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40-Man Raids: WHY most PEOPLE HATE THEM
dink
Member Posts: 438
Short Answer - They are made for hardcore acheiver types.
Long Answer - When you get to max level in WoW, the only things to do are to PvP in the battleground areas or to go on PvE raids to gain better loot. If you are a PvPer and want to be the best at it, then you ALSO have to go on PVE raids because the loot that is obtainable through 40-man raids is incredible, and you'll need it to be competitive. This means that the de facto endgame rewards effort and time-commitment.
Let's look at player-type motivations:
1. Casual Players - This is your most basic player. Lots of people get lumped into this play style, but really these are the people who just want to have fun. They don't really need specific content or special stuff. . . they just need fun that is easy to access and doesn't require them to do things out of the game - like applying to uber guilds, or setting up weekly play schedules to do 40-man raids. They'd be more than happy to play and beat 5 and 10 man raids or PvP though. If it's fun, and easy to get into.
2. PvP Players - These players are motivated by challenging other players to tests of skill. True PvP players (rather than greifers who are motivated by inflicting themselves on others) are looking for challenges. They like competitive games and thus are more likely to enjoy competitions that are even. They want real challenges of skill, and don't mind getting beat now and again as long as the game is fun.
3. Hardcorer players (aka Acheivers) - These players are motivated to distinguish themselves within the gaming community. They want to have the special swords, uber loot, titles and other "status" acheivements in the game. WoW's endgame suits them, because while they don't like having to form large uber guilds to meet their goals, or having to set up weekly events, they do like that they can do these things and acheive what they are motivated to do which is to feel special within the game community (Don't laugh if you are not an acheiver, other acheivers are envious of each other's loot and praise people with awesome loot. It happens all the time, and more power to them for it).
Casual gamers don't find 40-man raids or the setup for them fun, so they work directly AGAINST their motivation, and PvP players don't find them to be either competitive or to reward skill. In raids, you have to grind them over and over and only so many people will get a prize each raid. PvP players want to win or lose every time. . . like a basketball game. Also, with so much repetition, the challenge of raids soon becomes to stay awake during them. PvP players can't stand the lack of competition, the repetition, and the lack of challenge in the gameplay.
Only acheivers can endure these things. . . because while they still dislike the obstacles, their motivation lies beyond the obstacles directly. Casual players (motivated by fun and easy accessability) aren't going to work directly against their motivation and mess with joining uber guilds and setting up weekly raids, and PvP players (motivated by competitive tests of skill) aren't going to play a repetitive and unchallenging test of effort (rather tha skill).
Comments
All the controling behavior and loot drama I could deal with, although I would need to be sure to navigate the various pitfalls in a manner I am comfortable with, but since its boring there is no reason to do so. Achieving is part of why I play any RPG but I'm not neurotic enough to do something that isn't fun purely for in game achievement.
then playing diablo 3d.
Pvp was once great in this game now the mudflation and the honor system and the bgs turned it into a stinking pile of poo. I will remmber wow as a great example how to fuck up a game
The 5 man dungeons are fun because you get to play your class rather than a predefined role (shadow priest, paladin tank, druid dps, etc). Your input matters in each and every battle with few exceptions. You can be much more picky about who you spend your time with and therefor enjoy better company. You can also jump right into a 5 man and have a feeling of accomplishment without planning your life around your game time.
The fact that Blizzard places the best loot in 40 man raids is just insult to injury. Who would do a 40 man raid if the rewards were the same as an equally difficult 5 man? That's my point. 40 man raids suck. GG.
If it's not fun don't do it.
Simple enough?
They cannot give you "casual" content that goes on forever, there are only so many varieties of scripted mobs to kill. Yes I know going from level 1 to level 2 in 5 minutes was fun, but they cann't keep using that as a model for levels 60-120.
At some point its going to take killing thousands of murlocs to make the next level, and at that point it will become a "grind."
If you don't like PVE grinding, PVP and Raiding then I suggest you uninstall and move on because that's what MMORPG's are.
Grind for xp, grind for gold, grind for honor, grind for reputation, grind for skillups.
Grind=character development
Character development = MMORPG
Oh yeah and the people who think you need uberloot to do good in PVP are clueless.
why don't they come up with randomly generated non-kill quests off certain npcs? or have 100 npcs in an area which COULD offer X number of different quests, but you only get 10 randomly chosen npcs who will speak with you and give you work?
again, laziness and/or lack of talent.
even in wow, there could be all of these things, the people at blizzard choose to not make wow anything special or different. hence they force grinding upon it's players.
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?
fizzle - This is only true for games that are built for hardcore gamers and acheivers, did you even read the first post? I think the OP's point is that game developers could appeal to more players if their endgame content didn't cater exclusively to acheivers.
People do follow the advice you gave about leaving if you aren't having fun you know. Casual players will only do things they find fun, so they MIGHT make an alt after hitting level 60. . . but they might just as easily leave the game. Also, PvP players aren't going to do a crap-ton of PvE raids just to have a small chance to be the best in PvP (and don't talk to me about PvP gear - even the best sets compare poorly to the 40-man raid sets).
WoW has definitely painted themselves into a corner with this stuff. I don't see them ever making the game accessible to people who don't want to join uber guilds. Hopefully, the new crop of MMOs will learn to appeal to other player types.
fizzle - This is only true for games that are built for hardcore gamers and acheivers, did you even read the first post? I think the OP's point is that game developers could appeal to more players if their endgame content didn't cater exclusively to acheivers.
People do follow the advice you gave about leaving if you aren't having fun you know. Casual players will only do things they find fun, so they MIGHT make an alt after hitting level 60. . . but they might just as easily leave the game. Also, PvP players aren't going to do a crap-ton of PvE raids just to have a small chance to be the best in PvP (and don't talk to me about PvP gear - even the best sets compare poorly to the 40-man raid sets).
WoW has definitely painted themselves into a corner with this stuff. I don't see them ever making the game accessible to people who don't want to join uber guilds. Hopefully, the new crop of MMOs will learn to appeal to other player types.
they can, and do shai. we can only hope that by the time wow's expansion is realeased that they'll have started to change their ways and become UNlike eq.
wow is a pretty game. more talents trees and more viable high level talent builds would go a long way for them.
they can also just as easily add non-combat quests in at every patch. some with random riddles/mysteries. it doesn't HAVE to be a grind, ever. game devs just need to be CREATIVE.
honestly, how many npcs give quests right now? how hard would it be for a quest giver to give you one out of 5 possible quests? how hard would it be for that quest giver to have a total of 20 quests and to rotate to a different five every month or so? find old man withers, he was last seen by the trog cave. OMW is in the back of said cave, a captive. he's dying, wants you to relay a message (or two) to his family and a report to the king/magistrate. this leads to you helping his widow plant some crops, chase off X wolves before they kill Y cows, whatever, just stuff helping her. or maybe, his ghost appears and needs you to figure out what happened to something his widow misplaced. perhaps it's a deed to the land and the bank wants to take it over if she can't produce it. who knows. but for $750 million+/year, i'm thinking someone can come up with a plethora of noncombat options at all levels.
then again, they nerfed all reasons to do pvp combat outside of bgs (to include marking a bunch of npcs as civilian and heavily penalizing you if you kill them... what the...)... and the same devs wonder why there's no outdoor pvp any more....
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?
fizzle - This is only true for games that are built for hardcore gamers and acheivers, did you even read the first post? I think the OP's point is that game developers could appeal to more players if their endgame content didn't cater exclusively to acheivers.
People do follow the advice you gave about leaving if you aren't having fun you know. Casual players will only do things they find fun, so they MIGHT make an alt after hitting level 60. . . but they might just as easily leave the game. Also, PvP players aren't going to do a crap-ton of PvE raids just to have a small chance to be the best in PvP (and don't talk to me about PvP gear - even the best sets compare poorly to the 40-man raid sets).
WoW has definitely painted themselves into a corner with this stuff. I don't see them ever making the game accessible to people who don't want to join uber guilds. Hopefully, the new crop of MMOs will learn to appeal to other player types.
Could you provide me with an example?
Can you name 1 game with endgame content that meets your specifications?
And uh. Why aren't you playing it?
An example of an MMORPG with an accessible endgame? Nope. They are all designed for hardcore acheivers currently, though it looks like Gods & Heroes might do this by allowing you to supplement your party with player controlled minions (not like Guild Wars - these minions are an extension of your character - not crappy AI extras). Also, Age of Conan looks like they are considering keeping the uber guild barrier low. . . they might do 20-man as their largest possible uber guild raid.
So, of course, I WILL be playing it when such a game is created.
An example of an MMORPG with an accessible endgame? Nope. They are all designed for hardcore acheivers currently, though it looks like Gods & Heroes might do this by allowing you to supplement your party with player controlled minions (not like Guild Wars - these minions are an extension of your character - not crappy AI extras). Also, Age of Conan looks like they are considering keeping the uber guild barrier low. . . they might do 20-man as their largest possible uber guild raid.
So, of course, I WILL be playing it when such a game is created.
Huh. That's pretty much how I would have replied.
fizzle - This post isn't really about changing WoW. They aren't going to reinvent their endgame to make it more accessible to casual players and PvP players. It is a game that is suited to hardcore acheivers.
I'm just trying to point out to hardcore acheivers WHY people hate 40-man raids. It's not because they are lazy or unskilled as hardcore/acheiver types often point out. Obviously casual players and PvP players run the gambit of vigorous to lazy and l337 skillz to complete noobs, just like hardcore/acheiver players. The difference is that these other types of players are not motivated to enjoy competitions that are based on effort.
Casual gamers want challenges that are fun. PvP players want competitive challenges that award skill. Only the hardcore/acheiver gamers wants challenges that reward effort. . . and actually many of them don't like challenges that require effort and time commitment because they become bored. . . but it is a way for them to fulfill their motivation - which is to feel special within the game community.
Btw, shai is correct that no one has made an MMORPG that has focused on creating an endgame that appeals to casual gamers, but several successful games have focused on an endgame suited for PvP players. Guild Wars is notable because you can access the endgame loot through PvE or PvP. They have an interesting dual system. Imagine how excited PvP players would be if they could unlock the 40-man raid gear by playing in PvP arenas that set up matches as quickly and easily as they do in Guild Wars.
Also, DAoC was built on the concept of Realm vs. Realm PvP. After they added huge uber guild raids in their Trials of Atlantis expansion, they took a huge hit in membership as so many of the dedicated PvP crowd hated the new PvE raids and how they created such imbalance in PvP. They actually created new servers where the Trials of Atlantis expansion has been removed and they are the most popular servers in the game.
I think it will be really interesting to see how well Gods & Heroes will do. It is shaping up to be a real AAA title, which you might expect with Stieg Hedlund as the lead game designer (He created Diablo, Diablo II, and Starcraft). If they make an endgame that doesn't require people to join uber guilds and schedule raids in order to access the game's uber loot, then I think they'll have a ridiculously popular hit on their hands.
Though I don't think it will be as big as WoW is. . . WoW is a phenomenonal game, AND it is based off a phenomenal existing IP. I'm not bashing WoW - it rocks - I'm just explaining why most people hate the 40-man raids in it's endgame.
Here's a discussion thread I saw when I boredly looked back at the WOW forums today. This is the kind of nonsense that raiding perpetrates. It's nothing absurdly over-the-top like 50DKP minus, just a 17-page mess that shows the kind of fun you can have while raiding.
http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-dungeons&t=526853&p=1&tmp=1#post526853
Pantastic - What is really interesting about that thread Pantastic is that I bet the druid didn't quit because of a belt that he clearly could have taken if he had invoked his DKP and guild status to get.
I bet he left that guild because his motivation as a hardcore/acheiver type was already fulfilled. He already had the cool stuff, so there really isn't anything more for him in the game except to hold his guild hostage.
From what I read, he quit because his guild status didn't let him get it, and that he doesn't have everything he could want to get since he's just got healing junk. But honestly, I don't care either way. He could be the biggest dick in the world, or incredibly justified, and it makes no difference. The real point is that I don't want to be involved with pretty much any of the people or issues on the thread. When people think about their 'game' that way, it's just not something I want to touch.
Although that thread disgusts me in many ways, to be fair most of the posters are telling the OP the she/he and the other guild officers are idiots.
Back on point:
Raids are disliked by people like me because they are boring and silly. I mean come on is Nefarian so stupid he just sits there and whacks on an MT? Oh hey I'm a huge smart magical immoratal dragon and I can't even aim my AOE breath weapon the right way. I wonder what that raid group did to make Nefarian have an IQ of 5.
Raids are disliked for quite a few reasons. But they are also liked by some. And that is fine, to each their own
But they are hated for two main reasons:
-The disgusting social aspects: elisitism, horrible greed, controlling mentality, conformity, etc. The larger the roster requirement the worse this tends to get
-The exclusivity of playstyle that muscles out other playstyles. Some WoW devs (Tom Chilton, whether you like Evocare/Kalgan or not he is a Senior Lead deisgner) have explicitly stated they don't think 40 is necessarily any harder than 10. Most players (probably) also agree with this so they begin to hate the idea of 40 man raids. Favoritism will breed hatred, that is just the way it is. This is different than something like the guild ranking in Guild Wars since anyone can work up to chance to beat the #1 and everyone playing at taht level has the same skills/items available. In the end GW is put up or shut up. Raiding has no dynamic like this, its just people farting out opinions about what is "hard". Since one side gets rewarded more than the other this breeds hatred. It will always do so if you choose to arbitrarily reward one group over another. The key word is "arbitrary".
The first one can be avoided by not being in a guild with a**hats. This may be a simple solution, it is not an easy solution. However the a**hat-ery is very prevalent and therefore gives raiding/raiders a bad name. Plus alot of the a**hats tend to congregate together and then think their ideas are validated because their guildies agree with them.
The second one can only be prevented by the game devs themselves. They should have implemented parallel advancement paths with very similar loot rewards. There are "achievers" who raid and ones who don't raid. If you make one "better" than the other you will have a war. That they didn't see this a mile away is amazing to me. When you have system of "haves" and "have nots", they always hate each other, always. The only thing I can think of is they honestly believed they could herd everyone into raiding.
It is possible to raid "casually" in WoW. Its highly dependent on alot of things, mostly social, but it is numerically possible and some people do do it. I think this was probably Rob Pardo's vision from the beginning. Basically EQ was a great game but it had some clunks, from his point of view. If we just make it more streamlined and doable in managable chunks then that will be great.
But that is immaterial. Blizzard has a large number of paying customers who never intend to step foot in a 40-man. If they do not implement 10-man with very close gear there will always be a war rife with hatred untill all the non-raiders simply quit. The fact is that your "value" in WoW is based on skill/competence/intelligence, level, and gear. The first two are equal(potentially) the third is not. When you make people less valued based on something arbitrary like birth, guild connections, skin color, play style etc they will hate you. And many people see raiding = endgame as completely arbitrary, ie. unjustified.
Its just the star-bellied sneeches from Dr. Suess. Except the sneeches were smarter in the end than most WoW players or the developers for that matter.
This is entirely separate from mudflation and crazy itemization that is also occurring. Although that is currently happening through raid in WoW, that is merely happenstance. This may bug alot of PvPer's but they understand that its on Blizz not really raids or raiders. It could have easily happened through 5-mans if Blizz had chosen to make MC/BWL/AQ/Naxx 5-mans.
fizzle - This is only true for games that are built for hardcore gamers and acheivers, did you even read the first post? I think the OP's point is that game developers could appeal to more players if their endgame content didn't cater exclusively to acheivers.
People do follow the advice you gave about leaving if you aren't having fun you know. Casual players will only do things they find fun, so they MIGHT make an alt after hitting level 60. . . but they might just as easily leave the game. Also, PvP players aren't going to do a crap-ton of PvE raids just to have a small chance to be the best in PvP (and don't talk to me about PvP gear - even the best sets compare poorly to the 40-man raid sets).
WoW has definitely painted themselves into a corner with this stuff. I don't see them ever making the game accessible to people who don't want to join uber guilds. Hopefully, the new crop of MMOs will learn to appeal to other player types.
Could you provide me with an example?
Can you name 1 game with endgame content that meets your specifications?
And uh. Why aren't you playing it?
one could just as easily ask why are you so defensively hostile and negative towards other people, CONSISTENTLY? need a hug?
UO
Ryzom
Horizons
Eve
NWN (some noob keeps bringing it up as an mmo, so i might as well too. you can't honestly tell me that leveling ANYTHING in nwn is a grind...)
Shadowbane (3 hours tops to get off noob island, less if you're in a guild and just go to their crib; and then it's war baby~!! is killing your enemy players considered a grind?)
what about secondlife?
or um, every game that's NOT an eq-clone and has some original qualities to it?
dunno how many (if any) meet shai's specific wants, but um there's no antisocial 5000 hour raid grind (which was thought of and implemented by what is easily the absolute worst gaming company on the face of the planet-soe) involved in any of those.
edited to add:
before anyone posts anything ignorant, full of typos, no punctuation and blatantly childish... the title of this thread is 40-Man Raids: WHY most PEOPLE HATE THEM. the section i've quoted is to what i am replying. there, i said it, i broke it down for everyone. this thread is not "welcome fanbois"; it is not "tell me what you love about wow and why it's better than god". i just want to be incredibly clear on this point; because there's a growing number of fanbois who have an incredibly hard time communicating in complete (or even semi complete) thoughts via the forums. these posts are increasingly hard to read. sorry.
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?
Your explanation is quite good.
However you forget something...I am a hardcore achiever and I trash any raider I meet on every day God give me! So don't say that ALL hardcore achievers enjoy this! Uber guilds are crowded with casuals noobs with nothing but time to waste and the lethargy required to follow a few skilled leaders (these leaders have my respect, although we would meet at a blade edge, yet most of them avoid me, not out of fear, out of respect, despite all my hatred, they often see more value in me then in their followers and seeing me angry instead of actually competing sadden them, but that is another story and if I can bring a confrontation, I will, no matter how slim my chances are since some of them are plainly amazing).
I prefer a casual game over some raiding trash...of course...I dream of the perfect MMO, where casuals are happy and the best players in the zones populated by 95% of the server, and I am level 4594723943743895 on the 935721947430 layer of the Abyss killing some overgrown Kobold!
Not all achievers are dumb and endure everything, I endure everything that is FUN. Yeah, camping the hardest stuff, the longest hours, the harsh reality of achievement, as long as it is remaining...FUN.
The average raider is not an achiever, he sit on his A** and wait to earn DKP while the few achievers work the stuff out, yes they are lead by achievers, extremely skilled achievers who have my upmost respect on skill-brain oriented gaming consideration. But those achievers are evil and a minority, and their followers who are the core of the raiding folks are nothing but overgrown couch potatoes!
And despite the fact they merely need a few achievers for every 50 couch potatoes, Uber Guilds are falling apart, in pure deficit of skilled achievers...as achievers are not THAT attracted by those Uber Guilds. There are far more couch potatoes available for any uber guild than the very few skilled achievers they have. Often such Guild crumble to near nothingness after losing nothing but 3 or 4 persons...replacing them with dozens of couch potatoes only hasten the fall, as more couch potatoes require more achievers to work, but they are short of a few already...Nah, raiders are an insult and a joke to any real achiever, unless you are talking of the very few who lead it (not necessarily the official leaders), but those are sooo screwed outside-in, they deserve a good beating until comon sense come back into their thick skull!
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
Also in a later post I think Damian summed it up pretty well with games that aren't PvE grinding. SWG had the potential to have the best PvP end game with the rebel vs empire war but they fucked that up hard with fleet engagements etc. But no use whining over spilt milk. In City of Heroes you have base raids where you attack a hero or villain base and they are defending the base they designed are there any rewards for it no victory or defeat its primarily for fun.
There are may ways to equalize the gap between have and have nots. If I could get a set of armor = to tier 2 through a long ass line of linked quests that could take me 4 months I wouldn't care it would be fun, I may not be geared as fast but I could at least sit down with some friends do some quests do some pvp and still progress my character.
Other than that I think everyone else summed up the reasons why 40 man raids are hated its so damn annoying dealing with organizing 40 people etc.
gestalt11 - That was one of the most insightful posts I've ever read on a gaming forum.
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?
Yes, but the reasons they give for that are all pretty telling. Long discussions of who 'deserves' video game loot more (it's some pixels, agree who gets it or roll for it, and just move on). Every one of them agrees with some DKP-style accounting system in place primarily to reward attendance and 'value to the guild. Lots of blather about raid "progress" and putting the guild before the individual, nothing about anyone having fun or especially the person in question having fun. Lots of people clearly power-tripping on being able to tell someome else what they're allowed to do with their own character (like specs and loot). Clear unwillingness to even try new things from most of them (very few even entertain the idea of druids and preists doing anything but healbotting).
What possible reason would I have for wanting to game with ANY of these jerks? I don't want a second job that pays in phat lootz, I don't want absurd drama over video game pixels, I don't want petty power-tripping, I don't want to game on some set schedule, etc. Every single poster puts either loot or 'guild progress' ahead of being friends in the guild or of just having fun (and especially of each person having fun), whereas I prioritize my fun and gaming with friends and acquantinces that I enjoy WAY over purple pixels or how fast we learn the script for some boss.
THAT'S why so many people hate guilds that have much of anything to do with raiding, and people involved in raiding get so tied up in it that they don't even think of these kinds of things as important.
you have your gear.
now, your paper doll has your standard set-up with each piece of equipment having a slot. ok, now where we differ is that your paper doll has a pvp page and a raid page.
so you click on your raid page. on here you see undergarments for armor and/or embellishments.
for example:
head - head band, earrings, doo-rag, bandana, eye patch, feather (like on a string tied to your head and hanging freely)
chest - an insignia/crest, chain undercoat, leather undercoat, cloth/silk undercoat, sash, spikey shoulder pads
sword - scabbard, sword-runes, sword-gems?, new pommel, blade-enhanced by magic/mystic/runic/legendary powered sharpening stone, blade oiled with X brand oil
ok, those are quickies off the top of my head, but you see where i'm going. you have your armor, which is your armor everywhere. in raids, you DON'T get actual armor/weapons, all you get are the enhancements.
then you have a pvp page. as long as WoW is using the instanced BGs, then you can have the same sort of items available on faction vendors and for pvp rankings.
now, these are completely separate from the diablo-style changes they're planning (i.e. sockets). sockets would be on your main armor page. BUT, that's also a thought. you could have sockets on your pvp/raid pages which would further enhance your weapons/armor.
now, the ONLY time the enhancements from your raid page work are when you're in a raid instance. same for pvp enhancements.
as wow currently is, neither enhancement type will work in the normal world or in 5 man instances. i would actually like to extend that to 10 man instances. this way you have 5 and 10 man instances in which you can get actual item drops.
on the pvp side, i would want to increase the AB/WSG map sizes, put in random maps for all three BGs, and random mob spawns in all the BGs. these mobs will have up to boss ranks with them. bosses will drop blue enhancements and the rare purp. this way, you have added incentive to be in all the BGs.
now, the ones that are all gungho about raiding... why would you not like this? if you want to pvp, since pvp is a totally different world in WoW -- you should have no issues at all with this. you gained your gear raiding, not pvping. same thing but in reverse, for pvpers.
and again, just thrown in because it needs to be done -- a fourth talent tree for all classes. if they want to be lazy, steal a talent tree from another class. i'm sure you could slightly modify talents in certain trees to make them usable by other classes.
a final thing about the enhancement and item drops ... this opens the door to make craftable items equal to the best drops. they too will be able to be enhanced by the pvp/raid enhancers. and add in the dreaded max durability item decay. if you don't like it, too bad. if items don't last for ever, then you HAVE to buy more, which means you're stimulating the economy.
now, craftables being equal to the best drops means that the gold farmers just lost their lock on the market. everyone in the game can craft. that means that in your guild, you're going to have a bazillion folks that can craft stuff and you can get free (if you're in a guild worth a flip).
if you've never extensively played a game where you can lose items or that has item decay, then there are only two words for you on this topic (this topic being item loss and item decay) - shut up.
you have no opinion here, you have no right to input what you think it might do. your conjecture on this point is irrelevant and no one in the world cares a whit. if you still reply on this point, while having no experience in this arena, then that equals you inviting the world to slam you mercilessly.
my sincerest apologies for the bizarre caveats. some barely readable posters are just annoyingly asinine on topics which they have no knowledge.
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?
Yes, but the reasons they give for that are all pretty telling. Long discussions of who 'deserves' video game loot more (it's some pixels, agree who gets it or roll for it, and just move on). Every one of them agrees with some DKP-style accounting system in place primarily to reward attendance and 'value to the guild. Lots of blather about raid "progress" and putting the guild before the individual, nothing about anyone having fun or especially the person in question having fun. Lots of people clearly power-tripping on being able to tell someome else what they're allowed to do with their own character (like specs and loot). Clear unwillingness to even try new things from most of them (very few even entertain the idea of druids and preists doing anything but healbotting).
What possible reason would I have for wanting to game with ANY of these jerks? I don't want a second job that pays in phat lootz, I don't want absurd drama over video game pixels, I don't want petty power-tripping, I don't want to game on some set schedule, etc. Every single poster puts either loot or 'guild progress' ahead of being friends in the guild or of just having fun (and especially of each person having fun), whereas I prioritize my fun and gaming with friends and acquantinces that I enjoy WAY over purple pixels or how fast we learn the script for some boss.
THAT'S why so many people hate guilds that have much of anything to do with raiding, and people involved in raiding get so tied up in it that they don't even think of these kinds of things as important.
Couldn't have said it better myself cheers.
Yes, but the reasons they give for that are all pretty telling. Long discussions of who 'deserves' video game loot more (it's some pixels, agree who gets it or roll for it, and just move on). Every one of them agrees with some DKP-style accounting system in place primarily to reward attendance and 'value to the guild. Lots of blather about raid "progress" and putting the guild before the individual, nothing about anyone having fun or especially the person in question having fun. Lots of people clearly power-tripping on being able to tell someome else what they're allowed to do with their own character (like specs and loot). Clear unwillingness to even try new things from most of them (very few even entertain the idea of druids and preists doing anything but healbotting).
What possible reason would I have for wanting to game with ANY of these jerks? I don't want a second job that pays in phat lootz, I don't want absurd drama over video game pixels, I don't want petty power-tripping, I don't want to game on some set schedule, etc. Every single poster puts either loot or 'guild progress' ahead of being friends in the guild or of just having fun (and especially of each person having fun), whereas I prioritize my fun and gaming with friends and acquantinces that I enjoy WAY over purple pixels or how fast we learn the script for some boss.
THAT'S why so many people hate guilds that have much of anything to do with raiding, and people involved in raiding get so tied up in it that they don't even think of these kinds of things as important.
Yes but you see this sort of stuff in any clique. That is all the raiding scene is just some another slant on cliques. Fraternities, Sororities, sports teams, etc.
Guilds in WoW and EQ etc are extremely similar to Fraternities in American colleges.
I won't deny all the things you say are prevalent in that thread. Like I said in many ways reading it just makes me ill. But that thread is not monolithic, there are alot of different slants even among the raider cult. And I do think the uber-guild raiding subculture is rather cult-like. But for every super uptight completly devoted cultist there is a more relaxed one who was disgusted by the situation and even a few who know its a cult and just go along with it because they don't care.
No offense but I don't go to an American College. And I don't do cliques. Like everyone else, I did when I was younger, but they sucked then too. My life is well beyond that point. I don't wish to return to that way of living. Ever. Especially not, while relaxing in my own home playing my own game, which I pay for on my own computer. I mot certainly do not pay money to be treated that way. Quite the opposite.
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Big raids are boring. What you as an individual are doing within the team doesn't make a lot of diiference. If you sat at the back and did nothing all would still work. There is not so much challenge or sense of personal achievement. The level of team co-ordination is very low compared to a 5 man instance.
What's worse is the loot motivation. This attracts friction. My guild who were a lovely bunch of people would insist that all loot was to have first dibs by the guildmaster and his best mates. And he would set up the looting this way. Since it was only certain members of my guild who wished to play that way, I simply made a point never to raid with the manipulators.
In the end however to develop my toon further I got to the point where I wanted to go on raids and high level instances. The clan were of course always asking me, since they wanted the numbers to do the big raids, but they were also assuring me that I wouldn't see any of the loot (although I'm sure they wouldn't see it that way), and insisting that I must recalibrate my toon to their specification if I was ever to be considered for any loot of my class.
They were all great people, and they could justify 100% why them cherry picking all the loot was best for the guild. And wasn't I a guild player?
And my answer was "It's been a pleasure and privilage being invited to and participating in your guild, I hold you all in the highest regard and hope to bump into you at Ogrimmar in the future".
I would rather play in pick up teams with strangers who I can trust.