Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Quick Links
What are your feelings towards support classes?
HJ-GOAT
Member Posts: 5
Hi Everyone,
Goat here, dev GM in training. I'm not sure if I've introduced myself yet, but if not, howdy.
In any case, and in light of the newly released info on clerics, bards, and healers, I'd like to hear what you think about the idea of support classes as a whole, in any multiplayer game.
In gemstone it used to be understood that empaths healed and did very little else. It generally wasn't practical to solo with them beyond early levels, and group hunting was not all that common. As I understand it, things have changed now and empaths have a fair number of offensive-minded spells of their own. (I honestly don't know how effectively they solo like-level creatures). Some think that was a great idea, others thought empaths were getting spells that their profession should have instead.
I will hopefully be too entangled in code to actually play HJ a whole bunch once its released, but I'm sure I'll have a character, and I think I may try pure support just to see what it's like. I like combat to be as strategic as possible, and adding a layer of support to the battle dynamics takes it one step further away from hack-slash-hack-slash.
Do you enjoy playing classes that don't directly harm the enemy as efficiently as others but instead help group members do their thing? Do you think you'll play a character with support aspects? What design decisions make support classes thrive or fail?
Goat
Comments
Personally, I like to be able to throw in some damage, but since there is a 2-class system, my second class may be a support class.
At this point my main class will be a Ranger because I enjoy that kind of gameplay. Pets are fun too
For my 2nd class though, I'm considering a support class such as a bard or healer for a couple of reasons.
I usually have a a Very Small number of people that I group with regularly. And a common problem with mmo groups is that there never seems to be enough support players around when you need them. So even though I won't be 100% support, I'll still be able to help out (hopefully) in a meaningful way.
Also, sometimes I like to *gasp*-dare-i-say-it?. . . Solo. From what I've seen so far, choosing a 2nd class for support will probably help my ability to solo.
I don't think I would ever go all support, simply because of my soloish tendencies. I need to be able to drop the hammer on my own, instead of coordinating a group anytime I want to fight.
Regarding your question "What design decisions make support classes thrive or fail?" Simple. Support classes thrive when they bring Unique and Valuable abilities to a group. They fail when they can be replaced by classes that have similiar abilities, and then some.
Thats speaking about Thriving or Failing within the context of "Group Support".
-- I need a nerf --
Guild Wars 2 is my religion
Or or or ... they need non combat ways to level/progress.
FYI: According to the devs, keeping up with your friends will not be necessary. Their current claim is that people of disparate levels will be able to hunt together effectively.
Guild Wars 2 is my religion
Many games have experimented with making a healing class that does more than merely heal and buff; i.e., it is supposed to be a damage dealer as well.
The problem, from a game design standpoint, is that a class that can do major damage and also heal proficiently becomes the preferred class and presents balancing problems. So you end up with a class that heals well and does merely ok damage.
Now comes grouping dynamics. Typically if you are the group's intended healer, but spend time running around trying to bonk things with a mace, the group's reaction is "Listen bud, if we wanted a damage dealer we would have grouped with a wizard, not a cleric. Your job is to heal. Just stand back there, heal, and try not to get any aggro." That is the reality of most online games. It's expected.
The upside for people who play this role is that they are very, very popular. Groups are built around them. Guilds are always looking for more healers. These folks spend the least amount of time looking for groups because 5 seconds after they enter a zone they get 10 invites.
My suggestion is to flesh the class out to make it more fun to play, sure, but don't waste a second of time thinking you are going to radically change the way people play these games. The dedicated group healer is an entrenched playstyle and expectation. Let it be.
EQ1, EQ2, SWG, SWTOR, GW, GW2 CoH, CoV, FFXI, WoW, CO, War,TSW and a slew of free trials and beta tests
non-confrontational in real life, but my alter-ego pops out in MMOs;
it's a catharsis for me. Similarly, my daily life revolves around a lot of different people, and I find it refreshing to be able to excel at independence (i.e. soloing) in-game.
That said, I like tank classes because they generally are very hardy (lots of hitpoints), very forgiving (mostly because of all those hitpoints), and at least mildly functional on their own (though they usually seem to come with loads of downtime as well, which I hate). Support classes, on the other hand, tend to be very fragile (few hitpoints), very unforgiving (miss one spell and someone dies), and utterly reliant on others to accomplish things.
Fortunately, none of this seems to be quite true with Hero's Journey. Dual-classing should allow players to dull those extreme edges a bit. I'm sure pure combinations like healer/healer and warrior/warrior will still be all the rage when it comes to picking teams for raid content (assuming that's a concept that's going to have a place in HJ), but I suspect that just having a particular primary class will be enough for less specialized activity.
Now, do I think I'll play a support class in Hero's Journey? Almost certainly as a second class, though I still don't see myself playing one as a primary. What design decisions make support classes thrive or fail? I suspect it's the same as with any class: a well-examined purpose (what is the class supposed to do?) and a well-executed delivery of that purpose (is the class doing what it's supposed to be doing?). Everything beyond that is personal preference.
As far as what support classes should be doing, it really varies by class, I suppose. The typical answers to that question are one of three things: Healing/Resurrecting, Crowd Control, and Buffing. Honestly, I'm sick to death of narrow definitions, but they are what they are. I don't think there's any need to stick to the accepted gospel regarding what support classes do and don't do (though they should probably be supportive
Hey, if it were easy, everyone would be doing it! Welcome to the world of game design: where the line between your biggest fan and your biggest critic is redrawn every patch.
The only MMORPG I have played is Guild Wars. The support classes in this are great they aren't the main damage dealers but they can make the difference between success and failure.
- Necromancers raise undead to take some of the heat off warriors, curse enemies to weaken them, provide some healing.
- Mesmers - great for shutting down enemy spell casters, weakening enemy fighters
- monks - great for healing, and a range of spells that do double damage against undead as well as buffs to protect the party.
People who know what they are doing with support characters are incredibly useful, the reverse is people who have no idea can really aggravate you.
In H.J do each of the classes have some basic healing ability or will players be reliant on having a healer in the party? If that was the case I can see healer being the favourite secondary class.
I loved watching that old David Carradine T.V series where he was a shaolin priest. Does H.J support unarmed combat? If so should i make a healer/warrior or a warrior/healer for my monk?
I hope to see lots of quests with options for the support classes to exercise their abilites. Diplomatic roles for bards, or searching taverns for information, or even spreading information, rumuors in taverns.
Clerics should have quests that further the goals of whatever religious body they belong to.
Give us plague ridden villages for healers to cure. Gangrene for the warriors so they appreciate healers.
Sup Goat,
To me a support class provides intel, enchances or protects other players, or indirectly harms opponents(stun, ect.). Since supporting roles can really turn the tide of battle; I love playing them. What I'm really looking for is an mmo where I have to think. I guess that's why I tend to gravitate towards competative online play like guildwars.
In shadowbane I was a scout. I scouted the movements of armies while dodging stealth hunters. This was a real thrill sometimes. The thrill came from being a hunter but at the same time being hunted. I consider this a supporting role as my intel had an indirect impact on the coming battle. I was the eyes.
In guildwars I played various monk healers. It's almost like playing a metagame; being a monk in guildwars. Keeping those bars up in a guild vs guild battle can get crazy. Don't forget to add in that you tend to be a high priority target. The strategy came in surviving while being an effecient and effective healer. I deliberately chose the monk support class because of the challenge and strategy involved. Guildwars really has some great support classes. You can build entire group strategies around them. I haven't found many other games with this in common.
A few general reasons I like playing support classes.
- Being able to shape the battle field to my groups advantage.
- Having a big bag O'tricks.
- The feeling of micro managing.
- Wracking my brain over life or death decisions.
I noticed in the HJ e3 video from last year that the wizard can shape a firewall. The AI seems to want to run around the fire instead of through it. This can really add some strategy and tactics to the game. Drawing circles of fire around certain people to protect them or force the enemy to burn. Using firewalls to guide monsters into a choke where they can be aoe'd to hell. I like the idea.That being said, there are a lot of horrible design decisions that the support class has suffered in its mmo history. One being "Buffs". Your average +stat buff for so many minutes. Some annoyingly boring spell I have to cast every so often to keep all the stats high. This reduces the support class into a buff bot role. I don't blame people for creating buff bots. It's so completely boring to cast +5str for 10 minutes. Same goes for debuffs. -5str got 3 minutes, boring. Maybe if my "debuff" turned their sword into a HAM for 1 minute it might be interesting.
I'm going to end the post before it gets much longer. I like the extra strategy that seems to come with support classes. Powerful indirect effects turn me on. Boring maintenance spells a turn off.
l8r
When I play as a healer, I log in knowing that my primary role is to heal and assist. I don't expect to be able to DPS just under a Mage or anything silly.
But therein lays the beauty of a dual class system. In a game like HJ, one could chose Healer/Bard and be pure support, or Healer/Wizard if you want to deal it in both areas.
I personally would much rather see Healer as a class purely that. A very strong concentration on unique ways to heal and assist, to mend and repair. Maybe even ways to imbue weapons semi/permanently with healing assists with rare reagants or something. Healer to me should be completely and utterly a healer. Hell, I'd love to see the option of dualing the same class - aka Healer/Healer, with added depth in that primary role.
If you *then* want the ability to solo a lot, take Ranger as the primary or secondary. If you want to be a psuedo-Paladin, take Warrior+Healer or such.
I really want to see Healer as being just a pure, solid, giver of life.
BUT, it also needs a lot of versatility to make it interesting. Ala what big Al posted above me. There is nothing worse than being a buff bot as a class. And even worse when you get one or two big heals and a bunch of little heals and you just stand there spamming them.
For example, I just finished up a long Giants group with my Warden in EQ2. Paly pulls, I cast Regrowth heal over time... I watch the timer.. recast. These were orange and red mobs to me btw. That's all I did pretty much the whole session. I made a crapload of xp, but it was boring as batsh*t.
The problem is giving one enough healing ability that trying to heal against an orange con is not impossible, but making it difficult enough that I was able to keep the 28 Paly up against 2 x 29^^^ for the duration of the hunt. I'm a 22 Warden.
I dunno.. I love being a healer and is what I'll always do. But please make it a class of interest.
It's pretty good fun healing in WoW, but again is rather a case of spam, spam, spam the heals.
There has to be some way to make healing very intricate and intense, without making it impossible to keep your group in its feet.
If anyone can create this system, it's the Simugods.
"(The) Iraqi people owe the American people a huge debt of gratitude." - George W Bush.
Oh. My. God.
Thank you everyone for your responses.
Strategy in multi-player combat is something I'm very passionate about. I'm just started my transition from training to dev, and have no idea what I'll be working on. However, if I get my chance I'll want each class to feel like it makes a unique contribution on the battlefield and to have unique set of decisions to make. I imagine I'm not the only one working on HJ that feels that way.
My feel is that a support class should support. Soloing effectively should not be something they should be able to do. The fact that Imu is going with a duel calss system should help with being able to do some damage, but I think that if a class is going to be a very important member to a group, and generally speaking you dont wnat to have a gourp without 1 or 2 support classes, they should be able to go out and solo stuff with easy. No reason for them to group, and the other classes that depend on them are out of luck. Here is a good example of why support classes shouldnt be able to solo well.
WoW
The Priest , Druid and Shaman classes can solo very well, if they do their talents accordingly. As a result everyone mostly solos till lvl 60, then the support classes redo their talents so they are group friendly, becuase you can't solo a raid dungeon.
Now, I dont think they should be helpless, but they should do much better in a group. And their impact on a group should be very noticable.
The amazing power of:
The rogue bard.
Now I'm not exactly sure how this will work but I want to be able to make all the ladies swoon (jk) with my music and use my deviesh ways to beat up things. Imagine powering up yourself and unleashing a massive dagger flurry on the mob, yeah it'll be classy.
Which Final Fantasy Character Are You?
Final Fantasy 7
Support classes are perfectly fine, provided -- and I emphasize this, because it demands emphasis -- that you and your company are totally honest with your customers about which classes are meant for support, and that class roles do not change to/from support in the endgame. These are both critical, particularly with so many planned hybrid classes.
Don't pull a Blizzard, promise "no support classes", then make your hybrids into support classes one year after release. That just upsets people, and ultimately costs customers. Be honest and forthright about which classes are pure support, and you'll find that people are happy playing them. Otherwise, you'll find that people are bitter, hostile, and resentful about playing something other than what was advertised.
-josh
---------------------------------------------------
There's a good chance that I'll offend you. There's an even better chance that I could care less. Pleaes don't take the internet so seriously.
I like soloing, I think it's nice sometimes to not have to handle a whole group and just go out and do what you will, but if I were to play a healer I wouldn't expect to solo. Perhaps in the first few levels soloing is fine because this is when a supporting class, such as a healer, is getting grasps on the world as a whole as well as on skills and abilities, ect.
Once levels 15+ come by, (speaking generically about what is learned by level 15, of course,) in my opinion it should even out so that support classes should be just that, support. After all, a healer is suppose to be the one in the back healing everyone, not the person in the front killing uber enemies. I'm not saying I'm opposed to the healer who throws in a few hits here and there, not at all, it's just that HEALING should be key to them, which means healing others, which would then lead to being in a group, blah blah.
Another thing though, is that I've always found healing to be the least thankful job. I mean once you know people and group with them, sure, they get it. If you just get picked up in a group, however, there are quite a few times when it seems like no one knows what they're doing, and you get blamed. A mage with no armor tries to tank a massive mob... dies... and what's the response? 'OMG WTF d00d, why wurn't u healling!!111' I'm not fond of that... but I suppose it isn't THAT frequent of an occurence, just more so for healers than other types.
This is true, and it's something that needs to be watched carefully. I don't know how many times I've watched someone do something *!#%-all game-breakingly stupid, then scream "HEAL" at me like I am the band-aid for his bad decisions. Any time an encounter fares poorly, the healers and support classes are the first ones blamed.
-josh
---------------------------------------------------
There's a good chance that I'll offend you. There's an even better chance that I could care less. Pleaes don't take the internet so seriously.
I love the Guild Wars system where they have A.I henchmen you can take rather than a Pick Up Group. This means if I want to go exploring with my healer (or other support class character) I can.
Lots of people want to be able to do some solo stuff - so having the A.I henchies means you can still do this, even when playing a support class. At the same time a lot of the major quests (missions) are not doable with A.I henchies, so for these you still need to group with real people.
As a healer I have been complemented and abused. The compliments are nice and make you wonder how bad other healers are if you get complimented for doing an outstanding job, when you thought you did a reasonable job.
I dislike getting abused when the people you are trying to keep alive are too stupid to get out of the poisoned swamp water
.
Sometimes playing a support character requires a thick skin.
Support classes are the class you want everyone else to play. For me to play the game the way I want to I must have a healer along. Now if there were enough people that wanted to play healers that would be great, but there just isn’t.
I am generalizing here, I know there are some people that like to play healers (bless you) but the umber is no where near the 1:6 ratio that is needed to make the game fluid. The number of healers available are bolstered by the people that play a class because it is in demand, these people tend to burn too fast and quit (I fit into this category, and then it was back to the DPS class I loved).
As a developer in the next generation of MMO's your task is to make healing fun to play, or reduce the need for healers to match the population base. Multi-classing is a big step, but this makes the healer as a secondary class almost a necessity.
I cant speak for all but I can tell you why I no longer play a healer:
· Watching HP Bars of the party is just not fun.
· Mobs that pump out so much damage a healing circle as required.. (Count 10 hit button... repeat)
· Micro-managing buffs
· Too much pressure to do the job right EVERY time.
· I want to be a hero. Healing is too invisible, you only notice it when its not there
I mostly agree with ya Jaas.
I have tried support characters in SWG, GW, and COH/V. In SWG, I didn't mind the non-combat support role (entertainer). When they removed that (or the need for it), the combat support role was not something I really enjoyed. Nor do I in GW, nor in COH/V. I have only ever gotten one control character (a "dominator" villain) to a significant level in COH, and zero buffer/healer types.
I think I just need a more active role in the game. Healing feels too passive.
But also, although I am not mainly a soloer, I want it to be possible to solo the character. If my friends are not on yet but I expect them on soon, I don't want to have to sit in town waiting, and I don't feel right joining a pickup group when I know I will have to leave shortly. I want something I can do reasonably well by myself, until the rest of the gang logs in. If that's not possible, I tend to log out myself (bored) and then log back in later. This requires me to mostly guess when others will be on. And I find that annoying.
I'm not really into pickup groups, just in general. Given my druthers I would preferentially do 100% of the game with my existing guild of friends (about 10 total people, all awesome). But when they are not there, I don't want to HAVE to do pickup groups... I'd rather solo and wait for one of them to show up (it usually doesn't take long). And that is much harder to do with a healer type in most games (other than GW, as one person pointed out, because of the henchies) than it is to pick up a "DPS" character like a fighter and just go to town.
The other thing that always bugs me is that in most games, substitutes for healers exist -- healing potions instead of cure serious wounds spells; healing inspirations in COH/V; med-kits that anyone could use in SWG. But substitutes for DPS do not (other than in GW again) generally exist. This makes it very one-sided. In SWG, COH, NWN, you name the game, I could take my fighter, load up with "healing potions" (or whatever) and go solo some decent content. If 5 of us got on together and ALL played fighters, still we would not have a terrible problem, for the same reason. However, in those same games, it's almost universally impossible to play a healer solo, or a team of healers, because there is no one to do damage. Unlike the fighter who can "stock up" on "healing potions," a healer generally cannot stock up on "DPS potions." I think this sort of imbalance is one of the reasons healers are not more popular. Many of us actually like healing in group, but we don't like the fact that our healer is crippled without a group... and it's especially ufnair when the healer is so crippled, but the fighter or the rogue is not.
C
Hi, Goat.
I'm on record on this subject here and in HJ's play.net forum, so I won't belabor the point... much.
My personal answer to your question is that I don't consider non-combat classes to automatically be mere "support" classes.
If it's a playstyle important enough to build a class around it, then it's important enough to have content generated for it that's equivalent to what any other class gets. If you don't believe that some playstyle needs equivalent content, then it doesn't need to be a class.
So my biggest beef with HJ is that the only playstyle Simu considers worthy of content (as defined by having classes available for accessing that content) is combat. Here you (Simu) are, creating an entire gameworld with all kinds of interesting flora and fauna and physical and social phenomena (including lore)... and the only form of interaction with this rich world you're going to support with classes is to kill it?
Sigh.
I believe HJ would have been more satisfying to more gamers had it been designed to treat the other major playstyles -- commerce, crafting, exploration, socializing -- as equal partners to combat play, with fully-realized classes of their own. They would not have been support classes, except in the more appropriate sense that every playstyle supports every other playstyle.
Offering an explicit support class just sends the message to you, the player, that what you enjoy doing (which is why you chose that class) isn't important enough to get content of its own. It says that you exist only to service some other player of an explicitly non-support class.
Why should any player be satisfied with that?
Treating any kind of gameplay other than combat as mere "support" play is bad enough for any MMORPG with aspirations to being an interesting online world. I believe it will prove to be even worse for a game like HJ that hopes to make its depth and immersiveness a selling point.
*shrug* If HJ attracts and retains millions of subscribers, of course I'll admit I was wrong.
If it doesn't...?
--Flatfingers
This was always my gripe in SWG about crafters and entertainers and such. They were full classes, but had no way of really doing anything in terms of interacting with the game world. "Interact with other players?" Sure... but combat AND non-combat characters can do that. But "Interact with the gameworld" was left as "combat players only." And that always frustrated me.
I agree with your statement, "If it's important enough to have a class, it's important enough to have its own content." That's absolutely true.
C
Hey all, I'm new to the forums but I have been following certain games for a while, Hero's Journey being one of them.
This seems to be as good a topic as any to start posting on. As far as support classes are concerned, I disagree with having them, unless there are alternate forms of gaining experience besides combat. Otherwise there is no point to having them.
Having a purely support class means one of two things, either the class is not viable enough to be wanted in a group based on its skills, or its skills are the ones every group wants and a game will not start unless that role is filled. People seem to get fairly anal about having "the perfect party" and will not actually go out unless that group is made, complete with the defined roles that people expect.
I am a gamer. I like to play a game how I want to play it, and if I am forced to play a certain class based on others' perceived notions on how a class should be played...well, lets just say that I think of the game far less as being a good game. Look at Final Fantasy XI for an example of this. Dual classing is possible, but certain class combinations are not viable, nor are they wanted in a group, and that is a game that "forces" you to group. If you do not fit into a group's idea of how a class should be played, then you are not going to find a group. If I wanted to play a Fighter-Mage, I will be sitting out forever because the classes do not mesh well, and is not the most playable option for a Tank to play, even though it may be cool to be one, and fun to roleplay. You are forced to play the game how others want you to play, rather than how you want to play. That is not a good system. Guild Wars does the dual classing the best of any game I've played. Pretty much every class combo that I can think of is viable, and a support classes' role is not so vital that you miss it if you do not have it in your group.
One thing I also hate is being forced to group in a game. If I only have a couple of hours to play after work, I might just hop on for a bit to roam around. As a purely support class I would truthfully be unable to do that in the traditional sense because I could not survive in combat by myself, which is the only way to get experience, so I am stuck waiting for a group. And if I jump on at a time when no one near me is looking for a group, I don't get to play. Thus my time is wasted. The one thing that I can say about WoW, even though it's far from my "prefect" MMO, is that it is easy to get into with any class. You never feel useless and "stuck".
I reiterate: If there are purely support classes who cannot function without a group, then give them options to gain experience besides combat. Combat should be the Warrior's cup of tea. That's all they are built for, and they should excel at it beyond every other class. No other class should come close to them. 1 on 1, they should be able to destroy any other character they meet. Because what else does a Tank do? In order to differentiate classes, you need to give them things that they excel at that don't include combat. Give them skills that are useful in other areas. A Thief should be able to steal gold or items from vendors or some such. A Mage should be able to enchant items or create magical artifacts. A Priest could spread the religion of his or her god, gaining experience from converting people. A Bard should perform in taverns gaining experience from telling his or her tale to people.
Having every class viable in combat completely negates the Warrior. The warrior becomes nothing more than a movable rock, soaking damage and that's it, where it's the rest of the party's job to kill things. That is the downfall of MMOs. They rely on combat being the only way to gain experience, making a support class a necessity in a group sense but completely useless by itself. By giving everyone a job they excel at that is unique from everyone else, every class is viable and fun and playable. The game becomes better because there is more to do and experience every time you decide to make a new character to try something out.
"I aim to Misbehave" - Malcolm Reynolds, Serenity