I didn't ask to abolish raiding. I want the gaming companies, for once, to put out at least one MMO that doesn't cater to raiders, just one frigging game out of the dozens already on the market.
With PvE raiding, it has never been a question of being "good enough". I play games to have fun, not to be a simpering toady sitting through hour after hour of mind numbing boredom and fawning over a guild master in the hopes that he will condescend to reward me with shiny bits of loot. But in games where those people get the highest progression, anyone who doesn't do that will just be a moving target for them and I'll be damned if I'm going to pay money for the privilege. - Neanderthal
I must say I love MMOs. I have played most of them since UO, EQ, DAoc, till present day MMOs. I Hate PvE raids. At first, it was cool and exciting to kill a dragon, be the first in game to see a certain locaiton in a game, or get that uber loot. But, for some reason game designers think that we players want to raid for 6-12 hours at a time, they think we want to have to kill a boss 50+ times to get the item we are looking for, and they think we enjoy how mmos are implementing end game content.
My hatred of time consuming raiding has pushed me towards pvp games. I would rather fight a dynamic war against other intelligent players than some over scripted googleplex hitpoint having immune to everything dragon. I still enjoy MMOs, I just prefer games where the end game content is PVP related.
I will not play the eq, eq2, wow, or vanguard style raid games anymore. I like the games with mass pvp, realmwars, real human opponents, and objectives that players can work as a team towards while opposing other players trying to achieve those same goals. I have played many pvp oriented games such as UO, daoc, planetside, eve, ect... and I am still searching for a game that gets the open pvp style of game right. I am looking for a polished game, with true player competition. A game that provides a battliefeild for players to script thier own wars as opposed to a scripted war for players to take place in. A pvp game where there is definate and clearcut goals, rewards, and winners (for the time being). I can't think of one pvp mmo where you can win a war. (maybe because there are no winners in war? but thats a differnt discussion.) I dream of the day a company like Id software decides to do an open PvP sci-fi mmo with a persisant world(s) and fair, competative, well designed combat. A game hasnt pulled if off yet, but someday... and I'll be eager to play it.
"Well it's easy to make broad statements about how raiding is boring and overused, but the simple fact is that raiding exists in games BECAUSE people do enjoy it. Call them the silent majority if you like but since DKP actually meant killing dragons in EverQuest, most of the really successful MMOs have has raiding in some form or another. I personally don't look forward to farming instances for days for drops, but a large segment of gamers apparently have no problem with it judging by the massive number of players still doing it in World of Warcraft."
I wish people would research this before they post this like its the law. If you woulda researched hard numbers then you would came across the Blizzard presentation whereas they claim less than 5% of their populace raids. I personally dont know any raiders out of like 10 WoW players
Sometimes I wish the whole raid issue would just go away. You can't even find a casual game that doesn't force you to raid end game. Even City of Heroes (which I consider to be one of the most casual friendly MMOs on the market) forces you to raid Hamidon in order to upgrade your powers beyond what casual play can do. Ultimately, I'm sick and tired of the developing companies completely ignoring a significant portion of their market just so they can add some false sense of longevity to their games. Why do casuals have this stigma of being flighty and moving from game to game? Its because these developers refuse to actually cater to us, so why the hell should we stick around or show loyalty to any company that screws over our play style. I've had it with thier business models. I'm sick and tired of developers with chips on their shoulders who are unbelievably adversarial with casuals and our desires. I've given up on the whole genre and will not likely return in the near future. I'll consider subscribing to a MMO, if and only if it doesn't include any form of raiding period. Until they create a MMO that caters to the casual play style from beginning to end, they won't get another dime from me.
I feel ya brother. but I am here to deliver the gospel. WAR so promises not to have any raiding accoridng to the article here on this site
edit- and yeah I feel ya on CoX too. Was loving it til I hit 50 then discovered was huge difference between played using Hami-Os and those without. the icing on the cake is Issue 9 will be adding auction houses andf making the game more loot driven
The overwhelming majority NEVER raid in the endgame. Raiding exist BECAUSE devs want to keep some players hooked and they appeal to the worst players, social gankers. Bearing FoH or LoS or AL? You're kidding me? This is a TINY MINORITY, and a social gankers minority on top of that! Yes, I am a tiny little boy who cry at about been stealed my grouping-toys...however everything rational in me tell me that I am right and that it is unfair!
Casuals they love invites, offers, and options. These guilds are doing the OPPOSITE of what the casuals want. You have to follow rules A, B and C which are all turning you into a cold jerk! They are removing options, they insist that someone must have A, B or C to even group them/join them. These guilds hate to do PUGs, casuals love to do PUGs...and I am honestly happy to provide them a PUG if I can. These guilds, they would DESTROY loot rather than sell it to casuals, they have done it on many occasions and I was a witness and I find these guys deserving of nothing but raw hatred.
Raiding in it actual form is appealing mostly to the social gankers... Good raiding could be built, but it would first have to not be enforced on anyone. Best groupers deserve to be groupers! Not social gankers! Long ago, PvP-makers learn to not listen to gankers who request open FFA with full looting; they seem to be unable to make the same for PvE. Both results in the same situation, the powerfull abuse the needy. A powerfull player should lead by example no matter how silly this sound, not be rude with new players...and uber guilds are rude to everyone who doesn't raid with THEM; and they are usually rudes among themselves as well! These guilds even have rules that you have to DITCH your group regardless of anything else, come on, how more of a jerk can these be?
hehe you never stop whineing about this do yah lol. Seems like you had alot of bad experiences. Personally with out raid content or something more than standard group. You run out of content really fast. Grouping is fine and all, and yes i hate pug. normally cause you never know what moron you'll get stuck with. If there was a way to check the players iq before inviting them, then pug would be great. I much rather stick to people I know that can play, or invite people to join me when i know i wont be needing them.
There has yet to be a game that is forced raiding, true you will not have the best gear in the game by solo/ grouping, but you will still be good enough for that type of content. that and following set rules for raiding dont turn you into a jerk they are there for a reason. Plus requiring a certain class to have skills need to be effective are also there for a reason. That and 99% of the time raiding guilds have a schedule and they know when a raid will be called if the player joins a group before a raid they know how long they have to play in your group.
Also alot of raids are going away from the 8 hours to complete, most of the ones now days unless your learning it for the first time can be done pretty fast. Eq1 our average per target is 30 to 45 mins, raid zones a little over an hour, wow normally not more than 2 hours per zone.
that and if you think its a tiny minority that want to raid i think you off many would love to raid only a few can acctually make it. I constantly see people that just are clueless how to gear up and build a character useful for raiding. Also no reason to jump to an uber guild it doesnt take long to take a family guild and start them on the path of raiding and going thru targets as long as you get a decent raid leader.
But when it comes to you Anofalye groupers will be sub par players in the end thats just the way mmo's go. If you want to just be a grouper then deal with the fact youwill not be the best on the server. Really if your a grouper that shouldn't matter go enjoy the mindless grind the groupers do. I rather be raiding then grinding forever in a group. Which only about 1% of groups even really talk its more canned phrase to let everyone know when a heal is coming or a mob is incoming. Or at the end of the mission asking hey want to go again. probally why i avoid grouping as much as possible
Actually, it is forced raiding. When the end game is only about raiding and its the only avenue of improving your chracter, then you either have to do it or re-roll or quit. Being forced to do it sucks the big one, having to re-roll just delays the inevitable and it forces you to rehash old content. I just happen to be one of the ones who quits rather than financially support a MMO that could give a rat's ass about my play style. I keep discussing the issue on various boards in the hopes that a developer might have a brain fart and actually program entertaining content that isn't based on 4 - 8 hour stints of raiding ad nauseum.
By the way, all of the raiding games out there DO NOT offer raiding on a 30 minute to 1 hour schedule. The shortest I've seen is around 2 hours for a Hamidon raid in City of Heroes. The rest of the MMO's, even with recent expansions all clock in around 4 to 6 hours or even longer. Keep in mind, its not just the ridiculous time requirements that make some of us upset. Its their insane repetitiveness that is also a fun killer. The fact that 25 to 40 or even more go into an instance and when they leave, only 5 to 10 people get any meaningful loot per visit. What the hell is up with that? Every one who goes in should get at least one piece of loot and even that is pathetic payment for your time investment.
Game longevity is not my concern. I am a consumer and its my expectation to be entertained. It is not my expectation nor my desire to be some guinea pig in some freakish social experiment. These developers need to start earning their salaries by putting out entertaining content. Its their job after all. I don't give a damn if raids are the easiest and the most lazy way to stretch out an obvious lack of imagination. I'm not interested in making their jobs easier, but I am interested in them producing a product that I can actually enjoy.
They need to get off their collective asses and stop taking our patronage for granted. If they don't start making improvements in the genre, its going to die out in its infancy and return to its niche market beginnings.
With PvE raiding, it has never been a question of being "good enough". I play games to have fun, not to be a simpering toady sitting through hour after hour of mind numbing boredom and fawning over a guild master in the hopes that he will condescend to reward me with shiny bits of loot. But in games where those people get the highest progression, anyone who doesn't do that will just be a moving target for them and I'll be damned if I'm going to pay money for the privilege. - Neanderthal
Originally posted by skeezixs There has yet to be a game that is forced raiding, true you will not have the best gear in the game by solo/ grouping, but you will still be good enough for that type of content. that and following set rules for raiding dont turn you into a jerk they are there for a reason. Plus requiring a certain class to have skills need to be effective are also there for a reason. That and 99% of the time raiding guilds have a schedule and they know when a raid will be called if the player joins a group before a raid they know how long they have to play in your group. But when it comes to you Anofalye groupers will be sub par players in the end thats just the way mmo's go. If you want to just be a grouper then deal with the fact youwill not be the best on the server. Really if your a grouper that shouldn't matter go enjoy the mindless grind the groupers do. I rather be raiding then grinding forever in a group. Which only about 1% of groups even really talk its more canned phrase to let everyone know when a heal is coming or a mob is incoming. Or at the end of the mission asking hey want to go again. probally why i avoid grouping as much as possible
No thanks.
I don't have to play and pay for a sucky game that enforced raiding. You want to accept to be subpar and lame-o-trash, YOUR choice. I don't. I also have the freedom to debate openly and to help fellow groupers understand that they don't have to cope with the like of you, you are not worthy of their presence at any rate.
You are so elitist in your arguments, so looking from high on others, just reading you make me angry! Raiding is enforced the day it grant 1 hp more than grouping, and this is not acceptable. If you accept it, then good for you, but then you will be out of good groupers and good PUGers in your MMOs. You will be left alone with your tiny little circle of friends because you are AFRAID of taking risks. Maybe it is YOU that should consider playing single player RPGs as you don't like to mix with the community afterall! See, taking a guy that is clueless and making him succeed, that is something you will never know, because you are the guy who is clueless and taken in charge by your guild.
Best groupers have to be groupers. Period. Otherwise, you deserve no groupers in your game. As to "running out of content"; this is not my problem and I have shown far more tenacity in face of lack of content than any raiding guild did. So your point is null.
I am happy about 1 thing however, with little luck I will NEVER meet you again in a MMO, nor your kind. And I will be all the better. I don,t mind grouping clueless noob003 that will train me 935785 times, there is HOPE to improve him. You, raiders-enforcers...are hopeless, there is nothing to do with you...in fact...maybe there could be some PvP options!
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
Rules? Don't be a jerk, and if you want to raid be at the instance at start time. What other rules do you need? If you're running with a bunch of autocratic jerks, then maybe there's other rules. But if you are, then raiding isn't fun, so don't do it. If it's not fun you're not doing it right.
I resent the social ganker comment. You do not know me, and you do not know my friends who raid with me. You don't like raiding, don't. But nobody can ever force you to raid. I'm not clear on why you feel forced I guess.
The rules I was speaking off are about the obligation that guild members abandon their groups, whatever they do, in order to show at raiding. If you don't know this, then you don't know much about uber guilds in general. Many of them do that.
Giving better rewards is enforcing, and denying it make you a social ganker! Otherwise, productivity wouldn't be enforced on every company out there, they have the choice to be unproductive, to lose money and eventually fire 90% of their staff, it is a choice they have...yeah right!
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
Well i have to say this was not much of a debate rather a expressing of 2 opionions.
Anyway raiding i have to agree when you have cleared the dungeon or boss is boring thats problem with raiding the fun is only untill you have managed to do all the bosses or dungeons.
If i wanted to socialise with the guild i prefer to do it outside raiding.
raiding, as it stands now is way over the top. What is the point ?. spend hours upon hours just for a chance at an uber piece of gear, and for what? So you can advance to the next grindfest. I've lv'd my char. now whats left for me? pvp has no meaning, My faction doesn't hold or keep anything, doesnt deny the other team anything. pvp has turned into a raiding type grindfest for uber gear. The next raid is all about adding more uber gear to my collection. Rather like the cartoon where the mule is chasing the carrot on a string tied to a stick in front of it. Put the uber item in the instance, nope didn't drop, (more cart pulling) run it again, (pull that cart, or in this case pay that $$$) GOT IT! ohhh that carrot was good, where's the next one. So i guess this makes raiding as it wow stands as who can get the most carrots while pulling the cart the longest. Simply a hook to keep you playing, a time sink.
Well i have to say this was not much of a debate rather a expressing of 2 opionions.
Can there be much of a debate between Jews and Nazis?
Granted it is nothing as bad as this, and we are only in a HOBBY, so we all have blessed lives to start with. But my example between Nazis (raiders) and Jews been victimized stand. Debate is impossible when 1 side is cornered.
Best groupers have to be groupers. This can't be debated. Debating this is like debating slavery with slavers.
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
Game longevity is not my concern. I am a consumer and its my expectation to be entertained. It is not my expectation nor my desire to be some guinea pig in some freakish social experiment. These developers need to start earning their salaries by putting out entertaining content. Its their job after all. I don't give a damn if raids are the easiest and the most lazy way to stretch out an obvious lack of imagination. I'm not interested in making their jobs easier, but I am interested in them producing a product that I can actually enjoy.
After re-reading the article, I love the suggestion that games do a one-time [or multiple times, but not daily] GM run raid. Ryzom had something similar in the Kitin Invasions [the originals during beta, not the month long one, though that was fun too!]. THe GM of the day would spawn [and respawn] 10's to 100's of MOBs just outside a city. The players would race to get there to fight off these invaders [or in my case, be TPed by another GM - even though I had just left the newbie island!] I don't know if anything unique dropped, hell I didn't kill anything, I was just trying to survive and maybe throw a heal or two before being dropped again Anyway, this type of "raid" was fun for all [unless it spawned on your head and you couldn't leave the area] and, though requiring a GM to run, should be doable in just about any game...
As for "Raiding" as it is implemented now, no thanks. If raid gear only worked in raid areas, that'd be okay. Otherwise, raids support gold farmers - if I can't do it, I bet I can buy it! [ Not that I have, I don't play WoW and don't care enough about playing DDO to subscribe more than every other month or so - casual and solo ]
For me raiding sucks, but think you must have some form of raiding in an MMO. WOW raiding system was a nightmare as needing 40ppl to do a raid is a joke beyond belief in my eyes. This make the game very Guild orientated and for me thats wrong. Also making a dungeon thats takes hours and hours to complete is wrong. Making dungeons or mobs that only spawn every few days is also a joke. Basically thats why WOW sucked and also had no end game.
Raiding should be able to be done in 1grp or a max of 2grps. Dungeons shouldn't take longer than 3 hours to complete. Mobs should drop lots of 1337 lewt so not having to go back and do it 25000 times to get the 1 drop.
I'm a DAOC man and always will be until something better comes along. DAOC has had it's problems, but since the Classic servers have been out you can kit your char out within a week without playing 24/7.
For me this is what a game needs to be like. A perfect end game PvP and quick easy raiding for 1337 loot.
If you want the big Dungeon then loot should not be better , just maybe better looking.
i still beleive a casual player should not be as powerful as a full time gamer and this should be done through the end game PvP (like DAOC) and not through raiding ridiculous 12hour raids that only few ppl have the time to do.
The biggest problem have been mentioned with the business side of things playing a major part in game design and i'm afraid this will never change.
You aren't alone man.. me and my group of players have had the same feeling forever..
Though I think the main problem is the sheer SIZE of these things...
Take WoW for example (because it's just so good as a standard considering how many people have played it)
Everyone knew that you could get a group of 15 people together to do the 15 man raids... that was "do-able" .. it was gonna be tough to get organised enough not to wipe but at least you could get the people together..
Anything past that?? No chance... that's when the Uber Guild problems kick in... the kissing some kids ass who happens to be guild master and thinks he's some sort of leader and takes it way too seriously.. .. the leaving your real friends to try to join said Uber Guild because you want to .. essentially... play the game! .. etc.. etc.. etc..
So.. I think.. if you limit the max size of Raid content to 15 people ... you make it so a group of 15 players who otherwise play solo the entire time.. can ocassionaly get together a couple of groups worth of people and play the game they pay for every month..
So by making it accessable to the entire player base, you alleviate many of the problems you mentioned before.. because really it all stems from needing so many people to play the game's content!
You can make Raids epic and memorable in many ways other than making it take 40 people to do..
I mean .. even WoW learned that eventually when they reduced the number of people it took to do many of the Raids.. unfortunately they still have a ways to go on that front.. but they're learning
raiding should give raid class rewards, not player class rewards.
theres nothing wrong with raiding with your guild for an artifact that gives everyone in your guild (whether they show up or not) some sort of power that everyone can use.
there is something wrong with raiding with your guild to get a sword for ME.
The problem with raiding is that you can't have raiding AND have viable alternatives to raiding. Because if there are viable alternatives then not enough people will be willing to do raids and then there won't be any raiding. Some people say they wouldn't mind if a game has raiding as long as there are alternatives. Yeah, well, it doesn't work that way. I mean it sounds nice, but you can't have it both ways. If people don't have to raid for the best stuff then they won't. Because, NEWSFLASH: very few people actually enjoy raiding. Even the people who adamantly defend raiding...I don't beleive they really enjoy it. For them it's not about having fun in the content it's about having a game design that shuts other people out of progression so that the raiders can have the edge. So they can have the shiniest swords and strut around in the fanciest armor. Provide a real alternative to raiding and the whole motivation for doing raids collapses. Game developers, for whatever reason, keep putting in raiding end-games. Maybe just because it's easy content to design as some people say. Anyway, they keep doing it. They make vague promises that raiding won't be required ect., ect. Which, while technically true, are certainly misleading when you reach high levels and find that there is no other way to progress. What works in their favor is that people who don't want to raid keep falling for this. The devs know that if they can sucker non-raiders into their game they can get their money up untill those people find out the awfull truth...and that's all that matters. More and more I think that developers are looking at mmorpgs as a kind of disposable money-pump. They probably figure that most people won't play longer than about one year anyway. So the devs make their promises. Suck people in and get their money. People get disgusted and leave. A new game comes out with the same promises....and people fall for it all over again.
raiding should give raid class rewards, not player class rewards. theres nothing wrong with raiding with your guild for an artifact that gives everyone in your guild (whether they show up or not) some sort of power that everyone can use. there is something wrong with raiding with your guild to get a sword for ME. the reward should match the activity. raiding and grouping doesnt need to compete.
I have to agree, there is nothing worse then going through a raid for your 6th time, having your item drop only to suddently reilize there are about 5 other people who want the item as well. With the current raiding systems it often comes down to 1 or 2 people walking away happy and everyone else getting the shaft.
Why worry about the loot? If it is a good raid set up the challenge of pulling off the raid should be good enough. If it is one of the basic kill mob get loot type raids I can understand. There are some real fun raids out there where you are constantly busy needing to do different roles to make it thru the raid, or puzzles to the raid that have to be solved.
Also for those that want no raiding. Ok so that mean you can grind thru the game get max lvl and all the gear then what? Also if it is all grouping it is really hard to make a real challenge that only takes 6 or so players. Unless you then make it in to forced groups of tank healer support/debuffer and dps. Which that whole plan is way to over used.
Only type of games that i see that this type of play would work well would be like WWII online, or other non level or gear centric games which developers are afraid to make for some reason. even tho they would be super easy to build.
Also to the whole why should i care about the longevite of a game... If the game has a burn out of a couple months to grind to max lvl get the loots and then thats it. people quit game loses money and they game dies. To many games die the company can't turn there profit and the market ends. Yes your basically chasing a carrot on a stick but if there is no reason to keep people playing or interested in the game why make or play the game.
Basically you don't want to raid for the best gear, and yet you don't want the best gear to be hard to get. You want everyone to be able to experience everything just cause they own the game. Your basically looking at games with 2 months tops life span. Because all off the players that you complain out gear/ lvl you will grind thru the game hit the end and all leave before you get there and the game will end due to lack of players. On average with a full time job at about 4 hours a day to play i have ground thru the groupable part of the game in 2 or 3 months and left the game due to the end game content was lacking or boring. I have done this on 12 mmo's and have only stuck with 1 of them. until i find something that is fun again.
Typical reply from a hardcore. Always thinking that if loot isn't gotten from a raid, then there is no challenge. Therefore, we casuals want free loot since we hate raids. I can't believe how narrow minded and how unimaginative you people are. How the heck do you people think players got loot before raids? It wasn't considered trivial back then, so why the hell should it be considered that now? As far as I'm concerned, you can make single group and solo content challenging enough to justify getting the best loot in the game. You want to raid, then you have equal chance at that loot, but you also get the challenge of gathering 24 to 39 other people. But hey, you guys say you like that kind of crap, so why the constant whines about casuals getting access to gear without raiding? You do your thing, we do ours, we all get the loot we want and everyone should be happy. The real problem is that raiders are greedy powermongers and they can't stand the thought of players getting access to loot without playing the game their way. They don't believe in sharing content and if game mechanics allow it, they even try to block content from others, like they did in EverQuest.
I have no desire to spare your feelings, because when all is said and done, you could give a rat's ass about our desires and that is apparent from past games and its obvious from the posts you make. Its not that the coding mechanics can't work together in a game that would cater to both play styles, its the incompatibility of hardcore vs. casual thought processes. Hardcores expect a game to make them elite by shutting out any other play style that is not their own. You people suck and I'll be dancing a jig when they finally come out with a game that doesn't cater to your every whim.
With PvE raiding, it has never been a question of being "good enough". I play games to have fun, not to be a simpering toady sitting through hour after hour of mind numbing boredom and fawning over a guild master in the hopes that he will condescend to reward me with shiny bits of loot. But in games where those people get the highest progression, anyone who doesn't do that will just be a moving target for them and I'll be damned if I'm going to pay money for the privilege. - Neanderthal
Blizzard realized 40-man raids were a miserable failure, that's why they only made 25-man raids in the Expansion.
In another two years the WoW designers will realize even these are a waste of developer resources which only to appeal to a tiny fraction of their playerbase.
Raids will go the way of the dinosaur just like other lame hardcore mechanics like harsh death penalities and all the other useless timesinks that hardcores like to claim make games 'challenging'.
Blizzard made 25 man raids because the servers could not handle the load produced by the 40 man content. All big instances were almost unplayble for months after their introduction due to severe lag and the need for massive tweaking.
I don't know how the 25 man raids will fair compared to the 40 ones. I do know that guilds will be more selective in the end in regards with the player skills and they will probably be more strict with invites. And selective can go to directions the close minded "casuals" cannot comprehend. Why people confuse the achiever mentality and the need for better tools to tackle with harder encounters with the lootwhore mentality? I've encountered myself this kind of perverted hardcore attitude in past years but some raiders have matured past that. Others didn't. How's fair to stereotype everyone?
One thing is certain, it's not easy to create a successful raiding guild. And by successful I mean a guild that has achieved some form of overlapping between the individual goals and the common goals. If it was half as easy to form such guilds, everyone would be in one. It doesn't have to be the "best guild on the server" either, casual raiding is not something unheard of.
The problem with raids is that they need people that are enjoying themselves and feel good about each other. You can't have that by inviting every "uber" player on the server. The best way is to start small and then add people that are mature, goal driven and respectful towards each other. Earlier posters pointed out their own experiences about perverted guilds with the sole purpose of looting. With such a goal, neither a group of 5 or a group of 40 would have fun in the end. How much do you like when somebody drops a group when he's done with his quests or when the x item didn't drop from him and doesn't need anything else from the instant?
And in the end, when you perhaps spent over a year looking for good people to play with, you achieve a higher guild status by forming a sense of community instead of a sum of individuals. The successes in the raid instances come as a natural extension of the guild's will to work together towards a common goal. Why do people feel that they have the right to shun all this effort, to render it meaningless or worse, to look down on people that participate on those activities?
Raiding in it's true form, the goal achieving, does take more effort than grouping. The only drawback is that occasionally, despite your best effort to surround yourself with the best people, you end up with some bad apples as well. But if you put all the effort to make the "perfect" guild, there is no way you're going to keep those bad apples.
Bottom line, raid is fun when done with the right people and for the right reasons. The goal is the progression, loot is a side effect.
Unfortunately, raids are detrimental to the community aspect of guilds. Raid guilds can only afford to have people in the guild that can commit the time, energy, and resources needed to be able to participate in the raids. Only a small percentage of players can be raid type players. So, lots of drama insues when raid guilds fall apart due to the inevitable cycle of player turnover in games. What if there was no need to push out old people that you enjoyed playing a game with just because of scheduling conflicts? What if you could have fun in a game without the game feeling like a job? What if guilds could be groups of people that could enjoy hanging out with each other online instead of some pseudo-business atmosphere that had rigorous rules and guidelines because the raid environment pushed on us by the devs causes this problem? Raids, raid loot, and the time wasted in these endeavors needs to be re-thought or abolished. This needs to happen for the sake of online mmo community. P.S. I don’t thing that having raid content in a game is evil. I think that the implementation of loot, rare drops, and massive time required, causes a negative atmosphere.
I have raided 5 times a week and I have mixed feelings about it. It was fun because we had TS. In the weekends some where drunk and that had its hillarious moments
But in the end I have done MC for almost a year and my druid still needs the boots. Problem is that players need to raid the first few times and get totaly nothing because you have to earn "DKP".
I like the move Blizzard made with the 25-man instances (and smaller). While people would argue they did it because the server could not handle it is just untrue. Just look at the huge ammount of people I saw running in the first area in TBC and the server could handle it. Also the hardware thats for sale now is far more faster then 3 years ago.
Blizzard made the first step in making epic 5-man instances. The next step would be to make the mobs inside a bit smarter and unpredictable. But the problem is that companies want certainty, and the raiding model works (for now) so why change it? If WoW is really that bad and raiding that dull, then why does the playerbase only increase in WoW?
Comments
With PvE raiding, it has never been a question of being "good enough". I play games to have fun, not to be a simpering toady sitting through hour after hour of mind numbing boredom and fawning over a guild master in the hopes that he will condescend to reward me with shiny bits of loot. But in games where those people get the highest progression, anyone who doesn't do that will just be a moving target for them and I'll be damned if I'm going to pay money for the privilege. - Neanderthal
I must say I love MMOs. I have played most of them since UO, EQ, DAoc, till present day MMOs. I Hate PvE raids. At first, it was cool and exciting to kill a dragon, be the first in game to see a certain locaiton in a game, or get that uber loot. But, for some reason game designers think that we players want to raid for 6-12 hours at a time, they think we want to have to kill a boss 50+ times to get the item we are looking for, and they think we enjoy how mmos are implementing end game content.
My hatred of time consuming raiding has pushed me towards pvp games. I would rather fight a dynamic war against other intelligent players than some over scripted googleplex hitpoint having immune to everything dragon. I still enjoy MMOs, I just prefer games where the end game content is PVP related.
I will not play the eq, eq2, wow, or vanguard style raid games anymore. I like the games with mass pvp, realmwars, real human opponents, and objectives that players can work as a team towards while opposing other players trying to achieve those same goals. I have played many pvp oriented games such as UO, daoc, planetside, eve, ect... and I am still searching for a game that gets the open pvp style of game right. I am looking for a polished game, with true player competition. A game that provides a battliefeild for players to script thier own wars as opposed to a scripted war for players to take place in. A pvp game where there is definate and clearcut goals, rewards, and winners (for the time being). I can't think of one pvp mmo where you can win a war. (maybe because there are no winners in war? but thats a differnt discussion.) I dream of the day a company like Id software decides to do an open PvP sci-fi mmo with a persisant world(s) and fair, competative, well designed combat. A game hasnt pulled if off yet, but someday... and I'll be eager to play it.
Just say no to PvE raiding.
quote from article:
"Well it's easy to make broad statements about how raiding is boring and overused, but the simple fact is that raiding exists in games BECAUSE people do enjoy it. Call them the silent majority if you like but since DKP actually meant killing dragons in EverQuest, most of the really successful MMOs have has raiding in some form or another. I personally don't look forward to farming instances for days for drops, but a large segment of gamers apparently have no problem with it judging by the massive number of players still doing it in World of Warcraft."
I wish people would research this before they post this like its the law. If you woulda researched hard numbers then you would came across the Blizzard presentation whereas they claim less than 5% of their populace raids. I personally dont know any raiders out of like 10 WoW players
I feel ya brother. but I am here to deliver the gospel. WAR so promises not to have any raiding accoridng to the article here on this site
edit- and yeah I feel ya on CoX too. Was loving it til I hit 50 then discovered was huge difference between played using Hami-Os and those without. the icing on the cake is Issue 9 will be adding auction houses andf making the game more loot driven
hehe you never stop whineing about this do yah lol. Seems like you had alot of bad experiences. Personally with out raid content or something more than standard group. You run out of content really fast. Grouping is fine and all, and yes i hate pug. normally cause you never know what moron you'll get stuck with. If there was a way to check the players iq before inviting them, then pug would be great. I much rather stick to people I know that can play, or invite people to join me when i know i wont be needing them.
There has yet to be a game that is forced raiding, true you will not have the best gear in the game by solo/ grouping, but you will still be good enough for that type of content. that and following set rules for raiding dont turn you into a jerk they are there for a reason. Plus requiring a certain class to have skills need to be effective are also there for a reason. That and 99% of the time raiding guilds have a schedule and they know when a raid will be called if the player joins a group before a raid they know how long they have to play in your group.
Also alot of raids are going away from the 8 hours to complete, most of the ones now days unless your learning it for the first time can be done pretty fast. Eq1 our average per target is 30 to 45 mins, raid zones a little over an hour, wow normally not more than 2 hours per zone.
that and if you think its a tiny minority that want to raid i think you off many would love to raid only a few can acctually make it. I constantly see people that just are clueless how to gear up and build a character useful for raiding. Also no reason to jump to an uber guild it doesnt take long to take a family guild and start them on the path of raiding and going thru targets as long as you get a decent raid leader.
But when it comes to you Anofalye groupers will be sub par players in the end thats just the way mmo's go. If you want to just be a grouper then deal with the fact youwill not be the best on the server. Really if your a grouper that shouldn't matter go enjoy the mindless grind the groupers do. I rather be raiding then grinding forever in a group. Which only about 1% of groups even really talk its more canned phrase to let everyone know when a heal is coming or a mob is incoming. Or at the end of the mission asking hey want to go again. probally why i avoid grouping as much as possible
Actually, it is forced raiding. When the end game is only about raiding and its the only avenue of improving your chracter, then you either have to do it or re-roll or quit. Being forced to do it sucks the big one, having to re-roll just delays the inevitable and it forces you to rehash old content. I just happen to be one of the ones who quits rather than financially support a MMO that could give a rat's ass about my play style. I keep discussing the issue on various boards in the hopes that a developer might have a brain fart and actually program entertaining content that isn't based on 4 - 8 hour stints of raiding ad nauseum.
By the way, all of the raiding games out there DO NOT offer raiding on a 30 minute to 1 hour schedule. The shortest I've seen is around 2 hours for a Hamidon raid in City of Heroes. The rest of the MMO's, even with recent expansions all clock in around 4 to 6 hours or even longer. Keep in mind, its not just the ridiculous time requirements that make some of us upset. Its their insane repetitiveness that is also a fun killer. The fact that 25 to 40 or even more go into an instance and when they leave, only 5 to 10 people get any meaningful loot per visit. What the hell is up with that? Every one who goes in should get at least one piece of loot and even that is pathetic payment for your time investment.
Game longevity is not my concern. I am a consumer and its my expectation to be entertained. It is not my expectation nor my desire to be some guinea pig in some freakish social experiment. These developers need to start earning their salaries by putting out entertaining content. Its their job after all. I don't give a damn if raids are the easiest and the most lazy way to stretch out an obvious lack of imagination. I'm not interested in making their jobs easier, but I am interested in them producing a product that I can actually enjoy.
They need to get off their collective asses and stop taking our patronage for granted. If they don't start making improvements in the genre, its going to die out in its infancy and return to its niche market beginnings.
With PvE raiding, it has never been a question of being "good enough". I play games to have fun, not to be a simpering toady sitting through hour after hour of mind numbing boredom and fawning over a guild master in the hopes that he will condescend to reward me with shiny bits of loot. But in games where those people get the highest progression, anyone who doesn't do that will just be a moving target for them and I'll be damned if I'm going to pay money for the privilege. - Neanderthal
No thanks.
I don't have to play and pay for a sucky game that enforced raiding. You want to accept to be subpar and lame-o-trash, YOUR choice. I don't. I also have the freedom to debate openly and to help fellow groupers understand that they don't have to cope with the like of you, you are not worthy of their presence at any rate.
You are so elitist in your arguments, so looking from high on others, just reading you make me angry! Raiding is enforced the day it grant 1 hp more than grouping, and this is not acceptable. If you accept it, then good for you, but then you will be out of good groupers and good PUGers in your MMOs. You will be left alone with your tiny little circle of friends because you are AFRAID of taking risks. Maybe it is YOU that should consider playing single player RPGs as you don't like to mix with the community afterall! See, taking a guy that is clueless and making him succeed, that is something you will never know, because you are the guy who is clueless and taken in charge by your guild.
Best groupers have to be groupers. Period. Otherwise, you deserve no groupers in your game. As to "running out of content"; this is not my problem and I have shown far more tenacity in face of lack of content than any raiding guild did. So your point is null.
I am happy about 1 thing however, with little luck I will NEVER meet you again in a MMO, nor your kind. And I will be all the better. I don,t mind grouping clueless noob003 that will train me 935785 times, there is HOPE to improve him. You, raiders-enforcers...are hopeless, there is nothing to do with you...in fact...maybe there could be some PvP options!
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
The rules I was speaking off are about the obligation that guild members abandon their groups, whatever they do, in order to show at raiding. If you don't know this, then you don't know much about uber guilds in general. Many of them do that.
Giving better rewards is enforcing, and denying it make you a social ganker! Otherwise, productivity wouldn't be enforced on every company out there, they have the choice to be unproductive, to lose money and eventually fire 90% of their staff, it is a choice they have...yeah right!
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
Anyway raiding i have to agree when you have cleared the dungeon or boss is boring thats problem with raiding the fun is only untill you have managed to do all the bosses or dungeons.
If i wanted to socialise with the guild i prefer to do it outside raiding.
-Semper ubi sub ubi!
always wear underwear
raiding, as it stands now is way over the top. What is the point ?. spend hours upon hours just for a chance at an uber piece of gear, and for what? So you can advance to the next grindfest. I've lv'd my char. now whats left for me? pvp has no meaning, My faction doesn't hold or keep anything, doesnt deny the other team anything. pvp has turned into a raiding type grindfest for uber gear. The next raid is all about adding more uber gear to my collection. Rather like the cartoon where the mule is chasing the carrot on a string tied to a stick in front of it. Put the uber item in the instance, nope didn't drop, (more cart pulling) run it again, (pull that cart, or in this case pay that $$$) GOT IT! ohhh that carrot was good, where's the next one. So i guess this makes raiding as it wow stands as who can get the most carrots while pulling the cart the longest. Simply a hook to keep you playing, a time sink.
Can there be much of a debate between Jews and Nazis?
Granted it is nothing as bad as this, and we are only in a HOBBY, so we all have blessed lives to start with. But my example between Nazis (raiders) and Jews been victimized stand. Debate is impossible when 1 side is cornered.
Best groupers have to be groupers. This can't be debated. Debating this is like debating slavery with slavers.
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
I was talking about they only expressed theyr opionion on raiding instead of arguing against eachother wich would mean a real debate.
maybe a poor choosing of word i dont know but i still understood both opionions about endgame and raiding..
-Semper ubi sub ubi!
always wear underwear
Guild Wars 2 is my religion
As for "Raiding" as it is implemented now, no thanks. If raid gear only worked in raid areas, that'd be okay. Otherwise, raids support gold farmers - if I can't do it, I bet I can buy it!
<p align=center><a target=_blank href=http://www.nodiatis.com/personality.htm><img border=0 src=http://www.nodiatis.com/pub/20.jpg></a></p>;
For me raiding sucks, but think you must have some form of raiding in an MMO. WOW raiding system was a nightmare as needing 40ppl to do a raid is a joke beyond belief in my eyes. This make the game very Guild orientated and for me thats wrong. Also making a dungeon thats takes hours and hours to complete is wrong. Making dungeons or mobs that only spawn every few days is also a joke. Basically thats why WOW sucked and also had no end game.
Raiding should be able to be done in 1grp or a max of 2grps. Dungeons shouldn't take longer than 3 hours to complete. Mobs should drop lots of 1337 lewt so not having to go back and do it 25000 times to get the 1 drop.
I'm a DAOC man and always will be until something better comes along. DAOC has had it's problems, but since the Classic servers have been out you can kit your char out within a week without playing 24/7.
For me this is what a game needs to be like. A perfect end game PvP and quick easy raiding for 1337 loot.
If you want the big Dungeon then loot should not be better , just maybe better looking.
i still beleive a casual player should not be as powerful as a full time gamer and this should be done through the end game PvP (like DAOC) and not through raiding ridiculous 12hour raids that only few ppl have the time to do.
The biggest problem have been mentioned with the business side of things playing a major part in game design and i'm afraid this will never change.
DOAC ftw
Amen Derek.. Amen..
You aren't alone man.. me and my group of players have had the same feeling forever..
Though I think the main problem is the sheer SIZE of these things...
Take WoW for example (because it's just so good as a standard considering how many people have played it)
Everyone knew that you could get a group of 15 people together to do the 15 man raids... that was "do-able" .. it was gonna be tough to get organised enough not to wipe but at least you could get the people together..
Anything past that?? No chance... that's when the Uber Guild problems kick in... the kissing some kids ass who happens to be guild master and thinks he's some sort of leader and takes it way too seriously.. .. the leaving your real friends to try to join said Uber Guild because you want to .. essentially... play the game! .. etc.. etc.. etc..
So.. I think.. if you limit the max size of Raid content to 15 people ... you make it so a group of 15 players who otherwise play solo the entire time.. can ocassionaly get together a couple of groups worth of people and play the game they pay for every month..
So by making it accessable to the entire player base, you alleviate many of the problems you mentioned before.. because really it all stems from needing so many people to play the game's content!
You can make Raids epic and memorable in many ways other than making it take 40 people to do..
I mean .. even WoW learned that eventually when they reduced the number of people it took to do many of the Raids.. unfortunately they still have a ways to go on that front.. but they're learning
raiding should give raid class rewards, not player class rewards.
theres nothing wrong with raiding with your guild for an artifact that gives everyone in your guild (whether they show up or not) some sort of power that everyone can use.
there is something wrong with raiding with your guild to get a sword for ME.
the reward should match the activity.
raiding and grouping doesnt need to compete.
Why worry about the loot? If it is a good raid set up the challenge of pulling off the raid should be good enough. If it is one of the basic kill mob get loot type raids I can understand. There are some real fun raids out there where you are constantly busy needing to do different roles to make it thru the raid, or puzzles to the raid that have to be solved.
Also for those that want no raiding. Ok so that mean you can grind thru the game get max lvl and all the gear then what? Also if it is all grouping it is really hard to make a real challenge that only takes 6 or so players. Unless you then make it in to forced groups of tank healer support/debuffer and dps. Which that whole plan is way to over used.
Only type of games that i see that this type of play would work well would be like WWII online, or other non level or gear centric games which developers are afraid to make for some reason. even tho they would be super easy to build.
Also to the whole why should i care about the longevite of a game... If the game has a burn out of a couple months to grind to max lvl get the loots and then thats it. people quit game loses money and they game dies. To many games die the company can't turn there profit and the market ends. Yes your basically chasing a carrot on a stick but if there is no reason to keep people playing or interested in the game why make or play the game.
Basically you don't want to raid for the best gear, and yet you don't want the best gear to be hard to get. You want everyone to be able to experience everything just cause they own the game. Your basically looking at games with 2 months tops life span. Because all off the players that you complain out gear/ lvl you will grind thru the game hit the end and all leave before you get there and the game will end due to lack of players. On average with a full time job at about 4 hours a day to play i have ground thru the groupable part of the game in 2 or 3 months and left the game due to the end game content was lacking or boring. I have done this on 12 mmo's and have only stuck with 1 of them. until i find something that is fun again.
Typical reply from a hardcore. Always thinking that if loot isn't gotten from a raid, then there is no challenge. Therefore, we casuals want free loot since we hate raids. I can't believe how narrow minded and how unimaginative you people are. How the heck do you people think players got loot before raids? It wasn't considered trivial back then, so why the hell should it be considered that now? As far as I'm concerned, you can make single group and solo content challenging enough to justify getting the best loot in the game. You want to raid, then you have equal chance at that loot, but you also get the challenge of gathering 24 to 39 other people. But hey, you guys say you like that kind of crap, so why the constant whines about casuals getting access to gear without raiding? You do your thing, we do ours, we all get the loot we want and everyone should be happy. The real problem is that raiders are greedy powermongers and they can't stand the thought of players getting access to loot without playing the game their way. They don't believe in sharing content and if game mechanics allow it, they even try to block content from others, like they did in EverQuest.
I have no desire to spare your feelings, because when all is said and done, you could give a rat's ass about our desires and that is apparent from past games and its obvious from the posts you make. Its not that the coding mechanics can't work together in a game that would cater to both play styles, its the incompatibility of hardcore vs. casual thought processes. Hardcores expect a game to make them elite by shutting out any other play style that is not their own. You people suck and I'll be dancing a jig when they finally come out with a game that doesn't cater to your every whim.
With PvE raiding, it has never been a question of being "good enough". I play games to have fun, not to be a simpering toady sitting through hour after hour of mind numbing boredom and fawning over a guild master in the hopes that he will condescend to reward me with shiny bits of loot. But in games where those people get the highest progression, anyone who doesn't do that will just be a moving target for them and I'll be damned if I'm going to pay money for the privilege. - Neanderthal
Blizzard realized 40-man raids were a miserable failure, that's why they only made 25-man raids in the Expansion.
In another two years the WoW designers will realize even these are a waste of developer resources which only to appeal to a tiny fraction of their playerbase.
Raids will go the way of the dinosaur just like other lame hardcore mechanics like harsh death penalities and all the other useless timesinks that hardcores like to claim make games 'challenging'.
I don't know how the 25 man raids will fair compared to the 40 ones. I do know that guilds will be more selective in the end in regards with the player skills and they will probably be more strict with invites. And selective can go to directions the close minded "casuals" cannot comprehend. Why people confuse the achiever mentality and the need for better tools to tackle with harder encounters with the lootwhore mentality? I've encountered myself this kind of perverted hardcore attitude in past years but some raiders have matured past that. Others didn't. How's fair to stereotype everyone?
One thing is certain, it's not easy to create a successful raiding guild. And by successful I mean a guild that has achieved some form of overlapping between the individual goals and the common goals. If it was half as easy to form such guilds, everyone would be in one. It doesn't have to be the "best guild on the server" either, casual raiding is not something unheard of.
The problem with raids is that they need people that are enjoying themselves and feel good about each other. You can't have that by inviting every "uber" player on the server. The best way is to start small and then add people that are mature, goal driven and respectful towards each other. Earlier posters pointed out their own experiences about perverted guilds with the sole purpose of looting. With such a goal, neither a group of 5 or a group of 40 would have fun in the end. How much do you like when somebody drops a group when he's done with his quests or when the x item didn't drop from him and doesn't need anything else from the instant?
And in the end, when you perhaps spent over a year looking for good people to play with, you achieve a higher guild status by forming a sense of community instead of a sum of individuals. The successes in the raid instances come as a natural extension of the guild's will to work together towards a common goal. Why do people feel that they have the right to shun all this effort, to render it meaningless or worse, to look down on people that participate on those activities?
Raiding in it's true form, the goal achieving, does take more effort than grouping. The only drawback is that occasionally, despite your best effort to surround yourself with the best people, you end up with some bad apples as well. But if you put all the effort to make the "perfect" guild, there is no way you're going to keep those bad apples.
Bottom line, raid is fun when done with the right people and for the right reasons. The goal is the progression, loot is a side effect.
Edit: typos
Unfortunately, raids are detrimental to the community aspect of guilds. Raid guilds can only afford to have people in the guild that can commit the time, energy, and resources needed to be able to participate in the raids. Only a small percentage of players can be raid type players. So, lots of drama insues when raid guilds fall apart due to the inevitable cycle of player turnover in games.
What if there was no need to push out old people that you enjoyed playing a game with just because of scheduling conflicts? What if you could have fun in a game without the game feeling like a job? What if guilds could be groups of people that could enjoy hanging out with each other online instead of some pseudo-business atmosphere that had rigorous rules and guidelines because the raid environment pushed on us by the devs causes this problem?
Raids, raid loot, and the time wasted in these endeavors needs to be re-thought or abolished. This needs to happen for the sake of online mmo community.
P.S. I don’t thing that having raid content in a game is evil. I think that the implementation of loot, rare drops, and massive time required, causes a negative atmosphere.
I have raided 5 times a week and I have mixed feelings about it. It was fun because we had TS. In the weekends some where drunk and that had its hillarious moments
But in the end I have done MC for almost a year and my druid still needs the boots. Problem is that players need to raid the first few times and get totaly nothing because you have to earn "DKP".
I like the move Blizzard made with the 25-man instances (and smaller). While people would argue they did it because the server could not handle it is just untrue. Just look at the huge ammount of people I saw running in the first area in TBC and the server could handle it. Also the hardware thats for sale now is far more faster then 3 years ago.
Blizzard made the first step in making epic 5-man instances. The next step would be to make the mobs inside a bit smarter and unpredictable. But the problem is that companies want certainty, and the raiding model works (for now) so why change it? If WoW is really that bad and raiding that dull, then why does the playerbase only increase in WoW?