Again, you assume that I said raids are the only thing that do this [build community and foster cooperation]. I never even came close to making that assertation.
Sure you have; I have repeatedly said that I do not want to participate in raids, raiding, or raid guilds (and from context and occasionally explicitly, that means PVE raids). I have not said that I have any opposition to PVE content involving reasonably sized groups or PVP content (including large groups). Yet you repeatedly make statements like "EXACTLY! Because you don't have any desire to participate in the community, which, when it all boils down, is what ALL MMORPG's are all about. Which goes back to my argument that Blizzard isn't going to put a whole lot of effort into keeping people like you."
You can't have it both ways.
No, Blizzard makes content that will foster cooperation and community. Raids do that. Solo and PUGable content do not.
There is just so much wrong with this statement. For one thing, I never said PUGable content, I said group content - I most certainly did not say PUG only. You've got that raider cultlike thinking going on, where you can't imagine a guild doing things as a group, only as a raid or nothing.
Your claim that PUGable content does not foster community is not backed up by anything at all. I don't think it's actually possible to have a community with no PUG content, as you need some way for people to spontaneously group together so that they can find out if they like each other. You said earlier that your guild only recruits people recommended by a guild member, so how does your guild member meet them and decide that they like them - is it some kind of static group, or some kind of PUG? Every guild that I've ever talked to people from or have been in meets new people through PUGs (since guild groups will have guild people, and soloing is solo), so I'd have to say that PUGable content certainly does foster community since you need it to encounter new people for your non-PU group.
Also, Molten Core is PUG-able, I remember reading on several servers where people were doing pick-up raids and taking down bosses, so you have something which is both a raid, which allegedly does forster cooperation and community, and PUGable, which alegedly does not. Which is it? Or do pick-up-raids foster cooperation and community, but PUGs don't?
you don't want to make actual friends in an online game, and there's nothing wrong with that.
Your psychic abilities are wrong, as usual. I want to and have made actual friends in online games including WOW. What you don't understand is 'do not want to raid or be in a raid guild' does not mean 'does not want to make friends'; raid guilds actually discourage real friendship.
This is my last time doing a gigantic point-by-point post, any future ones will belike the highlights. I have fun with this kind of thing occasionally, but it gets old after a while.
Originally posted by MikeMonger As am I. My guild has gotten MC down to around 4 hours. How, through working together and learning stuff.
So what you're saying is that when you said "Yes, you're one of those close-minded non-raiders that wants raids to last 10,000 hours each. They don't. They last 4 hours, which can be spread over 2 or more days." you were simply wrong? Since you got your MC raids down to around 4 hours, they clearly must have been more in the past, thus disproving your earlier statement.
(Me)I'll tell you what, point me to the websites of 5 guilds in WOW that can finish MC in 4 hours or less and are interested in acquiring or even retaining members who raid for a total of 4 hours per week spread out over 2 or more days.
Here's a thought! Why not form your OWN guild, made up of your OWN friends!
Because that's a complete nonsequitor. You asserted that I was wrong in my estimate of how long raids take in WOW and claimed that they required a different time, I asked for a tiny number of example guilds that actually use the figure you claimed in practice. It's kind of telling that even your own guild doesn't meet the theoretical number you named. If you want, I can find 5 guilds that meet or exceed my estimate of 4-12 hours 2-3 nights a week, I already listed one.
People who go into this with the mentality that they HAVE to join a "raiding" guild so they can get "uber" loot, instead of joining a guild of people they like and playing the game just for the sake of playing the game, are going to wind up, well, like you.
It's interesting that a guy who whines that "You've made assumptions about me" posts something like this. You've described the exact opposite of my experience gaming in WOW, when I went in foolishly thinking you could form a guild with friends and just enjoy the game with them. It wasn't until later that I discovered how central the festering boil of raids was to the game, and that it wasn't possible to play the game for the sake of playing the game unless by 'playing the game' you mean 'raiding'.
If you view it as a "game", you're going to get all frustrated because
Again, we have the raider explaining that if you view WOW as a game, you won't enjoy it. Pretty much sums it up.
It's also interesting that you said this immediately after recommending "joining a guild of people they like and playing the game just for the sake of playing the game." Apparently I should play the game for the sake of playing the game, but not view it as a game.
your ONLY interest is in clawing your way to the top of the heap.
Interesting that I've been playing P&P RPGs off and on for over two decades, things which I view as "games" and in which there isn't a "top of the heap" in 90% or more of campaigns, and in playing wargames where the 'top of the heap' lasts for that one session after which you wipe the board and start over. Still, your psychic abilities must be active or something.
(me) Surely if this is such a viable playstyle you can find way less than 1 guild per server where it would be possible to do. And when we come back to look at them in in a few months when the expansion comes out, how many of those guilds do you think will have made significant progress in their next raid instance (BWL or AQ)?
And here's the root of your problem. You're not interested in actually liking the people in your guild. You're only interested in USING the people in your guild to get you phat lewtz. See above. Maybe you should be trying to find people you WANT to play with, instead of trying to find people that you can use to accomplish your goals. Maybe that's why these people have such high demands of their applicants? Because they know you're only in it to use them get yourself epics?
And here's the root of your problem: You're not actually debating, when someome demonstrates that you're wrong, you try to change the topic instead of answering them or admitting that you're wrong. You made an explicit claim about how long raids take in WOW, I asked for examples of guilds that are interested in having people play with them (not even bringing in new members). All I WANT is an example of people actually playing the game according to the raid timing you claimed was possible.
And I have no earthly idea why you think I'm interested in joining a raid guild. I think I've mentioned in every single post that I have zero desire to raid or join a raid guild, so what would possibly give you the impression that I'd want to join one for phat lewtz? I guess I'll make it clear to you: if a raid guild contacted me right now and offered to pay for my WOW account and powerlevel a character to 60 on their server and permanently give me first choice on any loot that drops on their raids, I would turn them down without a second thought.
You've refuted NOTHING.
Simply quoting your own words back at you has refuted your claim about how long WOW raids take, so that's one thing all by itself.
You've made assumptions about me, and dismissed my points without anything other than strongly worded opinion.
Ahh, sweet irony. I mean, you assumed that I wanted to join a raid guild for phat lootz even though I've said over and over that I don't want to join one at all. You assume that because I don't want to raid I don't want to participate in the community or make friends. What am I assuming, that you mean what you say?
Most decent guilds who aren't filled with people just using each other to achieve their own personal goals have limited or no DKP systems. Again, if you're getting tangled up in some kind of super complex accounting system, you're raiding with the wrong people.
So you're saying that the majority of raid guilds, including Lokimer's guild, are the wrong people? On my main server, there was only one guild doing 40-man raids that did not use a DKP system, and they didn't do them all that often. Finding a raiding guild that doesn't use some kind of complex accounting system in WOW is not exactly a common occurance.
No, Blizzard makes content that will foster cooperation and community. Raids do that. Solo and PUGable content do not.
There is just so much wrong with this statement. For one thing, I never said PUGable content, I said group content - I most certainly did not say PUG only. You've got that raider cultlike thinking going on, where you can't imagine a guild doing things as a group, only as a raid or nothing.
Your claim that PUGable content does not foster community is not backed up by anything at all. I don't think it's actually possible to have a community with no PUG content, as you need some way for people to spontaneously group together so that they can find out if they like each other. You said earlier that your guild only recruits people recommended by a guild member, so how does your guild member meet them and decide that they like them - is it some kind of static group, or some kind of PUG? Every guild that I've ever talked to people from or have been in meets new people through PUGs (since guild groups will have guild people, and soloing is solo), so I'd have to say that PUGable content certainly does foster community since you need it to encounter new people for your non-PU group.
Also, Molten Core is PUG-able, I remember reading on several servers where people were doing pick-up raids and taking down bosses, so you have something which is both a raid, which allegedly does forster cooperation and community, and PUGable, which alegedly does not. Which is it? Or do pick-up-raids foster cooperation and community, but PUGs don't?
You either misunderstood the statement, or are purposefully taking it out of context. I don't raid for raiding's sake. I raid because my guild gets together, hangs out, and has fun. That was the intent of that statement. Kind of like I only enjoy playing ANY online game with people I actually like.
I didn't misunderstand your statment at all, you said that I was wrong for assuming that you liked raiding, not that you don't raid for raiding's sake. When your intent is not expressed in the words at all, it's irrelevant. It simply can't be true both that I was wrong for 'assuming' that you like raiding, and that you like raiding at the same time.
(Me) OK, where is this MMORPG business model that you read - I'd like to read a copy too? And how, exactly, did you determine that it is universal among ALL MMORPG companies, did you conduct a survey or what? Or did you just make it all up on the fly and are hoping that no one calls you on it?
I could scrounge it up, but you know what? It wouldn't do any good whatsoever. You hate raiding so much, that you REFUSE to acknowledge that ANYONE ANYWHERE could POSSIBLY concieve of a SINGLE positive thing about it. You don't bother to ask, "why is raiding so prevelent". You only state "raiding sucks".
OK, so what this boils down to is that you can't actually produce the MMORPG business model that you allegedly read, and didn't actually determine that it is universal among ALL MMORPG companies? Yeah, definately looks like you were just blowing smoke and hoping no one called you on it.
(me)I applied common sense to the fact that you claim to know information about the motivations and plans of ALL MMORPG companies do but can't even list ALL MMORPG companies, and determined that you just made it up.
Ok then, if raids suck so bad, why do they exist? And try to answer without using the terms "basement dweller" or "people don't have a life".
That's compeltely irrelevant to the issue of whether your sweeping claim is actually a fact or is just something you made up because it sounded kind of plausible. I mean, all that has to happen is for there to be ONE MMORPG company that doesn't share your motivations and you're wrong, I think we'd all like to know how you verified that there is not one single counterexample.
DAoC is another game that requires large numbers of people working together for a common goal.
A common goal which is routinely worked towards by people in PUGs. Yes, that's right, DAOC battlegrounds don't require guild groups. In fact, a lot of DAOC people will say that the best community building was when they'd get the notice of a relic raid and show up to help defend it with whoever was on the scene. Earlier you said "No, Blizzard makes content that will foster cooperation and community. Raids do that. Solo and PUGable content do not," were you wrong then or now?
Again, you assume that I said raids are the only thing that do this. I never even came close to making that assertation.
Sure you have; I have repeatedly said that I do not want to participate in raids, raiding, or raid guilds (and from context and occasionally explicitly, PVE raids). I have not said that I have any opposition to PVE content involving reasonably sized groups or PVP content (including large groups). Yet you repeatedly make statements like "EXACTLY! Because you don't have any desire to participate in the community, which, when it all boils down, is what ALL MMORPG's are all about. Which goes back to my argument that Blizzard isn't going to put a whole lot of effort into keeping people like you."
You can't have it both ways.
[quoe]I made it up. You never said they were doing it to just piss you off. The fact that you're trying to punch holes in my argument by putting WAY too much emphasis on an offhand comment is a bad sign for you.[/quote]
The fact that every time I demolish one of your arguments you try to change the subject is a far, far worse sign for you. Plus you repeatedly bring up an offhand comment about basement dwellers that I made while I just mentioned this once, so it looks like another spot that's a worse sign for you than for me.
(me)And demanding that I say why Blizzard is doing something is just absurd; I don't claim to be telepathic, so I can't actually know what's going through their minds.
So, in other words...you have absolutely NO idea why raids play such an important role in loot distribution. You have no thoughts on it yourself. But you know that this (promoting community) ISN'T the reason.
Oh no, I have plenty of ideas about it, they're just irrelevant as to whether or not anything you've said is true. I'm also not silly enough to assert that my ideas about why a company does something are absolute fact.
Word of advice...when you're trying to dismiss someone else's idea, it's best to have your own counter-idea.
The fact that I'm not willing to engage in irrelevant speculation on the motives of a company doesn't make your false claims any less wrong. At this point, I'm pretty much arguing by quoting your own words back at you; you constantly contradict yourself. There is no need for me to offer a 'counter idea' when your idea is so clearly wrong, especially since part of the problem with what you say is that you claim firm knowledge of things that are really just guesses on your part.
Word of advice... when you're trying to promote an idea, it's best to have one strong enough to stand on its own.
(Me) Blizzard has implemented nothing that will keep me playing the game for a good long time,
EXACTLY! Because you don't have any desire to participate in the community,
No, as I keep saying I don't have any idea to participate in RAIDING. Community is fine, it's RAIDING that I want nothing to do this. RAID != COMMUNITY. Let me it very simply: Me not want raid at all, me hate raiding. Me do like community.
which, when it all boils down, is what ALL MMORPG's are all about. Which goes back to my argument that Blizzard isn't going to put a whole lot of effort into keeping people like you. And I'm not saying that in a condescending way...
LOL, of course you are. Word of advice: If you feel the need to tell someome that you're not being condescending, you probably are.
you don't want to make actual friends in an online game, and there's nothing wrong with that.
Your psychic abilities are wrong, as usual. I want to and have made actual friends in online games including WOW. What you don't understand is 'do not want to raid or be in a raid guild' does not mean 'does not want to make friends'; raid guilds actually discourage real friendship.
Actually, I beleive I said repeatedly that the content they put in is SPECIFICALLY DESIGNED NOT to be geared towards player like yourself...the short-timers. They gave you a cool game to play for 1-59, which got you to cough up $15 a month for 3 or 4 months (or however long it was).
Actually, your explicitly asked me "What has Blizzard implemented that will keep you playing the game for a good long time? " so I answered the question that you asked. And again, if you don't make new content that appeals to people, then they'll leave when they've exhausted the old content. People who play 1-59 and leave are short-timers not because of some law of the universe, but because they played the existing content that appealed to them and blizzard decieded not to make more.
You keep going on the assumption that Blizzard is trying to keep it's ENTIRE playerbase.
Really? Where, exactly? Oh, this is probably another thing that you just made up and you're going to whine now that I've called you on it. Oh no, better yet, it's actually YOUR CLAIM, lol. "By making these encounters so difficult that only a group who knows how to work together well can accomplish it, Blizzard encourages you to make friends...friends that you'll keep paying $15 a month to keep talking to."
Originally posted by Gameloading Originally posted by Pantastic
By making these encounters so difficult that only a group who knows how to work together well can accomplish it, Blizzard encourages you to make friends...friends that you'll keep paying $15 a month to keep talking to.
By making the game a raid game, they convinced me quit WOW, not even consider the expansion, and to look long and hard before buying another Blizzard game ever again. Doesn't sound like their crafty plan succeeded, maybe if I didn't have messageboards, instant messengers, email, and a phone it could have worked.
If 'participate in the community' means 'play the game on a schedule, take part in some complex accounting scheme for loot, put up with a basement-dwelling raid leader ordering you around, and make sure not to interact with most of the server' then I'll gladly avoid ever participating in what you consider a community ever again in my life.
So because you don´t like it their plan didn´t succeed? Hello, 5 million subscribers?
hello, 5 billion chinese?
Buddhism does not believe in God. It believes in People. In Buddhist teaching, there is no aggressive promotion of Buddhism or strong rejection of other religions. All these make Buddhism fall into the same scope of Confucianism and Taoist. Its ability to co-exist with any other religions makes it being developed into one of the largest religions in China.
do you like rice? do you worship the buddha?
so 5 million subscribers means what exactly? they all follow the same rice eating buddha and so that makes it right and good?
things to consider when saying "hello, 5 million subscribers?"
1 - any mission that requires you to spend more than a couple of hours to complete is not family oriented/friendly. people have lives. people with priorities will make their family/friends the priority versus spending the entire weekend farming the same dungeon for the hundredth time.
2 - group warfare (city fights if wow ever bothered to install some sort of player housing), would easily encourage large groups of people to play together, without necessitating spending the better part of a few days in the same exact dungeon with the same mobs doing the same things. of course, turn your settings down and join AV and you'll see how wonderful large groups are in wow, and that's WITH settings turned down.
3 - shouldn't you point out the wonderful variety of high end gear? oh wait, there's only one type that is acceptable for end game -- t0.5, t1, t2, t3... wonderful variety of high end talent builds in each class? oops, yeah, not really any variety there in the minds of the folks doing 20+ raids. um, you could point out the wonderful variety in the instances, how every time you reset one, the maps and mobs are slightly askew from the previous times, thusly providing new and exciting challenges. oh yeah, the game's made for the lowest common denominator -- ADD-enabled, highly caffeinated, latch-key kids.
4 - you don't have to ever join a guild to hit the battlegrounds. you can get exalted faction with all three and have your choice of uber-cheap purples. if you're playing in the BGs that much, you'll at least hit pvp rank 11, which means 90g epic mount and super cheap very powerful blue class set. mix/match that with the purples, or just upgrade to the purples from the bg factions and you're golden.
5 - join a shard that does pugs or has an alliance of small guilds which do the large instances.
hello, 5 million subscribers? = i really don't have anything to back up my point of view.
sorry.
wow COULD be a great game.
1 - fire the GM and forum mod staff. hire competent people. period, no exceptions.
2 - add another talent tree to every class. add a bonus talent point every 5 levels. force the devs to come up with powerful, viable builds which require you to get the 31 point talent in each and every talent tree. also, nearly as powerful, but vastly more versatile, builds which require 20/21 points in multiple trees.
3 - create half a dozen class sets for EVERY class of t0.5, t1, t2, t3 gear.
4 - have crafting capable of creating armor sets at LEAST equal to t0.5, t1, t2, and t3 gear.
5 - quadruple the items you can purchase from faction vendors. make it worthwhile to even hit neutral and friendly.
6 - double (if not triple) the available skills.
7 - add completely customizable player housing.
8 - add 5 - 20 outposts in each zone. treat said outposts as you would the objectives in AB. if your side (horde/alliance) takes control, you get npcs to protect it. also, the local mine/lumber mill/et cetera generates common (80%), uncommon (10%), rare (6%), very rare (3%) and *unique* (1%) raw materials. these can be used to make the bazillion new items creatable for the different tiers of gear and all the new skills will use also. variety of ways to figure out who is eligible for the items. an idea is that a guild is able to "claim" a single resource at a time (with 5-20 outposts per zone/area, there should be lots for folks). or perhaps a nation (X number of allied guilds) can work to takeover and claim an area. each guild splits the take evenly, goes to guildmaster, who can distribute as she sees fit. also, you can build/utilize siege/defense equipment.
9 - have player built means of transportation. have it where they can auto-follow specified paths between towns. also have the option to go four-wheeling to pretty much where ever you can travel on foot. chariots, rocket cars, different boat types, different flying craft, have goblin eng oriented and gnome eng oriented rides. of course, make them all highly customizable. i.e. you can outfit it with X add ons which can be a mix/match combination of speed, armor, weapons, stealth, et cetera.
all of this is possible. as was stated previously... 5 million subscribers?
5 million+ subscribers = um, $15 times 5 million, $75 MILLION/month, um, $900 million a year, plus what? $50 on time fee of the game itself, which is another $250 million+ bonus bucks. i think they can afford the staff and hardware to do this. especially since they're not spending the money on new servers/realms.
don't take this as hate. i've got a few lvl 60s. but, wow took a few incredibly HORRID things from eq and carried them over to their game. unless of course, their target audience actually IS the unemployed add teen age market and "live in mommy's basement until i die" types.
could we please get correspondent writers and moderators, on the eve forum at mmorpg.com, who are well-versed on eve-online and aren't just passersby pushing buttons? pretty please?
Originally posted by damian7 hello, 5 billion chinese?Buddhism does not believe in God. It believes in People. In Buddhist teaching, there is no aggressive promotion of Buddhism or strong rejection of other religions. All these make Buddhism fall into the same scope of Confucianism and Taoist. Its ability to co-exist with any other religions makes it being developed into one of the largest religions in China.do you like rice? do you worship the buddha? so 5 million subscribers means what exactly? they all follow the same rice eating buddha and so that makes it right and good?things to consider when saying "hello, 5 million subscribers?"
I recommend against posting while under the influence.
Originally posted by damian7 hello, 5 billion chinese?Buddhism does not believe in God. It believes in People. In Buddhist teaching, there is no aggressive promotion of Buddhism or strong rejection of other religions. All these make Buddhism fall into the same scope of Confucianism and Taoist. Its ability to co-exist with any other religions makes it being developed into one of the largest religions in China.do you like rice? do you worship the buddha? so 5 million subscribers means what exactly? they all follow the same rice eating buddha and so that makes it right and good?things to consider when saying "hello, 5 million subscribers?"
I recommend against posting while under the influence.
so don't post under the influence.
maybe you should've made the comment to the person who said "5 million subscribers, hello?"
oh wait... you wrote a book of a reply earlier. i think i probably agreed with most of it. dunno, i'm watching tv and eating a burger whilst reading. i have to go back and check it out again.
could we please get correspondent writers and moderators, on the eve forum at mmorpg.com, who are well-versed on eve-online and aren't just passersby pushing buttons? pretty please?
Originally posted by MikeMonger Originally posted by Pantastic
By making these encounters so difficult that only a group who knows how to work together well can accomplish it, Blizzard encourages you to make friends...friends that you'll keep paying $15 a month to keep talking to.
By making the game a raid game, they convinced me quit WOW, not even consider the expansion, and to look long and hard before buying another Blizzard game ever again. Doesn't sound like their crafty plan succeeded, maybe if I didn't have messageboards, instant messengers, email, and a phone it could have worked.
If 'participate in the community' means 'play the game on a schedule, take part in some complex accounting scheme for loot, put up with a basement-dwelling raid leader ordering you around, and make sure not to interact with most of the server' then I'll gladly avoid ever participating in what you consider a community ever again in my life.
From your post, I think I can safely assume that you're a first time MMORPG player.
Why? Because of your "play the game on a schedule" line. See, that's EXACTLY what Blizzard wants you to do. They (and all other MMORPG companies) want you to view their product less as a "game", and more as a "social event". Scheduling time for a raid should, in theory, become no different than scheduling a time to meet up with friends for a movie or a night out....
THAT'S what I mean by "community". And that's the attitude that's kept a lot of the old MMORPG's running for a long time.
If you never go beyond viewing WoW as a "game", than you're going to quit. Because games get boring after you've played them long enough.
ok, mikemonger, i'm sorry man, but after reading just THIS reply... you need help man.
you need to go outside, meet some new people, get a job, get a significant other, get some pets (or kids), eseentially, an offline life.
if the game creators wanted you to play because of a community, then they would HELP build said community.
look at the wow forums. the only thing those addle-coved mods build is a select group of bootie-kissing sycophants whom they love because of said bootie-kissing.
if a game wanted to build a community, then why don't they host community events? instead of static, same old same old caca-poo things a million times? this is where eq screwed the pooch and a number of mmo's have mindlessly followed suit.
unless the last couple of releases for UO vastly changed it's gameplay, then that's one thing i can say UO did correctly -- no 12+ hour marathon adventures into a dungeon. of course, pre-carebear UO also did pvp right.
a truly socially active, community building game would be something like eve. wow is not conducive to "community" building in the slightest. check out forums for eve. find and apply to an appealing sounding corporation. then create a trial eve account. perhaps pay for the first month's sub after the trial ends. i'm pretty sure you'll see what a community building game does.
by the same token, you could probably try this with a game like Ryzom or even Horizons.
wow is a divisive, time-sucking black hole of mediocrity. true story.
could we please get correspondent writers and moderators, on the eve forum at mmorpg.com, who are well-versed on eve-online and aren't just passersby pushing buttons? pretty please?
So what you're saying is that when you said "Yes, you're one of those close-minded non-raiders that wants raids to last 10,000 hours each. They don't. They last 4 hours, which can be spread over 2 or more days." you were simply wrong? Since you got your MC raids down to around 4 hours, they clearly must have been more in the past, thus disproving your earlier statement.
Yes, if you work together with people and learn it, it takes 4 hours or less. If you just kind of stagger in there, you won't be able to even clear it.
You don't have to spend more that 4 hours learning, though.
My statement is not disproved. If you LEARN TO WORK WITH OTHERS, raiding only takes 4 hours. If you DON'T learn to work with others, the raids will fail completely. Which wraps up into the original premis...that raids are specifically designed to encourage you to work with and build relationships with the same group of people.
Because that's a complete nonsequitor. You asserted that I was wrong in my estimate of how long raids take in WOW and claimed that they required a different time, I asked for a tiny number of example guilds that actually use the figure you claimed in practice. It's kind of telling that even your own guild doesn't meet the theoretical number you named. If you want, I can find 5 guilds that meet or exceed my estimate of 4-12 hours 2-3 nights a week, I already listed one.
Ok, then lets call a spade a spade. You don't like raiding because it takes a long time. You simply don't want to put any EFFORT into LEARNING the raids, so that it DOESN'T take a long amount of time. Fine. I'll admit it. When my guild didn't know what the hell it was doing, we never even COMPLETED a raid, much less finish one in four hours.
But where does it say that you need to spend more than four hours a week LEARNING a raid? Spend 4 hours one week, learn a bit. Spend 4 more the next week, learn a little bit more.
There's ZERO need to go into MC or any other raid instance for huge amounts of time in any one sitting...unless, of course, you're trying it with a PuG....
It's interesting that a guy who whines that "You've made assumptions about me" posts something like this. You've described the exact opposite of my experience gaming in WOW, when I went in foolishly thinking you could form a guild with friends and just enjoy the game with them. It wasn't until later that I discovered how central the festering boil of raids was to the game, and that it wasn't possible to play the game for the sake of playing the game unless by 'playing the game' you mean 'raiding'.
Not even going to bother responding to this. Why? Because it's just another anti-raid spiel. The point I'm discussing is...raids build community. You have yet to even bother acknowleding it. You just keep prattling on about how "raids take forever" and "I hate raids".
Again, we have the raider explaining that if you view WOW as a game, you won't enjoy it. Pretty much sums it up.
And again, we have the non-raider REFUSING to acknowledge that much of WoW's success depends upon people PARTICIPATING WITH THE COMMUNITY.
You stick WoW in the same class as, say, Solitaire, or Windows hearts. I stick it in the same class as, say, Battlefield. You choose to limit your community interaction because it's "just a game". I realize that the game is SO MUCH MORE FUN when you play it with other people. That's the difference between you and I.
It's also interesting that you said this immediately after recommending "joining a guild of people they like and playing the game just for the sake of playing the game." Apparently I should play the game for the sake of playing the game, but not view it as a game.
Wow. You're reaching now. Why not pull MORE stuff COMPLETELY out of context? Go ahead..it validates your whole point..that raiding sucks. The funny thing about your point is, I NEVER disagreed with you. Ever. Please quote the line where I say "raiding is the greatest thing since sliced bread." What's that? I never said raids were great? I've only been trying to explain to you WHY raids are set up the way they are. Hmph. Go figure.
Interesting that I've been playing P&P RPGs off and on for over two decades, things which I view as "games" and in which there isn't a "top of the heap" in 90% or more of campaigns, and in playing wargames where the 'top of the heap' lasts for that one session after which you wipe the board and start over. Still, your psychic abilities must be active or something.
Wow. This might be the single most off-topic, unrelated, and pointless sentence in the entire thread.
By the way, WHY exactly do you resent raids and raiders so much, if it weren't for the uber leet gear they keep pwning you in PvP with? What's that? You'd like to kick some ass in PvP too? Therebye...wait for it...wait for it...getting to the top of the heap?
And here's the root of your problem: You're not actually debating, when someome demonstrates that you're wrong, you try to change the topic instead of answering them or admitting that you're wrong.
You have NEVER explained to my why raiding DOES NOT FOSTER COMMUNITY! EVER! Not once! You keep sprouting off the reasons why you HATE raiding, but you NEVER even ACKNOWLEDGE that point. So far, the only response you've given is...."I hate raiding."
Great. wonderful. We GET it.
You made an explicit claim about how long raids take in WOW, I asked for examples of guilds that are interested in having people play with them (not even bringing in new members).
And I responded with the overarching theme of my post...that if you're APPLYING to guilds JUST so you can get uber loot, you're still not really being social. You're just using people...like you would an NPC in a single person game.
All I WANT is an example of people actually playing the game according to the raid timing you claimed was possible.
Ok. Me. There. My guild started off with 12 people (I wasn't one of them). After a couple of months, we were up to 30 (still not including me). Then a coworker convinced me to try WoW, introduced me to the guild, and I got in...by that point, we were up to 47. I pulled a couple of cool people in I'd met through PuG's. After awhile, we got up to 63 members (over 100 characters, if you include alts) and started raiding.
THAT'S how my little "uber raiding guild" developed. No "applications". No flat out rejections based on how people were geared or specced.
And there ya go. Satisfied? There's your example.
And I have no earthly idea why you think I'm interested in joining a raid guild.
I dunno...maybe because you were whining about how hard they were to get into? So...wait...you haven't even bothered trying to get into one, and you've already given up, because none of them will want you? Interesting.
I think I've mentioned in every single post that I have zero desire to raid or join a raid guild, so what would possibly give you the impression that I'd want to join one for phat lewtz?
Heh. See above.
I guess I'll make it clear to you: if a raid guild contacted me right now and offered to pay for my WOW account and powerlevel a character to 60 on their server and permanently give me first choice on any loot that drops on their raids, I would turn them down without a second thought.
Right...because you have ZERO desite to interact with the WoW community. Which means you were going to quit sooner than later anyway. You think your righteous indignation over the whole raiding structure was supposed to be some kind of wake up call to Blizzard? Wake up. You were EXPECTED to quit. MMORPG's RELY on community...those who don't participate get bored and quit. This is a reality all MMORPG companies understand.
Simply quoting your own words back at you has refuted your claim about how long WOW raids take.
Wow, you're all hung up on that one, aren't ya. Congrats. You've caught me in an "incomplete statement". Of course, the fact that anybody with an ounce of common sense understood that the "once you learn it" part is inherently implied probably wouldn't agree with you, but, whatever.
Ahh, sweet irony. I mean, you assumed that I wanted to join a raid guild for phat lootz even though I've said over and over that I don't want to join one at all.
Hint...if you don't want someone to assume you want to join a raid guild, THEN DON'T COMPLAIN ABOUT HOW HARD THEY ARE TO GET INTO!!!!!
Or are you just making this up, grasping at straws?
You assume that because I don't want to raid I don't want to participate in the community or make friends. What am I assuming, that you mean what you say?
But, from everything you've said...you don't. WoW is "just a game", and it's "social" significance is minor. That's the impression you're giving in your posts.
So you're saying that the majority of raid guilds, including Lokimer's guild, are the wrong people?
I don't know. I don't play with them.
On my main server, there was only one guild doing 40-man raids that did not use a DKP system, and they didn't do them all that often.
And? The point being? This goes back to finding your OWN guild, and growing it the way YOU want. No, you won't be jumping right into the phat lewtz right away, though. And you'll actually have to LEARN the encounters, instead of having people do it for you. That's the trade off. One you're apparently unwilling to make.
Finding a raiding guild that doesn't use some kind of complex accounting system in WOW is not exactly a common occurance.
Heh...the funny thing is, you make zero distinction between a "raiding guild" and a "guild that raids". I belong to the latter, where people are actually nice to each other, and we don't need to have our accountants sitting next to us while we play the game.
There is just so much wrong with this statement. For one thing, I never said PUGable content, I said group content - I most certainly did not say PUG only.
Why? If it ain't a PuG, then you have to *gasp* SCHEDULE A TIME TO PLAY A GAME! Which is, based on your earlier posts, a concept you're dead set against.
You've got that raider cultlike thinking going on, where you can't imagine a guild doing things as a group, only as a raid or nothing.
Nope, because I'm not a raider. I raid. There's a difference. A difference that the "non-raider cultlike thinking" can't comprehent.
Your claim that PUGable content does not foster community is not backed up by anything at all.
Really? Do you remember all the people you've PuG'ed with? Hang out with them on a regular basis? Chat about things other than "do we roll on that"? You DO? Here's a thought...grab all these people, and form the guild YOU want!
I don't think it's actually possible to have a community with no PUG content,
I NEVER said that! I never even came CLOSE to saying that. PuG's are important for initial meetings with people...as I said before, it's how we've recruited many people into the guild. They're a stepping stone, kind of like the initial handshake you give someone when you first meet them. But that's ALL they are.
as you need some way for people to spontaneously group together so that they can find out if they like each other. You said earlier that your guild only recruits people recommended by a guild member, so how does your guild member meet them and decide that they like them - is it some kind of static group, or some kind of PUG?
See above...I said something about grabbing cool PUG people too, but I'm too tired to look for it right now.
Every guild that I've ever talked to people from or have been in meets new people through PUGs (since guild groups will have guild people, and soloing is solo), so I'd have to say that PUGable content certainly does foster community since you need it to encounter new people for your non-PU group.
See above. At least you're TRYING to acknowledge the whole "community building" thing at this point, and for that, I applaud you. You still haven't said why raids DON'T do that.
Also, Molten Core is PUG-able, I remember reading on several servers where people were doing pick-up raids and taking down bosses, so you have something which is both a raid, which allegedly does forster cooperation and community, and PUGable, which alegedly does not. Which is it? Or do pick-up-raids foster cooperation and community, but PUGs don't?
See, what I find amusing about this statement, is that you take a very EXTREME, RARE case, and use it to try to prove your entire point. Didn't you accuse me of doing something similiar earlier.
If you're going to argue, argue CONSISTANT.
I didn't misunderstand your statment at all, you said that I was wrong for assuming that you liked raiding, not that you don't raid for raiding's sake. When your intent is not expressed in the words at all, it's irrelevant. It simply can't be true both that I was wrong for 'assuming' that you like raiding, and that you like raiding at the same time.
Huh? Whatever. Next.
OK, so what this boils down to is that you can't actually produce the MMORPG business model that you allegedly read, and didn't actually determine that it is universal among ALL MMORPG companies? Yeah, definately looks like you were just blowing smoke and hoping no one called you on it.
What's funny about this is you don't even ACKNOWLEDGE my request for 5 examples of guilds you left WoW because of raiding.
Word of advice? Challenging someone to "provide a link" is the easiest way to fight a forum argument. It's also the cheapest, and accomplishes absolutely nothing. I've read it (for A Tale of the Desert, actually....long story), and I was able to see the obvious connections with other MMORPG's. You don't want to believe it? Fine. Don't care. Irrelevent. Just like this whole debate.
You still haven't even bothered saying why raiding DOESN'T foster community. When shown how community increases the longevity of MMORPG's, you just kind of, well, dropped it. Why? Because you hate raiding, and anything that might put a remotely positive spin on it, you're going to disagree with. Not because it's logical, but because you hate it.
So, fine. Raiding sucks the big one. It takes 80 hours a week and is only for no-life dweebs who live in their parent's basements!
There. Now can I go back to discussing the ACTUAL topic of this thread with people? Thanks. Because honestly, I've seen all your anti-raiding arguments before.
That's compeltely irrelevant to the issue of whether your sweeping claim is actually a fact or is just something you made up because it sounded kind of plausible.
WAY to avoid the question entirely! Good job! I applaud you.
I mean, all that has to happen is for there to be ONE MMORPG company that doesn't share your motivations and you're wrong,
Guess what? That one MMORPG company will be out of business right quick, I can tell you that.
Ok...MORE pointless requests for links...find me ONE MMORPG company of any significant age that has endured with NO community. There. You'll probably call that one irrelevent too.
I think we'd all like to know how you verified that there is not one single counterexample.
Well, for me to verify counter examples, you need to give me examples. Something which you won't do, because any question that you don't like the answer to, you dismiss as irrelevent.
A common goal which is routinely worked towards by people in PUGs.
SMALL PUG's. DAoC requires LARGE groups, of people KNOWEDGABLE about working with the people they're with. You're really grasping at straws now.
Well, if they wanted to SUCCEED, they'd BETTER be guild groups, or damn near guild groups.
Earlier you said "No, Blizzard makes content that will foster cooperation and community. Raids do that. Solo and PUGable content do not," were you wrong then or now?
The funny thing is, you think you've proven something here. All you've done is taken a few statements out of context, and understated other things. So I was right then, and I'm still right now.
Sure you have; I have repeatedly said that I do not want to participate in raids, raiding, or raid guilds (and from context and occasionally explicitly, PVE raids).
*sigh* The ENTIRE point of this discussion is WITHIN THE CONTEXT OF THE WoW GAME!!!!! Raids ARE the only way to do this...IN WORLD OF WARCRAFT. In other games, they do it other ways.
I have not said that I have any opposition to PVE content involving reasonably sized groups or PVP content (including large groups). Yet you repeatedly make statements like "EXACTLY! Because you don't have any desire to participate in the community, which, when it all boils down, is what ALL MMORPG's are all about. Which goes back to my argument that Blizzard isn't going to put a whole lot of effort into keeping people like you." You can't have it both ways.
Huh? No...I've been pretty uni-directional here. I'm only trying to "have" it one way, as you say.
The fact that every time I demolish one of your arguments you try to change the subject is a far, far worse sign for you.
I almost spit out my drink on this. You haven't even ACKNOWLEDGED my argument...that raids are there to foster community. You have to acknowledge a point, before you can actually "demolish" it.
Plus you repeatedly bring up an offhand comment about basement dwellers that I made while I just mentioned this once, so it looks like another spot that's a worse sign for you than for me.
No, I just like the term, because it sums up your attitude perfectly. That, and it always puts a funny picture in my head...of some 400 pound dude with little squinty eyes with crumbs and chocolate all over his face....
Oh no, I have plenty of ideas about it, they're just irrelevant as to whether or not anything you've said is true. I'm also not silly enough to assert that my ideas about why a company does something are absolute fact.
SHARE them! I say "raiding exists to foster community." You disagree. Fine. What does it exist for? I don't CARE that you hate raids. Whether you hate raids or not is what's actually irrelevent to this discussion.
The fact that I'm not willing to engage in irrelevant speculation on the motives of a company doesn't make your false claims any less wrong.
In other words..."I really don't have any ideas, but I'm going to condescendingly pretend I do". Right. Gotcha.
At this point, I'm pretty much arguing by quoting your own words back at you; you constantly contradict yourself.
It's easy to make someone contradict themselves, when you misquote and take things out of context. Politicians do it all the time.
There is no need for me to offer a 'counter idea' when your idea is so clearly wrong, especially since part of the problem with what you say is that you claim firm knowledge of things that are really just guesses on your part.
LOL. "You're idea is clearly wrong, because I hate raiding." Thank you, your argument has just been summed up.
Hey, why do raids exist, why don't they foster community?
Word of advice... when you're trying to promote an idea, it's best to have one strong enough to stand on its own.
Heh. Heh heh. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!
No, as I keep saying I don't have any idea to participate in RAIDING. Community is fine, it's RAIDING that I want nothing to do this. RAID != COMMUNITY. Let me it very simply: Me not want raid at all, me hate raiding. Me do like community.
Oh really? You don't want to join a guild unless it's a raiding guild. You don't want to do group content if you need to schedule it, so you only want to do PUG's. You, my friend, are a BASTION of the community!
LOL, of course you are. Word of advice: If you feel the need to tell someome that you're not being condescending, you probably are.
No, I feel the need to say that because the term "someone like you" usually leads or follows a condescending statement. I was trying to be nice. My bad. Guess that was pointless.
Your psychic abilities are wrong, as usual. I want to and have made actual friends in online games including WOW. What you don't understand is 'do not want to raid or be in a raid guild' does not mean 'does not want to make friends'; raid guilds actually discourage real friendship.
Couldn't agree more. The guilds you describe as raid guilds all suck. You should form up your many WoW freinds, form a guild, and raid the way YOU want. You'll find it's a hoot...kind of like a 5 man dungeon, but with lots more fun banter.
Actually, your explicitly asked me "What has Blizzard implemented that will keep you playing the game for a good long time? " so I answered the question that you asked.
Yup. Your answer was...."nothing".
And again, if you don't make new content that appeals to people, then they'll leave when they've exhausted the old content.
No, they'll leave when they realize that auto-attack, 1,2,1,2,1,2 is BORING GAME PLAY. Which it really is.
People who play 1-59 and leave are short-timers not because of some law of the universe, but because they played the existing content that appealed to them and blizzard decieded not to make more.
Actually, it IS a Law of the Universe. Want to hear what it is? Here we go:
Computer games get boring after awhile.
Woo hoo, another 5 man dungeon! Now I can press autoattack, 1,2,1,2,1,2 with a DIFFERENT BACKGROUND! Now THAT'S excitement!
Really? Where, exactly? Oh, this is probably another thing that you just made up and you're going to whine now that I've called you on it.
I'll admit that this was overstated. So now you can write a whole paragraph about how that invalidates the ENTIRE thread. Whatever. Don't care.
Oh no, better yet, it's actually YOUR CLAIM, lol. "By making these encounters so difficult that only a group who knows how to work together well can accomplish it, Blizzard encourages you to make friends...friends that you'll keep paying $15 a month to keep talking to."
Yup. Ridiculous. And you've done NOTHING to even acknowledge it.
Question. Why do raids exist? Why do they NOT foster community?
Once you can answer this question, come back. Until then, yes, we know you hate raids. We know you hate raiding guilds. Thank you. Move along. Nothing to see here.
ok, mikemonger, i'm sorry man, but after reading just THIS reply... you need help man. I do? Really?
you need to go outside, meet some new people, get a job, get a significant other, get some pets (or kids), eseentially, an offline life. Really? 6:30 am : wake up 7am-3 pm: work 3:20-5:20: work out at gym 5:30-6 (or so): dinner 6 (or so) - 11(or so): ??????? friends, girlfriend, WoW, whatever 11(or so): bed Seems like a pretty normal schedule to me....
if the game creators wanted you to play because of a community, then they would HELP build said community. They do.
look at the wow forums. the only thing those addle-coved mods build is a select group of bootie-kissing sycophants whom they love because of said bootie-kissing. While I'm not going to argue that the WoW forums are a mass of shit, the greater bulk of the WoW playerbase doesn't know they exist.
if a game wanted to build a community, then why don't they host community events? instead of static, same old same old caca-poo things a million times? this is where eq screwed the pooch and a number of mmo's have mindlessly followed suit. That Darkmoon fair thing? The stupid orphans thing? The whole war effort thing?
unless the last couple of releases for UO vastly changed it's gameplay, then that's one thing i can say UO did correctly -- no 12+ hour marathon adventures into a dungeon. of course, pre-carebear UO also did pvp right.
a truly socially active, community building game would be something like eve. wow is not conducive to "community" building in the slightest. check out forums for eve. find and apply to an appealing sounding corporation. then create a trial eve account. perhaps pay for the first month's sub after the trial ends. i'm pretty sure you'll see what a community building game does. Ok. That's how Eve does it. And it's one of the few MMORPG's from a small company that's successful. I never said that raiding was the ONLY way to foster community. But it is how WoW has chosen to do it.
by the same token, you could probably try this with a game like Ryzom or even Horizons.
wow is a divisive, time-sucking black hole of mediocrity. true story.
Oh, there's nothing innovative or interesting about WoW's gameplay. Its all been done before, and sometimes better. I never said WoW was the greatest game around. I just said they use raiding to foster community. Sheesh.
ok, mikemonger, i'm sorry man, but after reading just THIS reply... you need help man. I do? Really?
you need to go outside, meet some new people, get a job, get a significant other, get some pets (or kids), eseentially, an offline life. Really? 6:30 am : wake up 7am-3 pm: work 3:20-5:20: work out at gym 5:30-6 (or so): dinner 6 (or so) - 11(or so): ??????? friends, girlfriend, WoW, whatever 11(or so): bed Seems like a pretty normal schedule to me....
if the game creators wanted you to play because of a community, then they would HELP build said community. They do.
look at the wow forums. the only thing those addle-coved mods build is a select group of bootie-kissing sycophants whom they love because of said bootie-kissing. While I'm not going to argue that the WoW forums are a mass of shit, the greater bulk of the WoW playerbase doesn't know they exist.
if a game wanted to build a community, then why don't they host community events? instead of static, same old same old caca-poo things a million times? this is where eq screwed the pooch and a number of mmo's have mindlessly followed suit. That Darkmoon fair thing? The stupid orphans thing? The whole war effort thing?
unless the last couple of releases for UO vastly changed it's gameplay, then that's one thing i can say UO did correctly -- no 12+ hour marathon adventures into a dungeon. of course, pre-carebear UO also did pvp right.
a truly socially active, community building game would be something like eve. wow is not conducive to "community" building in the slightest. check out forums for eve. find and apply to an appealing sounding corporation. then create a trial eve account. perhaps pay for the first month's sub after the trial ends. i'm pretty sure you'll see what a community building game does. Ok. That's how Eve does it. And it's one of the few MMORPG's from a small company that's successful. I never said that raiding was the ONLY way to foster community. But it is how WoW has chosen to do it.
by the same token, you could probably try this with a game like Ryzom or even Horizons.
wow is a divisive, time-sucking black hole of mediocrity. true story.
Oh, there's nothing innovative or interesting about WoW's gameplay. Its all been done before, and sometimes better. I never said WoW was the greatest game around. I just said they use raiding to foster community. Sheesh.
Question. Why do raids exist? Why do they NOT foster community?
Once you can answer this question, come back.
um...
raids exist as a means for gaming companies to sucker people into wasting months of their lives farming the same exact maps/mobs ad nauseum in order to get the entire guild geared up so that everyone can dress alike. BORING.
"hey joe, here's the part where you run into the corner, do that flying hammer thing and keep aggro of the snake dude, and healer group 1, keep him alive. healer group 2, keep groups A, B, and C alive while they kill off the minions one at a time..."
sound familiar? what community is built there? a community that can farm an instance a bazillion times in their sleep?
the problem with this guild-based uber-gear-gathering community is that it IS geared to the lowest common denominator.
a random example jumps to mind.
there's this guild on hyjal. has a 19 year old boy who plays a girl dwarf warrior. after said boy had gotten his first purple piece of gear, it went to his head. his fragile psyche went into overdrive and all of a sudden, he knew everything about everything and if you didn't do things EXACTLY as he dictated, you were some sort of retard. yeah, i watched a number of the "special people" show themselves special in this very fashion, time and again, on many many toons in many many guilds in quite a number of MMOs. this is coming from someone that never really got into muds, but started playing online consistently with diablo (original).
THAT is the community this raiding fosters.
plus, the attitude of -- i'm so much better than all of you other people because i'm in the "Sweet Monkey Go Go Juice Hyper Team Lollipop Killah of No0bZ" guild.
another random example. i'm skilling up mining on some random lvl 38ish toon i have. i'm MINING a node. this girl gnome stands by me, just standing there. i figure i'll share, and let her take a hit (since i'd only taken two). chick bogarts it. see, since she was in this supposedly uber guild, ALL the mining nodes in the entire area were hers, BECAUSE she was mining.
she killed some mob that was so far away as to not be in sight, and she did that so she could mine the node. odd, i'd just killed four big ole spiders that were having a campfire singalong, with the bonfire ON TOP of said node...
so she logs onto a similarly named lvl 60 (which was actually in the "uber" guild) and is like "DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM?"
wow, gimme some community~!!
of course, i'm sorry, your community is only WITHIN said guild.
ok, let's take super friends - the legion of doom. there's your example of the special folks which comprise the majority of people in said guilds. yes, there's an incredibly disfunctional, factionalized community within said guilds. again, the majority of these are the jobless, the teen agers, and other people who REALLY need to spend more time offline.
so i guess maybe they're trying to just get people addicted, find weaknesses to exploit in the masses, and make $900+ million a year?
like i said in a prior post, places like blizzard have no intention or idea of fostering actual communities, as in "extended family" and "trusted friends whom i let borrow my car".
could we please get correspondent writers and moderators, on the eve forum at mmorpg.com, who are well-versed on eve-online and aren't just passersby pushing buttons? pretty please?
Originally posted by MikeMonger Originally posted by damian7
ok, mikemonger, i'm sorry man, but after reading just THIS reply... you need help man. I do? Really?
you need to go outside, meet some new people, get a job, get a significant other, get some pets (or kids), eseentially, an offline life. Really? 6:30 am : wake up 7am-3 pm: work 3:20-5:20: work out at gym 5:30-6 (or so): dinner 6 (or so) - 11(or so): ??????? friends, girlfriend, WoW, whatever 11(or so): bed Seems like a pretty normal schedule to me....
if the game creators wanted you to play because of a community, then they would HELP build said community. They do.
look at the wow forums. the only thing those addle-coved mods build is a select group of bootie-kissing sycophants whom they love because of said bootie-kissing. While I'm not going to argue that the WoW forums are a mass of shit, the greater bulk of the WoW playerbase doesn't know they exist.
if a game wanted to build a community, then why don't they host community events? instead of static, same old same old caca-poo things a million times? this is where eq screwed the pooch and a number of mmo's have mindlessly followed suit. That Darkmoon fair thing? The stupid orphans thing? The whole war effort thing?
unless the last couple of releases for UO vastly changed it's gameplay, then that's one thing i can say UO did correctly -- no 12+ hour marathon adventures into a dungeon. of course, pre-carebear UO also did pvp right.
a truly socially active, community building game would be something like eve. wow is not conducive to "community" building in the slightest. check out forums for eve. find and apply to an appealing sounding corporation. then create a trial eve account. perhaps pay for the first month's sub after the trial ends. i'm pretty sure you'll see what a community building game does. Ok. That's how Eve does it. And it's one of the few MMORPG's from a small company that's successful. I never said that raiding was the ONLY way to foster community. But it is how WoW has chosen to do it.
by the same token, you could probably try this with a game like Ryzom or even Horizons.
wow is a divisive, time-sucking black hole of mediocrity. true story.
Oh, there's nothing innovative or interesting about WoW's gameplay. Its all been done before, and sometimes better. I never said WoW was the greatest game around. I just said they use raiding to foster community. Sheesh.
ok, mikemonger, i'm sorry man, but after reading just THIS reply... you need help man. I do? Really?
you need to go outside, meet some new people, get a job, get a significant other, get some pets (or kids), eseentially, an offline life. Really? 6:30 am : wake up 7am-3 pm: work 3:20-5:20: work out at gym 5:30-6 (or so): dinner 6 (or so) - 11(or so): ??????? friends, girlfriend, WoW, whatever 11(or so): bed Seems like a pretty normal schedule to me....
if the game creators wanted you to play because of a community, then they would HELP build said community. They do.
look at the wow forums. the only thing those addle-coved mods build is a select group of bootie-kissing sycophants whom they love because of said bootie-kissing. While I'm not going to argue that the WoW forums are a mass of shit, the greater bulk of the WoW playerbase doesn't know they exist.
if a game wanted to build a community, then why don't they host community events? instead of static, same old same old caca-poo things a million times? this is where eq screwed the pooch and a number of mmo's have mindlessly followed suit. That Darkmoon fair thing? The stupid orphans thing? The whole war effort thing?
unless the last couple of releases for UO vastly changed it's gameplay, then that's one thing i can say UO did correctly -- no 12+ hour marathon adventures into a dungeon. of course, pre-carebear UO also did pvp right.
a truly socially active, community building game would be something like eve. wow is not conducive to "community" building in the slightest. check out forums for eve. find and apply to an appealing sounding corporation. then create a trial eve account. perhaps pay for the first month's sub after the trial ends. i'm pretty sure you'll see what a community building game does. Ok. That's how Eve does it. And it's one of the few MMORPG's from a small company that's successful. I never said that raiding was the ONLY way to foster community. But it is how WoW has chosen to do it.
by the same token, you could probably try this with a game like Ryzom or even Horizons.
wow is a divisive, time-sucking black hole of mediocrity. true story.
Oh, there's nothing innovative or interesting about WoW's gameplay. Its all been done before, and sometimes better. I never said WoW was the greatest game around. I just said they use raiding to foster community. Sheesh.
nice double post within a single thread.
but the meat of what you posted sort of proves my point.
you felt the need to actually plot out and validate a schedule? you're obviously always right (in your mind) and never met a person who knew something you didn't already know, or had a better reply to (again in your mind). so with that, i leave you to your "opinions".
but to summarize = raiding is the EQ way of suckering people into paying for next month's sub. uo doesn't have raids. never did. you used uo as an example of community. well, um, no raids there, longest going mmo around. yeah, um, i'm not really going to try to expound further due to the *in my mind* thing you have going on.
could we please get correspondent writers and moderators, on the eve forum at mmorpg.com, who are well-versed on eve-online and aren't just passersby pushing buttons? pretty please?
nice double post within a single thread. Sorry. I have no idea how that happened.
but the meat of what you posted sort of proves my point.
you felt the need to actually plot out and validate a schedule? you're obviously always right (in your mind) and never met a person who knew something you didn't already know, or had a better reply to (again in your mind). so with that, i leave you to your "opinions". So basically, when I say that MMORPG's are social events, you call me a loser who never gets out. When I point out my typical schedule, I'm a loser who...get's out too much? Huh? You said I needed to get out. I merely demonstrated that I'm actually "out" a lot. I'm sorry if I blew your assertation out of the water, but it doesn't mean I consider myself "always" right. Heck, if you wade through some of the previous walls of text, than you'd see I repeatedly acknowledge my mis-statemeents. But what I find amusing is, that because I can actually DEFEND my opinion with arguments other than "raids are the suxxors", I'm a "know it all".
but to summarize = raiding is the EQ way of suckering people into paying for next month's sub. Ok...why does it work? Why do people get "suckered" into going on the same raids over and over and over again? Are ALL these people who raid "suckers"? What's the motivation? uo doesn't have raids. never did. you used uo as an example of community. well, um, no raids there, longest going mmo around. yeah, um, i'm not really going to try to expound further due to the *in my mind* thing you have going on.
*sigh* UO has COMMUNITY. That COMMUNITY has it's roots in the old school FFA PvP, and the need to stick together for survival...ie, people were FORCED to work together. WoW has chosen to accomplish the same thing (foster community) using raids. THIS IS NOT A PRO RAID THREAD, for the love of God. This is a "why raids exist" thread. Yes, you hate raids. Thank you. Move along.
Originally posted by damian7 Question. Why do raids exist? Why do they NOT foster community?Once you can answer this question, come back.
um...
raids exist as a means for gaming companies to sucker people into wasting months of their lives farming the same exact maps/mobs ad nauseum in order to get the entire guild geared up so that everyone can dress alike. BORING.
"hey joe, here's the part where you run into the corner, do that flying hammer thing and keep aggro of the snake dude, and healer group 1, keep him alive. healer group 2, keep groups A, B, and C alive while they kill off the minions one at a time..."
sound familiar? what community is built there? a community that can farm an instance a bazillion times in their sleep?
the problem with this guild-based uber-gear-gathering community is that it IS geared to the lowest common denominator.
a random example jumps to mind.
there's this guild on hyjal. has a 19 year old boy who plays a girl dwarf warrior. after said boy had gotten his first purple piece of gear, it went to his head. his fragile psyche went into overdrive and all of a sudden, he knew everything about everything and if you didn't do things EXACTLY as he dictated, you were some sort of retard. yeah, i watched a number of the "special people" show themselves special in this very fashion, time and again, on many many toons in many many guilds in quite a number of MMOs. this is coming from someone that never really got into muds, but started playing online consistently with diablo (original).
THAT is the community this raiding fosters.
plus, the attitude of -- i'm so much better than all of you other people because i'm in the "Sweet Monkey Go Go Juice Hyper Team Lollipop Killah of No0bZ" guild.
another random example. i'm skilling up mining on some random lvl 38ish toon i have. i'm MINING a node. this girl gnome stands by me, just standing there. i figure i'll share, and let her take a hit (since i'd only taken two). chick bogarts it. see, since she was in this supposedly uber guild, ALL the mining nodes in the entire area were hers, BECAUSE she was mining.
she killed some mob that was so far away as to not be in sight, and she did that so she could mine the node. odd, i'd just killed four big ole spiders that were having a campfire singalong, with the bonfire ON TOP of said node...
so she logs onto a similarly named lvl 60 (which was actually in the "uber" guild) and is like "DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM?"
wow, gimme some community~!!
of course, i'm sorry, your community is only WITHIN said guild.
ok, let's take super friends - the legion of doom. there's your example of the special folks which comprise the majority of people in said guilds. yes, there's an incredibly disfunctional, factionalized community within said guilds. again, the majority of these are the jobless, the teen agers, and other people who REALLY need to spend more time offline.
so i guess maybe they're trying to just get people addicted, find weaknesses to exploit in the masses, and make $900+ million a year?
like i said in a prior post, places like blizzard have no intention or idea of fostering actual communities, as in "extended family" and "trusted friends whom i let borrow my car".
Wow, so raids don't foster community because WoW is full of immature assholes.
You might actually be onto something there.
But you know what? Whatever. I try to point out that the reason raids exist is to foster community and build freindships, which in turn will keep people playing (and paying) longer. The responses to this concept I get are:
"Raiding sucks."
"I hate raiding."
"Raiding takes too long."
"It's hard to get into a raiding guild."
"Members of raiding guilds are elitist."
"I've had bad experiences with people in raiding guilds."
etc, etc.
I guess I'm the exception, not the rule. I raid because my guildmates actually enjoy hanging out with each other, and raids are one of only two ways where the bulk of the guild can get together and hang out.
So, to all you other people...I'm sorry your WoW experiences have sucked so bad. I'm sorry that you've never been able to find a way to make interacting with 9-39 other people enjoyable, because all you seem to run into are assholes.
I'm going to concede. Raids DON'T foster community. They only exist to keep people raiding. Why do they keep raiding, despite the fact that they suck hard? Shhhhh! We don't want to discuss that.
Raids suck. Raiders are no life losers. All raiding guilds are populated with nothing but assholes.
I guess that all MMOs rely on the community as everyone plays together and you do not get an option not to. Still wow seems to give one plenty of oportunities to solo and still get somewhat good stuff from quests. Sure doing power raids with 40 people can earn you an epic but the group must be well organized and know each others game style and strengths along with weaknesses. Where does such a great party or guild start? Well I think it starts with one small raiding party that decided to do more together in the game. I also think that Blizzard put such a high level on good gear is to reward the players for staying such a long time in the game to actually raise to that level and power.
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue."
Originally posted by MikeMonger The point I'm discussing is...raids build community. You have yet to even bother acknowleding it.
That's what say you're discussing to try to score points, but it's not what you've actually been discussing. In your very first post, you said "No, Blizzard makes content that will foster cooperation and community. Raids do that. Solo and PUGable content do not." That is not simply a statement that raids build community, that is also a a statement that PUG content doesn't, and it neglects to even mention the organized group content that a lot of people bring up in these discussions.
You've also been stating (not really arguing) that "raiding" and "participating in the community" are the same thing, that if you don't raid you're not participating in the community. Here's a good example exchange:
(Me) if a raid guild contacted me right now and offered to pay for my WOW account and powerlevel a character to 60 on their server and permanently give me first choice on any loot that drops on their raids, I would turn them down without a second thought.
Right...because you have ZERO desite to interact with the WoW community. Which means you were going to quit sooner than later anyway. You think your righteous indignation over the whole raiding structure was supposed to be some kind of wake up call to Blizzard? Wake up. You were EXPECTED to quit. MMORPG's RELY on community...those who don't participate get bored and quit. This is a reality all MMORPG companies understand.
Anyone with brain cells will note that I said that I have no desire to RAID, yet in your response you said I had no desire to interact with the community. That's very consistent throughout everything you've posted; if someome doesn't like raids or raiding, you declare that it means they don't want to participate in the community, which is clearly not true. When called on this, you either deny what you said or try to change the topic. That's why I'm not messing with your 'raids build community' bit, it's not what you're really discussing. You're clearly not trying to change topics away from anything you've written in the past, like your OP, and I'm not going to particiapte in that game.
You also play some bizzaro word games, I mean all anyone can really say about these is WTF; I mean, a painting crew is a crew that paints, a cleaning crew is a crew that cleans, a dancing guild is a guild that dances.
Heh...the funny thing is, you make zero distinction between a "raiding guild" and a "guild that raids". I belong to the latter, where people are actually nice to each other, and we don't need to have our accountants sitting next to us while we play the game.
Nope, because I'm not a raider. I raid. There's a difference. A difference that the "non-raider cultlike thinking" can't comprehent.
Plus there seems to be something really weird gaps in your reasoning I've said over and over how I don't like raiding at all, you've even complained that I've mentioned it far too much for you. Yet you actually posted something saying that there was a way I want to raid (hint: I don't want to raid, there is no way I want to raid)
You should form up your many WoW freinds, form a guild, and raid the way YOU want. You'll find it's a hoot...kind of like a 5 man dungeon, but with lots more fun banter.
And you have a tendancy to just make up crap; there's a bunch of things that you apparently just decided were true, I've pointed out a bunch of them below and stopped when I got bored:
Ok, then lets call a spade a spade. You don't like raiding because it takes a long time. You simply don't want to put any EFFORT into LEARNING the raids, so that it DOESN'T take a long amount of time.
Nope, that's just another one of those things that you made up. I've listed multiple other reasons for not liking raids, several of them right beside the time estimate you've obsessed on, and it clearly wasn't even a complete list of why I don't like raiding. In fact, I never even said that they were too long - you decided that a comment about scheduling blocks of time as a complaint about raids being too long.
For someome who doesn't want to make the conversation about me not liking raids, you spend a lot of time speculating about why I don't like raids and asking me to explain what I don't like about raids.
You stick WoW in the same class as, say, Solitaire, or Windows hearts. I stick it in the same class as, say, Battlefield. You choose to limit your community interaction because it's "just a game". I realize that the game is SO MUCH MORE FUN when you play it with other people. That's the difference between you and I.
You have raider brain damage: there is something other than 'playing completely alone' and 'playing in a raid'. That's the crux of the problem in this discussion. That something is more people than are involved in, say, Solitare, but fewer than are involved in Molten Core.
By the way, WHY exactly do you resent raids and raiders so much, if it weren't for the uber leet gear they keep pwning you in PvP with? What's that? You'd like to kick some ass in PvP too? Therebye...wait for it...wait for it...getting to the top of the heap?
Since I've listed multiple reasons for why I don't like raids, I'm not sure why you're acting like there's one possible reason. And I'm really not clear on how 'wanting roughtly equal PVP fights' instead of a walkover is supposed to be 'getting to the top of the heap'.
You made an explicit claim about how long raids take in WOW, I asked for examples of guilds that are interested in having people play with them (not even bringing in new members).
And I responded with the overarching theme of my post...that if you're APPLYING to guilds JUST so you can get uber loot, you're still not really being social. You're just using people...like you would an NPC in a single person game.
This quote really speaks for itelf. Remember that I haven't talked about applying to guilds or reasons for applying to one at all, it just makes it more absurd.
(me)And I have no earthly idea why you think I'm interested in joining a raid guild.
I dunno...maybe because you were whining about how hard they were to get into? So...wait...you haven't even bothered trying to get into one, and you've already given up, because none of them will want you? Interesting.
When did I say anything about how hard or easy raid guilds are to get into? I posted a quote from a guild's application page to back up my estimate of the time required for raiding. At no point did I say anything it being difficult to get into one, much less complain about it. And your chain of random ideas is just plain amusing.
(me) There is just so much wrong with this statement. For one thing, I never said PUGable content, I said group content - I most certainly did not say PUG only.
Why? If it ain't a PuG, then you have to *gasp* SCHEDULE A TIME TO PLAY A GAME! Which is, based on your earlier posts, a concept you're dead set against.
The normal definition of "Pick Up Group" is one composed of people who mostly don't know each other, genrally a group formed by using LFG to find memebrs. It does not normally mean a group of people from a guild who decide to form up a party from who's playing at the time and run an instance. Using a vastly broader definition than normal doesn't really show anything.
(your first post) No, Blizzard makes content that will foster cooperation and community. Raids do that. Solo and PUGable content do not.
(me) I don't think it's actually possible to have a community with no PUG content,
I NEVER said that! I never even came CLOSE to saying that. PuG's are important for initial meetings with people...as I said before, it's how we've recruited many people into the guild. They're a stepping stone, kind of like the initial handshake you give someone when you first meet them. But that's ALL they are.
People can make their own decision about how close saying that PUG content does not foster cooperation and community is to saying that it's possible to have a community with no PUG content.
Anyway, that's enough. I think it's clear enough for anyone who's actually reading the bottom of this over-long missive.
Originally posted by MikeMonger Originally posted by Precusor Only pvpers whine about gear.
Heh. You forgot about all the "how else do I advance my character" people....
Why else whine about the gear for more of the same thing? wasting your life like gerbils running on a wheel going for that carrot on a stick... well have fun.. for the rest of us casuals give me the option for balanced pvp and I'd shut about gear all together.
Originally posted by Lokimer I agree with the topic starter. Even EQ has a thriving Base still becuase of ALL the guilds involved in raiding, that's what EQ is. These games are abotu making money from us consumers. THe unique thing about The corporations running the gaming industry, specifically as far as the big MMROPG's go, is that the CEO's and Execs don't have on their "90 day glasses" . WHich means, they have short term number goals, but they don't overlook the longterm like the music industry. They want to be assured of their financial security for a long time after the game reaches it's peak subscriber status. Beleive it or not, There are Thousands of raiding guilds, all with hundreds of members. Now while this isn't a super big percentage of the games population, it's sufficient to help preserve the game in it's later years.
Now frankly, All the people who are going to quit becuase there is no more content past what they've already beat on their way to 60 and post 60, well, they already kenw you were going to quit, becuase you obviously are an achiever type player who will not submit to the group mentality. Not that that is a bad thing, but this sort of mmorpg simply does not cater to a casual/ solo player friendly endgame. When you have a lvl cap and you hit it. How do you progress without making godlike items? Team up. I'd be pretty safe to say that over 50% of the people who raid don't get the philosophy of what raiding is abotu and never will, but do it for the items for their one character, bragging rights, and to be uber. I for one do not kill raid bosses for items. I farm items to kill raid bosses, and that is the mentality that keeps players playing for such a ,long time. They don't see their fellow guildmates as tools to achieve personal and near sighted goals. We see the guild itself as the next step in the game. Building a guild, managing it's players, Farming items to make the guild as a whole stronger to beat new bosses and compete with other guilds. It's not a personal affair, but a community affair.
If it wasn't casual/solo friendly; what was 1 through 60? A raid fest? LOL
[quote] I for one do not kill raid bosses for items. I farm items to kill raid bosses, and that is the mentality that keeps players playing for such a ,long time. They don't see their fellow guildmates as tools to achieve personal and near sighted goals. We see the guild itself as the next step in the game. Building a guild, managing it's players, Farming items to make the guild as a whole stronger to beat new bosses and compete with other guilds. It's not a personal affair, but a community affair. [/quote]
if that is true, why do we need item rewards with ridicolously inflated stats at all? wouldn t the challenge itself and maybe rewards like titles or visually superior armor (as opposed to better stats) be a better way to keep the game fair for everyone, regardless wether they prefer 5mans, raids or pvp? thinking of it, isn t that exactly what Blizzard promised before release but failed to deliver ?
Originally posted by Mikes123 [quote] I for one do not kill raid bosses for items. I farm items to kill raid bosses, and that is the mentality that keeps players playing for such a ,long time. They don't see their fellow guildmates as tools to achieve personal and near sighted goals. We see the guild itself as the next step in the game. Building a guild, managing it's players, Farming items to make the guild as a whole stronger to beat new bosses and compete with other guilds. It's not a personal affair, but a community affair. [/quote]
if that is true, why do we need item rewards with ridicolously inflated stats at all? wouldn t the challenge itself and maybe rewards like titles or visually superior armor (as opposed to better stats) be a better way to keep the game fair for everyone, regardless wether they prefer 5mans, raids or pvp? thinking of it, isn t that exactly what Blizzard promised before release but failed to deliver ?
just to caveat to this. if you pre-ordered or bought wow early on (like the first 9 months of the game BEFORE there were any battlegrounds); then, read the box and your book that came with it. it talks about the wonderful battlegrounds and pvp that are a part of the game and which was a major selling point in my pre-ordering.
yet there were no battlegrounds until like 9 months after release into retail...
that speaks worlds about blizzard and wow.
raids are dev's way of 1- being lazy with end game and 2- being uncreative with end game.
what in wow stimulates a player economy? not crafts, there's nothing you can craft that can compete with drops end game. you lose nothing when you die. items don't decay do they? your "player economy" is all from drops.
they/blizz lament that no one does outdoor pvp. why should you? they buffed up town guards to get a bazillion extras real quick. town guards never dropped loot worth much anything, nor did random enemy npcs.
no player housing. no outposts which can be taken and held by horde or alliance. there's just no reason to attack any enemy towns ever.
think about the "community" that would be built (throughout an entire faction) by there being objectives to take? if each zone has a dozen outposts that either side could claim, but only a single guild can claim any one objective.... there's something to build a community around.
not from the (and i speak from about 9 years of MMO gaming experience most of which was as a part of a guild or clan) "hey, check the calendar for when this 8 hour borefest will start. stock up on whatever pots you'll need. make sure you bring plenty of ammo if you use it. we should get 4-6 good items tonight, so if you haven't gotten anything lately, you should get a drop tonight." that's not community. that's a group of people, like the previous poster stated, gearing up to fight the next big bad in yet another lengthy farmable borefest.
could we please get correspondent writers and moderators, on the eve forum at mmorpg.com, who are well-versed on eve-online and aren't just passersby pushing buttons? pretty please?
That's what say you're discussing to try to score points, but it's not what you've actually been discussing. In your very first post, you said "No, Blizzard makes content that will foster cooperation and community. Raids do that. Solo and PUGable content do not." That is not simply a statement that raids build community, that is also a a statement that PUG content doesn't, and it neglects to even mention the organized group content that a lot of people bring up in these discussions.
And if you'd actually bothered to read and acknowledge some of my points, you'd see why I've said raids do it better than PuG's.
However, your debate style is to ignore or dismiss as irrelevent those points which help the other guy's point or hurt your own, so there's no point in even bothering replying to this post. Your response will exclude anything that doesn't help your cause.
You've also been stating (not really arguing) that "raiding" and "participating in the community" are the same thing, that if you don't raid you're not participating in the community. Here's a good example exchange:
Well, I guess I have been "stating" this...but that's only because you choose to excise the points I make as to WHY it builds community.
Anyone with brain cells will note that I said that I have no desire to RAID, yet in your response you said I had no desire to interact with the community.
Well, you'd prefer to do primarily solo and PuG content. Which isn't really overly social. But again...whatever. That's probably "irrelevent" too.
That's very consistent throughout everything you've posted; if someome doesn't like raids or raiding, you declare that it means they don't want to participate in the community, which is clearly not true.
No, if somone wants to stick primarily with solo and PUG content, they don't want to interact with the communmity. But again, whatever. Don't care.
When called on this, you either deny what you said or try to change the topic. That's why I'm not messing with your 'raids build community' bit, it's not what you're really discussing.
Right, exactly what am I discussing then?
You're clearly not trying to change topics away from anything you've written in the past, like your OP, and I'm not going to particiapte in that game.
I'm NOT trying to change topics away from my OP? What's wrong with that? How is that a "game"?
You also play some bizzaro word games, I mean all anyone can really say about these is WTF; I mean, a painting crew is a crew that paints, a cleaning crew is a crew that cleans, a dancing guild is a guild that dances.
Right. So all guilds who raid are "raiding guilds", all "raiding guilds" suck, and therefore my guild sucks.
Gotcha.
Plus there seems to be something really weird gaps in your reasoning I've said over and over how I don't like raiding at all, you've even complained that I've mentioned it far too much for you. Yet you actually posted something saying that there was a way I want to raid (hint: I don't want to raid, there is no way I want to raid)
No, you want the cool gear that comes with raiding.
You should form up your many WoW freinds, form a guild, and raid the way YOU want. You'll find it's a hoot...kind of like a 5 man dungeon, but with lots more fun banter.
And you have a tendancy to just make up crap; there's a bunch of things that you apparently just decided were true, I've pointed out a bunch of them below and stopped when I got bored:
Really? Yup. More of that "irrelevent" stuff I guess.
Ok, then lets call a spade a spade. You don't like raiding because it takes a long time. You simply don't want to put any EFFORT into LEARNING the raids, so that it DOESN'T take a long amount of time.
Nope, that's just another one of those things that you made up.
Not at all. I say, "raiding only takes 4 hours." You respond with "HAH! HAH! You said raiding only takes 4 hours! You NEVER said you had to LEARN the raids first! HAH! You're a lyer! Raids take MORE THAN four hours BEFORE you learn them! I just annihlated your point!"
I'm paraphrasing.
I've listed multiple other reasons for not liking raids,
And most of the responses I've made to those are, "than you're raiding with the wrong people." which you are. I then tried to explain how the rigth people makes it very enjoyable, which leads back into the community thing...but your response has univerally been "raids suck".
several of them right beside the time estimate you've obsessed on, and it clearly wasn't even a complete list of why I don't like raiding. In fact, I never even said that they were too long - you decided that a comment about scheduling blocks of time as a complaint about raids being too long.
No, I decided that your aversion to scheduling blocks of time was an indicator that you view the game strictly as a game, and not as a social event.
For someome who doesn't want to make the conversation about me not liking raids, you spend a lot of time speculating about why I don't like raids and asking me to explain what I don't like about raids.
I never asked you to explain why you don't like raids. I HAVE asked, repeatedly, why do raids exist, and why DON'T they foster community.
You have raider brain damage: there is something other than 'playing completely alone' and 'playing in a raid'. That's the crux of the problem in this discussion. That something is more people than are involved in, say, Solitare, but fewer than are involved in Molten Core.
Again, you use the term "raider" like its a bad word, an insult. I'm not a "raider", but according to you, because I raid, I'm a "raider". You're predjudiced.
Since I've listed multiple reasons for why I don't like raids, I'm not sure why you're acting like there's one possible reason. And I'm really not clear on how 'wanting roughtly equal PVP fights' instead of a walkover is supposed to be 'getting to the top of the heap'.
Fine, you're right. You've listed a lot of reasons for hating raids. And yet...you can't even list one reason why they DON'T build community, or why they exist if they suck so much.
This quote really speaks for itelf. Remember that I haven't talked about applying to guilds or reasons for applying to one at all, it just makes it more absurd.
Oh really?
I'll tell you what, point me to the websites of 5 guilds in WOW that can finish MC in 4 hours or less and are interested in acquiring or even retaining members who raid for a total of 4 hours per week spread out over 2 or more days. Surely if this is such a viable playstyle you can find way less than 1 guild per server where it would be possible to do.I'll tell you what, point me to the websites of 5 guilds in WOW that can finish MC in 4 hours or less and are interested in acquiring or even retaining members who raid for a total of 4 hours per week spread out over 2 or more days. Surely if this is such a viable playstyle you can find way less than 1 guild per server where it would be possible to do.
I've seen a lot of things like http://www.eternal-guild.com/?p=app "We raid Pacific Standard Time. We raid weekday evening's 5pm/pst - Midnight depending. We generally have a morning raid on Saturdays, no earlier than 9am. If you cannot raid with us during these times DO NOT APPLY." when looking at raiding guilds and not anything about 4 hours spread over 2 days. Those pages are actual facts; people actually doing raid content don't seem to agree with your belief that raids in WOW take only 4 hours and that not even in one day. Yet somehow, I'm the one making stuff up.
Both from your post made 5/20 at 2:29 pm. And unlike you, I threw the ENTIRE paragraphs in there, so as not to try to take stuff out of context. If you know how difficult it is to find "raiding" guilds, then obviously, you've tried to do it. Unless, of course, you just made all that up?
I know I know...you're going to respond something like "Yeah, well, just because I know how hard it is to get into a raid guild, doesn't mean I've ever actually TRIED to get into one!"
When did I say anything about how hard or easy raid guilds are to get into?
Heh. Heh heh. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
I posted a quote from a guild's application page to back up my estimate of the time required for raiding. At no point did I say anything it being difficult to get into one, much less complain about it. And your chain of random ideas is just plain amusing.
So, pointing out how difficult it is to get into a raid guild isn't complaining about how difficult it is to get into a raid guild. You know what? How difficult it is or is not is irrelevent. I don't care. You say things lile "raids guilds are hard to get into" and then follow it up with "I've never tried to get into a raid guild." You're right...it makes it impossible to argue with you, because you can sprout off anything you'd like, and then when it starts to work against you, deny it has anything to do with you.
The normal definition of "Pick Up Group" is one composed of people who mostly don't know each other, genrally a group formed by using LFG to find memebrs. It does not normally mean a group of people from a guild who decide to form up a party from who's playing at the time and run an instance. Using a vastly broader definition than normal doesn't really show anything.
So in other words, "I only want to play with 4 guildies at a time, because there are ALWAYS 4 guildies logged in who aren't doing anything, and make up the proper classes for a well balanced group.
Can't...argue with that, I guess. I know in MY guild, while there are always other people on, they're usually doing something else.....
People can make their own decision about how close saying that PUG content does not foster cooperation and community is to saying that it's possible to have a community with no PUG content.
Anyway, that's enough. I think it's clear enough for anyone who's actually reading the bottom of this over-long missive.
Yup. It's clear you do a nifty job of avoiding those questions that you don't want to answer.
Maybe I should start doing that. Just pick and choose the points in your posts that I want to respond to. Completely ignore the existance of points which actually help your point of view. That's your style of debate.
Anyway, why do raids exist? Why do they NOT foster community?
I think your missing a lot of the point Mike. Most people don't have a problem with great gear coming from 40 man raids. The problem is that this gear skews the other aspects of the game like PvP a raider has better gear than a pvper even someone that grinds the shit out of the pvp system still has not as much gear as a raider. I enjoy Raiding from time to time I just don't want to have to do it all the time in order to enjoy the thing I like the most PvP. There are some really simple fixes to it make some really good PvP gear that only works versus players not incredibly difficult to get maybe takes 10-15 hours a of work per peace that would be on par with Raid gear but really lacking in whats need for raids such as resistances etc. The problem is the raid system is exclusive and it doesn't keep people out of raiding it keeps them from enjoying things such as pvp as well.
Originally posted by Fenrir767 I think your missing a lot of the point Mike. Most people don't have a problem with great gear coming from 40 man raids. The problem is that this gear skews the other aspects of the game like PvP a raider has better gear than a pvper even someone that grinds the shit out of the pvp system still has not as much gear as a raider. I enjoy Raiding from time to time I just don't want to have to do it all the time in order to enjoy the thing I like the most PvP. There are some really simple fixes to it make some really good PvP gear that only works versus players not incredibly difficult to get maybe takes 10-15 hours a of work per peace that would be on par with Raid gear but really lacking in whats need for raids such as resistances etc. The problem is the raid system is exclusive and it doesn't keep people out of raiding it keeps them from enjoying things such as pvp as well.
Yes, you're absolutely right. Raid gear skews the game in favor of the raiders. Someone decked out in a full set of the highest tier raid loot will dominate ANYBODY who isn't, regardless of relative skill levels.
You'll get no argument from me on this.
This ties back into my original point. To be the best of the best, you have to raid. Why? Because the only mechanic in WoW that encourages large scale cooperation is raiding.
It's not a question of the amount of time put in. It's a question of interacting with other players.
Other MMORPG's do it different ways, but ultimately, they all have the same thing in common...the more people that have to work together to accompish something, the greater the reward is.
Because of WoW's bad PvP design, there's really no way to accomplish that same level of codependence. You can sit back, move around a little bit, and still get PvP credit.
I never said that raiding was the greatest thing in the universe. That's what certain other people who have posted on this thread WANT me to say, though. If WoW introduced a mechanic other than raiding that encouraged the same level of player interaction, than that other mechanic will provide raid-level rewards.
But you'll never see solo or small group content for raid level epics. Blizzard will throw the occasional bone to the non-raiders (like the whole Slithius thing, for example), but ultimately, the best rewards will come from working with others. Many others.
The 2 head/main game designers were 2 leaders of some of the major raiding guilds in everquest. They have no actual experience beyond that. And they work on content that they themselves enjoy and not what the mass of the community would enjoy.
The simple question is this.
Why is it that raiders are against any means of upgrading through solo/group content to be equals(even if it took LONGER then an average player took to get up that high)?
NOBODY who wants group or solo content with equal rewards, doesn't want raids to be a part of the game. They are all for raids being the fastest way to obtain gear, but they want a way that they can become equals without raiding.
Lets say this is the time chart for how long it took to obtain the gear.(fake numbers, just a example)
Raid tier 3=1000 hours
Group/solo tier 3=1500 hours
PvP tier 3=...they said they are working on a skill based system for ranks or something so ionno in the future, but it should take about 1250ish hours. And have ranks NOT reset, since if your in raid tier 2, and quit for months you dont have to come back and start learning mc/bwl all over again.(also reduce honor from bgs by 2/3rds, and have your gears"item level" affect your chars "pvp level" and honor rewards... so a level 80 gear person would gain considerably less honor from a level 63 geared person)
Since if PvP puts in a equal time/effort they deserve equal rewards. SINCE WOW WAS MARKETED AS A PVP GAME BEFORE RELEASE.
And even IF raids did encourage a community. If someone got bored enough of the game that theyd quit... they wont stay because of the community.
The 2 head/main game designers were 2 leaders of some of the major raiding guilds in everquest. They have no actual experience beyond that. And they work on content that they themselves enjoy and not what the mass of the community would enjoy.
You know what? All the self proclaimed "non-raiders" seem to talk about how almost anybody who plays WoW hates raids. And yet, subscription numbers are steady. If everyone hated raids, wouldn't you see a mass exodus of post-60 people? I mean, the game's been out for, what, a year and a half? And yet, the indicators (more servers, longer queues) say that subscription numbers are still rising.
I don't think the "mass of the community" shares your abject hatred of raiding.
The simple question is this.
Why is it that raiders are against any means of upgrading through solo/group content to be equals(even if it took LONGER then an average player took to get up that high)?
I don't know. I don't consider myself a "raider".
NOBODY who wants group or solo content with equal rewards, doesn't want raids to be a part of the game. They are all for raids being the fastest way to obtain gear, but they want a way that they can become equals without raiding.
And once WoW introduces a game mechanic that requires the same level of player interaction that raiding requires, you'll have that alternative.
Lets say this is the time chart for how long it took to obtain the gear.(fake numbers, just a example)
Raid tier 3=1000 hours
Group/solo tier 3=1500 hours
PvP tier 3=...they said they are working on a skill based system for ranks or something so ionno in the future, but it should take about 1250ish hours. And have ranks NOT reset, since if your in raid tier 2, and quit for months you dont have to come back and start learning mc/bwl all over again.(also reduce honor from bgs by 2/3rds, and have your gears"item level" affect your chars "pvp level" and honor rewards... so a level 80 gear person would gain considerably less honor from a level 63 geared person)
Great. But I never even came remotely close to implying that raids give the best rewards because of time invested. Not only that, I specifically said in post 1 that they're not difficult.
Since if PvP puts in a equal time/effort they deserve equal rewards. SINCE WOW WAS MARKETED AS A PVP GAME BEFORE RELEASE.
Well, it's a year and a half later. WoW is no longer what it was when they first marketed it. I think it's safe to say that, with the many divergences that the game has taken, you can no longer judge it by what they said it would be before it came out.
And even IF raids did encourage a community. If someone got bored enough of the game that theyd quit... they wont stay because of the community.
That's flat out, balls out WRONG. I remember SWG, right before the CU. People were griping to high heaven how dull it was because of the ZERO content, but they kept paying because they liked their guildies. Same thing with Everquest...been there, done that, everything was the same. Same thing with Ultima Online...people kept playing that primitive thing LONG after they were bored with it, because of the friends they'd made.
Yes, people will eventually quit DESPITE their friends...but it takes a whole lot longer for them to get around to doing in, than someone who doesn't have any significant relationships ingame.
I would highly doubt abou the subscription numbers are as steady as before. What I would honestly like to see from the game is some equalizing in the content. I think 40 man raids are good but who said you need 40 man raids why not 20 man raids or something more manageable. That's about the only grip I have really is how many people you need and the way the drops work. I enjoy having hard PvE encounters I just wish they would figure out some way to make the raid content more accesible for all and find some way to level the playing field in PvP.
Comments
Highlight from the gigantic wall of text:
Sure you have; I have repeatedly said that I do not want to participate in raids, raiding, or raid guilds (and from context and occasionally explicitly, that means PVE raids). I have not said that I have any opposition to PVE content involving reasonably sized groups or PVP content (including large groups). Yet you repeatedly make statements like "EXACTLY! Because you don't have any desire to participate in the community, which, when it all boils down, is what ALL MMORPG's are all about. Which goes back to my argument that Blizzard isn't going to put a whole lot of effort into keeping people like you."
You can't have it both ways.
There is just so much wrong with this statement. For one thing, I never said PUGable content, I said group content - I most certainly did not say PUG only. You've got that raider cultlike thinking going on, where you can't imagine a guild doing things as a group, only as a raid or nothing.
Your claim that PUGable content does not foster community is not backed up by anything at all. I don't think it's actually possible to have a community with no PUG content, as you need some way for people to spontaneously group together so that they can find out if they like each other. You said earlier that your guild only recruits people recommended by a guild member, so how does your guild member meet them and decide that they like them - is it some kind of static group, or some kind of PUG? Every guild that I've ever talked to people from or have been in meets new people through PUGs (since guild groups will have guild people, and soloing is solo), so I'd have to say that PUGable content certainly does foster community since you need it to encounter new people for your non-PU group.
Also, Molten Core is PUG-able, I remember reading on several servers where people were doing pick-up raids and taking down bosses, so you have something which is both a raid, which allegedly does forster cooperation and community, and PUGable, which alegedly does not. Which is it? Or do pick-up-raids foster cooperation and community, but PUGs don't?
Your psychic abilities are wrong, as usual. I want to and have made actual friends in online games including WOW. What you don't understand is 'do not want to raid or be in a raid guild' does not mean 'does not want to make friends'; raid guilds actually discourage real friendship.
This is my last time doing a gigantic point-by-point post, any future ones will belike the highlights. I have fun with this kind of thing occasionally, but it gets old after a while.
So what you're saying is that when you said "Yes, you're one of those close-minded non-raiders that wants raids to last 10,000 hours each. They don't. They last 4 hours, which can be spread over 2 or more days." you were simply wrong? Since you got your MC raids down to around 4 hours, they clearly must have been more in the past, thus disproving your earlier statement.
Because that's a complete nonsequitor. You asserted that I was wrong in my estimate of how long raids take in WOW and claimed that they required a different time, I asked for a tiny number of example guilds that actually use the figure you claimed in practice. It's kind of telling that even your own guild doesn't meet the theoretical number you named. If you want, I can find 5 guilds that meet or exceed my estimate of 4-12 hours 2-3 nights a week, I already listed one.
It's interesting that a guy who whines that "You've made assumptions about me" posts something like this. You've described the exact opposite of my experience gaming in WOW, when I went in foolishly thinking you could form a guild with friends and just enjoy the game with them. It wasn't until later that I discovered how central the festering boil of raids was to the game, and that it wasn't possible to play the game for the sake of playing the game unless by 'playing the game' you mean 'raiding'.
Again, we have the raider explaining that if you view WOW as a game, you won't enjoy it. Pretty much sums it up.
It's also interesting that you said this immediately after recommending "joining a guild of people they like and playing the game just for the sake of playing the game." Apparently I should play the game for the sake of playing the game, but not view it as a game.
Interesting that I've been playing P&P RPGs off and on for over two decades, things which I view as "games" and in which there isn't a "top of the heap" in 90% or more of campaigns, and in playing wargames where the 'top of the heap' lasts for that one session after which you wipe the board and start over. Still, your psychic abilities must be active or something.
And here's the root of your problem: You're not actually debating, when someome demonstrates that you're wrong, you try to change the topic instead of answering them or admitting that you're wrong. You made an explicit claim about how long raids take in WOW, I asked for examples of guilds that are interested in having people play with them (not even bringing in new members). All I WANT is an example of people actually playing the game according to the raid timing you claimed was possible.
And I have no earthly idea why you think I'm interested in joining a raid guild. I think I've mentioned in every single post that I have zero desire to raid or join a raid guild, so what would possibly give you the impression that I'd want to join one for phat lewtz? I guess I'll make it clear to you: if a raid guild contacted me right now and offered to pay for my WOW account and powerlevel a character to 60 on their server and permanently give me first choice on any loot that drops on their raids, I would turn them down without a second thought.
Simply quoting your own words back at you has refuted your claim about how long WOW raids take, so that's one thing all by itself.
Ahh, sweet irony. I mean, you assumed that I wanted to join a raid guild for phat lootz even though I've said over and over that I don't want to join one at all. You assume that because I don't want to raid I don't want to participate in the community or make friends. What am I assuming, that you mean what you say?
So you're saying that the majority of raid guilds, including Lokimer's guild, are the wrong people? On my main server, there was only one guild doing 40-man raids that did not use a DKP system, and they didn't do them all that often. Finding a raiding guild that doesn't use some kind of complex accounting system in WOW is not exactly a common occurance.
There is just so much wrong with this statement. For one thing, I never said PUGable content, I said group content - I most certainly did not say PUG only. You've got that raider cultlike thinking going on, where you can't imagine a guild doing things as a group, only as a raid or nothing.
Your claim that PUGable content does not foster community is not backed up by anything at all. I don't think it's actually possible to have a community with no PUG content, as you need some way for people to spontaneously group together so that they can find out if they like each other. You said earlier that your guild only recruits people recommended by a guild member, so how does your guild member meet them and decide that they like them - is it some kind of static group, or some kind of PUG? Every guild that I've ever talked to people from or have been in meets new people through PUGs (since guild groups will have guild people, and soloing is solo), so I'd have to say that PUGable content certainly does foster community since you need it to encounter new people for your non-PU group.
Also, Molten Core is PUG-able, I remember reading on several servers where people were doing pick-up raids and taking down bosses, so you have something which is both a raid, which allegedly does forster cooperation and community, and PUGable, which alegedly does not. Which is it? Or do pick-up-raids foster cooperation and community, but PUGs don't?
I didn't misunderstand your statment at all, you said that I was wrong for assuming that you liked raiding, not that you don't raid for raiding's sake. When your intent is not expressed in the words at all, it's irrelevant. It simply can't be true both that I was wrong for 'assuming' that you like raiding, and that you like raiding at the same time.
OK, so what this boils down to is that you can't actually produce the MMORPG business model that you allegedly read, and didn't actually determine that it is universal among ALL MMORPG companies? Yeah, definately looks like you were just blowing smoke and hoping no one called you on it.
That's compeltely irrelevant to the issue of whether your sweeping claim is actually a fact or is just something you made up because it sounded kind of plausible. I mean, all that has to happen is for there to be ONE MMORPG company that doesn't share your motivations and you're wrong, I think we'd all like to know how you verified that there is not one single counterexample.
A common goal which is routinely worked towards by people in PUGs. Yes, that's right, DAOC battlegrounds don't require guild groups. In fact, a lot of DAOC people will say that the best community building was when they'd get the notice of a relic raid and show up to help defend it with whoever was on the scene. Earlier you said "No, Blizzard makes content that will foster cooperation and community. Raids do that. Solo and PUGable content do not," were you wrong then or now?
Sure you have; I have repeatedly said that I do not want to participate in raids, raiding, or raid guilds (and from context and occasionally explicitly, PVE raids). I have not said that I have any opposition to PVE content involving reasonably sized groups or PVP content (including large groups). Yet you repeatedly make statements like "EXACTLY! Because you don't have any desire to participate in the community, which, when it all boils down, is what ALL MMORPG's are all about. Which goes back to my argument that Blizzard isn't going to put a whole lot of effort into keeping people like you."
You can't have it both ways.
[quoe]I made it up. You never said they were doing it to just piss you off. The fact that you're trying to punch holes in my argument by putting WAY too much emphasis on an offhand comment is a bad sign for you.[/quote]
The fact that every time I demolish one of your arguments you try to change the subject is a far, far worse sign for you. Plus you repeatedly bring up an offhand comment about basement dwellers that I made while I just mentioned this once, so it looks like another spot that's a worse sign for you than for me.
Oh no, I have plenty of ideas about it, they're just irrelevant as to whether or not anything you've said is true. I'm also not silly enough to assert that my ideas about why a company does something are absolute fact.
The fact that I'm not willing to engage in irrelevant speculation on the motives of a company doesn't make your false claims any less wrong. At this point, I'm pretty much arguing by quoting your own words back at you; you constantly contradict yourself. There is no need for me to offer a 'counter idea' when your idea is so clearly wrong, especially since part of the problem with what you say is that you claim firm knowledge of things that are really just guesses on your part.
Word of advice... when you're trying to promote an idea, it's best to have one strong enough to stand on its own.
No, as I keep saying I don't have any idea to participate in RAIDING. Community is fine, it's RAIDING that I want nothing to do this. RAID != COMMUNITY. Let me it very simply: Me not want raid at all, me hate raiding. Me do like community.
LOL, of course you are. Word of advice: If you feel the need to tell someome that you're not being condescending, you probably are.
Your psychic abilities are wrong, as usual. I want to and have made actual friends in online games including WOW. What you don't understand is 'do not want to raid or be in a raid guild' does not mean 'does not want to make friends'; raid guilds actually discourage real friendship.
Actually, your explicitly asked me "What has Blizzard implemented that will keep you playing the game for a good long time? " so I answered the question that you asked. And again, if you don't make new content that appeals to people, then they'll leave when they've exhausted the old content. People who play 1-59 and leave are short-timers not because of some law of the universe, but because they played the existing content that appealed to them and blizzard decieded not to make more.
Really? Where, exactly? Oh, this is probably another thing that you just made up and you're going to whine now that I've called you on it. Oh no, better yet, it's actually YOUR CLAIM, lol. "By making these encounters so difficult that only a group who knows how to work together well can accomplish it, Blizzard encourages you to make friends...friends that you'll keep paying $15 a month to keep talking to."
By making the game a raid game, they convinced me quit WOW, not even consider the expansion, and to look long and hard before buying another Blizzard game ever again. Doesn't sound like their crafty plan succeeded, maybe if I didn't have messageboards, instant messengers, email, and a phone it could have worked.
If 'participate in the community' means 'play the game on a schedule, take part in some complex accounting scheme for loot, put up with a basement-dwelling raid leader ordering you around, and make sure not to interact with most of the server' then I'll gladly avoid ever participating in what you consider a community ever again in my life.
So because you don´t like it their plan didn´t succeed? Hello, 5 million subscribers?
hello, 5 billion chinese?
Buddhism does not believe in God. It believes in People. In Buddhist
teaching, there is no aggressive promotion of Buddhism or strong rejection of other
religions. All these make Buddhism fall into the same scope of Confucianism and Taoist.
Its ability to co-exist with any other religions makes it being developed into one of the
largest religions in China.
do you like rice? do you worship the buddha?
so 5 million subscribers means what exactly? they all follow the same rice eating buddha and so that makes it right and good?
things to consider when saying "hello, 5 million subscribers?"
1 - any mission that requires you to spend more than a couple of hours to complete is not family oriented/friendly. people have lives. people with priorities will make their family/friends the priority versus spending the entire weekend farming the same dungeon for the hundredth time.
2 - group warfare (city fights if wow ever bothered to install some sort of player housing), would easily encourage large groups of people to play together, without necessitating spending the better part of a few days in the same exact dungeon with the same mobs doing the same things. of course, turn your settings down and join AV and you'll see how wonderful large groups are in wow, and that's WITH settings turned down.
3 - shouldn't you point out the wonderful variety of high end gear? oh wait, there's only one type that is acceptable for end game -- t0.5, t1, t2, t3... wonderful variety of high end talent builds in each class? oops, yeah, not really any variety there in the minds of the folks doing 20+ raids. um, you could point out the wonderful variety in the instances, how every time you reset one, the maps and mobs are slightly askew from the previous times, thusly providing new and exciting challenges. oh yeah, the game's made for the lowest common denominator -- ADD-enabled, highly caffeinated, latch-key kids.
4 - you don't have to ever join a guild to hit the battlegrounds. you can get exalted faction with all three and have your choice of uber-cheap purples. if you're playing in the BGs that much, you'll at least hit pvp rank 11, which means 90g epic mount and super cheap very powerful blue class set. mix/match that with the purples, or just upgrade to the purples from the bg factions and you're golden.
5 - join a shard that does pugs or has an alliance of small guilds which do the large instances.
hello, 5 million subscribers? = i really don't have anything to back up my point of view.
sorry.
wow COULD be a great game.
1 - fire the GM and forum mod staff. hire competent people. period, no exceptions.
2 - add another talent tree to every class. add a bonus talent point every 5 levels. force the devs to come up with powerful, viable builds which require you to get the 31 point talent in each and every talent tree. also, nearly as powerful, but vastly more versatile, builds which require 20/21 points in multiple trees.
3 - create half a dozen class sets for EVERY class of t0.5, t1, t2, t3 gear.
4 - have crafting capable of creating armor sets at LEAST equal to t0.5, t1, t2, and t3 gear.
5 - quadruple the items you can purchase from faction vendors. make it worthwhile to even hit neutral and friendly.
6 - double (if not triple) the available skills.
7 - add completely customizable player housing.
8 - add 5 - 20 outposts in each zone. treat said outposts as you would the objectives in AB. if your side (horde/alliance) takes control, you get npcs to protect it. also, the local mine/lumber mill/et cetera generates common (80%), uncommon (10%), rare (6%), very rare (3%) and *unique* (1%) raw materials. these can be used to make the bazillion new items creatable for the different tiers of gear and all the new skills will use also. variety of ways to figure out who is eligible for the items. an idea is that a guild is able to "claim" a single resource at a time (with 5-20 outposts per zone/area, there should be lots for folks). or perhaps a nation (X number of allied guilds) can work to takeover and claim an area. each guild splits the take evenly, goes to guildmaster, who can distribute as she sees fit. also, you can build/utilize siege/defense equipment.
9 - have player built means of transportation. have it where they can auto-follow specified paths between towns. also have the option to go four-wheeling to pretty much where ever you can travel on foot. chariots, rocket cars, different boat types, different flying craft, have goblin eng oriented and gnome eng oriented rides. of course, make them all highly customizable. i.e. you can outfit it with X add ons which can be a mix/match combination of speed, armor, weapons, stealth, et cetera.
all of this is possible. as was stated previously... 5 million subscribers?
5 million+ subscribers = um, $15 times 5 million, $75 MILLION/month, um, $900 million a year, plus what? $50 on time fee of the game itself, which is another $250 million+ bonus bucks. i think they can afford the staff and hardware to do this. especially since they're not spending the money on new servers/realms.
don't take this as hate. i've got a few lvl 60s. but, wow took a few incredibly HORRID things from eq and carried them over to their game. unless of course, their target audience actually IS the unemployed add teen age market and "live in mommy's basement until i die" types.
could we please get correspondent writers and moderators, on the eve forum at mmorpg.com, who are well-versed on eve-online and aren't just passersby pushing buttons? pretty please?
I recommend against posting while under the influence.
maybe you should've made the comment to the person who said "5 million subscribers, hello?"
oh wait... you wrote a book of a reply earlier. i think i probably agreed with most of it. dunno, i'm watching tv and eating a burger whilst reading. i have to go back and check it out again.
could we please get correspondent writers and moderators, on the eve forum at mmorpg.com, who are well-versed on eve-online and aren't just passersby pushing buttons? pretty please?
By making the game a raid game, they convinced me quit WOW, not even consider the expansion, and to look long and hard before buying another Blizzard game ever again. Doesn't sound like their crafty plan succeeded, maybe if I didn't have messageboards, instant messengers, email, and a phone it could have worked.
If 'participate in the community' means 'play the game on a schedule, take part in some complex accounting scheme for loot, put up with a basement-dwelling raid leader ordering you around, and make sure not to interact with most of the server' then I'll gladly avoid ever participating in what you consider a community ever again in my life.
From your post, I think I can safely assume that you're a first time MMORPG player.
Why? Because of your "play the game on a schedule" line. See, that's EXACTLY what Blizzard wants you to do. They (and all other MMORPG companies) want you to view their product less as a "game", and more as a "social event". Scheduling time for a raid should, in theory, become no different than scheduling a time to meet up with friends for a movie or a night out....
THAT'S what I mean by "community". And that's the attitude that's kept a lot of the old MMORPG's running for a long time.
If you never go beyond viewing WoW as a "game", than you're going to quit. Because games get boring after you've played them long enough.
ok, mikemonger, i'm sorry man, but after reading just THIS reply... you need help man.
you need to go outside, meet some new people, get a job, get a significant other, get some pets (or kids), eseentially, an offline life.
if the game creators wanted you to play because of a community, then they would HELP build said community.
look at the wow forums. the only thing those addle-coved mods build is a select group of bootie-kissing sycophants whom they love because of said bootie-kissing.
if a game wanted to build a community, then why don't they host community events? instead of static, same old same old caca-poo things a million times? this is where eq screwed the pooch and a number of mmo's have mindlessly followed suit.
unless the last couple of releases for UO vastly changed it's gameplay, then that's one thing i can say UO did correctly -- no 12+ hour marathon adventures into a dungeon. of course, pre-carebear UO also did pvp right.
a truly socially active, community building game would be something like eve. wow is not conducive to "community" building in the slightest. check out forums for eve. find and apply to an appealing sounding corporation. then create a trial eve account. perhaps pay for the first month's sub after the trial ends. i'm pretty sure you'll see what a community building game does.
by the same token, you could probably try this with a game like Ryzom or even Horizons.
wow is a divisive, time-sucking black hole of mediocrity. true story.
could we please get correspondent writers and moderators, on the eve forum at mmorpg.com, who are well-versed on eve-online and aren't just passersby pushing buttons? pretty please?
So what you're saying is that when you said "Yes, you're one of those close-minded non-raiders that wants raids to last 10,000 hours each. They don't. They last 4 hours, which can be spread over 2 or more days." you were simply wrong? Since you got your MC raids down to around 4 hours, they clearly must have been more in the past, thus disproving your earlier statement.
Yes, if you work together with people and learn it, it takes 4 hours or less. If you just kind of stagger in there, you won't be able to even clear it.
You don't have to spend more that 4 hours learning, though.
My statement is not disproved. If you LEARN TO WORK WITH OTHERS, raiding only takes 4 hours. If you DON'T learn to work with others, the raids will fail completely. Which wraps up into the original premis...that raids are specifically designed to encourage you to work with and build relationships with the same group of people.
Because that's a complete nonsequitor. You asserted that I was wrong in my estimate of how long raids take in WOW and claimed that they required a different time, I asked for a tiny number of example guilds that actually use the figure you claimed in practice. It's kind of telling that even your own guild doesn't meet the theoretical number you named. If you want, I can find 5 guilds that meet or exceed my estimate of 4-12 hours 2-3 nights a week, I already listed one.
Ok, then lets call a spade a spade. You don't like raiding because it takes a long time. You simply don't want to put any EFFORT into LEARNING the raids, so that it DOESN'T take a long amount of time. Fine. I'll admit it. When my guild didn't know what the hell it was doing, we never even COMPLETED a raid, much less finish one in four hours.
But where does it say that you need to spend more than four hours a week LEARNING a raid? Spend 4 hours one week, learn a bit. Spend 4 more the next week, learn a little bit more.
There's ZERO need to go into MC or any other raid instance for huge amounts of time in any one sitting...unless, of course, you're trying it with a PuG....
It's interesting that a guy who whines that "You've made assumptions about me" posts something like this. You've described the exact opposite of my experience gaming in WOW, when I went in foolishly thinking you could form a guild with friends and just enjoy the game with them. It wasn't until later that I discovered how central the festering boil of raids was to the game, and that it wasn't possible to play the game for the sake of playing the game unless by 'playing the game' you mean 'raiding'.
Not even going to bother responding to this. Why? Because it's just another anti-raid spiel. The point I'm discussing is...raids build community. You have yet to even bother acknowleding it. You just keep prattling on about how "raids take forever" and "I hate raids".
Again, we have the raider explaining that if you view WOW as a game, you won't enjoy it. Pretty much sums it up.
And again, we have the non-raider REFUSING to acknowledge that much of WoW's success depends upon people PARTICIPATING WITH THE COMMUNITY.
You stick WoW in the same class as, say, Solitaire, or Windows hearts. I stick it in the same class as, say, Battlefield. You choose to limit your community interaction because it's "just a game". I realize that the game is SO MUCH MORE FUN when you play it with other people. That's the difference between you and I.
It's also interesting that you said this immediately after recommending "joining a guild of people they like and playing the game just for the sake of playing the game." Apparently I should play the game for the sake of playing the game, but not view it as a game.
Wow. You're reaching now. Why not pull MORE stuff COMPLETELY out of context? Go ahead..it validates your whole point..that raiding sucks. The funny thing about your point is, I NEVER disagreed with you. Ever. Please quote the line where I say "raiding is the greatest thing since sliced bread." What's that? I never said raids were great? I've only been trying to explain to you WHY raids are set up the way they are. Hmph. Go figure.
Interesting that I've been playing P&P RPGs off and on for over two decades, things which I view as "games" and in which there isn't a "top of the heap" in 90% or more of campaigns, and in playing wargames where the 'top of the heap' lasts for that one session after which you wipe the board and start over. Still, your psychic abilities must be active or something.
Wow. This might be the single most off-topic, unrelated, and pointless sentence in the entire thread.
By the way, WHY exactly do you resent raids and raiders so much, if it weren't for the uber leet gear they keep pwning you in PvP with? What's that? You'd like to kick some ass in PvP too? Therebye...wait for it...wait for it...getting to the top of the heap?
And here's the root of your problem: You're not actually debating, when someome demonstrates that you're wrong, you try to change the topic instead of answering them or admitting that you're wrong.
You have NEVER explained to my why raiding DOES NOT FOSTER COMMUNITY! EVER! Not once! You keep sprouting off the reasons why you HATE raiding, but you NEVER even ACKNOWLEDGE that point. So far, the only response you've given is...."I hate raiding."
Great. wonderful. We GET it.
You made an explicit claim about how long raids take in WOW, I asked for examples of guilds that are interested in having people play with them (not even bringing in new members).
And I responded with the overarching theme of my post...that if you're APPLYING to guilds JUST so you can get uber loot, you're still not really being social. You're just using people...like you would an NPC in a single person game.
All I WANT is an example of people actually playing the game according to the raid timing you claimed was possible.
Ok. Me. There. My guild started off with 12 people (I wasn't one of them). After a couple of months, we were up to 30 (still not including me). Then a coworker convinced me to try WoW, introduced me to the guild, and I got in...by that point, we were up to 47. I pulled a couple of cool people in I'd met through PuG's. After awhile, we got up to 63 members (over 100 characters, if you include alts) and started raiding.
THAT'S how my little "uber raiding guild" developed. No "applications". No flat out rejections based on how people were geared or specced.
And there ya go. Satisfied? There's your example.
And I have no earthly idea why you think I'm interested in joining a raid guild.
I dunno...maybe because you were whining about how hard they were to get into? So...wait...you haven't even bothered trying to get into one, and you've already given up, because none of them will want you? Interesting.
I think I've mentioned in every single post that I have zero desire to raid or join a raid guild, so what would possibly give you the impression that I'd want to join one for phat lewtz?
Heh. See above.
I guess I'll make it clear to you: if a raid guild contacted me right now and offered to pay for my WOW account and powerlevel a character to 60 on their server and permanently give me first choice on any loot that drops on their raids, I would turn them down without a second thought.
Right...because you have ZERO desite to interact with the WoW community. Which means you were going to quit sooner than later anyway. You think your righteous indignation over the whole raiding structure was supposed to be some kind of wake up call to Blizzard? Wake up. You were EXPECTED to quit. MMORPG's RELY on community...those who don't participate get bored and quit. This is a reality all MMORPG companies understand.
Simply quoting your own words back at you has refuted your claim about how long WOW raids take.
Wow, you're all hung up on that one, aren't ya. Congrats. You've caught me in an "incomplete statement". Of course, the fact that anybody with an ounce of common sense understood that the "once you learn it" part is inherently implied probably wouldn't agree with you, but, whatever.
Ahh, sweet irony. I mean, you assumed that I wanted to join a raid guild for phat lootz even though I've said over and over that I don't want to join one at all.
Hint...if you don't want someone to assume you want to join a raid guild, THEN DON'T COMPLAIN ABOUT HOW HARD THEY ARE TO GET INTO!!!!!
Or are you just making this up, grasping at straws?
You assume that because I don't want to raid I don't want to participate in the community or make friends. What am I assuming, that you mean what you say?
But, from everything you've said...you don't. WoW is "just a game", and it's "social" significance is minor. That's the impression you're giving in your posts.
So you're saying that the majority of raid guilds, including Lokimer's guild, are the wrong people?
I don't know. I don't play with them.
On my main server, there was only one guild doing 40-man raids that did not use a DKP system, and they didn't do them all that often.
And? The point being? This goes back to finding your OWN guild, and growing it the way YOU want. No, you won't be jumping right into the phat lewtz right away, though. And you'll actually have to LEARN the encounters, instead of having people do it for you. That's the trade off. One you're apparently unwilling to make.
Finding a raiding guild that doesn't use some kind of complex accounting system in WOW is not exactly a common occurance.
Heh...the funny thing is, you make zero distinction between a "raiding guild" and a "guild that raids". I belong to the latter, where people are actually nice to each other, and we don't need to have our accountants sitting next to us while we play the game.
There is just so much wrong with this statement. For one thing, I never said PUGable content, I said group content - I most certainly did not say PUG only.
Why? If it ain't a PuG, then you have to *gasp* SCHEDULE A TIME TO PLAY A GAME! Which is, based on your earlier posts, a concept you're dead set against.
You've got that raider cultlike thinking going on, where you can't imagine a guild doing things as a group, only as a raid or nothing.
Nope, because I'm not a raider. I raid. There's a difference. A difference that the "non-raider cultlike thinking" can't comprehent.
Your claim that PUGable content does not foster community is not backed up by anything at all.
Really? Do you remember all the people you've PuG'ed with? Hang out with them on a regular basis? Chat about things other than "do we roll on that"? You DO? Here's a thought...grab all these people, and form the guild YOU want!
I don't think it's actually possible to have a community with no PUG content,
I NEVER said that! I never even came CLOSE to saying that. PuG's are important for initial meetings with people...as I said before, it's how we've recruited many people into the guild. They're a stepping stone, kind of like the initial handshake you give someone when you first meet them. But that's ALL they are.
as you need some way for people to spontaneously group together so that they can find out if they like each other. You said earlier that your guild only recruits people recommended by a guild member, so how does your guild member meet them and decide that they like them - is it some kind of static group, or some kind of PUG?
See above...I said something about grabbing cool PUG people too, but I'm too tired to look for it right now.
Every guild that I've ever talked to people from or have been in meets new people through PUGs (since guild groups will have guild people, and soloing is solo), so I'd have to say that PUGable content certainly does foster community since you need it to encounter new people for your non-PU group.
See above. At least you're TRYING to acknowledge the whole "community building" thing at this point, and for that, I applaud you. You still haven't said why raids DON'T do that.
Also, Molten Core is PUG-able, I remember reading on several servers where people were doing pick-up raids and taking down bosses, so you have something which is both a raid, which allegedly does forster cooperation and community, and PUGable, which alegedly does not. Which is it? Or do pick-up-raids foster cooperation and community, but PUGs don't?
See, what I find amusing about this statement, is that you take a very EXTREME, RARE case, and use it to try to prove your entire point. Didn't you accuse me of doing something similiar earlier.
If you're going to argue, argue CONSISTANT.
I didn't misunderstand your statment at all, you said that I was wrong for assuming that you liked raiding, not that you don't raid for raiding's sake. When your intent is not expressed in the words at all, it's irrelevant. It simply can't be true both that I was wrong for 'assuming' that you like raiding, and that you like raiding at the same time.
Huh? Whatever. Next.
OK, so what this boils down to is that you can't actually produce the MMORPG business model that you allegedly read, and didn't actually determine that it is universal among ALL MMORPG companies? Yeah, definately looks like you were just blowing smoke and hoping no one called you on it.
What's funny about this is you don't even ACKNOWLEDGE my request for 5 examples of guilds you left WoW because of raiding.
Word of advice? Challenging someone to "provide a link" is the easiest way to fight a forum argument. It's also the cheapest, and accomplishes absolutely nothing. I've read it (for A Tale of the Desert, actually....long story), and I was able to see the obvious connections with other MMORPG's. You don't want to believe it? Fine. Don't care. Irrelevent. Just like this whole debate.
You still haven't even bothered saying why raiding DOESN'T foster community. When shown how community increases the longevity of MMORPG's, you just kind of, well, dropped it. Why? Because you hate raiding, and anything that might put a remotely positive spin on it, you're going to disagree with. Not because it's logical, but because you hate it.
So, fine. Raiding sucks the big one. It takes 80 hours a week and is only for no-life dweebs who live in their parent's basements!
There. Now can I go back to discussing the ACTUAL topic of this thread with people? Thanks. Because honestly, I've seen all your anti-raiding arguments before.
That's compeltely irrelevant to the issue of whether your sweeping claim is actually a fact or is just something you made up because it sounded kind of plausible.
WAY to avoid the question entirely! Good job! I applaud you.
I mean, all that has to happen is for there to be ONE MMORPG company that doesn't share your motivations and you're wrong,
Guess what? That one MMORPG company will be out of business right quick, I can tell you that.
Ok...MORE pointless requests for links...find me ONE MMORPG company of any significant age that has endured with NO community. There. You'll probably call that one irrelevent too.
I think we'd all like to know how you verified that there is not one single counterexample.
Well, for me to verify counter examples, you need to give me examples. Something which you won't do, because any question that you don't like the answer to, you dismiss as irrelevent.
A common goal which is routinely worked towards by people in PUGs.
SMALL PUG's. DAoC requires LARGE groups, of people KNOWEDGABLE about working with the people they're with. You're really grasping at straws now.
Yes, that's right, DAOC battlegrounds don't require guild groups.
Well, if they wanted to SUCCEED, they'd BETTER be guild groups, or damn near guild groups.
Earlier you said "No, Blizzard makes content that will foster cooperation and community. Raids do that. Solo and PUGable content do not," were you wrong then or now?
The funny thing is, you think you've proven something here. All you've done is taken a few statements out of context, and understated other things. So I was right then, and I'm still right now.
Sure you have; I have repeatedly said that I do not want to participate in raids, raiding, or raid guilds (and from context and occasionally explicitly, PVE raids).
*sigh* The ENTIRE point of this discussion is WITHIN THE CONTEXT OF THE WoW GAME!!!!! Raids ARE the only way to do this...IN WORLD OF WARCRAFT. In other games, they do it other ways.
I have not said that I have any opposition to PVE content involving reasonably sized groups or PVP content (including large groups). Yet you repeatedly make statements like "EXACTLY! Because you don't have any desire to participate in the community, which, when it all boils down, is what ALL MMORPG's are all about. Which goes back to my argument that Blizzard isn't going to put a whole lot of effort into keeping people like you." You can't have it both ways.
Huh? No...I've been pretty uni-directional here. I'm only trying to "have" it one way, as you say.
The fact that every time I demolish one of your arguments you try to change the subject is a far, far worse sign for you.
I almost spit out my drink on this. You haven't even ACKNOWLEDGED my argument...that raids are there to foster community. You have to acknowledge a point, before you can actually "demolish" it.
Plus you repeatedly bring up an offhand comment about basement dwellers that I made while I just mentioned this once, so it looks like another spot that's a worse sign for you than for me.
No, I just like the term, because it sums up your attitude perfectly. That, and it always puts a funny picture in my head...of some 400 pound dude with little squinty eyes with crumbs and chocolate all over his face....
Oh no, I have plenty of ideas about it, they're just irrelevant as to whether or not anything you've said is true. I'm also not silly enough to assert that my ideas about why a company does something are absolute fact.
SHARE them! I say "raiding exists to foster community." You disagree. Fine. What does it exist for? I don't CARE that you hate raids. Whether you hate raids or not is what's actually irrelevent to this discussion.
The fact that I'm not willing to engage in irrelevant speculation on the motives of a company doesn't make your false claims any less wrong.
In other words..."I really don't have any ideas, but I'm going to condescendingly pretend I do". Right. Gotcha.
At this point, I'm pretty much arguing by quoting your own words back at you; you constantly contradict yourself.
It's easy to make someone contradict themselves, when you misquote and take things out of context. Politicians do it all the time.
There is no need for me to offer a 'counter idea' when your idea is so clearly wrong, especially since part of the problem with what you say is that you claim firm knowledge of things that are really just guesses on your part.
LOL. "You're idea is clearly wrong, because I hate raiding." Thank you, your argument has just been summed up.
Hey, why do raids exist, why don't they foster community?
Word of advice... when you're trying to promote an idea, it's best to have one strong enough to stand on its own.
Heh. Heh heh. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!
No, as I keep saying I don't have any idea to participate in RAIDING. Community is fine, it's RAIDING that I want nothing to do this. RAID != COMMUNITY. Let me it very simply: Me not want raid at all, me hate raiding. Me do like community.
Oh really? You don't want to join a guild unless it's a raiding guild. You don't want to do group content if you need to schedule it, so you only want to do PUG's. You, my friend, are a BASTION of the community!
LOL, of course you are. Word of advice: If you feel the need to tell someome that you're not being condescending, you probably are.
No, I feel the need to say that because the term "someone like you" usually leads or follows a condescending statement. I was trying to be nice. My bad. Guess that was pointless.
Your psychic abilities are wrong, as usual. I want to and have made actual friends in online games including WOW. What you don't understand is 'do not want to raid or be in a raid guild' does not mean 'does not want to make friends'; raid guilds actually discourage real friendship.
Couldn't agree more. The guilds you describe as raid guilds all suck. You should form up your many WoW freinds, form a guild, and raid the way YOU want. You'll find it's a hoot...kind of like a 5 man dungeon, but with lots more fun banter.
Actually, your explicitly asked me "What has Blizzard implemented that will keep you playing the game for a good long time? " so I answered the question that you asked.
Yup. Your answer was...."nothing".
And again, if you don't make new content that appeals to people, then they'll leave when they've exhausted the old content.
No, they'll leave when they realize that auto-attack, 1,2,1,2,1,2 is BORING GAME PLAY. Which it really is.
People who play 1-59 and leave are short-timers not because of some law of the universe, but because they played the existing content that appealed to them and blizzard decieded not to make more.
Actually, it IS a Law of the Universe. Want to hear what it is? Here we go:
Computer games get boring after awhile.
Woo hoo, another 5 man dungeon! Now I can press autoattack, 1,2,1,2,1,2 with a DIFFERENT BACKGROUND! Now THAT'S excitement!
Really? Where, exactly? Oh, this is probably another thing that you just made up and you're going to whine now that I've called you on it.
I'll admit that this was overstated. So now you can write a whole paragraph about how that invalidates the ENTIRE thread. Whatever. Don't care.
Oh no, better yet, it's actually YOUR CLAIM, lol. "By making these encounters so difficult that only a group who knows how to work together well can accomplish it, Blizzard encourages you to make friends...friends that you'll keep paying $15 a month to keep talking to."
Yup. Ridiculous. And you've done NOTHING to even acknowledge it.
Question. Why do raids exist? Why do they NOT foster community?
Once you can answer this question, come back. Until then, yes, we know you hate raids. We know you hate raiding guilds. Thank you. Move along. Nothing to see here.
ok, mikemonger, i'm sorry man, but after reading just THIS reply... you need help man.
I do? Really?
you need to go outside, meet some new people, get a job, get a significant other, get some pets (or kids), eseentially, an offline life.
Really?
6:30 am : wake up
7am-3 pm: work
3:20-5:20: work out at gym
5:30-6 (or so): dinner
6 (or so) - 11(or so): ??????? friends, girlfriend, WoW, whatever
11(or so): bed
Seems like a pretty normal schedule to me....
if the game creators wanted you to play because of a community, then they would HELP build said community.
They do.
look at the wow forums. the only thing those addle-coved mods build is a select group of bootie-kissing sycophants whom they love because of said bootie-kissing.
While I'm not going to argue that the WoW forums are a mass of shit, the greater bulk of the WoW playerbase doesn't know they exist.
if a game wanted to build a community, then why don't they host community events? instead of static, same old same old caca-poo things a million times? this is where eq screwed the pooch and a number of mmo's have mindlessly followed suit.
That Darkmoon fair thing? The stupid orphans thing? The whole war effort thing?
unless the last couple of releases for UO vastly changed it's gameplay, then that's one thing i can say UO did correctly -- no 12+ hour marathon adventures into a dungeon. of course, pre-carebear UO also did pvp right.
a truly socially active, community building game would be something like eve. wow is not conducive to "community" building in the slightest. check out forums for eve. find and apply to an appealing sounding corporation. then create a trial eve account. perhaps pay for the first month's sub after the trial ends. i'm pretty sure you'll see what a community building game does.
Ok. That's how Eve does it. And it's one of the few MMORPG's from a small company that's successful. I never said that raiding was the ONLY way to foster community. But it is how WoW has chosen to do it.
by the same token, you could probably try this with a game like Ryzom or even Horizons.
wow is a divisive, time-sucking black hole of mediocrity. true story.
Oh, there's nothing innovative or interesting about WoW's gameplay. Its all been done before, and sometimes better. I never said WoW was the greatest game around. I just said they use raiding to foster community.
Sheesh.
Question. Why do raids exist? Why do they NOT foster community?
Once you can answer this question, come back.um...
raids exist as a means for gaming companies to sucker people into wasting months of their lives farming the same exact maps/mobs ad nauseum in order to get the entire guild geared up so that everyone can dress alike. BORING.
"hey joe, here's the part where you run into the corner, do that flying hammer thing and keep aggro of the snake dude, and healer group 1, keep him alive. healer group 2, keep groups A, B, and C alive while they kill off the minions one at a time..."
sound familiar? what community is built there? a community that can farm an instance a bazillion times in their sleep?
the problem with this guild-based uber-gear-gathering community is that it IS geared to the lowest common denominator.
a random example jumps to mind.
there's this guild on hyjal. has a 19 year old boy who plays a girl dwarf warrior. after said boy had gotten his first purple piece of gear, it went to his head. his fragile psyche went into overdrive and all of a sudden, he knew everything about everything and if you didn't do things EXACTLY as he dictated, you were some sort of retard. yeah, i watched a number of the "special people" show themselves special in this very fashion, time and again, on many many toons in many many guilds in quite a number of MMOs. this is coming from someone that never really got into muds, but started playing online consistently with diablo (original).
THAT is the community this raiding fosters.
plus, the attitude of -- i'm so much better than all of you other people because i'm in the "Sweet Monkey Go Go Juice Hyper Team Lollipop Killah of No0bZ" guild.
another random example. i'm skilling up mining on some random lvl 38ish toon i have. i'm MINING a node. this girl gnome stands by me, just standing there. i figure i'll share, and let her take a hit (since i'd only taken two). chick bogarts it. see, since she was in this supposedly uber guild, ALL the mining nodes in the entire area were hers, BECAUSE she was mining.
she killed some mob that was so far away as to not be in sight, and she did that so she could mine the node. odd, i'd just killed four big ole spiders that were having a campfire singalong, with the bonfire ON TOP of said node...
so she logs onto a similarly named lvl 60 (which was actually in the "uber" guild) and is like "DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM?"
wow, gimme some community~!!
of course, i'm sorry, your community is only WITHIN said guild.
ok, let's take super friends - the legion of doom. there's your example of the special folks which comprise the majority of people in said guilds. yes, there's an incredibly disfunctional, factionalized community within said guilds. again, the majority of these are the jobless, the teen agers, and other people who REALLY need to spend more time offline.
so i guess maybe they're trying to just get people addicted, find weaknesses to exploit in the masses, and make $900+ million a year?
like i said in a prior post, places like blizzard have no intention or idea of fostering actual communities, as in "extended family" and "trusted friends whom i let borrow my car".
could we please get correspondent writers and moderators, on the eve forum at mmorpg.com, who are well-versed on eve-online and aren't just passersby pushing buttons? pretty please?
ok, mikemonger, i'm sorry man, but after reading just THIS reply... you need help man.
I do? Really?
you need to go outside, meet some new people, get a job, get a significant other, get some pets (or kids), eseentially, an offline life.
Really?
6:30 am : wake up
7am-3 pm: work
3:20-5:20: work out at gym
5:30-6 (or so): dinner
6 (or so) - 11(or so): ??????? friends, girlfriend, WoW, whatever
11(or so): bed
Seems like a pretty normal schedule to me....
if the game creators wanted you to play because of a community, then they would HELP build said community.
They do.
look at the wow forums. the only thing those addle-coved mods build is a select group of bootie-kissing sycophants whom they love because of said bootie-kissing.
While I'm not going to argue that the WoW forums are a mass of shit, the greater bulk of the WoW playerbase doesn't know they exist.
if a game wanted to build a community, then why don't they host community events? instead of static, same old same old caca-poo things a million times? this is where eq screwed the pooch and a number of mmo's have mindlessly followed suit.
That Darkmoon fair thing? The stupid orphans thing? The whole war effort thing?
unless the last couple of releases for UO vastly changed it's gameplay, then that's one thing i can say UO did correctly -- no 12+ hour marathon adventures into a dungeon. of course, pre-carebear UO also did pvp right.
a truly socially active, community building game would be something like eve. wow is not conducive to "community" building in the slightest. check out forums for eve. find and apply to an appealing sounding corporation. then create a trial eve account. perhaps pay for the first month's sub after the trial ends. i'm pretty sure you'll see what a community building game does.
Ok. That's how Eve does it. And it's one of the few MMORPG's from a small company that's successful. I never said that raiding was the ONLY way to foster community. But it is how WoW has chosen to do it.
by the same token, you could probably try this with a game like Ryzom or even Horizons.
wow is a divisive, time-sucking black hole of mediocrity. true story.
Oh, there's nothing innovative or interesting about WoW's gameplay. Its all been done before, and sometimes better. I never said WoW was the greatest game around. I just said they use raiding to foster community.
Sheesh.
nice double post within a single thread.
but the meat of what you posted sort of proves my point.
you felt the need to actually plot out and validate a schedule? you're obviously always right (in your mind) and never met a person who knew something you didn't already know, or had a better reply to (again in your mind). so with that, i leave you to your "opinions".
but to summarize = raiding is the EQ way of suckering people into paying for next month's sub. uo doesn't have raids. never did. you used uo as an example of community. well, um, no raids there, longest going mmo around. yeah, um, i'm not really going to try to expound further due to the *in my mind* thing you have going on.
could we please get correspondent writers and moderators, on the eve forum at mmorpg.com, who are well-versed on eve-online and aren't just passersby pushing buttons? pretty please?
Wow, so raids don't foster community because WoW is full of immature assholes.
You might actually be onto something there.
But you know what? Whatever. I try to point out that the reason raids exist is to foster community and build freindships, which in turn will keep people playing (and paying) longer. The responses to this concept I get are:
"Raiding sucks."
"I hate raiding."
"Raiding takes too long."
"It's hard to get into a raiding guild."
"Members of raiding guilds are elitist."
"I've had bad experiences with people in raiding guilds."
etc, etc.
I guess I'm the exception, not the rule. I raid because my guildmates actually enjoy hanging out with each other, and raids are one of only two ways where the bulk of the guild can get together and hang out.
So, to all you other people...I'm sorry your WoW experiences have sucked so bad. I'm sorry that you've never been able to find a way to make interacting with 9-39 other people enjoyable, because all you seem to run into are assholes.
I'm going to concede. Raids DON'T foster community. They only exist to keep people raiding. Why do they keep raiding, despite the fact that they suck hard? Shhhhh! We don't want to discuss that.
Raids suck. Raiders are no life losers. All raiding guilds are populated with nothing but assholes.
There. I'm one of you now.
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue."
That's what say you're discussing to try to score points, but it's not what you've actually been discussing. In your very first post, you said "No, Blizzard makes content that will foster cooperation and community. Raids do that. Solo and PUGable content do not." That is not simply a statement that raids build community, that is also a a statement that PUG content doesn't, and it neglects to even mention the organized group content that a lot of people bring up in these discussions.
You've also been stating (not really arguing) that "raiding" and "participating in the community" are the same thing, that if you don't raid you're not participating in the community. Here's a good example exchange:
Anyone with brain cells will note that I said that I have no desire to RAID, yet in your response you said I had no desire to interact with the community. That's very consistent throughout everything you've posted; if someome doesn't like raids or raiding, you declare that it means they don't want to participate in the community, which is clearly not true. When called on this, you either deny what you said or try to change the topic. That's why I'm not messing with your 'raids build community' bit, it's not what you're really discussing. You're clearly not trying to change topics away from anything you've written in the past, like your OP, and I'm not going to particiapte in that game.
You also play some bizzaro word games, I mean all anyone can really say about these is WTF; I mean, a painting crew is a crew that paints, a cleaning crew is a crew that cleans, a dancing guild is a guild that dances.
Plus there seems to be something really weird gaps in your reasoning I've said over and over how I don't like raiding at all, you've even complained that I've mentioned it far too much for you. Yet you actually posted something saying that there was a way I want to raid (hint: I don't want to raid, there is no way I want to raid)
And you have a tendancy to just make up crap; there's a bunch of things that you apparently just decided were true, I've pointed out a bunch of them below and stopped when I got bored:
Nope, that's just another one of those things that you made up. I've listed multiple other reasons for not liking raids, several of them right beside the time estimate you've obsessed on, and it clearly wasn't even a complete list of why I don't like raiding. In fact, I never even said that they were too long - you decided that a comment about scheduling blocks of time as a complaint about raids being too long.
For someome who doesn't want to make the conversation about me not liking raids, you spend a lot of time speculating about why I don't like raids and asking me to explain what I don't like about raids.
You have raider brain damage: there is something other than 'playing completely alone' and 'playing in a raid'. That's the crux of the problem in this discussion. That something is more people than are involved in, say, Solitare, but fewer than are involved in Molten Core.
Since I've listed multiple reasons for why I don't like raids, I'm not sure why you're acting like there's one possible reason. And I'm really not clear on how 'wanting roughtly equal PVP fights' instead of a walkover is supposed to be 'getting to the top of the heap'.
This quote really speaks for itelf. Remember that I haven't talked about applying to guilds or reasons for applying to one at all, it just makes it more absurd.
When did I say anything about how hard or easy raid guilds are to get into? I posted a quote from a guild's application page to back up my estimate of the time required for raiding. At no point did I say anything it being difficult to get into one, much less complain about it. And your chain of random ideas is just plain amusing.
The normal definition of "Pick Up Group" is one composed of people who mostly don't know each other, genrally a group formed by using LFG to find memebrs. It does not normally mean a group of people from a guild who decide to form up a party from who's playing at the time and run an instance. Using a vastly broader definition than normal doesn't really show anything.
People can make their own decision about how close saying that PUG content does not foster cooperation and community is to saying that it's possible to have a community with no PUG content.
Anyway, that's enough. I think it's clear enough for anyone who's actually reading the bottom of this over-long missive.
LOL Damian, your grey-text-quote fooled me into thinking you posted that buddhist bit. Whoever posted that is the one who needs to not PUI.
Why else whine about the gear for more of the same thing? wasting your life like gerbils running on a wheel going for that carrot on a stick... well have fun.. for the rest of us casuals give me the option for balanced pvp and I'd shut about gear all together.
Realmreaver formally of EQ, SWG, FFXI and WoW.
Malis/Pirotess of PSO.
Some named of Diablo 1 and 2
Grendel Kinguard of GW.
Realmreaver formally of EQ, SWG, FFXI and WoW.
Malis/Pirotess of PSO.
Some named of Diablo 1 and 2
Grendel Kinguard of GW.
raid bosses for items. I farm items to kill raid bosses, and that is
the mentality that keeps players playing for such a ,long time. They
don't see their fellow guildmates as tools to achieve personal and near
sighted goals. We see the guild itself as the next step in the game.
Building a guild, managing it's players, Farming items to make the
guild as a whole stronger to beat new bosses and compete with other
guilds. It's not a personal affair, but a community affair. [/quote]
if that is true, why do we need item rewards with ridicolously inflated stats at all? wouldn t the challenge itself and maybe rewards like titles or visually superior armor (as opposed to better stats) be a better way to keep the game fair for everyone, regardless wether they prefer 5mans, raids or pvp?
thinking of it, isn t that exactly what Blizzard promised before release but failed to deliver ?
yet there were no battlegrounds until like 9 months after release into retail...
that speaks worlds about blizzard and wow.
raids are dev's way of 1- being lazy with end game and 2- being uncreative with end game.
what in wow stimulates a player economy? not crafts, there's nothing you can craft that can compete with drops end game. you lose nothing when you die. items don't decay do they? your "player economy" is all from drops.
they/blizz lament that no one does outdoor pvp. why should you? they buffed up town guards to get a bazillion extras real quick. town guards never dropped loot worth much anything, nor did random enemy npcs.
no player housing. no outposts which can be taken and held by horde or alliance. there's just no reason to attack any enemy towns ever.
think about the "community" that would be built (throughout an entire faction) by there being objectives to take? if each zone has a dozen outposts that either side could claim, but only a single guild can claim any one objective.... there's something to build a community around.
not from the (and i speak from about 9 years of MMO gaming experience most of which was as a part of a guild or clan) "hey, check the calendar for when this 8 hour borefest will start. stock up on whatever pots you'll need. make sure you bring plenty of ammo if you use it. we should get 4-6 good items tonight, so if you haven't gotten anything lately, you should get a drop tonight." that's not community. that's a group of people, like the previous poster stated, gearing up to fight the next big bad in yet another lengthy farmable borefest.
could we please get correspondent writers and moderators, on the eve forum at mmorpg.com, who are well-versed on eve-online and aren't just passersby pushing buttons? pretty please?
That's what say you're discussing to try to score points, but it's not what you've actually been discussing. In your very first post, you said "No, Blizzard makes content that will foster cooperation and community. Raids do that. Solo and PUGable content do not." That is not simply a statement that raids build community, that is also a a statement that PUG content doesn't, and it neglects to even mention the organized group content that a lot of people bring up in these discussions.
And if you'd actually bothered to read and acknowledge some of my points, you'd see why I've said raids do it better than PuG's.
However, your debate style is to ignore or dismiss as irrelevent those points which help the other guy's point or hurt your own, so there's no point in even bothering replying to this post. Your response will exclude anything that doesn't help your cause.
You've also been stating (not really arguing) that "raiding" and "participating in the community" are the same thing, that if you don't raid you're not participating in the community. Here's a good example exchange:
Well, I guess I have been "stating" this...but that's only because you choose to excise the points I make as to WHY it builds community.
Anyone with brain cells will note that I said that I have no desire to RAID, yet in your response you said I had no desire to interact with the community.
Well, you'd prefer to do primarily solo and PuG content. Which isn't really overly social. But again...whatever. That's probably "irrelevent" too.
That's very consistent throughout everything you've posted; if someome doesn't like raids or raiding, you declare that it means they don't want to participate in the community, which is clearly not true.
No, if somone wants to stick primarily with solo and PUG content, they don't want to interact with the communmity. But again, whatever. Don't care.
When called on this, you either deny what you said or try to change the topic. That's why I'm not messing with your 'raids build community' bit, it's not what you're really discussing.
Right, exactly what am I discussing then?
You're clearly not trying to change topics away from anything you've written in the past, like your OP, and I'm not going to particiapte in that game.
I'm NOT trying to change topics away from my OP? What's wrong with that? How is that a "game"?
You also play some bizzaro word games, I mean all anyone can really say about these is WTF; I mean, a painting crew is a crew that paints, a cleaning crew is a crew that cleans, a dancing guild is a guild that dances.
Right. So all guilds who raid are "raiding guilds", all "raiding guilds" suck, and therefore my guild sucks.
Gotcha.
Plus there seems to be something really weird gaps in your reasoning I've said over and over how I don't like raiding at all, you've even complained that I've mentioned it far too much for you. Yet you actually posted something saying that there was a way I want to raid (hint: I don't want to raid, there is no way I want to raid)
No, you want the cool gear that comes with raiding.
And you have a tendancy to just make up crap; there's a bunch of things that you apparently just decided were true, I've pointed out a bunch of them below and stopped when I got bored:
Really? Yup. More of that "irrelevent" stuff I guess.
Nope, that's just another one of those things that you made up.
Not at all. I say, "raiding only takes 4 hours." You respond with "HAH! HAH! You said raiding only takes 4 hours! You NEVER said you had to LEARN the raids first! HAH! You're a lyer! Raids take MORE THAN four hours BEFORE you learn them! I just annihlated your point!"
I'm paraphrasing.
I've listed multiple other reasons for not liking raids,
And most of the responses I've made to those are, "than you're raiding with the wrong people." which you are. I then tried to explain how the rigth people makes it very enjoyable, which leads back into the community thing...but your response has univerally been "raids suck".
several of them right beside the time estimate you've obsessed on, and it clearly wasn't even a complete list of why I don't like raiding. In fact, I never even said that they were too long - you decided that a comment about scheduling blocks of time as a complaint about raids being too long.
No, I decided that your aversion to scheduling blocks of time was an indicator that you view the game strictly as a game, and not as a social event.
For someome who doesn't want to make the conversation about me not liking raids, you spend a lot of time speculating about why I don't like raids and asking me to explain what I don't like about raids.
I never asked you to explain why you don't like raids. I HAVE asked, repeatedly, why do raids exist, and why DON'T they foster community.
You have raider brain damage: there is something other than 'playing completely alone' and 'playing in a raid'. That's the crux of the problem in this discussion. That something is more people than are involved in, say, Solitare, but fewer than are involved in Molten Core.
Again, you use the term "raider" like its a bad word, an insult. I'm not a "raider", but according to you, because I raid, I'm a "raider". You're predjudiced.
Since I've listed multiple reasons for why I don't like raids, I'm not sure why you're acting like there's one possible reason. And I'm really not clear on how 'wanting roughtly equal PVP fights' instead of a walkover is supposed to be 'getting to the top of the heap'.
Fine, you're right. You've listed a lot of reasons for hating raids. And yet...you can't even list one reason why they DON'T build community, or why they exist if they suck so much.
This quote really speaks for itelf. Remember that I haven't talked about applying to guilds or reasons for applying to one at all, it just makes it more absurd.
Oh really?
I'll tell you what, point me to the websites of 5 guilds in WOW that can finish MC in 4 hours or less and are interested in acquiring or even retaining members who raid for a total of 4 hours per week spread out over 2 or more days. Surely if this is such a viable playstyle you can find way less than 1 guild per server where it would be possible to do.I'll tell you what, point me to the websites of 5 guilds in WOW that can finish MC in 4 hours or less and are interested in acquiring or even retaining members who raid for a total of 4 hours per week spread out over 2 or more days. Surely if this is such a viable playstyle you can find way less than 1 guild per server where it would be possible to do.
I've seen a lot of things like http://www.eternal-guild.com/?p=app "We raid Pacific Standard Time. We raid weekday evening's 5pm/pst - Midnight depending. We generally have a morning raid on Saturdays, no earlier than 9am. If you cannot raid with us during these times DO NOT APPLY." when looking at raiding guilds and not anything about 4 hours spread over 2 days. Those pages are actual facts; people actually doing raid content don't seem to agree with your belief that raids in WOW take only 4 hours and that not even in one day. Yet somehow, I'm the one making stuff up.
Both from your post made 5/20 at 2:29 pm. And unlike you, I threw the ENTIRE paragraphs in there, so as not to try to take stuff out of context. If you know how difficult it is to find "raiding" guilds, then obviously, you've tried to do it. Unless, of course, you just made all that up?
I know I know...you're going to respond something like "Yeah, well, just because I know how hard it is to get into a raid guild, doesn't mean I've ever actually TRIED to get into one!"
When did I say anything about how hard or easy raid guilds are to get into?
Heh. Heh heh. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
I posted a quote from a guild's application page to back up my estimate of the time required for raiding. At no point did I say anything it being difficult to get into one, much less complain about it. And your chain of random ideas is just plain amusing.
So, pointing out how difficult it is to get into a raid guild isn't complaining about how difficult it is to get into a raid guild. You know what? How difficult it is or is not is irrelevent. I don't care. You say things lile "raids guilds are hard to get into" and then follow it up with "I've never tried to get into a raid guild." You're right...it makes it impossible to argue with you, because you can sprout off anything you'd like, and then when it starts to work against you, deny it has anything to do with you.
The normal definition of "Pick Up Group" is one composed of people who mostly don't know each other, genrally a group formed by using LFG to find memebrs. It does not normally mean a group of people from a guild who decide to form up a party from who's playing at the time and run an instance. Using a vastly broader definition than normal doesn't really show anything.
So in other words, "I only want to play with 4 guildies at a time, because there are ALWAYS 4 guildies logged in who aren't doing anything, and make up the proper classes for a well balanced group.
Can't...argue with that, I guess. I know in MY guild, while there are always other people on, they're usually doing something else.....
People can make their own decision about how close saying that PUG content does not foster cooperation and community is to saying that it's possible to have a community with no PUG content.
Anyway, that's enough. I think it's clear enough for anyone who's actually reading the bottom of this over-long missive.
Yup. It's clear you do a nifty job of avoiding those questions that you don't want to answer.
Maybe I should start doing that. Just pick and choose the points in your posts that I want to respond to. Completely ignore the existance of points which actually help your point of view. That's your style of debate.
Anyway, why do raids exist? Why do they NOT foster community?
Yes, you're absolutely right. Raid gear skews the game in favor of the raiders. Someone decked out in a full set of the highest tier raid loot will dominate ANYBODY who isn't, regardless of relative skill levels.
You'll get no argument from me on this.
This ties back into my original point. To be the best of the best, you have to raid. Why? Because the only mechanic in WoW that encourages large scale cooperation is raiding.
It's not a question of the amount of time put in. It's a question of interacting with other players.
Other MMORPG's do it different ways, but ultimately, they all have the same thing in common...the more people that have to work together to accompish something, the greater the reward is.
Because of WoW's bad PvP design, there's really no way to accomplish that same level of codependence. You can sit back, move around a little bit, and still get PvP credit.
I never said that raiding was the greatest thing in the universe. That's what certain other people who have posted on this thread WANT me to say, though. If WoW introduced a mechanic other than raiding that encouraged the same level of player interaction, than that other mechanic will provide raid-level rewards.
But you'll never see solo or small group content for raid level epics. Blizzard will throw the occasional bone to the non-raiders (like the whole Slithius thing, for example), but ultimately, the best rewards will come from working with others. Many others.
Do you honestly not know the answer to this?
The answer is simply this:
The 2 head/main game designers were 2 leaders of some of the major raiding guilds in everquest. They have no actual experience beyond that. And they work on content that they themselves enjoy and not what the mass of the community would enjoy.
The simple question is this.
Why is it that raiders are against any means of upgrading through solo/group content to be equals(even if it took LONGER then an average player took to get up that high)?
NOBODY who wants group or solo content with equal rewards, doesn't want raids to be a part of the game. They are all for raids being the fastest way to obtain gear, but they want a way that they can become equals without raiding.
Lets say this is the time chart for how long it took to obtain the gear.(fake numbers, just a example)
Raid tier 3=1000 hours
Group/solo tier 3=1500 hours
PvP tier 3=...they said they are working on a skill based system for ranks or something so ionno in the future, but it should take about 1250ish hours. And have ranks NOT reset, since if your in raid tier 2, and quit for months you dont have to come back and start learning mc/bwl all over again.(also reduce honor from bgs by 2/3rds, and have your gears"item level" affect your chars "pvp level" and honor rewards... so a level 80 gear person would gain considerably less honor from a level 63 geared person)
Since if PvP puts in a equal time/effort they deserve equal rewards. SINCE WOW WAS MARKETED AS A PVP GAME BEFORE RELEASE.
And even IF raids did encourage a community. If someone got bored enough of the game that theyd quit... they wont stay because of the community.