Replacing text, or an animation, with a red circle does not remove the requirement that the player has to learn to move (or associate that with some other function) - it just makes the stimulus larger.
What we learn might not change, but the meaning of it and the process of learning might be completely different.
In the case of an enemy that telegraphs a non-red circle attack (stimulus A) I have to learn first what the action means, what the boss will do. i.e. the context of the stimulus A, in order for me to apply a counter: mechanism B (not stand on the fire). So, mechanism B is tied to that specific boss's stimulus A. A different boss might apply the exact same stimulus A (the same animation) but instead of creating an area of fire, the outcome could be totally different (e.g. an earthquake) and so mechanism B would not be the appropiate solution to counter it. Another boss could use stimulus F (a totally different animation) and the outcome could be “an area of fire” which then would lead the player to use Mechanism B again. In this case each stimulus is contextualized and so the player's process of learning and reaction is also contextualized in a specific encounter.
In the case of a red circle, my defense mechanism B is not tied to a specific boss in a specific way, it does not tell me anything about the enviroment I am in. Stimulus A here is “a big red circle” and mechanism B is “move out of the red circle”. So I am basically not playing against THIS or THAT specific boss, I am playing a meta-game which just happens to coincide with THIS boss but that can be applied to ANY boss whatsoever. Stimulus A = get out of the red circle. You don't even have to know what will appear on the red circle, it doesn't matter cause it's not part of the meta-game. For me this is not "dumbing down" a game, it just make all the effort, money, imagination put to create a boss encounter pointless. Which sometimes leads me to ask myself: why do they spend millions creating this game when they could have basically just made a game where I controlled a pixel and the whole purpose of the game was to move said pixel out of red circles that randomly appear on the screen?
I guess it comes down to the purpose that each player places on the game. Could we say that players whose purpose is “to beat the game” prefer red circles and players that “enjoy the journey” prefer not to have them? Maybe.
Are you against the boss giving any indication at all that it's going to attack? Or are you only against it drawing on the ground "this is exactly where the boss is going to attack so you might want to move away"? If the former, then I disagree, as getting killed without any way of knowing that it's coming or countering it does not make for interesting gameplay.
If the latter, and you're fine with a boss winding up to indicate that, say, it is in the process of swinging a sword, early enough that you can react quickly to mitigate the damage, then that's a different matter. A game should at least make it clear after the fact where you would have taken damage, though this can be done by making the damage zone match the animation. That's actually harder to do than you might think, though.
I am going to blame Magic the Gathering. Tap>INTERRUPT haha
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what
it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience
because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in
the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you
playing an MMORPG?"
Originally posted by RidelynnAnother way to look at it, and realize why so many guilds require tools like this (Boss Mods, etc):Let's say you have a raid of 25 people - the standard WoW raid nowadays.Let's say there's a boss tell - if someone misses the tell, the boss enrages and wipes the raid. Not a totally uncommon scenario. Sure, most of the times the punishment is less severe, and it takes several people failing, but to make the math easy (I'm hardly a math major), we'll say 1 failure = wipe.Most people can get this tell right 95% of the time. In fact, we'll assume that everyone gets this right 95% of the time.To calculate the odds of success, it's (P)^n, where P is the probability of a single occurance happening, and n is the number of occurances.So, our P is 0.95, our n is 25. 0.95^25 = 0.277So we have a <28% chance of winning this raid... even though there's only a 1 in 20 chance of any one person screwing up. Once you take that out 25 times, odds are someone is going to screw up. And that means a wasted run for 25 people - one hour wasted, buffs and consumables wasted, and most importantly, morale wasted.Now let's say there's an addon, that puts a huge red circle on the ground. Just by installing and using it, it increases the chances of success. Now, each person has a 98% chance of succeeding against the boss tell.P = 0.98, n= 25, 0.98^25 = 0.603Sure, these are arbitrary numbers, but I'd say they are within the realm of plausibility.So now, just by increasing the awareness of the raiders, we increased the odds of success to more than 60%. We didn't change the action they had to perform, we just increased the stimulus, and in doing so, more than doubled our chances of success. If you think "uber top guilds" don't use tools like this ... "uber top guilds" are the ones writing tools like this, and use of tools such as these give them the edge they have to get on top in the first place.
Funny I have used the same math to come up with an entirely different conclusion.
25 people, Each with a 5% chance of failing the mechanic = 72% chance of raid wiping = bad mechanic. In fact nearly all mechanics are bad. Instead of playing the game we are reduced to min-maxing the mechanic. Not fun, not fun at all.
We need to convince ourselves and then the developers that the "boss fight" and the "boss fight mechanics" are a stale dead end and move on to some other paradigm.
Except... changing the stimulus is just a matter of eyecandy - to have a red circle, or a boss animation, or emote text - that's just a matter of presentation. An Addon that telegraphs an alarm siren and huge flashing alerts - again, just a matter of presentation. The game itself stays the same.
If you are arguing about the mechanics that necessitate paying attention to the game, then it's a whole different ball of wax - your arguing that games should be written different, and probably such that they do not require reflexive action. If this is the crux of your case, the answer is simply "pick a different game" - because no matter what the tell may be, it won't change the underlaying basics of the game, which is that of responding to various situations appropriately and within some realtime constraint.
There are times when I enjoy something that is strategic without the additional stress of timing: Chess, for example, where you can sit and plan your moves carefully. Turn-based strategy games, for a video game example.
And there are times when I like a bit more chaos - something real time, visceral, and action-oriented. I admit I'm a bit tired of EQ and WoW - that doesn't make the mechanic bad, just not fun for me at the moment after playing it for years and years, but GW2 is fun for that, and Vindictus is a blast for action-oriented combat and animation-based tells (and yes, even a few red circles from time to time).
If you got the ability to telepathically read someones mind (or in this case read the script) then I can see maybe it not being needed but you NEED some clue what is going on. Can some of it be 'lessened' to be less visually showing? Possibly, but its hard to really balance stuff out as depending where the person is it can make it very difficult to see things and adjust.
Honestly though, I have no problem with things being telegraphed in detail, its more to me about how long the telegraphing lasts before the ability is actually used I feel should play more of a part. Being visible though very quick isn't a bad thing to me, giving you a chance to react using quick decision making based off where its going to hit and move very quickly in response.
Comments
Can they just alt-tab out and run the game in window mode? Or better yet, have a tablet handy for looking up strategies.
What we learn might not change, but the meaning of it and the process of learning might be completely different.
In the case of an enemy that telegraphs a non-red circle attack (stimulus A) I have to learn first what the action means, what the boss will do. i.e. the context of the stimulus A, in order for me to apply a counter: mechanism B (not stand on the fire). So, mechanism B is tied to that specific boss's stimulus A. A different boss might apply the exact same stimulus A (the same animation) but instead of creating an area of fire, the outcome could be totally different (e.g. an earthquake) and so mechanism B would not be the appropiate solution to counter it. Another boss could use stimulus F (a totally different animation) and the outcome could be “an area of fire” which then would lead the player to use Mechanism B again. In this case each stimulus is contextualized and so the player's process of learning and reaction is also contextualized in a specific encounter.
In the case of a red circle, my defense mechanism B is not tied to a specific boss in a specific way, it does not tell me anything about the enviroment I am in. Stimulus A here is “a big red circle” and mechanism B is “move out of the red circle”. So I am basically not playing against THIS or THAT specific boss, I am playing a meta-game which just happens to coincide with THIS boss but that can be applied to ANY boss whatsoever. Stimulus A = get out of the red circle. You don't even have to know what will appear on the red circle, it doesn't matter cause it's not part of the meta-game. For me this is not "dumbing down" a game, it just make all the effort, money, imagination put to create a boss encounter pointless. Which sometimes leads me to ask myself: why do they spend millions creating this game when they could have basically just made a game where I controlled a pixel and the whole purpose of the game was to move said pixel out of red circles that randomly appear on the screen?
I guess it comes down to the purpose that each player places on the game. Could we say that players whose purpose is “to beat the game” prefer red circles and players that “enjoy the journey” prefer not to have them? Maybe.
Don Quixote's Delusions
I am going to blame Magic the Gathering. Tap>INTERRUPT haha
Epic Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAigCvelkhQ&list=PLo9FRw1AkDuQLEz7Gvvaz3ideB2NpFtT1
https://archive.org/details/softwarelibrary_msdos?&sort=-downloads&page=1
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you playing an MMORPG?"
Except... changing the stimulus is just a matter of eyecandy - to have a red circle, or a boss animation, or emote text - that's just a matter of presentation. An Addon that telegraphs an alarm siren and huge flashing alerts - again, just a matter of presentation. The game itself stays the same.
If you are arguing about the mechanics that necessitate paying attention to the game, then it's a whole different ball of wax - your arguing that games should be written different, and probably such that they do not require reflexive action. If this is the crux of your case, the answer is simply "pick a different game" - because no matter what the tell may be, it won't change the underlaying basics of the game, which is that of responding to various situations appropriately and within some realtime constraint.
There are times when I enjoy something that is strategic without the additional stress of timing: Chess, for example, where you can sit and plan your moves carefully. Turn-based strategy games, for a video game example.
And there are times when I like a bit more chaos - something real time, visceral, and action-oriented. I admit I'm a bit tired of EQ and WoW - that doesn't make the mechanic bad, just not fun for me at the moment after playing it for years and years, but GW2 is fun for that, and Vindictus is a blast for action-oriented combat and animation-based tells (and yes, even a few red circles from time to time).
If you got the ability to telepathically read someones mind (or in this case read the script) then I can see maybe it not being needed but you NEED some clue what is going on. Can some of it be 'lessened' to be less visually showing? Possibly, but its hard to really balance stuff out as depending where the person is it can make it very difficult to see things and adjust.
Honestly though, I have no problem with things being telegraphed in detail, its more to me about how long the telegraphing lasts before the ability is actually used I feel should play more of a part. Being visible though very quick isn't a bad thing to me, giving you a chance to react using quick decision making based off where its going to hit and move very quickly in response.