WAR Elf classes

[Numtini]

The PVP crowd will play whatever race and class is the most optimized for racking up large numbers of individual kills and maximizing independence.

It wouldn't matter if you made a pink fairy with a shirt that says "I wet my bed and suck cock." If it gives them an edge, they'll play it.

[Venkman]

Here's a part I'm confused on, and I thought the answer was in this thread. Can't find it though so will ask:

What part of instantiated endgame PvP zones could exclude casuals in WAR? Is it because points a team/side gains can be lost through losses?

[eldaec]

What part of instantiated endgame PvP zones could exclude casuals in WAR? Is it because points a team/side gains can be lost through losses?

That's the biggest element.

(We don't know if it is technically losing points - it might just be that it gives the other team points, and when they reach X points, they win. The effect is the same - it is still zero sum.)

But equally, a structure which uses locked 6v6, 12v12 etc instances will ensure pre-made teams that play together consistently dominate anything else, this inherently encourages elder players to exclude newer players.

I have my team of 6, why would I ever interact with less skilled/geared/developed characters? I don't need them, all they can do is enter instances and give the opposition points, I would be better off if they don't play.

Instance based sport PvP devalues the cat herding elements of something like DAoC that build realm community and links between new & elder players. It also rewards people for interacting solely with their own hyper-organised team.

The PVP crowd will play whatever race and class is the most optimized for racking up large numbers of individual kills and maximizing independence.

The history of other faction based MMOGs suggests that large majority of people pick their first realm according to which is prettiest, then once in a realm community, stick with it. It's certainly true that people will create alts to gain advantage within the realm.

Naturally if the game design encourages you to ignore your realm outside of the immeadiate team you enter sport-pvp with, then the realm community may not grow, and teams will swing between realms more often.

[Venkman]

WoW BGs might be an ok model then, as long as they allow for PUGs. In WoW BGs, even the losers gain some points. Not as fast as winners, but it's enough that you could find entire sides just going AFK for the entire battle letting themselves get rolled. Slower than winning but macroable.

Also, dedicated formed groups are not a common thing, at least in WoW. I'm sure the density is higher in DAoC, but that playerbase is very old now, and much more narrow. I found WoW BGs to be more casual than any other endgame activity, including faction farming.

It's sport and largely irrelevant to the PvE player. But segregating the endgame players by giving each something to do is better than alienating one whole group by focusing on one activity or pissing both off by forcing them together.

[eldaec]

WoW BGs might be an ok model then, as long as they allow for PUGs. In WoW BGs, even the losers gain some points. Not as fast as winners, but it's enough that you could find entire sides just going AFK for the entire battle letting themselves get rolled. Slower than winning but macroable.

I'm not explaining myself well regarding points.

I'm talking about realm victory points that are shared realm wide.

The object of the end game is to drive the battlefront forward/back. By losing instances new/weak players will allow their battlefront to fall back. In other words, the realm is worse off than if they hadn't entered the instance.

This is not an issue about personal xp or rp.

Some of the very highest end players won't care too much about realm objectives, but most will, and the middle rank and lower rank players will care about them the most, because it is through realm objectives that lower ranking players get to win from time to time.

I found WoW BGs to be more casual than any other endgame activity

And I would argue that this is precisely because BGs are not the main end game in WoW, they are just 'a fun thing to do'.

PvP in WAR is supposed to be the reason you are developing your character.

Pre-mades, or at least groups formed from with a guild or alliance were the majority of groups in DAoC RvR. The key was that uber guild groups would have to communicate with new guild groups to get shit done on the frontier, plus, since nobody could actually hurt the realm by coming along and taking up slots, people were open to filling teams with random players.

The WAR design will encourage pre-mades further. The exclusionary pressure of the zero-sum game will concentrate it even more.



I actually think sport-pvp is a decent thing to include as a low-intensity low-reward side line. The problem is making it the "real" end game.

[Venkman]

Ok, that moving battlefront puts this into a lot better context. You probably explained it before and I just missed it :)

But, on WoW BGs, the reason I found them casual is because of their receptiveness to PUGs and the fact that even the losers gained something. They very much weren't just for shits and giggles though. They were an alternative path to continual gear improvement if you didn't have the time to faction grind or the time/will to Raid. You weren't getting the bestest of the best, but this was more due to the sort of stats the PvP gear had than anything linear. PvP gear was different from PvE kind. And while the toppest/bestest PvE gear was still the kind to turn heads, a statistical "almost nobody" was ever going to get it because of the amount of people capable of playing at that level.

Regardless, the WAR battlefront changes everything. If things turn out as you describe, then I can see them either making that battlefront not move that much, or change the rewards to some other things (like, say, the original vision for sigils in DAoC :) ). Aren't there various brackets for sport-PvP though? Seems I recall something about various ways of contributing to the realm without affecting the front line.

Oh, and great conversation btw, particularly on a weekend.

[Trippy]

Can we think of a MMOG where the naughty team outnumbered the sensible team?

EQ.
Never underestimate the love of dark elves.

Not when I played.

[Xanthippe]

I'm confused now.  I thought WAR pvp was going to be like DAOC frontier pvp.  It's going to be like GW pvp?

[Merusk]

Can we think of a MMOG where the naughty team outnumbered the sensible team?

EQ.
Never underestimate the love of dark elves.

Not when I played.

Gulp is right, and in a BIG way on Sullon Zek, where 'faction mattered.'   "Good Guys" were pushed-back to Qeynos and Halla, and that was it for areas they controlled.

We /were/ discussing PVP factions here, not PvE.

 

Also, eldaec, people didn't go to Horde in droves because the races were deemed "ugly as fuck."

This is a Mythic game.

*Everyone* is ugly as fuck.

But only Order get leather jackets.

Yep, everyone's equally ugly.  Which means "goody two shoes image" vs "Badass image"   I know which one wins more males age 15-25.

[caladein]

The WAR design will encourage pre-mades further. The exclusionary pressure of the zero-sum game will concentrate it even more.

I agree with your basic argument but I think you're overestimating two things:

• The ability of the top-end to discourage the remainder of their side's population. While the scrubs may actually be hurting their side, they probably won't care about anything above their own self-interest (in terms of rewards or fun). As long as they are getting something out of getting pounded X% of the time, the meta-game just won't matter much.
  
  
• The importance of the cathearding meta-game for either the top-end or the scrubs. The only time I ever really experienced anything outside of a cluster-fuck in open PvP situations was when the groups were small (say 20-30 people on 2-3 sides). Anything above 40 people, let alone 100, and you simply don't care about or can't manage that large a group of people.
  
  For the herders it's mostly an unwelcome bother to have to mobilize an entire force. (I found it fun for the most part to have an entire army rest on my shoulders (healers FTW). For the vast majority of the officer corps I've been in, it was a major headache.) For the herded, they're simply cannon fodder either way. They may be on the winning side on occasion, but their actual kills were few and far between.

On the issue of a "realm community" though, I agree that open RvR is a big driver of that. It builds relationships between the elite and the leaders of the zerg guilds, not really among the top-end and scrubs directly (especially if battlefields aren't some static place but instead shifting hotspots). Maybe I've seen too many chains of command, but it's always "Hey man, can you get us some guys over here? We could use the meat shields something fierce." in a whisper to a guild leader not "Rally to our aid!" in public.

[bhodi]

The populace will probably split into three groups; I think planetside is a good indicator of how things might turn out. You have the Zerg, the Premades, and the Pickups. The pickups are 'leaders' who invite random people for a pickup 'raid' with some semblance of unity (though you will always have random people doing their own thing).

There are many ways to make sure the groups don't destroy each other's fun -- concentrate the Zerg on one or two fronts by have some sort of 'only the front outposts are highly vulnerable' type relay system, give extra rewards to captains for commanding people underneath him (and for being commanded) to take care of the pickups with slightly more involved mission objectives than 'swarm the front', and extra rewards for things only premades can do -- scouting, raids deep behind enemy lines, and directing the war front metagame by opening new fronts or holes for the zerg/premades.

Recognizing and planning for different activities for the three different groups should eliminate some of the stepping on each other's toes.

[Drogo]

My biggest problem with WAR is that it concentrates so much on instances for deciding who is winning the realm war. Personally I had tons more fun in WoW doing the meaningless Tarren Mill vs Southshore battles than I ever did in the instanced BGs. Even on a server that has heavily alliance favored and having Tarren Mill overrun several times a night, it was still more fun than the BGs because it was all based on PvP and actually killing the other opponents. You never knew what was going to be coming at you and each fight was different.

WoW BGs are the exact opposite of what PvP is supposed to be about. BGs became nothing more than a race toward victory goals. In AV it became a race to the generals with enemies riding by each other without bothering to fight. In WSG it was a battle of speed and CCing the enemy team long enough to capture the flag not actual fighting. In AB it was protect the flag at all cost without any consideration of how many people died. While some people may enjoy those games, it was not PvP to me. PvP is killing the enemy in greater numbers than they kill you despite whether the odds are even or not. Arenas I thought were going to be a nice change, but it became a game of who could use the bridge or the pillars to greatest effect. I still missed the open free for all that was TM vs SS and the absolute fun carnage that resulted. Perhaps an open arena with no obstacles and teams facing each other over open ground might have been better, but I still quit WoW because world PvP was dead.

I would really have like to see WAR bring back on open RvR system, that allowed for constant world PvP being what counted like in DAOC. Unfortunately, the time for open PvP seems to have vanished. With WAR focusing on instanced battlegrounds, PotBS focusing on limiting PvP areas and resetting the server to limit territorial gains, and AoC delaying their launch and not showing they can provide the kind of PvP they described on paper it makes me despair for the future of open PvP. I had hoped one of these games would breathe life back into MMO PvP, but once again I fear I will be disappointed.

UO stopped being a PvP paradise with the additon of Trammel, SB failed because it had horrible coding, Eve fails because it cannot provide the large fleet battles it promises and suffers from developer and GM misconduct. WoW started out amazing, but it ultimately fails because where the winners and losers both gain something and no one loses anything it makes PvP meaningless. When someone afking in a BG gains more than someone in the world constantly fighting there is a problem. The next round of MMOs all seem to miss the point of old school PvP. To test yourself against a human opponent in an uncontrolled environment.

Sure there are gank squads that roll everyone in world PvP, but at least the less skilled players have the option to band together and overwhelm them. In instanced PvP it is always about the best geared team winning and usually the losing team getting a consolation prize for showing up. I would much prefer battles where you have no idea what you will be facing, how large the enemy group is, and there being a definite winner and a loser for each engagement. It just doesn't seem like MMOs know how to pull this off or at least to pull it off in a way that is financially better than having PvP with no risk. I look back with fondness to the days of hardcore PvP servers of such games like EQ and AC and hope they will come again. I seriously doubt they will though. While the old mantra that there is no money in PvP has fallen by the wayside with WoW, it seems the new mantra is there is no money in PvP with risk and it is a shame.

[Amaron]

I totally expect the order side to have a slight population edge and totally less skilled overall playerbase @ pvp.

In general that could be true due to the lolzgank people being a pretty big segment of pvpers actually.   I still doubt we are going to see any class balance though.  It's going to be all about rolling it up on whatever side doesn't suck as far as PvPers are concerned.

[caladein]

So you don't like tactical use of terrain or objectives. Gotcha.

Sure there are gank squads that roll everyone in world PvP, but at least the less skilled players have the option to band together and overwhelm them. In instanced PvP it is always about the best geared team winning and usually the losing team getting a consolation prize for showing up. I would much prefer battles where you have no idea what you will be facing, how large the enemy group is, and there being a definite winner and a loser for each engagement. It just doesn't seem like MMOs know how to pull this off or at least to pull it off in a way that is financially better than having PvP with no risk. I look back with fondness to the days of hardcore PvP servers of such games like EQ and AC and hope they will come again. I seriously doubt they will though. While the old mantra that there is no money in PvP has fallen by the wayside with WoW, it seems the new mantra is there is no money in PvP with risk and it is a shame.

The TM/SS fights or any open objective-less brawl a) don't have a scoreboard outside of one's own personal KDR and b) only stop when one side gets curbstomped, more then likely preceded by boredom on that side. I've fought plenty of battles that we've had to leave because manageable 2:1 odds became 3:1, but we held off the enemies for a good while and I walked away satisfied. The reverse has also happened and I hardly took any enjoyment out of it, even though we "won".

Asymmetrical "personal" victory conditions are the only way to maintain sanity in the face of temporary or true population imbalances. That said, one can't support a personal definition of victory if one is to have some tangible reward at the end (assuming no player looting).

At the very least, one can provide asymmetrical rewards (realm points being a function of local population ratio for example). (ELO-like rankings in WoW are a method to correct for skill differences through asymmetric rewards, a very good team beating a very bad team causes a very small points exchange versus two evenly rated teams.) Better yet is to provide asymmetrical tactical objectives so there is some purpose outside of "Get your face kicked in." (Asymmetric strategic objectives are in WAR since I assume that taking the enemy's capital is more difficult than taking some borderland region.) Oops, too bad though, objectives are apparently retarded or something.

It's not creative or anything, but instancing is easy as the only intrinsically asymmetrical part of it is the queue times. Add some form of rating-based matchmaking system, and one has corrected for everything else.

(Okay, could I use "one" and "asymmetric" any more in one damn post? I think not.

Also, derail of a derail complete, yay.)

[Merusk]

Mindless zerging like happened in TM/ SS was for one reason and one reason only.  To get a hell of a lot of HKs so you could get a PVP rank. The best way of doing this was being an AOE class that didn't join a group, or simply tagging multiple other people from range and not dying while your zerg killed them.  Joining the 'raid group' just meant you took the dishonor hit for the non-combat PCs that would eventually get aggroed and killed.   If you think the battles in those days stemmed from anything other than that you're fooling yourself.

Eve fails because it cannot provide the large fleet battles it promises

And I strongly disagree on this.  They've upped the server capacity MANY times over the years.  They've even given star systems where they KNEW a large battle was going to take place a dedicated server for that day or two.  The problem is that EVE battles center around large fleets, and the larger the capacity the more people flood into the area because they know the server/ node has a larger capacity.  The problem isn't that they don't provide large fleet battles, the problem is they keep refusing to design reasons and methods for smaller ones.   You'd see a shitload of smaller fleets if there were rules like collision damage between ships, line of sight, and AOE damage from exploding ships based on the size of the ship/ ammo carried. (One thing that I do always laugh about in EVE is how the players look-down on DIKU type games, when theirs is the essence of "Lock and autoattack" without any of the specials.)

[lamaros]

For some people PvP means really different things.

I'm with Drogo, for me PvP is not about artificial victory conditions, it's about a battle with the same equipment, enemies, victory conditions and rules as applies to the game generally. In WoW I only felt like I was PvPing when I was fighting in the wider world: avoiding being ganked, taking out enemies 1v1 in the middle of nowhere, or the random chaos of some STV/HB/Etc back and forth. Unless I feel like there's some continuity between the game as a whole and the PvP experience then it isn't PvP to me.

Give me a 5 man instance where two PC teams are fighting against each other to clear the place and get the loot, being able to attack each other all the while, and I'll call it a PvP experience (I also think it would be awesome) because I'm competing with other players in an environment which seems a pivitol part of the game.

But the existing BGs in WoW were like minigames to me; diversions with no immediate carry over implications to the gameworld (loot) while the impact that was felt down the line (PvP loot) was achieved in a way that didn't feel at all like the rest of the game and was disconnected from the playing activity in a substantial way. I wouldn't consider any game that delivered that time of experience a true PvP experience.

PvP for me is all about Winning and Losing. Unless the winner gets more out of the victory than the loser does from the loss, or unless the PvP experience is FPSlike and not linked to a MMO 'world', it's not going to attract.

[Modern Angel]

I thought they were going to have a zone which would constantly funnel people to, a la a big persistent AV. One person quits, someone else takes his place. Ebb and flow of numbers and effort.

Dwarf -----MEETING PVPS ZONE ----- Orcs

Boy was I fucking wrong. I'll still check it out and I still desperately want a beta invite to judge for myself but how does war = 12v12 capture the flag matches? How? It's such a fundamentally stupid design decision: you cannot (CANNOT) compete with WoW on WoW's terms so don't! Give me something different! Anything!

[HRose]

I spotted today a message from Damion Schubert on Mud-Dev. It's interesting to read in relation to Warhammer:

I think many designers and observers underestimate the power and importance of a high level, large-group endgame such as raiding or sieging. Such gameplay is, to most players, the horizon - the true promise of what massively multiplayer gameplay is all about. Saying "what if there was a monster that took FORTY of us to take down?" is a uniquely evocative statement. It is, as you state, an earnest desire to be part of something big. It's big, and it's visceral. Having your small 5-man squad win a battle which adds a few points to some global scoreboard is interesting, in a fantasy football sort of way, but what players want from their massively multiplayer games are actions which are viscerally... well... massively multiplayer.

[Nebu]

I believe that people want to compete with the masses (end game gear, realm rank, economics, whatever), but want to actually play the game with smaller groups.  The popularity of instancing and battlegrounds support this. 

[lamaros]

I spotted today a message from Damion Schubert on Mud-Dev. It's interesting to read in relation to Warhammer:

I think many designers and observers underestimate the power and importance of a high level, large-group endgame such as raiding or sieging. Such gameplay is, to most players, the horizon - the true promise of what massively multiplayer gameplay is all about. Saying "what if there was a monster that took FORTY of us to take down?" is a uniquely evocative statement. It is, as you state, an earnest desire to be part of something big. It's big, and it's visceral. Having your small 5-man squad win a battle which adds a few points to some global scoreboard is interesting, in a fantasy football sort of way, but what players want from their massively multiplayer games are actions which are viscerally... well... massively multiplayer.

This has been put forward by many mouths already, and it's still just as silly.

You only have to look at the reaction to Kara in WoW to see just how wrong this kind of thinking is.

Massively Multilayer does not mean 40 people. 40 people is not massive. Is BF2 a MMOG? No.

It is the world, the inhabitants of the world, the number of things to do in the world, etc that make in massive, not that number of people directly involved in your day to day gaming.

[Hoax]

I believe that people want to compete with the masses (end game gear, realm rank, economics, whatever), but want to actually play the game with smaller groups.  The popularity of instancing and battlegrounds support this. 

/disagree

Instancing is popular?  Everyone prefers it to zone checks & spawn lines to be sure.  But beyond the TERRIBLY overrepresented on f13 "omg I can't stand playing online games with random people" segment of gamers I dont think there is any strong love for instances just hatred for the alternatives of the past.

Battlegrounds are popular?  Please elaborate on how you prove that BG's -because they are small scale sport pvp and everyone loves that- are favored over other forms of larger scale pvp.  BG's are popular for the same reason that raids are "popular" lewtz.

[Venkman]

I agree with Hoax. The failure of public-space PvE in the past has more to do with the game system than it does a particular hate for other people. Instancing solves the social problems caused by limited resources as an intrinsic part of the game system. And nobody can argue that this form of game isn't successful.

The problem is nobody can argue public-space content itself as a concept is broken at some fundamental level either. Random social encounters are mostly a turn off if a) it takes you a long time to like someone new; or, b) you're competing with them for a resource. You can't solve the former problem as a game developer.

[Nebu]

Instancing is popular?  Everyone prefers it to zone checks & spawn lines to be sure.  But beyond the TERRIBLY overrepresented on f13 "omg I can't stand playing online games with random people" segment of gamers I dont think there is any strong love for instances just hatred for the alternatives of the past.

I think that we have no way of measuring whether people prefer instancing vs. "a large world done right" precisely because noone has ever done the latter.  I still think that most people prefer to get their loot with less competition and that has nothing to do with random pugs.  People are free to congregate in common areas (WoW, GW, CoH) and then go explore instanced areas.  The bottom line is that instancing removes one of the major cockblocks present in the first gen MMO's.  

Battlegrounds are popular?  Please elaborate on how you prove that BG's -because they are small scale sport pvp and everyone loves that- are favored over other forms of larger scale pvp.  BG's are popular for the same reason that raids are "popular" lewtz.

Large scale pvp has inherent problems that most game makers have done little to address.

1) It punishes those players with less than optimal rigs.
2) Every iteration that I've seen offers too little incentive to keep people interested (i.e. it's often little more than CTF).  
3) Inherent difficulty in rewarding the victors vs punishing the losers (see DAoC and Shadowbane).   Which, in turn, leads to bandwagoning.

Perhaps the second issue is the same as the first.  We've never observed a high quality version of non-instanced worlds or large-scale pvp so it's difficult to guess what people want.  The mere notion that WoW is successful with its systems leads me to belive there's at least some preference.  

[ajax34i]

Large scale pvp has inherent problems that most game makers have done little to address.

Plus the technical issue of lag.  See EVE's massive battles.  If it's not server lag, it'll be client/graphics lag.

[Nebu]

Plus the technical issue of lag.  See EVE's massive battles.  If it's not server lag, it'll be client/graphics lag.

That's what I was getting at in #1, though I wasn't inclusive enough.  Good point.

[HRose]

Plus the technical issue of lag.  See EVE's massive battles.  If it's not server lag, it'll be client/graphics lag.

Same issue, actually.

We've never observed a high quality version of non-instanced worlds or large-scale pvp, so we don't know how good they can be.

And we also never had development geared toward the "massively multiplayer", so we don't know where the technology could be.

Five/six years ago I was playing DAoC, in wars with 200 players, with a crappy computer, and a dial-up modem. I lagged, but it worked.

If development focused to deliver that (large scale multiplayer) I think that we could have seen significant progress to minimize those issues. Instead we have engines like EQ2 lagging if more than four players show up on screen.

It's a matter of objectives.

[UnSub]

I spotted today a message from Damion Schubert on Mud-Dev. It's interesting to read in relation to Warhammer:

I think many designers and observers underestimate the power and importance of a high level, large-group endgame such as raiding or sieging. Such gameplay is, to most players, the horizon - the true promise of what massively multiplayer gameplay is all about. Saying "what if there was a monster that took FORTY of us to take down?" is a uniquely evocative statement. It is, as you state, an earnest desire to be part of something big. It's big, and it's visceral. Having your small 5-man squad win a battle which adds a few points to some global scoreboard is interesting, in a fantasy football sort of way, but what players want from their massively multiplayer games are actions which are viscerally... well... massively multiplayer.

For me, massively multiplayer is NOT getting into a 40 character raid that sits as content at the end of the game. Or a 100 character event. Or a 500 character event. Because as that number grows, the importance of my character diminishes and the entire social angle gets drowned out in a sea of noise.

Massively multiplayer for me is about logging in, being able to quickly get together a team, play for a while, have a fun time, log off and do it again tomorrow. I like coop games. MMOs (especially PvE games) tend to have a strong coop focus. The best MMO events I've seen have been things that don't take a lot of planning and you can pull off relatively quickly e.g. Rikti zone raids in CoH/V.

The idea of having to camp out for six hours through a location to get to the giant monster that you then fight with regimented precision built up from the other 99 times you did it is somehow what MMOs should be aiming for fills me with deep, deep dread.

[Venkman]

"Massively multiplayer" is a catchall term thrown around to introduce everyone from small multiplayer co-op matches to pitched 50 v 50 v 50 three way siege/banes in SB. Evolution has focused on making these games smaller, relegating the "massive" to the concept of the persistent 24/7 world and an aggregate of trades people call an "economy". In my opinion there's very few truly massive games. Eve is one such example. You are absolutely part of a living beast, integral whether ratting or nuking POSes in gigantic battles.

Yes, the graphics get in the way of the true feel of massive, but I don't necessarily feel you need to have 500 people on the screen to feel part of a larger whole. That's because the converse is WoW, where you could have scores of people on the screen at one time but still be very much alone because the whole game is you grabbing your bit of content from a system designed to give it to you.

The more inclusive worlds try to span the gulfs between the occasional grouper who sees "massive" as the opportunity, even seldom taken, to meet or just work with other people, and those who only ever want to do anything that requires tens or scores of other folks, either with or against them. The trouble is few have the budget to actually span this gulf effectively, so we get a genre where so many of the popular titles are shades of the exact same experience, with the rest relegated to comparatively "niche" status because they didn't have the time, team or money to hit the broadest market.

I still wonder if the concept of truly massive itself is niche though. The more you are a part of a larger whole, the more of yourself you end up feeling compelled to invest. That's easy if your incremental investments are light, the different between a truly "massive" multi-user experience like MySpace or XBLA. But it's not so easy if your incremental investment requires you pound away at largely derivative and repetitive tasks wrapped in some vague suggestion of a "game".

[Merusk]

I still wonder if the concept of truly massive itself is niche though.

It is.  For the reasons you list, and because of the self-image of hero folks want in their escapism.

[AcidCat]

The idea of having to camp out for six hours through a location to get to the giant monster that you then fight with regimented precision built up from the other 99 times you did it is somehow what MMOs should be aiming for fills me with deep, deep dread.

Preach on, Brother. Raiding as it exists in WoW right now is just such a highly repetitive, scripted activity. It's more like learning dance choreography than an actual battle ... stand here, move there, when the boss does this you do this ... might as well be simon fucking says. Do the steps correctly, collect loot at end, repeat. There is zero feeling of spontanaety or creativity, just a set script for how to do each encounter in a specific way.

I also have to chime in on how much I hate 'sport style' pvp. I've always hated capture the flag because no matter what the game, it was just this dumb artificial construct, like these warrior who are out to kill each other agree to play some dumb schoolyard game. I want my pvp to feel like a real war ... which is an aspect I think PlanetSide got right - in a war you fight for concrete objectives like taking a base or town. WoW battlegrounds don't really do it for me either ... something like Arathi Basin is a nod in the right direction because you're fighting to control real estate, but at the same time it's rendered null because it's not real even within the gameworld, just an instance that affects nothing. PvP really needs to take place in the actual noninstanced gameworld, have cities or bases you can actually take control of as a goal that gives concrete rewards.

[Venkman]

Raiding and BGs sorta both attempt to do what earlier games did not: achieve to a much wider playerbase. I believe that even if Shadowbane worked perfectly and looked awesome, in the Western market it'd still be a very niche game. It's a huge time sink with the greatest risk imaginable (having a good chunk of that invested time taken away). That's not the level of immersion the average gamer is looking for.

So Raiding is a puzzle-solving activity that then becomes a maintenance one (ensuring people don't screw up, integrating newbies, etc). And BGs are about the sport, the fun, the get-some-points-to-get-some-gear and hey maybe we can get sponsors and observer mode and turn it into the next-gen sport we keep hoping FPS will become too... kinda thing. If you can get people to pay to watch it, it's a "sport" :)

[eldaec]

I still wonder if the concept of truly massive itself is niche though. The more you are a part of a larger whole, the more of yourself you end up feeling compelled to invest. That's easy if your incremental investments are light, the different between a truly "massive" multi-user experience like MySpace or XBLA. But it's not so easy if your incremental investment requires you pound away at largely derivative and repetitive tasks wrapped in some vague suggestion of a "game".

I don't think the massive thing is niche at all.

And your example of MySpace proves it. Myspace is the very opposite of niche, yet it clearly pulls people into a massive community.

But for MMOGs to take advantage of it they need to build mechanics which foster community. Realm based objectives and rvr obviously help here, but only if they are designed abround encouraging inclusion and communication.

It needs to get cleverer and faster than 40 people smashing the same line of pinatas for 4 hours on a raid, but equally 6 people in a hermetically sealed instance won't do much for realm community either.

Raiding and BGs sorta both attempt to do what earlier games did not: achieve to a much wider playerbase. I believe that even if Shadowbane worked perfectly and looked awesome, in the Western market it'd still be a very niche game. It's a huge time sink with the greatest risk imaginable (having a good chunk of that invested time taken away). That's not the level of immersion the average gamer is looking for.

Absolutely agree, but this is where fixed-faction RvR wins over guild v guild.

RvR means everyone knows which side you are on. The bad guys can be effectively dehumanised, newbies can be protected by geography, nobody can doublecross you in a way that isn't much fun if you aren't prepared for it.

RvR allows for an element of society and politics, without making it absolutely central to the game, and without punishing you for not keeping up with who is pissed at whom.

[Venkman]

Myspace is opposite of Eve though (massive defined). MS is no accountability anonymity public barking with network/connections minigame. So different types of mmo, leaving the core question open :)

[eldaec]

What I'm saying is that EVE is a massively connected guild vs guild game. Guild vs guild is niche. It's niche mostly because of the extreme politics.

The idea of interacting with a number of players massively greater than the number you can know personally, isn't niche.

[Venkman]

I agree. But I don't think it's just because GvG (CvC) is niche. Eve is fundamentally more immersive by nature of how everything is interconnected, far more than any of the easier/more popular games and social sites. People are turned off from the game even before they understand their part of the cosmic economy.

Semantics though :) Eve niche. Myspace not.