

Utnayan_sl said:

What exactly did he say that was so wrong?

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This>>>Requiring a holy trinity impairs that by forcing you to either exclude someone you like and enjoy playing the game with or possibly forcing you to include someone you don't want to play with simply because of the class/combat system.

Ultimately this decreases the enjoyment of the game and doesn't play to the strengths of the genre.

The problem with this statement is, and thinking of devs in general is, requiring "x" will make poor johnny actually send a tell to group, and we can't have that! Why is communicating with other members of the MMO community considered a "burden on the player" now?
To be fair, I'm drinking but its thinking like this that annoys me to death. Is it really that tough to ask around for help in an MMO? We actually have a dev telling us that if a player is required to group up with certain race/class combinations, itdecreases the enjoyment of the game. Seriously?

Merlin_sl said:

This>>>Requiring a holy trinity impairs that by forcing you to either exclude someone you like and enjoy playing the game with or possibly forcing you to include someone you don't want to play with simply because of the class/combat system.

Ultimately this decreases the enjoyment of the game and doesn't play to the strengths of the genre.

The problem with this statement is, and thinking of devs in general is, requiring "x" will make poor johnny actually send a tell to group, and we can't have that! Why is communicating with other members of the MMO community considered a "burden on the player" now?
To be fair, I'm drinking but its thinking like this that annoys me to death. Is it really that tough to ask around for help in an MMO? We actually have a dev telling us that if a player is required to group up with certain race/class combinations, itdecreases the enjoyment of the game. Seriously?

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Sober up and then reread. You have mistaken him.

Arden_sl said:

Sober up and then reread. You have mistaken him.

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The quote is pretty cut and dried. If I'm mistaken, then correct me yourself?

Merlin_sl said:

The quote is pretty cut and dried. If I'm mistaken, then correct me yourself?

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Well I'll correct you: The quote is saying that the holy trinity restricts who can play with who based upon class. It has nothing to do with having "poor johnny actually send a tell to group," because he'd do that anyway without the trinity. The trinity just changes who he can play with effectively and ergo who he can play with at any given time. No trinity or a system that does not facilitate a precise number of each class in any given group will mitigate that effect.

And yes, it will decrease the enjoyment of the game because your poor johnny, although able to just send a tell to someone of the correct class, might not be able to play with the person he wanted to. Lesser enjoyment.

Merlin_sl said:

The quote is pretty cut and dried. If I'm mistaken, then correct me yourself?

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Yes it is cut and dry, and you misread it pretty bad. The real issue is people not being able to play with their friends due to class choice, or being forced to play with non-friends due to class choice. The goal is to make grouping required, but it should be with people you like. Tough to achieve while keeping things like "group roles". I'm not saying group roles are bad, but they do have issues, and games like FFXIV, EQN, and GW2 are all different attempts to fix that issue.

And we go full circle back to my original statement. The "holy trinity" is still, to this day, the best option we have. The alternative is, GW2. Which would you prefer?