interesting. on your first point i disagree because damage dealing is not one of the trinity. It wasnt in everquest and it wasnt in dark age of camelot. Those games had dedicated crowd control classes.
if you go back to that model you have no dedicated dps role, and thus all are required to do that. Actually all were always required to do that. I dont accept wows model of tank/heal/dps as a superior model for the reasons you suggested.
what if all the classes were designed around tank/heal and crowd control where each class could perform any two of those three roles by design. All classes are and have always been designed to deal damage. Even a daoc midgard healer could deal some damage.
Are you thinking of a different Everquest than I am? Maybe that Lords of Everquest RTS game, or Champions of Norrath on PS2? Because no way in hell was there an Everquest MMO where everyone was expected to do damage. Try telling a Cleric to stop medding and get some swings in with his mace. Unheard of. Furthermore, crowd control was never a third arm of a trinity in that game.
If you tried to grind out levels in a dungeon against red mobs in a group with no tank, you had virtually no chance of survival. The mob would head for your healer and kill them, followed by everyone else.
If you tried to grind out levels in a dungeon against red mobs in a group with no healer, you had virtually no chance of survival. If the tank or tanks managed to survive even one fight, there would be an overly long recovery time while they rested, and there'd be no way to keep up with the spawns.
If you tried to grind out levels in a dungeon against red mobs in a group with no dedicated damage classes, you had virtually no chance of survival. The length of the fights would drag on, depleting the healer(s)' mana and ensuring a long fight followed by a long recovery time, and again you'd be unable to keep up with spawns and would die to repops.
Grinding out levels against reds was the default mode of gameplay, and it happened all the time with no bard or enchanter in the group. It simply meant being a little more careful, having a bit of trouble breaking the camp initially, and then having the puller zone with a bad pull when it happened.
You can wish to your heart's content that someone would design a Tank/Heal/CC Trinity game, but you can't possibly go on claiming that EQ was that game.
There's multiple reasons for not having a 3-man group.
One is practical reasons. Most MMOs are setup with a trinity system where certain roles are required in a group - a tank, a healer and a number of damage dealers. Since by far most people are interested in the damage dealer role, having 3-man groups would in most MMOs cause crazy amount of waiting time for damage dealers to get groups.
Second is the genre's roots in old tabletop role-playing and CRPGs, most of which are designed for groups of 4 or more player characters.
There might be more, but those two are from the top of my head.
interesting. on your first point i disagree because damage dealing is not one of the trinity. It wasnt in everquest and it wasnt in dark age of camelot. Those games had dedicated crowd control classes.
if you go back to that model you have no dedicated dps role, and thus all are required to do that. Actually all were always required to do that. I dont accept wows model of tank/heal/dps as a superior model for the reasons you suggested.
what if all the classes were designed around tank/heal and crowd control where each class could perform any two of those three roles by design. All classes are and have always been designed to deal damage. Even a daoc midgard healer could deal some damage.
on your second point, most players dont know what came before wow, so i doubt that tabletop games would have any effect at all.
EQ and daoc definitely had dedicated dps, but they usually did a little extra.
Funny thing is, neither were really a "trinity" system, but utilized 4 areas, healer, tank, dps, support (varied from cc, slows, debuffs, buffs). Without that dedicated support, most serious groups were screwed. Imagine an EQ group without an enchanter late game, or bard or shaman, heh.
Same with daoc, no speed, ugh, but doable, no cc? lol forget it. In daoc's case, the cc class was usually combined with another function, healer for heals, sorc for some dps, bard, well never had a bard be main healer and cc, but loved the speed . Loved the large groups in daoc, allowed to really mix and match, and really didnt even need a "trinity" like group. Went without tanks quite often. There was a lot of flexibility, even if some people tried to pigeon hole the "perfect" group.
I kind of hate these smaller groups that have come out. Some now have 4, just too low for my tastes, 5 was ok, but I really like 6+, loved the 8 in daoc. I do like big raids, but I can understand it being too much with 40+ for a lot of people, but plenty like 20, 25 people, and that would be fine, 3 groups of 8, or 4 of 6, nice 24 man raid,
It just seems the bigger groups had more diversity and dynamic of interplay, so lowering the number would make it bland. I understand the fun of playing with a couple buddies, but I would get bored if that was at most I could group with.
I played a cleric from day one in eq. I would always help out when necessary, but sure, there were times when medding was more important. Perhaps i didnt have to play as hard as you because we always had an enchanter and often a bard....of course i also played the game at the appropiate level ( whites, oranges, "light" reds), and i also played for fun back then.. grinding didnt actually occur to me back then...
The cleric could do alot more than Cheal. I certainly could.
i could understand if you were doing a raid, sure you need to focus on your corse skills ( which is why i hated raiding), but in normal grouping i never had an issue helping out.
i also played a hiealer in daoc for a very long time and my job was to heal and cc (midgard healer was required to do both, unlike the other realms)..so sure in that one it was harder since you were doing two roles already to get a few smacks in.
Daoc also had the tank heal cc trinity. damage was just filler.
in an age where mmo's are supposed to be soloable, i cant figure out why they wouldnt at least try to make a mmo with a smaller group size. Its superior in every way.
MMOs are supposed to be soloable? Why not just play Skyrim or something then.
The most fond MMO memories I have are 72 man raids in Everquest.
I completely disagree that a smaller group size is superior or requires less specialists.
And some of my worst memories of any mmos were those esame exact 50+ person raids from everquest.
To each his own.
But, in recent years there have been polls done and they show that most players do NOT like large raids and prefer smaller group oriented content.
So why not appeal to both?
Oh I absolutely agree, there should be content for all styles of play. Also, I played alot with the same group of very organized raiders, so the level of chaos in say - a pickup Rallos Zek raid - was never there, everyone knew their role.
I actually gave this thought the other day and I hate to keep referring to Everquest but it was the community that I was most involved in. I ENJOYED farming my shards for Vex Thal (etc. etc.) because during those long boring ass camps I formed relationships with other players some of which I'm still in touch with today. I despise the fact that quest items drop like 100% of the time now. There is very little sense of accomplishment. Teamwork and social aspects of MMOs were what originally drew me into these games and I haven't been able to find that sense of community in a great while, again that is only what appeals to me personally.
People that don't have the time to spend on succeeding to the perceived "highest level" would complain of unattainable items and how zones shouldn't be locked out for some people instead of just being happy with what they could do. Unfortunately, we are largely a community of spoiled brats. If earning it takes too much "work" then it should be given to us or made mind-numbingly easy and this mindset is beoming ever so apparent outside of gaming as well. This is why they can't design a game that appeals to all playstyles.
I guess I was just bewildered by the guy that said MMOs should be soloable. Should there be solo content? Absolutely! There should also be small group and large group content available to those that wish to use it (please not a recycled "heroic" version of the same crap). There NEEDS to be items and zones that are unavailable to the person that can only play a few hours a week, in my opinion.
The less people you make dungeon and group content for...the harder it is for DPS to find a group.
Bring back 8 man dungeons and 8 man content...there never is a shortage of DPS and it opens up room for non-dps support, who often get the shaft in games that have them.
Not sure what game sspecifically had this, but i do remember finding a group that involved a puller, a tank, a healer, a buffer and 4 dps...that was fun...think it was a game with open world dungeons and you just farmed the dungeon though...fun at the time but gamers are too impatient to really enjoy the well oiled machine that a functioning dungeon group is.
There's multiple reasons for not having a 3-man group.
One is practical reasons. Most MMOs are setup with a trinity system where certain roles are required in a group - a tank, a healer and a number of damage dealers. Since by far most people are interested in the damage dealer role, having 3-man groups would in most MMOs cause crazy amount of waiting time for damage dealers to get groups.
Second is the genre's roots in old tabletop role-playing and CRPGs, most of which are designed for groups of 4 or more player characters.
There might be more, but those two are from the top of my head.
interesting. on your first point i disagree because damage dealing is not one of the trinity. It wasnt in everquest and it wasnt in dark age of camelot. Those games had dedicated crowd control classes.
if you go back to that model you have no dedicated dps role, and thus all are required to do that. Actually all were always required to do that. I dont accept wows model of tank/heal/dps as a superior model for the reasons you suggested.
what if all the classes were designed around tank/heal and crowd control where each class could perform any two of those three roles by design. All classes are and have always been designed to deal damage. Even a daoc midgard healer could deal some damage.
on your second point, most players dont know what came before wow, so i doubt that tabletop games would have any effect at all.
I think your perception of the holy trinity probably differs from what most people mean when they talk about it. That's the first time I've ever seen anyone replace damage dealer with crowd control. It doesn't exactly fit the common MMO setup, either.
There's multiple reasons for not having a 3-man group.
One is practical reasons. Most MMOs are setup with a trinity system where certain roles are required in a group - a tank, a healer and a number of damage dealers. Since by far most people are interested in the damage dealer role, having 3-man groups would in most MMOs cause crazy amount of waiting time for damage dealers to get groups.
Second is the genre's roots in old tabletop role-playing and CRPGs, most of which are designed for groups of 4 or more player characters.
There might be more, but those two are from the top of my head.
Rubbish.
Vanguard has the Trinity and Vanguard has 6 people groups.
Most effective group setup in Vanguard: 2 tanks, 2 healers, 1 bard and 1 other damage dealer.
And theres plenty of tanks and healers around in Vanguard, because its fun to play a tank or healer in that game.
Well ok except Warrior. Warrior kind of sucks because you're completely dependent upon getting a group. Shaman of the Phoenix variety is not as awful, but also a quite weak solist. They would kind of need better snares so they can at least kite better. Everyone else is good to great at it, though.
The less people you make dungeon and group content for...the harder it is for DPS to find a group.
Bring back 8 man dungeons and 8 man content...there never is a shortage of DPS and it opens up room for non-dps support, who often get the shaft in games that have them.
Not sure what game sspecifically had this, but i do remember finding a group that involved a puller, a tank, a healer, a buffer and 4 dps...that was fun...think it was a game with open world dungeons and you just farmed the dungeon though...fun at the time but gamers are too impatient to really enjoy the well oiled machine that a functioning dungeon group is.
Actually support is a very strong asset in DDO. Everyone wants that bard to buff em n do some good quality CC. Problem is that only one slot in the part is needed but then rarely see em in groups.
There's multiple reasons for not having a 3-man group.
One is practical reasons. Most MMOs are setup with a trinity system where certain roles are required in a group - a tank, a healer and a number of damage dealers. Since by far most people are interested in the damage dealer role, having 3-man groups would in most MMOs cause crazy amount of waiting time for damage dealers to get groups.
Second is the genre's roots in old tabletop role-playing and CRPGs, most of which are designed for groups of 4 or more player characters.
There might be more, but those two are from the top of my head.
i think you hit the head on the nail.. players prefer to be damage dealers only..i.e no responsibility for one of the harder roles.
this makes sense given the current generation L.
however i believe that if all classes are very well rounded capable of multiple useful roles, given that everyone likes to do some damage, that the game itself would be far better balanced overall. You dont need to worry about looking for healers, tanks or crowd control if all classes have a share in these roles.
Originally posted by BigRock411 The less people you make dungeon and group content for...the harder it is for DPS to find a group.Bring back 8 man dungeons and 8 man content...there never is a shortage of DPS and it opens up room for non-dps support, who often get the shaft in games that have them.Not sure what game sspecifically had this, but i do remember finding a group that involved a puller, a tank, a healer, a buffer and 4 dps...that was fun...think it was a game with open world dungeons and you just farmed the dungeon though...fun at the time but gamers are too impatient to really enjoy the well oiled machine that a functioning dungeon group is.
Actually support is a very strong asset in DDO. Everyone wants that bard to buff em n do some good quality CC. Problem is that only one slot in the part is needed but then rarely see em in groups.
The problem is that the more roles, the harder to fill them.
Not sure if this has been mentioned before or not, but LOTRO has some really fun 3 man dungeon's. And they have the skirmish system that can be played solo, 3, 6, or 12 man. Unfortunately Lotro has also developed one of the worst form's of f2p/p2w model's in my opiniion.
Comments
Are you thinking of a different Everquest than I am? Maybe that Lords of Everquest RTS game, or Champions of Norrath on PS2? Because no way in hell was there an Everquest MMO where everyone was expected to do damage. Try telling a Cleric to stop medding and get some swings in with his mace. Unheard of. Furthermore, crowd control was never a third arm of a trinity in that game.
If you tried to grind out levels in a dungeon against red mobs in a group with no tank, you had virtually no chance of survival. The mob would head for your healer and kill them, followed by everyone else.
If you tried to grind out levels in a dungeon against red mobs in a group with no healer, you had virtually no chance of survival. If the tank or tanks managed to survive even one fight, there would be an overly long recovery time while they rested, and there'd be no way to keep up with the spawns.
If you tried to grind out levels in a dungeon against red mobs in a group with no dedicated damage classes, you had virtually no chance of survival. The length of the fights would drag on, depleting the healer(s)' mana and ensuring a long fight followed by a long recovery time, and again you'd be unable to keep up with spawns and would die to repops.
Grinding out levels against reds was the default mode of gameplay, and it happened all the time with no bard or enchanter in the group. It simply meant being a little more careful, having a bit of trouble breaking the camp initially, and then having the puller zone with a bad pull when it happened.
You can wish to your heart's content that someone would design a Tank/Heal/CC Trinity game, but you can't possibly go on claiming that EQ was that game.
EQ and daoc definitely had dedicated dps, but they usually did a little extra.
Funny thing is, neither were really a "trinity" system, but utilized 4 areas, healer, tank, dps, support (varied from cc, slows, debuffs, buffs). Without that dedicated support, most serious groups were screwed. Imagine an EQ group without an enchanter late game, or bard or shaman, heh.
Same with daoc, no speed, ugh, but doable, no cc? lol forget it. In daoc's case, the cc class was usually combined with another function, healer for heals, sorc for some dps, bard, well never had a bard be main healer and cc, but loved the speed . Loved the large groups in daoc, allowed to really mix and match, and really didnt even need a "trinity" like group. Went without tanks quite often. There was a lot of flexibility, even if some people tried to pigeon hole the "perfect" group.
I kind of hate these smaller groups that have come out. Some now have 4, just too low for my tastes, 5 was ok, but I really like 6+, loved the 8 in daoc. I do like big raids, but I can understand it being too much with 40+ for a lot of people, but plenty like 20, 25 people, and that would be fine, 3 groups of 8, or 4 of 6, nice 24 man raid,
It just seems the bigger groups had more diversity and dynamic of interplay, so lowering the number would make it bland. I understand the fun of playing with a couple buddies, but I would get bored if that was at most I could group with.
when did you start playing eq?
I played a cleric from day one in eq. I would always help out when necessary, but sure, there were times when medding was more important. Perhaps i didnt have to play as hard as you because we always had an enchanter and often a bard....of course i also played the game at the appropiate level ( whites, oranges, "light" reds), and i also played for fun back then.. grinding didnt actually occur to me back then...
The cleric could do alot more than Cheal. I certainly could.
i could understand if you were doing a raid, sure you need to focus on your corse skills ( which is why i hated raiding), but in normal grouping i never had an issue helping out.
i also played a hiealer in daoc for a very long time and my job was to heal and cc (midgard healer was required to do both, unlike the other realms)..so sure in that one it was harder since you were doing two roles already to get a few smacks in.
Daoc also had the tank heal cc trinity. damage was just filler.
Oh I absolutely agree, there should be content for all styles of play. Also, I played alot with the same group of very organized raiders, so the level of chaos in say - a pickup Rallos Zek raid - was never there, everyone knew their role.
I actually gave this thought the other day and I hate to keep referring to Everquest but it was the community that I was most involved in. I ENJOYED farming my shards for Vex Thal (etc. etc.) because during those long boring ass camps I formed relationships with other players some of which I'm still in touch with today. I despise the fact that quest items drop like 100% of the time now. There is very little sense of accomplishment. Teamwork and social aspects of MMOs were what originally drew me into these games and I haven't been able to find that sense of community in a great while, again that is only what appeals to me personally.
People that don't have the time to spend on succeeding to the perceived "highest level" would complain of unattainable items and how zones shouldn't be locked out for some people instead of just being happy with what they could do. Unfortunately, we are largely a community of spoiled brats. If earning it takes too much "work" then it should be given to us or made mind-numbingly easy and this mindset is beoming ever so apparent outside of gaming as well. This is why they can't design a game that appeals to all playstyles.
I guess I was just bewildered by the guy that said MMOs should be soloable. Should there be solo content? Absolutely! There should also be small group and large group content available to those that wish to use it (please not a recycled "heroic" version of the same crap). There NEEDS to be items and zones that are unavailable to the person that can only play a few hours a week, in my opinion.
The less people you make dungeon and group content for...the harder it is for DPS to find a group.
Bring back 8 man dungeons and 8 man content...there never is a shortage of DPS and it opens up room for non-dps support, who often get the shaft in games that have them.
Not sure what game sspecifically had this, but i do remember finding a group that involved a puller, a tank, a healer, a buffer and 4 dps...that was fun...think it was a game with open world dungeons and you just farmed the dungeon though...fun at the time but gamers are too impatient to really enjoy the well oiled machine that a functioning dungeon group is.
I think your perception of the holy trinity probably differs from what most people mean when they talk about it. That's the first time I've ever seen anyone replace damage dealer with crowd control. It doesn't exactly fit the common MMO setup, either.
Rubbish.
Vanguard has the Trinity and Vanguard has 6 people groups.
Most effective group setup in Vanguard: 2 tanks, 2 healers, 1 bard and 1 other damage dealer.
And theres plenty of tanks and healers around in Vanguard, because its fun to play a tank or healer in that game.
Well ok except Warrior. Warrior kind of sucks because you're completely dependent upon getting a group. Shaman of the Phoenix variety is not as awful, but also a quite weak solist. They would kind of need better snares so they can at least kite better. Everyone else is good to great at it, though.
What a load of rubbish.
Actually support is a very strong asset in DDO. Everyone wants that bard to buff em n do some good quality CC. Problem is that only one slot in the part is needed but then rarely see em in groups.
i think you hit the head on the nail.. players prefer to be damage dealers only..i.e no responsibility for one of the harder roles.
this makes sense given the current generation L.
however i believe that if all classes are very well rounded capable of multiple useful roles, given that everyone likes to do some damage, that the game itself would be far better balanced overall. You dont need to worry about looking for healers, tanks or crowd control if all classes have a share in these roles.
Actually support is a very strong asset in DDO. Everyone wants that bard to buff em n do some good quality CC. Problem is that only one slot in the part is needed but then rarely see em in groups.
The problem is that the more roles, the harder to fill them.Not sure if this has been mentioned before or not, but LOTRO has some really fun 3 man dungeon's. And they have the skirmish system that can be played solo, 3, 6, or 12 man. Unfortunately Lotro has also developed one of the worst form's of f2p/p2w model's in my opiniion.
Skirimishing is a waste of time in Lotro, a missed oportunity which went PvE rather than PvM.
But Lotro has one of the best F2P systems I know of, I think of F2P as awful, but Turbines is not too bad. What games have a better F2P set up?