Originally posted by Zairu the same people who talk all day about horrible communities, and how horrible the genre has become, are the same people that are no fun to group with. i'll play with a 'casual' bunch of people only interested in having fun, compared to a wannabe elitest, that can't find a new hobby that suits them. grow up, get a new past time.
Really now? I've found the casual players to typically yield the most selfish and ill-behaved players. Using the LFD tool in WoW has provided nearly all of my terrible grouping experiences, ranging from rampant ninja looting, needless verbal harassment, and just plain careless and selfish behavior. These issues are exacerbated by an LFD tool where there is zero commitment and zero accountability due to it's random and cross server assembly of players into groups.
Originally posted by Zairu ironically, all of those games that get praised as being the 'great', 'real', mmo's, are still around on live servers. so, if new games are so horrible, go back to your classics and avoid the games you don't like, while i enjoy games i consider fun like EQ2, WoW, and now Rift. go play dinosaur games with outdated graphics, clunky ui, and slow response time. you won't be bothering me, that's for sure.
I keep hearing this tired old line, so I'll keep responding to it with the same tired old response:
The "real" MMOs no longer exist. Yes EQ, UO, SWG, etc, are all still around, they're only there in name only. The actual gameplay of these games is drastically different from their original incarnation in their glory days. So no, we cannot go back to those games because they no longer exist.
I can't stop loling at so many people who just know for sure how I want to play the game, and who make assumptions about the effect of everything on MY gameplay. Like the guy who says "Yes, players need to socialize in MMOs", no actually I just WANT to socialize as much as I feel like, you see I pay for the experience I enjoy. On Monday that may mean spending 6 hours with my guild, and on Tuesday it may mean spending 20 minutes in a warfront without 2 hours of building a group. How is that hard to understand?
There are a great many more people out there who simply don’t have the time or patience to sit in a major city spamming the LFG channel to round out their groups
what about people who dont have time to do quests,same teleport tool to them is good idea too?
or gathering,same tool for them too?
who dont have time to search rare bosses,same tool for them too?
i think theres still shopping channels too,what about those people? who dont have time to spam shopping channels in hope to find that rare item what he needs,or dont have time to search good deals,money finder tool for them?
Questing, hunting rare mobs, gathering, etc = playing the game
Waiting for players to make up a group before you can do anything = pointless timesink
[Mod Edit]
Playing: Ableton Live 8 ~ ragequitcancelsubdeletegamesmashcomputerkillself ~
A dungeon finder tool is not needed functionality for a game. It's a tool requested by people who want instant gratification, and use a "lack of time" as an excuse for being lazy. Previous MMOs have done fine without any such tool, in fact WoW did perfectly fine for several years without it.
Furthermore, this completely glosses over the negative impacts that introducing such a 'feature' has upon a game. In short, it greatly hurts a game's community by devaluing the need for players to socialize. Yes, players need to socialize in MMOs. The entire point of an MMO is to participate in the game with other players, so there is an inherent purpose for players to need to socialize with each other.
That's not to say that players don't socialize via a random dungeon finder group. Rather, the level to which they socialize is extremely shallow. They've put no investment into forming their group, they little to no reason to speak to anyone else in their group, and they have little to no reason to be polite to others in their group due to the LFD system removing the choice in whom you end up in a group with in the future (this is espcially true for cross server LFD).
Lastly, claiming that the LFD is completely optional is a half-truth at best. Yes, using the LFD tool is optional, and the option still exists to manually form groups. However, the existence of a LFD tool means that it is significantly more difficult to form a group manually due to sheer frequency of players who would simply go the 'easy route' and use the LFD tool. As such, use of the LFD tool is more of a forced option due to the increased difficulty of manually forming groups.
The above pertains mostly to an automatic group forming LFD tool, particularly if it were cross server. I would have no problem with an LFD tool where players could opt into "LFD", and then other players could browse the players LFD on their server and invite them. This would still give a measure of commitment and communication, without being too much of a hassle.
Yea, I totally forgot: games are meant to be like work.
Anyone else see the irony?
Playing: Ableton Live 8 ~ ragequitcancelsubdeletegamesmashcomputerkillself ~
Raiding is a VERY small part of most games. In DAoC it was even smaller. I was loyally in a guild in those days, and loved grouping with guildies. But primarily, everyone in the game grouped with everyone else. Sometimes you'd get two people in a group from the same guild. On a rarer occasion you'd see an entire group of guildies doing some kind of event. But, almost 100% of the time I was leveling up, it was with people from a large variety of different guilds. Guilds came together for small raids. Alliances came together for big raids, but everyone was welcome to join. RvR was the only time you ever saw guild exclusive groups. SOCIETY was just more social back then.
Fixed it for you.
Seriously though, to me, MMO's are not the issue, just another symptom of a growing problem of society in general. We are no longer a communal or social soceity, but a voyeur society. We like to know what's going on but nothing more. Facebook isn't about making friends or forming communities/socializing, its about being able to be nosy at a distance and only integrate yourself into people's lives as much as you want.
As I have said before, Sure a lot of people walk down the hall or acrss campus and say "Hi, how are you?" but they only expect you to say "I'm good" and not say anything as to how you really feel or what's going on in your life. And if you do, they get uncomfortable and quickly move on.
The same is true with MMO's. Its not about being a community or being social, its about being as social as you want to be. And sadly, the majority of players are content with a LFD tool and only "using" their fellow players to get what they want and a LFD tool makes that easier. Today's player only cares about being social enough to make it seem like they are helping you, but in turn, they only want the reward they are after. Its an entitlement culture at its worst...but that is another debate.
^ This +1000
My thoughts, your keyboard. Good show.
Spot on, but I don't think it's a completely sad situation, I think it's just how people have always been.
I game to be surrounded by people and to interract with the ones I get on with. So I don't try to be best friends forever with the first tank that shows up to my raid - to me that seems to be fairly normal.
If you think it isn't, go down to your local superstore and see how many random strangers want to walk round at choose groceries with you. Stand at the entrance yelling 'LFM for the Frozen Aisle'.
That shit worked back in the day when all this was novel. People grouped with anyone because the whole thing was new and they wanted someone to share their experiences with. Nowadays, everyone knows the score - if you want some fake-mates or you're some kind of uber-social butterfly, join a guild.
Eitherway, the hardcore-types out there that are moaning for nothing. This game was never going to cater to that market from the get-go, which I would've thought was blatantly obvious.
Aryas
Playing: Ableton Live 8 ~ ragequitcancelsubdeletegamesmashcomputerkillself ~
not everyone has the time to sit numbingly at a screen, spamming the same LFX class until they get a group going.
That is so true. But the problem with Wows dungeon finder are the following thing:
It is multi server. That leads to 2 things:
1. Blizzard don't have to merge really small servers since you still can group. That is bad because you actally learn to know people at your server when you play with them, it is how you make friends in MMOs.
2. the thing everyone whine on, you don't suffer the same consequenses for your action as if you play with people from your server. In other games people know the bad apples on their servers, the ones that always leaves the dungeon half way in because they got what they needed or worse, need on items they have on them.
So merge the servers until they are large enough and take away the multi server thing from the dungeon finder and it is a great tool. Like it is now it creates problems as well as it helps people in a hurry.
As for don't use it, it kinda makes any other way to get a PUG a lot harder.
The dungeon finder is a great idea, but I just don't like exactly how it is done.
Personally I thought this game was lacking in that dept and needed a dungeon finder, however as an overall mmo player that's been around the block I don't like WoW's style for it entirely so I hope they don't copy it but at the same time it works. I think Wow easily has the easiest to use, and most effective quickest way to find a group buuuuuut....
I'm one of those more immersive players that want a full, good experience, finding a guild this way and with friends, wow's cross server style while it finds you groups very quickly, ruins this because people don't bother to socialize or be fun they just trash things at a fast pace because they'll never see the people again. Unfortunately one server worth of players especially on a game that isn't wow, isn't going to work well with a queue system.
I really like Rift in beta so far and I want to see it succeed in all departments, but this is one I hope they can remedy soon hopefully before launch. Unfortunately I think their server structure ideas from the get go have messed this up. imo the best way to use a queue system like this and all players have access to each other in the future so they make guilds, friends and socialize, is to design the game around a single global server with instanced outdoor areas as needed like STO, Champions or Guild Wars (or coh to a lesser extent) do. As it is now this just isn't going to be possible though.
I like dungeon finder, for it's purpose, a lot, I dont like spamming trade for a group just because spamming trade is in no way a better choise than a tool for the same purpose, but I would like it to be across my own server only, to promote server community.
In Rift it's not so bad like in WoW where only meaningful content ever is in instances, where with cross-realm dungeon finder your own server becomes nothing but hardware. I remember in WoW after cross-realm BG's it already felt like it destroyed the community feel of your own server.
Since in Rift there is also things to do out in the open it's not that bad, and it wouldnt be a problem at all if it was only in your own server. So YES for the tool if it's for your own realm, and... Well, that should be the only option anyway, for it to be a realm specific tool only.
curse players for playing games they consider fun! curse them to hell!
I really did not plan on buying rift just because it is not my cup of tea. But if they implement a cross-server looking for group tool I might have to get the game just so I can use it to grief people. You know ninja loot and just go out of my way to try to piss people off (not enough to get banned from the game but just enough to annoy people that are trying to play the game). The best part will be because it is cross server none of the players will be able to do anything about it. They can’t ignore me; they can’t put me on a server blacklist because I can do it across all servers. So you are right the cross server tool is a great idea it allows everyone to have fun. (If you really do not think people do this then you are crazy, they have been doing it in FPS for a long time until devs put tools to stop them. The great part in MMOs they are putting in tools to let people act like this to other people.)
So please Trion please put in a cross server tool that has no player accountability, if you do I will do my best to grief everyone I meet in game. (Even though this is sarcastic, if Trion does create a tool like this I might be a griefer just to prove how much fun that tool can be. After all the mentality is “it is my $15” I should be able to do what I want with it, well then my fun will be to see how much I can screw up your fun when you use this tool. Ah isn’t life grand!)
People are blowing the problems with WoW's DF way out of hand. One, you can always report ninjas. Two, server community? Really? I could care less about anyone outside my guild let alone track them down to wag my finger at them for ninjaing or some other "not cool" behaviour. I came back to WoW for 4.0.1 after leaving during TBC and rerolled my paly, got to 15 and never stepped out of SW except to mine/herb. I had already experienced the overland zones, but not the "to cap" dungeons. DF is a blast and for every run that goes south I can easily go weeks without incident. Its a game, its not work, its entertainment. I want to get in, find the class that suites me best, experience all of the content and move once I have.
I'll be cancelling my order for Rifts today, I hated that dynamic of "push the button and que up with "X" group.".
I played WOW and that was one of the things that made me realize that it is one of the reasons the community wasn't worth a $hit. Glad they announced this early, save my money for TOR and GW2 now (hopefully they won't do what this "fail" future title has done.
I'll be cancelling my order for Rifts today, I hated that dynamic of "push the button and que up with "X" group.".
I played WOW and that was one of the things that made me realize that it is one of the reasons the community wasn't worth a $hit. Glad they announced this early, save my money for TOR and GW2 now (hopefully they won't do what this "fail" future title has done.
If you don't like a feature, does not mean you have to use it. The only important consideration of a game is if it is fun.
Thanks for influencing other companys blizzard, after I finish playing one or two mmo's ive been playing im done with this genre.
I feel your pain and I agree that Blizzard's effect on developers has been infuriating for gamers who want substance and a good RPG community. Pretend it's all about food though and I promise you, it becomes a lot less painful:
Thank you McDonalds for influencing the fast food industry, after I finish eating another imitation burger and fry meal, I'm done with this type of food.
And therein lies the reality. We havn't had quality mmorpg attempts. We've had fastfood crap. Titles that had their lore handed to them on a silver platter: Lord of the Rings Online and Age of Conan, literally trashed the memory of the original authors of said titles. Lord of the Rings Online (LOTRO) had to go free to play to try to keep their heads above the water and keep up with increasing content.
Some recent examples of poorly designed titles that looked amazing at first:
LOTRO
They never once considered 2 faction pvp (like in the books), and left the Orcs, Goblins, and so forth to be nothing more than a side experience in a very limited pvp environment (Etten Moors, et al). Where was the Battle for Helms Deep? Where were the epic conflicts between good and evil? Other than artificially programmed non player characters (NPCs), there was no real living player vs living player effect in the game since their PvM (Player vs Monster) pvp was a minimal effort at best. Players could literally log in as a monster player after level 10. After a so called epic fight between the Free People players and the Creeps (the monster players) - you could engage in a discourse because in all likelyhood that fellow dwarf you are now questing with was an Uruk-Hai ten minutes ago. Talk about destroying the feel of US vs THEM and any sense of the word epic.
AoC
In Age of Conan, necromancers could run with all pets out, past Cimmerian guards (Cimmeria was a part of Hyborea where anything close to magic was as frowned upon as a Salem witch trial). Priests of Mitra, the divinely good priests who served Conan's kingdom of Aquilonia, were able to engage one another in combat, as well as fight side by side with their book sworn mortal enemies, Priests of Set. At best this was a more Americanized version of Guild Wars with a lot less fun factor. Battles looked like everyone was killing themselves because there was just no way to tell the difference between anyone's guild other than the red lettering over their heads. Same race classes slaughtered each other - pretty sad when the books define how culture was everything to the people of Hyborea - and those small groups that forgot it, quickly felt the pain of sword.
Ridiculous. Developers have gotten lazy since WoW's inception. The industry is filled with people who have no business being involved because they are corporate officers and not creative people who grew up loving the genre (the newer owners of Warhammer and Alganon are shining examples of this).
The top dogs of the industry started with:
Richard Garriott's Ultima Online (First title to break the 10,000 player mark) in 1997
Brad McQuaid, Steve Clover, and Bill Trost's 1999 release of Everquest (First to break the 225,000 player mark in 1999)
Toby Ragaini (lead designer) et al. created Asheron's Call in 1999 (2 months after Everquest) - at its peak in 2001 it hit 120,000 players
Long before Age of Conan's production caused Robert E. Howard to roll over in his grave...Funcom released Anarchy Online (2001). Sadly the title made less money in its entire history than Jay Z made in a 2008 released IRS statement (38 million beats their 28 million).
And my all time favorite: Dark Age of Camelot also in 2001 and I quote: At high levels, where other games tend to grow stale, players in Dark Age of Camelot can participate in PvP struggles, territorial conquest, and protecting their Realm's Relics (objects of power) from enemy invasion, as well as attempting to pilfer enemy Relics themselves.
You won't find that concept in any title anymore - sadly. And no, Warhammer is not worth mentioning - just another embarrassment with a ridiculously over caffeinated propoganda staff who in the end have RvR'd themselves to death with two limited factions - IN THE FACE.
POINT IS, there was a time when mmorpgs were well designed and built off of true RP concepts, like community housing, complex race and class differences across multiple factions, the concept of CONQUEST and territorial acquisition.
The times have changed. Hang in there, someone with creativity and independent financing will eventually emerge. I hope?
There are a great many more people out there who simply don’t have the time or patience to sit in a major city spamming the LFG channel to round out their groups
what about people who dont have time to do quests,same teleport tool to them is good idea too?
or gathering,same tool for them too?
who dont have time to search rare bosses,same tool for them too?
i think theres still shopping channels too,what about those people? who dont have time to spam shopping channels in hope to find that rare item what he needs,or dont have time to search good deals,money finder tool for them?
Questing, hunting rare mobs, gathering, etc = playing the game
Waiting for players to make up a group before you can do anything = pointless timesink
[Mod Edit]
questing is like searching items and exp to do dungeons= pointless timesink,i dont have time for that or patience ,,tool for that.
gatgering is not gaming,pointless timesink ,crafting is,,tool for that
hunting rare mobs is like hunting rare players to team with,pointless timesink,tool for that.
actually i dont have time to clear trash mobs in dungeons either,pointless timesink,tool for that too.
There are a great many more people out there who simply don’t have the time or patience to sit in a major city spamming the LFG channel to round out their groups
what about people who dont have time to do quests,same teleport tool to them is good idea too?
or gathering,same tool for them too?
who dont have time to search rare bosses,same tool for them too?
i think theres still shopping channels too,what about those people? who dont have time to spam shopping channels in hope to find that rare item what he needs,or dont have time to search good deals,money finder tool for them?
Questing, hunting rare mobs, gathering, etc = playing the game
Waiting for players to make up a group before you can do anything = pointless timesink
[Mod Edit]
questing is like searching items and exp to do dungeons= pointless timesink,i dont have time for that or patience ,,tool for that.
gatgering is not gaming,pointless timesink ,crafting is,,tool for that
hunting rare mobs is like hunting rare players to team with,pointless timesink,tool for that.
actually i dont have time to clear trash mobs in dungeons either,pointless timesink,tool for that too.
3rd Time you posted the same rubbish, sitting in town spamming LFG is not playing the game, it is waiting to play, not much diffrent than sitting in a log-in que cept worse because you may never get in. The game has to caitor to people who do not want to join a guild for whatever reason. How you could equate doing a dungeon to finding a group I will never understand, does the tool do the dungeon for you ? No. All it does is help you get a group going, and you don't even need to use it, if you love talking to new people by all means talk your batteries flat and find a group the good ol fashioned way, but stop begrudging other people who want to get in have fun and know that they will at least find a group to go with.
MMO's have timesinks, BIG SHOCK, but they all have a point:
Kill a Mob = Gain XP and Loot
Complete a Dungeon = Fun group play and xp and loot
Farm Mats for Hours = Make some gold and buy some shinny new gear
Do Warfronts = Get to murder people, hone your skills, and get some PVP gear
All these activities can be pre-planed, if your not in a guild finding a group can't, if this little tool did the actual work for you I would be on your side, but it doesn't, it just gets you started.
I don't have time (and don't want to waste time) waiting until a group forms "the old way" i.e. spamming chan channels or waiting for irl friends to connect. I'm more willing to wait for a fun group to do some questing instead.
Therefore using a dungeon finder is nice and quick and serves its purpose (I love it!). It also doesn't prevent from doing some dungeon crawling with guildies or group via channels so no one should complain.
And yes some people like to play MMOs without joining a guild and this should be respected as well (as I've read some comments here that scare me); and I've been both: guild officer in one game and not in guild in another and I've enjoyed both ways.
If a feature X drove me eventually away from game Y, why would you think that it won't influence my decision to leave Z game if it is eventually implemented in it?
Cross server LFG automated tools turn open worlds into instanced dungeon runs. If I wanted to play an instanced dungeon run, I'd play DDO or even GW1. Or WoW of course, minus node hunting, today WoW is a instanced dungeon run game.
I heard a mini lecture about the D generation (the Digital generation, born 1996-) the other day. Scared the hell out of me as a lecturer. They are coming and they will be damn difficult to teach.
Apparently the dominant feature of the D generation is that they will buy almost anything (digital or physical) provided they don't have to wait for it. They "demand" content in short sharp bursts.
I suspect we are seeing some of them in MMOs now and a cross server LFD tool is the kind of thing they will "demand".
1. Who invented the X cross server dungeon finder ?: Blizzard.
So the WOW warriors hate it, as usual whatever Blizzard does.
2. Why did Blizzard introduce it?
Because in a game with 100+ normal and heroic dungeons (just calculate) you can't do that content with 3K+ people on line even in a FULL single server realm. So you have the choice: wasted content or let it play by regrouping players from ALL of the population in your region (+1 million).
Answer is obvious: if you want the players to see all content, combine all players and take advantage of your multi million player base. Now dungeons are played by combining 100's of servers per continent.
The "warriors" don't like it of course. Because Blizzard took advantage of their huge number of players and ... as warriors they don't like that. WOW can now offer gameplay in groups from level 10 to 85+ 24/7. That's a huge advantage that is the direct result of their ... player numbers. Same for balanced BG's btw, now divided in 5 level brackets.
Of course it enrages the haters of the biggest MMO..
3. Rift why did they introduce it?
They don't have 100+ dungeons, they don't have (and will never have)- a million players per continent and so the question remains why should they consider it? Because it is ... in WOW. The game they want to copy to the very last programming bit and if you copy WOW that means success ....(as history has proven /sarcasm off).
Conclusion: The copy just copies, the original has a strategy behind it.
Actually I would like a game that is not solely focused on the instanced dungeon, but it also uses the open world as well. Surely enough, WoW has tons of dungeons, but at the same time forgo the open world. Its a tradeoff and it seems that converting WoW into DDO has paid off for Blizzard, since the new players are enjoying the content.
I'm not so sure that WoW would need such a tool at launch, so the point is mute. Different games cater to different audiences and need different things throughtout their lifeline.
Btw, it is a tool. As with all tools it has its advantages and its shortcomings. We've seen the advantages and suffered the shortcomings. No need to repeat the same mistakes Blizzard did in this game.
Original? lol. You mean the master copier right? WoW doesn't have one single original idea. None. It has one original technology concept, which is phasing. That's it. Stating that WoW is original is like stating that the sea is dry. Good for a laugh and some head scratching.
If a feature X drove me eventually away from game Y, why would you think that it won't influence my decision to leave Z game if it is eventually implemented in it?
Cross server LFG automated tools turn open worlds into instanced dungeon runs. If I wanted to play an instanced dungeon run, I'd play DDO or even GW1. Or WoW of course, minus node hunting, today WoW is a instanced dungeon run game.
WoW was already an instanced dungeon run game. One of the main reasons the feature was implemented was so players could more easily find groups to grind through endgame content. The fact that players under the level cap now have an alternative to questing as a means of leveling up is simply an added bonus.
Perhaps. But you were not spending 95% of your time either in a city or an instance. At least I didn't.
Do you do so now?
Nobody is forcing you to play WoW any differently than you ever did. Those that wish to play the game simply by queuing up for dungeons in the middle of hub cities don't affect you and are simply playing the game the way they want to play it.
It might have something to do with needing more than a day to dry each zone from whatever content they put in Cataclysm. Still, this is a Rift thread regarding a feature to be added in that game. So I'll stop at this.
Comments
Really now? I've found the casual players to typically yield the most selfish and ill-behaved players. Using the LFD tool in WoW has provided nearly all of my terrible grouping experiences, ranging from rampant ninja looting, needless verbal harassment, and just plain careless and selfish behavior. These issues are exacerbated by an LFD tool where there is zero commitment and zero accountability due to it's random and cross server assembly of players into groups.
I keep hearing this tired old line, so I'll keep responding to it with the same tired old response:
The "real" MMOs no longer exist. Yes EQ, UO, SWG, etc, are all still around, they're only there in name only. The actual gameplay of these games is drastically different from their original incarnation in their glory days. So no, we cannot go back to those games because they no longer exist.
I can't stop loling at so many people who just know for sure how I want to play the game, and who make assumptions about the effect of everything on MY gameplay. Like the guy who says "Yes, players need to socialize in MMOs", no actually I just WANT to socialize as much as I feel like, you see I pay for the experience I enjoy. On Monday that may mean spending 6 hours with my guild, and on Tuesday it may mean spending 20 minutes in a warfront without 2 hours of building a group. How is that hard to understand?
Questing, hunting rare mobs, gathering, etc = playing the game
Waiting for players to make up a group before you can do anything = pointless timesink
[Mod Edit]
Playing: Ableton Live 8
~ ragequitcancelsubdeletegamesmashcomputerkillself ~
Yea, I totally forgot: games are meant to be like work.
Anyone else see the irony?
Playing: Ableton Live 8
~ ragequitcancelsubdeletegamesmashcomputerkillself ~
Spot on, but I don't think it's a completely sad situation, I think it's just how people have always been.
I game to be surrounded by people and to interract with the ones I get on with. So I don't try to be best friends forever with the first tank that shows up to my raid - to me that seems to be fairly normal.
If you think it isn't, go down to your local superstore and see how many random strangers want to walk round at choose groceries with you. Stand at the entrance yelling 'LFM for the Frozen Aisle'.
That shit worked back in the day when all this was novel. People grouped with anyone because the whole thing was new and they wanted someone to share their experiences with. Nowadays, everyone knows the score - if you want some fake-mates or you're some kind of uber-social butterfly, join a guild.
Eitherway, the hardcore-types out there that are moaning for nothing. This game was never going to cater to that market from the get-go, which I would've thought was blatantly obvious.
Aryas
Playing: Ableton Live 8
~ ragequitcancelsubdeletegamesmashcomputerkillself ~
That is so true. But the problem with Wows dungeon finder are the following thing:
It is multi server. That leads to 2 things:
1. Blizzard don't have to merge really small servers since you still can group. That is bad because you actally learn to know people at your server when you play with them, it is how you make friends in MMOs.
2. the thing everyone whine on, you don't suffer the same consequenses for your action as if you play with people from your server. In other games people know the bad apples on their servers, the ones that always leaves the dungeon half way in because they got what they needed or worse, need on items they have on them.
So merge the servers until they are large enough and take away the multi server thing from the dungeon finder and it is a great tool. Like it is now it creates problems as well as it helps people in a hurry.
As for don't use it, it kinda makes any other way to get a PUG a lot harder.
The dungeon finder is a great idea, but I just don't like exactly how it is done.
Personally I thought this game was lacking in that dept and needed a dungeon finder, however as an overall mmo player that's been around the block I don't like WoW's style for it entirely so I hope they don't copy it but at the same time it works. I think Wow easily has the easiest to use, and most effective quickest way to find a group buuuuuut....
I'm one of those more immersive players that want a full, good experience, finding a guild this way and with friends, wow's cross server style while it finds you groups very quickly, ruins this because people don't bother to socialize or be fun they just trash things at a fast pace because they'll never see the people again. Unfortunately one server worth of players especially on a game that isn't wow, isn't going to work well with a queue system.
I really like Rift in beta so far and I want to see it succeed in all departments, but this is one I hope they can remedy soon hopefully before launch. Unfortunately I think their server structure ideas from the get go have messed this up. imo the best way to use a queue system like this and all players have access to each other in the future so they make guilds, friends and socialize, is to design the game around a single global server with instanced outdoor areas as needed like STO, Champions or Guild Wars (or coh to a lesser extent) do. As it is now this just isn't going to be possible though.
I like dungeon finder, for it's purpose, a lot, I dont like spamming trade for a group just because spamming trade is in no way a better choise than a tool for the same purpose, but I would like it to be across my own server only, to promote server community.
In Rift it's not so bad like in WoW where only meaningful content ever is in instances, where with cross-realm dungeon finder your own server becomes nothing but hardware. I remember in WoW after cross-realm BG's it already felt like it destroyed the community feel of your own server.
Since in Rift there is also things to do out in the open it's not that bad, and it wouldnt be a problem at all if it was only in your own server. So YES for the tool if it's for your own realm, and... Well, that should be the only option anyway, for it to be a realm specific tool only.
I really did not plan on buying rift just because it is not my cup of tea. But if they implement a cross-server looking for group tool I might have to get the game just so I can use it to grief people. You know ninja loot and just go out of my way to try to piss people off (not enough to get banned from the game but just enough to annoy people that are trying to play the game). The best part will be because it is cross server none of the players will be able to do anything about it. They can’t ignore me; they can’t put me on a server blacklist because I can do it across all servers. So you are right the cross server tool is a great idea it allows everyone to have fun. (If you really do not think people do this then you are crazy, they have been doing it in FPS for a long time until devs put tools to stop them. The great part in MMOs they are putting in tools to let people act like this to other people.)
So please Trion please put in a cross server tool that has no player accountability, if you do I will do my best to grief everyone I meet in game. (Even though this is sarcastic, if Trion does create a tool like this I might be a griefer just to prove how much fun that tool can be. After all the mentality is “it is my $15” I should be able to do what I want with it, well then my fun will be to see how much I can screw up your fun when you use this tool. Ah isn’t life grand!)
The more features Rift has the better it will do. What's the problem?
"So what? Big deal"
People are blowing the problems with WoW's DF way out of hand. One, you can always report ninjas. Two, server community? Really? I could care less about anyone outside my guild let alone track them down to wag my finger at them for ninjaing or some other "not cool" behaviour. I came back to WoW for 4.0.1 after leaving during TBC and rerolled my paly, got to 15 and never stepped out of SW except to mine/herb. I had already experienced the overland zones, but not the "to cap" dungeons. DF is a blast and for every run that goes south I can easily go weeks without incident. Its a game, its not work, its entertainment. I want to get in, find the class that suites me best, experience all of the content and move once I have.
Well, this pretty much summed it up for me.
I'll be cancelling my order for Rifts today, I hated that dynamic of "push the button and que up with "X" group.".
I played WOW and that was one of the things that made me realize that it is one of the reasons the community wasn't worth a $hit. Glad they announced this early, save my money for TOR and GW2 now (hopefully they won't do what this "fail" future title has done.
If you don't like a feature, does not mean you have to use it. The only important consideration of a game is if it is fun.
I feel your pain and I agree that Blizzard's effect on developers has been infuriating for gamers who want substance and a good RPG community. Pretend it's all about food though and I promise you, it becomes a lot less painful:
Thank you McDonalds for influencing the fast food industry, after I finish eating another imitation burger and fry meal, I'm done with this type of food.
And therein lies the reality. We havn't had quality mmorpg attempts. We've had fastfood crap. Titles that had their lore handed to them on a silver platter: Lord of the Rings Online and Age of Conan, literally trashed the memory of the original authors of said titles. Lord of the Rings Online (LOTRO) had to go free to play to try to keep their heads above the water and keep up with increasing content.
Some recent examples of poorly designed titles that looked amazing at first:
LOTRO
They never once considered 2 faction pvp (like in the books), and left the Orcs, Goblins, and so forth to be nothing more than a side experience in a very limited pvp environment (Etten Moors, et al). Where was the Battle for Helms Deep? Where were the epic conflicts between good and evil? Other than artificially programmed non player characters (NPCs), there was no real living player vs living player effect in the game since their PvM (Player vs Monster) pvp was a minimal effort at best. Players could literally log in as a monster player after level 10. After a so called epic fight between the Free People players and the Creeps (the monster players) - you could engage in a discourse because in all likelyhood that fellow dwarf you are now questing with was an Uruk-Hai ten minutes ago. Talk about destroying the feel of US vs THEM and any sense of the word epic.
AoC
In Age of Conan, necromancers could run with all pets out, past Cimmerian guards (Cimmeria was a part of Hyborea where anything close to magic was as frowned upon as a Salem witch trial). Priests of Mitra, the divinely good priests who served Conan's kingdom of Aquilonia, were able to engage one another in combat, as well as fight side by side with their book sworn mortal enemies, Priests of Set. At best this was a more Americanized version of Guild Wars with a lot less fun factor. Battles looked like everyone was killing themselves because there was just no way to tell the difference between anyone's guild other than the red lettering over their heads. Same race classes slaughtered each other - pretty sad when the books define how culture was everything to the people of Hyborea - and those small groups that forgot it, quickly felt the pain of sword.
Ridiculous. Developers have gotten lazy since WoW's inception. The industry is filled with people who have no business being involved because they are corporate officers and not creative people who grew up loving the genre (the newer owners of Warhammer and Alganon are shining examples of this).
The top dogs of the industry started with:
Richard Garriott's Ultima Online (First title to break the 10,000 player mark) in 1997
Brad McQuaid, Steve Clover, and Bill Trost's 1999 release of Everquest (First to break the 225,000 player mark in 1999)
Toby Ragaini (lead designer) et al. created Asheron's Call in 1999 (2 months after Everquest) - at its peak in 2001 it hit 120,000 players
Long before Age of Conan's production caused Robert E. Howard to roll over in his grave...Funcom released Anarchy Online (2001). Sadly the title made less money in its entire history than Jay Z made in a 2008 released IRS statement (38 million beats their 28 million).
And my all time favorite: Dark Age of Camelot also in 2001 and I quote: At high levels, where other games tend to grow stale, players in Dark Age of Camelot can participate in PvP struggles, territorial conquest, and protecting their Realm's Relics (objects of power) from enemy invasion, as well as attempting to pilfer enemy Relics themselves.
You won't find that concept in any title anymore - sadly. And no, Warhammer is not worth mentioning - just another embarrassment with a ridiculously over caffeinated propoganda staff who in the end have RvR'd themselves to death with two limited factions - IN THE FACE.
POINT IS, there was a time when mmorpgs were well designed and built off of true RP concepts, like community housing, complex race and class differences across multiple factions, the concept of CONQUEST and territorial acquisition.
The times have changed. Hang in there, someone with creativity and independent financing will eventually emerge. I hope?
/my 2 cents.
questing is like searching items and exp to do dungeons= pointless timesink,i dont have time for that or patience ,,tool for that.
gatgering is not gaming,pointless timesink ,crafting is,,tool for that
hunting rare mobs is like hunting rare players to team with,pointless timesink,tool for that.
actually i dont have time to clear trash mobs in dungeons either,pointless timesink,tool for that too.
Generation P
3rd Time you posted the same rubbish, sitting in town spamming LFG is not playing the game, it is waiting to play, not much diffrent than sitting in a log-in que cept worse because you may never get in. The game has to caitor to people who do not want to join a guild for whatever reason. How you could equate doing a dungeon to finding a group I will never understand, does the tool do the dungeon for you ? No. All it does is help you get a group going, and you don't even need to use it, if you love talking to new people by all means talk your batteries flat and find a group the good ol fashioned way, but stop begrudging other people who want to get in have fun and know that they will at least find a group to go with.
MMO's have timesinks, BIG SHOCK, but they all have a point:
Kill a Mob = Gain XP and Loot
Complete a Dungeon = Fun group play and xp and loot
Farm Mats for Hours = Make some gold and buy some shinny new gear
Do Warfronts = Get to murder people, hone your skills, and get some PVP gear
All these activities can be pre-planed, if your not in a guild finding a group can't, if this little tool did the actual work for you I would be on your side, but it doesn't, it just gets you started.
I don't have time (and don't want to waste time) waiting until a group forms "the old way" i.e. spamming chan channels or waiting for irl friends to connect. I'm more willing to wait for a fun group to do some questing instead.
Therefore using a dungeon finder is nice and quick and serves its purpose (I love it!). It also doesn't prevent from doing some dungeon crawling with guildies or group via channels so no one should complain.
And yes some people like to play MMOs without joining a guild and this should be respected as well (as I've read some comments here that scare me); and I've been both: guild officer in one game and not in guild in another and I've enjoyed both ways.
If a feature X drove me eventually away from game Y, why would you think that it won't influence my decision to leave Z game if it is eventually implemented in it?
Cross server LFG automated tools turn open worlds into instanced dungeon runs. If I wanted to play an instanced dungeon run, I'd play DDO or even GW1. Or WoW of course, minus node hunting, today WoW is a instanced dungeon run game.
I heard a mini lecture about the D generation (the Digital generation, born 1996-) the other day. Scared the hell out of me as a lecturer. They are coming and they will be damn difficult to teach.
Apparently the dominant feature of the D generation is that they will buy almost anything (digital or physical) provided they don't have to wait for it. They "demand" content in short sharp bursts.
I suspect we are seeing some of them in MMOs now and a cross server LFD tool is the kind of thing they will "demand".
Few observations.
1. Who invented the X cross server dungeon finder ?: Blizzard.
So the WOW warriors hate it, as usual whatever Blizzard does.
2. Why did Blizzard introduce it?
Because in a game with 100+ normal and heroic dungeons (just calculate) you can't do that content with 3K+ people on line even in a FULL single server realm. So you have the choice: wasted content or let it play by regrouping players from ALL of the population in your region (+1 million).
Answer is obvious: if you want the players to see all content, combine all players and take advantage of your multi million player base. Now dungeons are played by combining 100's of servers per continent.
The "warriors" don't like it of course. Because Blizzard took advantage of their huge number of players and ... as warriors they don't like that. WOW can now offer gameplay in groups from level 10 to 85+ 24/7. That's a huge advantage that is the direct result of their ... player numbers. Same for balanced BG's btw, now divided in 5 level brackets.
Of course it enrages the haters of the biggest MMO..
3. Rift why did they introduce it?
They don't have 100+ dungeons, they don't have (and will never have)- a million players per continent and so the question remains why should they consider it? Because it is ... in WOW. The game they want to copy to the very last programming bit and if you copy WOW that means success ....(as history has proven /sarcasm off).
Conclusion: The copy just copies, the original has a strategy behind it.
Actually I would like a game that is not solely focused on the instanced dungeon, but it also uses the open world as well. Surely enough, WoW has tons of dungeons, but at the same time forgo the open world. Its a tradeoff and it seems that converting WoW into DDO has paid off for Blizzard, since the new players are enjoying the content.
I'm not so sure that WoW would need such a tool at launch, so the point is mute. Different games cater to different audiences and need different things throughtout their lifeline.
Btw, it is a tool. As with all tools it has its advantages and its shortcomings. We've seen the advantages and suffered the shortcomings. No need to repeat the same mistakes Blizzard did in this game.
Original? lol. You mean the master copier right? WoW doesn't have one single original idea. None. It has one original technology concept, which is phasing. That's it. Stating that WoW is original is like stating that the sea is dry. Good for a laugh and some head scratching.
WoW was already an instanced dungeon run game. One of the main reasons the feature was implemented was so players could more easily find groups to grind through endgame content. The fact that players under the level cap now have an alternative to questing as a means of leveling up is simply an added bonus.
Perhaps. But you were not spending 95% of your time either in a city or an instance. At least I didn't.
Do you do so now?
Nobody is forcing you to play WoW any differently than you ever did. Those that wish to play the game simply by queuing up for dungeons in the middle of hub cities don't affect you and are simply playing the game the way they want to play it.
It might have something to do with needing more than a day to dry each zone from whatever content they put in Cataclysm. Still, this is a Rift thread regarding a feature to be added in that game. So I'll stop at this.