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The All Important End-Game
boboslave
Member Posts: 77
G'day everyone,
I'm a WoW player and i'm about to reach lvl cap, and not sure whether the
raiding/pvp in WoW will keep me interested, only time will tell of course.
I've heard a lot of criticism of blizzard and their backflip at end-game, and whilst
it appears that many games follow the same path of high-lvl raiding, i'm curious
to find out from MMO players about what end-game activities they would prefer over
raiding.
WoW is my first MMO, so i'm not familiar with all of the others and how they solve
the problem of endgame.
Obviously, the major difference for people at max level is the lack of progression
in their character past that point. In WoW, Gear and the grinding for said gear, is
pretty much your option for improving your character, and even that doesn't help
much if you don't like raiding or pvp.
So i guess i'm keen to find out peoples ideas for what would have been a better
choice for blizzard to feature in their end-game? Use examples of other MMOs
or MUDs, if possible, that you think solved the problem, and tell me how they did it.
It is extremely easy to be a critic, but i'd like to hear some positive thoughts on
the endgame that you would really enjoy. I ask this, cause i hear of people playing
a game for 4 years, and yet get bored in WoW after 2 months, and i have no idea
what the difference is.
Cheers All
Comments
I played WoW since release, quit not to long ago.
What I think the problem is:
The ONLY end-game is combat raiding, be it PvP or PvE there is nothing else and no matter how many new dungeons or battlefields it will get stale not having anything else to do but beat on NPCs and PCs. The only achievement and progression has to do with gear, by winning a battleground round you dont achieve anything but further progression to having access to better gear. Even other MMOs with only a combat end-game give you more things to achieve than just better gear, be it destroying enemy bases or taking over terroritories or whatever. To sum it up, all you do is combat and all you get is new gear.
There is also WoW suddenly going from casaul to hardcore, dungeons will require you to set aside 2-3 hours atleast, if you intend to do molten core then alot more than that(atleast 8 hours). You won't get very far in PvP as a casaul player, because you are competing against the hardcores for the few high rank slots available that give you access to gear worth equiping. Then there is specific gear only droping from very specific bosses, to get some of the set items you need to do a 2-3 hour instance to get to the end boss then hope your classes item out of the 7 other classes drops, then you have to out roll anyone else who needs it. So WoW end-game you will either end up doing 5+ hours of PvP a day or 3+ hours of PvE a session to actaully make progress, nothin' else to do.
What I think the first steps to solving it is:
A dynamic world that people can affect, something to do other than combat at end-game(a better and more diverse crafting system would really help). Somewhat DAoCs RvR added to WoW and a crafting system complex like SWGs would be a good start.
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MMOs Retired From: Earth and Beyond, Project Entropia, There, A Tale in the Desert, Star Wars Galaxies, World of Warcraft, Eve Online, City of Heroes/Villains.
MMOs Currently (worth) Playing: None.
MMO hopefuls: Age of Conan.
G'day Dinion,
How'd crafting in SWG work? I've heard that people generally
think WoWs crafting is a little simple. I haven't minded it, but
once again, most of it requires more grinding and time waisting
to achieve.
Does SWG differ in its requirements for advancing skills?
Edit: Also if you have time, can you explain a little about the RvR.
Anyone who posts here, i apologise in advance for my newb questions.
SWGs crafting is completely different. I don't think all of its complexities would really fit into the WoW world but the basics of what I would like is more variety in crafted goods and differences in quality depending on the person crafting the item and the resources they use(which means they would give quality levels to resources). This would also mean crafting could be made to be more of a speciality, something that people can devote themselves to and work hard to produce better goods. Some of the capital cities could also be extended for player owned stores/vendors, there is a hell of alot of empty space for such things.
WoW needs something other than combat, a better crafting system seems like it would be the easiest thing that can be implimented.
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MMOs Retired From: Earth and Beyond, Project Entropia, There, A Tale in the Desert, Star Wars Galaxies, World of Warcraft, Eve Online, City of Heroes/Villains.
MMOs Currently (worth) Playing: None.
MMO hopefuls: Age of Conan.
Yeah, i just popped over to the SWG forum and read about
a guy's plight with his droids
It does sound interesting, i think i'd still like everything linked through
the AH still though, i like that feature and it's a shame that it's not
being used to its full. (i.e. linked AHs in all the major cities, better
location choices for AH rather than at the front bloody entrance of
Ironforge, boggle!)
Maybe they could add more features to the AH to accomodate it,
such as being able to search for particular sellers, and better
drill downs on categories (give alchemy items a category, etc).
I guess it would just annoy me if i had to hunt down a particular
person, i like having it all in the one place. Woah, damn it, now
i just sound like the fast-food generation.
Hmm....player shops it is, maybe they could link your shop inventory
to the AH as well, that way it still appears there but people can come
to you directly, and HAGGLE!!
Yuck, I never realized the cold, hard truth. I can't think of anything to do other than raid either, since crafting is the worst feature of WoW
I wish UO wasnt so out-dated. That game had so much to do, before and after you reached the level cap
I'm not sure if i'll have the time, being a little casual, to do the high lvl raid
stuff. Which cuts WoW short for me possibly. The Raid content looks
awesome in WoW, i think the main problem is that it's the only thing you
can do, apart from PVP (not everyone's cup of tea). Because of this, many
players have chewed threw the raid content, and so there is simply not
enough there for them, and they get bored quickly.
I suppose what i want to discuss here with you guys, is what blizzard could
have done, and hopefully still are able to do (though blizz seems pretty
'Our Vision' orientated), to solve the situation.
As far as I can tell, Blizzard hasn't done anywhere near enough in their game
to foster the community. What i mean is - a lot of the complaints i hear seem
to revolve around the fact that the players themselves are very restricted.
i.e.
- simple crafting system that doesn't allow players to be a little creative, and
everyone just creates and pimps the exact same stuff.
- no methods to alter the look and accessorise your character. you can't buff
your character to have more muscles, or make him fatter cause he drinks too
much dwarven ale (i'd like a pudgy elf). You can't even get a hair cut, or grow
a goatee, i mean everyone knows that goatees equals the evil. This would be
more important to Roleplayers, but i like personalising a character.
- player and guild housing is missing, limiting another social aspect of MMOs
- lack of a decent 'LookingForGroup' tool. It's so hard sometimes to put together a
group, simply cause the most effective method is still spamming it in ironforge /
orgrimmar. A simple flag and comment would suffice, so that I could say -
I'm interested in doing instance A (comment about reason), instance b (reason). So
that other players can do a /LFG [instance they want to do] to see everyone who
wants to go and for what reason. Once group is formed, party leader clicks on the
Ready button (or whatever) and party gets teleported from wherever to the
meeting stone (wow an actual use for them).
- Raiding should be made easier for the more casual/smaller guilds - obviously the
time required to do the instance is still an issue. However a simple raid notice
board in the inn, where players could see who was organising a raid and for what
time, and then could express an interest in joining through the board would be so
useful. This wouldn't effect the large guilds who already have the numbers, but
it would help pickup raids immensely - cause it would allow more planning to occur.
The players joining the raid then should get a message reminding them of the raid
a few hours before it is supposed to begin (if they are on), and maybe an in game
mail.
Ok - well i'll stop there - cause this is in general - and i'm starting to rant
What else has other games done at end game that has been fun and rewarding?
What other forms of progression past lvl cap are there?
And, if someone could explain the RvR to me that would be sweet.
Cheers
I'd say a major thing they could do would be to hire a live events staff and some writers to scripts a story arc. That was one of the best features of Asheron's Call. Not only did the game evolve every patch, the story behind it changed as well. They made special efforts to have activities for players of all levels that would in some way affect the outcome of said story events. While the live events happened somewhat infrequently (only a few people per patch would find the big enemy/solve the big quest of that particular story arc), there were usually collection quests and game changes that related to those events.
Another thing I felt Asheron's Call did right was that it didn't really need an endgame because the end of the game kept getting farther and farther away. When it was published, the level cap was 126. No one at Turbine ever thought anyone would reach 126. When people did finally start arriving at that magic number, they raised the level limit and added new content. In that way, you never really ran out of things to do. Granted, the grind could really get to you with the diminishing experience returns, but there was always something left to do. With World of Warcraft, the endgame is reached pretty quickly after character creation, which really almost eliminates the PvE aspect of the game.
One thing Blizzard mentioned while the game was still in beta was a "Hero" system of sorts. They never really elaborated on that, but apparently it was some way for players to continue working on their characters. As wonderful as that sounds, however, they'd also need new PvE content other than instances to really make it worthwile (in my opinion). Maybe that stuff is on the backburner now, but I haven't heard anything about it since before launch.
Another thing that would help (PvP) would be zones of control. Currently people are pvping for honor points, which they can use to buy perks. That's a self-oriented goal that really doesn't do much other than make your character a little stronger. Zones of control would allow people to actually take territory away from their enemies. I really liked the way Anarchy Online handled that. The side who currently had the most property would get bonuses. It's been years since I last played it, but I think you'd get things like more money from corpses or better mission rewards or something like that. In any case, it gave people a reason to actually "storm the hill." Furthermor, the territory nodes were defended by player-built defenses, and each node could hold player "boosters" that would increase a skill or a stat or something; those defenses and boosters cost a fair bit of money, so it provided both a money sink for the game and something expendable worth paying for even if you happened to be a maxed out character.
Really, there's a lot of stuff Blizzard could've done. They just didn't do it. What's there is great, but it's a starting point, not a destination. They called it done before it was finished, and their product has a huge churn rate as a result. Fortunately for them, they seem to be sucking up newbies as fast as they're losing oldbies.
Awesome points Jenuviel,
I love the world of warcraft, i think it has wonderful story arc
potential, great characters, lots of adventure, everything you
really want from a fantasy universe.
It's just a real shame that Blizzard isn't doing anything with it.
I believe Blizzard is still working on the Hero thing, but the problem
here is that the company is used to producing games that, while are
high quality, take forever for them to produce. This has worked ok
for them in the past. It seems, from my newbish perspective, that
it's an absolutely horrible business model to take into an MMO, an
environment that requires pro-activeness and re-activeness, not
over-cautiousness and cageyness.
The devlopers are obviously talented, but why they hide behind the
rest of the pr/cm staff boggles me. They behave like a secret shadowy
society of manipulators and nerf-assassins. It just doesn't work!! The
CMs, bless them, are making it a 'we're with the players against the
devs, we charge into the nasty dev meetings and fight for your opinions'.
All that does is make the devs 'The Enemy', whoever had that business idea
should be sacrificed to open the dark portal damn it, absolutely terrible plan.
I like your point about the zones, at the moment, contested zones in the game
should be re-named to gankzerg zone, they really don't make you feel that
it's contested, especially in regards to PVP.
It's unfortunate, I love WoW, the whole reason why I'm enjoying chatting with you
guys, is my small child-like hope, that the devs will break their silence, talk to
the players, and actually make WoW not only the most commercially successful MMO,
but the best game as well. Pipe dream I know, but...oh well 'sigh'.
I guess one of the major issues that prevents most of this cool stuff occuring is that
Blizzard seems to be absolutely terrified of its whinging masses. 'Oh Noes' says
Blizz, 'We can't do something that might actually impact on peoples gameplay'.
If some of this stuff was implemented, and Bliz stopped being so 'Wizard of Oz behind
the freakin curtin', would any of you consider playing more WoW?
The problem with talking about the end game in an MMORPG is that there really isn't one until the game ends 4-5 years down the line.
When I reach the level cap, if I get bored, I'll stop playing and return when new high level content becomes available.
Don't lose faith in WoW. Blizz aren't stupid. The potential cash making possibilities of future expansions is to enormous to ignore. There WILL be expansions and lots of 'em. Count on it.
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Don't jump off the roof Dad
You'll make a hole in the yard
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I don't really get the whole concept of 'end game' at all, coming from a TTRPG background.
There's always more to do, community building, roleplay, helping others and so on.
Postmortem Studios
Roleplaying games to DIE for
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The solution to end game woes can be summed up in a single word: Gambling.
To begin with, with a proper gambling system there is no end game. For even if you are on the top, you are only there for a short period of time. Gambling can be done without PVP, but in my opinion a human element adds a vastly superior unpredictable element needed for gambling. Also a complex or twitch skill based combat system is needed to retain the unpredictable element of dealing with other players. This means that this system probably wouldn't work for a lot of mmorpgs out there now. IMO if you are playing one of those mmorpgs and you get to the end game, and it gets old, and the classes arent different enough to try a new one or whatever then its just time to quit.
However a gambling system doesn't get old until you lose consistently non-stop. What are a few types of what I am talking about? The basic idea is faster gain, but higher chance of losing gain. UO is a good example of what I am talking about: When you died you lost everything you had... the combat system was also complex enough for pvp to be fairly unpredictable. Although of course UO has bad graphics, not that many unique items, and another thing that bothered me is you could only GM a few skills. It would be cooler if for example after dying you could go into a cave and mine metal then come out and forge all new equipment for yourself after you had been playing the game for a while and mastered those skills.
But anyways another example of a game I am talking about is one with permadeath. A game I usually think of along with permadeath is a leveling/item system like the one in the fallout games. Items make a big difference in your characters development, leveling is pretty fast and only somewhat signifigant and far from being the only signifigant factor in combat. You wouldn't look at this game like you would any other mmorpg... it would almost be like playing an FPS but rather than just collecting weapons and losing them when you died, you lost a little bit more. You might go a long time before being killed, and during this time you might have leveled up a good deal. However the bottom line is, people are capable of adjusting to the nature of the game, and it is only the factors which are different from the type of scenario I have depicted which make permadeath unviable for an mmorpg.
Of course gambling can be more conservative as well... In early Neocron for example when you died you had a chance to loose something in your quick access belt, and one of those had to be whatever weapon you were using. In that game the weapon was the most signifigant piece of equipment the player had, because all the armour and other stuff was generic and bought from stores.
Anyways this is why you hear people say that PVP is superior to PVE. PVE has no way to compare to the long term entertainment value of PVP. Although I must admit that I have recently been playing EQ2 and like it somewhat, I believe that I will get bored of what is there much faster than they can make it. The new graphics, intuitive designs, and intelligent tradeskill system are entertaining, but eventually they will lose this entertainment value and no amount of repititions of similar dugeons with similar mobs will counteract this. And for a reality facing player like me, this might be well before I cap a single character in this game. For while it is their perogative to fool me into thinking that I am not bored of the game long past I actually get bored of it, and never allow a clearcut "end" to the game, I know that eventually I will have gained all the entertainment there is to be had from this game.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------PROBABILITY(YOUR STATEMENTS BEING MOTIVATED BY FEAR(I>U)) > .5
Tho I won't say it's that far away, it does hit the nail on the head.
Almost every mmorpg had high level content complains at launch.
EQ, AO, DAoC, CoH, AC2, SWG (tho SWG might not be too good an example
they all fleshed out as time progressed tho, and added a *lot* of stuff, including a lot of endgame.
While it's silly that it (partly) isn't in at launch, I think you can fully expect WoW to have cleaned up it's act conciderably 1 to 1,5 years down the line
for now it's just great fun reaching 60 even if there's not much after that
Very interesting points Kriminal, well written as well.
In reality, most people would get bored playing the same game repeatedly
(excpet for counterstrike players, i never understood them). If you get bored,
stop playing, you can always play again if you think there is something that interests you.
Issues with that type of gaming though revolves around the fact that MMOs are
becoming more mainstream, and I guess companies are afraid of making things
like death too harsh.
Competition and Risk are probably the things that would keep people interested, which
is probably why many of the companies are looking at PVP. Blizzard is too afraid
to add in things like dishonour and punish people though - PVP is becoming just
like another grind, except you don't go grind mobs, you go grind gold farmers
Over all, the amount of entertainment i've received from WoW has been a hell
of a lot, and i believe money well spent. I guess i don't really feel that i need to
be playing the thing for years and years. Not much in the way of entertainment
keeps me interested for anywhere near the amount of time i've already played
WoW.
I'm looking forward to Dragon Age though, i'm definately interested to see what
sort of world they can create, but lol, that's off topic.
Thanks for the conversation so far guys.
Edit: I agree Grim and Bel, both good points. I'm happy to let WoW mature, I
might not be playing it all the time, but i'm not bag it, i think it's good even with
it's faults. Oh, and Grim, i enjoy a bit of roleplay myself. Have player created
stuff planned for my end-game as well. I'd like Blizz to add more tools to enable
that kinda stuff though.
I would say the only thing Lineage II did right was have a fun end game. At end game you have enough power to attempt things like creation of giulds, castle sieges, and breeding dragons all of witch can actualy alter the game world. ie. If you own a castle then you can tax the surounding country side and get money off it but it makes the weponds and armor for the other players more expensive.
Please note, that lineage II also has many flaws that makes it a game worth skipping over
The idea of an endgame in MMORPG's comes from the extreamly heavy enphasis on leveling. TTRPG lends more toward the social/story driven mechanic. At this point most MMORPGs are about the trip from level 1 to level max. Very little in most of these games lends well to a true RPG experience due mainly to technical reasons. The audience races to hit level caps as soon as they possibly can by any means necessary, then, when the grind is done, wonders what to do next. Without being led around by the nose, many don't really know what to do next.
The games, at this point, cant really facilitate the type of open ended freedom that TTRPG's offer. If you want an "end game" you more or less need to create it yourself. There is usually plenty to do in any game at level cap but it depends on the type of gamer you are. The logical thing would be some sort of community building. Again depending on play style and the game mechanic. Roleplaying a particular type of character with its own personality (roleplaying) is an option at any point in the game. The audiance again, misses the point of this so badly in fact, that most MMORPG's have seperate servers for it. (role play servers so you are playing a massive online role playing game in the special "role playing" server as opposed to the "standard server) Helping those new to the community is an option also. Some game communities are better at this then others.
EQ2 has an iteresting option for this, the guild "levels", by which you increase your guilds standing in the game world. You could possibly never finish that (not sure how the mechanic works) In most games, guilds simply exsist, they are more a social club then anything dynamic to the game world. A guild in World of Warcraft, no matter how many level 60 characters it had or how many rare items it had or how many raids they do, can never have any impact on the game world. Asherons call also has an interesting take on it. Players swear alliegence to one another and build "monarchies". This elevates the characters social status in the game. Dark Age of Camelot allows guilds bonuses for taking over enemy realms Keeps that last until the Keep is lost. The Keep also has the guild banner and all NPC defenders wear the guild cloak.
I think games like World of Warcraft could do very well as a "role playing game" however the audience treats it as a playstation game racing to cap then demanding to be entertained further. I dont really think there is an "end game" in any MMORPG just a point where you the player gets bored with the environment. Until MMORPG's become more story driven (closer to the player level) and less statisics based, this is the best you will be able to do. Until that happens the best thing is to group/guild with like minded people. People who value the game experience rather then the numbers on the stat sheets. If you really think about it why can't you go on a "raid" at low level? Is all subjective. It just depends what you want to call it.
End game is sort of a misnomer for an MMORPG. They don't really ever end because the developers are always adding new content and expansions.
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It's just me, so open the door.
EverQuest (the original) has mountains of endgame material provided you are in a raiding guild and have time to raid. No other game can rack up the same quantity of developer-made content.
Well said Torak,
I'll pretty much just AMEN to that!
You can level very quickly in WoW without much play time. Even if you aren't racing you can get to max level fairly quickly.
Yes, I can see some people taking a year to hit 60. But just because someone only took months to hit 60 they can't demand further entertainment? If you want someone to continue paying to play I think they can.
Hmmm I responded to this before but post got lost.
Anyway, I think endgame is apt for the few mmorpgs I've played. Because it describes what is left for you to do once you have hit a level cap. End game may last several years but it still can be described as end game.
For example WoW - whatever you do after you have hit level 60. For some people their endgame started months ago. For the person who hit 60 within a few days, 7 months ago! I wonder if that player kept playing and if so...for how long?
What forms of PVP have people seen that they really enjoyed?
Obviously, games like Guild Wars, are built around PVP gameplay,
but what games, like WoW, Eq2 have added meaningful PVP that
you really enjoyed.
Many are unhappy with Blizzard's current attempt at honor + battlegrounds,
any features of a different game you would have liked to see
in WoW, or in MMOs in general?
As much as I hate the term, I'm a stereotypical carebear. I'm a woman over 30 with a strong dislike for conflict. PvP just isn't my thing, though I have no problem if it's in the game; I just don't want to be forced to do it. As I mentioned above, Anarchy Onine's system is the closest I've come to enjoying it in any form. I rarely engaged in the actual conflicts, but I still helped guild members buy assets (and had assets of my own) in conflicted areas, so even I had something invested in the side versus side aspect of the game.
I think any major title needs to focus equally on PvE and PvP elements, though more specialized titles (pure PvE or pure PvP) can certainly work on a smaller scale. While Everquest 2 is doing well enough, how many potential players did they lose to World of Warcraft when it was announced the game had no PvP? Now that we're further down the line, it's becoming pretty obvious that Blizzard tried to cater to both crowds, but really hasn't done enough for either.
Sure, one can say that it's still early in the game's life cycle, but I don't think there's any doubt that Blizzard's focus for World of Warcraft was the endgame. I'm a fairly slow mover in these games, and I reached level 60 about three months after starting. They made it easy to level, quick to level, and had relatively few levels to go through; [low difficulty] + [little time required] + [little ground to cover] = [endgame]. For a game designed around the endgame, however, that endgame is as shallow as any I've seen. It makes you wonder.
Now, to be fair, some people do actually enjoy the endgame that's there, and that's their right. It might just be that the people who are sticking with the game and enjoying the level 60 activities are precisely the group Blizzard was targeting. I think anyone who has played the game is aware that Blizzard was extremely unprepared for the sheer volume of players they attracted, so perhaps the game was never really intended for a wider audience. If so, no worries at all. If they really thought they were going to have a high player retention rate over a wide variety of playstyles, though, they were mistaken. I guess only they know. One thing's for sure, however- they actually had all that business they were unprepared for, and letting it slip away is definitely not a typical business model. We'll have to see if they do anything to lower their churn, and if what they do has any affect whatsoever.
Don't you worry little buddy. You're dealing with a man of honor. However, honor requires a higher percentage of profit
For every achiever, End Game matter a LOT. In many achievers cases, it matter more then the road to getting to the end game.
End Game should be similar to the process that get you there, just harder and limiting(mental sanity or some other way to limit your ''tries'' is far better then an endless grind, althought there could be 2 END Games that dont affect each others, 1 based on grind and 1 on challenge and few tries each week or whatever).
A Lack of End Game is less bad then a wrong End Game, since a lack mean you look for the expensions...a wrong mean you quit the game unmotivated to ever try it again.
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
Anarchy online probably have the best end game of the bunch.
A far to complicated system to go into, but be it raiding or solo with 30 mins or 30 hours to spend on one session there was almost always something to do. And it wasnt that easy to reach either, at least not in comparison to the newer games. It just have insane amounts of content, no trivial loot code, allthough they tried it, and it doesnt matter as the place is so huge and diverse there are but a few farmers. Tons of social aspects and gear as well.
A simple solution would be somehing like Horizon, may it rest in peace, wer
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Originally posted by Jerek_
I wonder if you honestly even believe what you type, or if you live in a made up world of facts.
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