Come help save mud history

[Draegan]

Downtime socialization is ass.  Downtown, as many people have said already, is terrible.  No one wants to sit there and do NOTHING.  I want to play the game.  It's sad that devs still think in a video game that contains 99% fighting, looting and winning at something that sitting down and recovering during trivial moments is a good thing.  Stop it.  Fire yourself.

The difference, I think, is that you're playing a game whereas a lot of people playing MUDs don't really look at it as playing a game. Instead, they're existing in a world that has some game elements within it. When there's downtime, you're not spending your time making fart jokes or whatever. You're talking about the issues of the day for the most part - "Should the city of Shallam go to war with the alliance of the cities of Ashtan and Mhaldor? Does Shallam have the manpower to resist them?" "Are the forestals really going to put an herb embargo on the Occultists?". Whether this kind of thing sounds painful or fun to you probably depends on how interested you are in roleplaying and participating in the larger plots/schemes/story threads going on around you. It's really a completely different mindset from the "bash monsters to get equipment to bash more monsters" model that WoW devolved to (not that I blame WoW for doing that, as it's clearly fulfilling the desires of a lot of people).

--matt

I never saw much RP in MUDs that I played, but I never played LP-Muds, MOOs or MUSHs either.  MUDs may be different because everything is imaginary and I think more immersive than a 3d rendered world.  MUDs also didn't require you to have a hand on your mouse and fingers on WASD either so it lent to a more relaxed atmosphere.  Plus everyone macroed everything anyway.

[Raph]

There's definitely kneejerk reactions around words like "downtime" -- I agree we're using the word in different ways.

This thread is "downtime" for many of you. We speak of "forced downtime" but let me reverse it for a second -- what's forced is UPTIME. Players can choose downtime whenever they want. It's the default state -- lounging around doing nothing. Uptime requires action. And you need to nudge people along the curve to get them to take action, because of simple inertia. A body at rest tends to stay at rest. :)

So games have developed incentives to get you to go do stuff. The payback for this is direct jolts of fun. Users are perfectly capable of taking actions on their own and getting fun. But if your objective is to have users get that jolt often, then you force them to have fun. You throw them into situations where they have to take action. You make them get off their lazy butts and make tough choices. You push them constantly, via all sorts of signals, to feel like staying still will make them feel bad, insignificant, inadequate.

The culmination of this, of course, is constant action. But here's the thing... humans get tired. The body itself, the human mind, has natural thresholds. Laziness may be bad, but lack of rest is worse. And in this, I include mental rest. Every arc of human activity has periodicity to it, with ramping attention, peak action, flow, gradual decline, story sharing, evaluation, rest, and then repeat.

Simple empirical test: name an intense game with naturally long sessions. Sure, you see some crazy people who do play intense games for hours and hours on end. They usually need to depend on stimulants to do it. In general, the more sustained high action and attention a game demands, the more exhausting it is, and the shorter the game is. That is because the game itself has architected downtime BY ENDING. A high-intensity game that lasts eight hours would have few players precisely because people wouldn't be able to handle it by and large.

A side effect, of course, of constantly incentivizing action is that those who try to choose to have downtime within the environment will often fail. There will be no "quiet spots," and they will either get sucked in or decamp.

This human cycle is pretty much inevitable. This whole forum is premised on the "ramping attention" phase ("come check out this new KRPG!") phase and the "story sharing, evaluation, rest" stage of activity. It happens on long cycles (the still active SWG forum) and on session-level cycles (your various guilds).

Arguing about whether a game should have downtime in it is arguing whether the game should have those phases within itself, in the environment, or have them elsewhere, in forums and other communities. There are benefits and tradeoffs to each. Either way, socialization DOES require downtime.

Leaving aside design mistakes of the past, those of you who want none in your MMO are basically saying you want it to be a game more like Quake -- a game where the other phases exist outside of the game framework. Those like me who want it in the game want the virtual world to be a setting, a space, a place, and be able to at least be able to choose it. And when we did architected downtime, we were just trying to make sure that the world didn't force out the quiet times.

I'm not in the Quake camp because virtual worlds ARE places, spaces, persistent, and encompass way more than gogogogogo.

[Lantyssa]

The problems come if people are forced into downtime when they're still in the gogogo phase, or they feel they have to stay alert and contributing when they either want to rest, or for the Quake types want to log out.

I certainly want the option of staying in the world for my rest and relaxation, but not everyone does.  It's not perfect, but I think WoW actually does this pretty well until you get to the Raiding part of the game, which is why there is a lot of complaining about it.  Allowing the player to make the determination of when to be active and when to be resting instead of forcing it on them would go a long way towards making a successful game.

[Nebu]

The problems come if people are forced into downtime when they're still in the gogogo phase, or they feel they have to stay alert and contributing when they either want to rest, or for the Quake types want to log out.

I certainly want the option of staying in the world for my rest and relaxation, but not everyone does.  It's not perfect, but I think WoW actually does this pretty well until you get to the Raiding part of the game, which is why there is a lot of complaining about it.  Allowing the player to make the determination of when to be active and when to be resting instead of forcing it on them would go a long way towards making a successful game.

Excellent point.  Players want choices and gameplay options.  I think there are a great many players that would take advantage of downtime if they saw some benefit to it.  Giving huge bonuses for in-game downtime and the development of social activities that are also fun pastimes, would go a long way toward the goal. 

[Musashi]

Funny, my wow server has a great community.   You just have to be young enough to chat on the forums all day or know someone who'll tell you the right chat channels to join.  Alternatly you can do enough PUGs to meet up with folks, drop them on your friends list and run more stuff with them later.

However, it takes a desire to socialize and be a part of a community and the time to dedicate to forming relationships, just like in real life.   The proclivity of older players (which everyone here is.) to quit general chat because of "the damn kids" probably also adds to thoughts that the community sucks.   It doesn't suck you're just 10 years beyond the peer group of the greater community.  You'll have to seek-out folks of your own age group, which will be a problem since most of them ALSO have quit general chat and hate running PUGs.  

No, forced downtime just means your players will find something else to play.  As has been mentioned, I have plenty of other options these days.

Yea, I agree with this completely.  I found that in my time in WoW the community was extremely vibrant.  Sure it was a lot of shit talking kids who allowed the anonymity of the internet to exercise their inner twat weasel.  But after you get over that, it's pretty funny sometimes.  There was a lot of fun to be had, and for the most part, the kids want to win.  So when it comes down to actually playing, they'll do what needs to be done.  But I am ten(ish) years older than the college kids.  So it is annoying sometimes.

But if the alternative is trying to find some poor slob Necro to camp Lord Bergergle with because he has the literally one support spell on his hotbar that I don't to spend hours upon days underwater by our lonesome, then you can't really tell me you're pointing me in the direction of the fun.  That didn't make me want to play more.  It made me get KS'd like three times after which I pretty much said 'gay' and quit.  And then WoW came out which I played nonstop for three years, met WAY more people, and had way more fun.

So yea.  Wow not being the most social game...  I guess I need clarification and I can't be arsed to read what Raph wrote.  But it seems like that's kind of sour grapes.  No offense, man.  But there's 11 million people not being social I guess.  And I'm pretty sure all of them would play a WoW clone skinned with Star Wars.  But you know.  Dancing Wookies get you immediate furfag street cred.  And who doesn't want that, really?

Okay, Raph pretty much clarified while i was posting.  So are dancing Wookies uptime or downtime?     I kid.

I guess my problem with what you are saying, Raph, is in how to manage the 'story sharing, evaluation, and rest' stage of activity.  The usual proclivity of most WoW players, if I may be so bold as to speak for the teeming horde, is to spend this time on vent.  It's not something that is really coded into the game beyond the fact that there exists the opportunity to experience content in groups, and some content cannot be accomplished without others.  In other words, I don't need you to hold my hand to reach the conclusion that other players help me, and that by socializing with them, I better my chances for success.  I knew that coming it.  And I did all my story sharing, evaluation, and rest on Vent or in the Battlegrounds Mortal Striking people's faces off with my friends.  So you're right it does require downtime.  But it doesn't require a hard coded conductor, unless you count the guys who wrote Ventrillo.

[Ingmar]

Waiting for that dude who is late every week is enough downtime for me.

If you incentivize downtime too much, you run the risk of people catching on that they're essentially paying you a monthly fee to wait around for stuff. This is relatively OK, when what you're waiting for is other players to make a gameplay decision; example, taking a keep in the Alb frontier and waiting the half hour for the Albs to get their act together and come try to take it back. It becomes a much harder sell, psychologically speaking, when you have to sit around because the game is forcing you to (or incentivizing you to the point where it would be stupid not to sit around), whether or not it gets you some in game advantage.

[Lantyssa]

Incentivizing (is that even a word?) downtime isn't what I would suggest.  Give a lot of things for people to do if they want is wonderful, however if they feel they are losing out by not participating, it's no longer downtime but a necessary activity.

[Ratman_tf]

There's definitely kneejerk reactions around words like "downtime" -- I agree we're using the word in different ways.

This thread is "downtime" for many of you. We speak of "forced downtime" but let me reverse it for a second -- what's forced is UPTIME. Players can choose downtime whenever they want. It's the default state -- lounging around doing nothing. Uptime requires action. And you need to nudge people along the curve to get them to take action, because of simple inertia. A body at rest tends to stay at rest. :)

So games have developed incentives to get you to go do stuff. The payback for this is direct jolts of fun. Users are perfectly capable of taking actions on their own and getting fun. But if your objective is to have users get that jolt often, then you force them to have fun. You throw them into situations where they have to take action. You make them get off their lazy butts and make tough choices. You push them constantly, via all sorts of signals, to feel like staying still will make them feel bad, insignificant, inadequate.

The culmination of this, of course, is constant action. But here's the thing... humans get tired. The body itself, the human mind, has natural thresholds. Laziness may be bad, but lack of rest is worse. And in this, I include mental rest. Every arc of human activity has periodicity to it, with ramping attention, peak action, flow, gradual decline, story sharing, evaluation, rest, and then repeat.

Simple empirical test: name an intense game with naturally long sessions. Sure, you see some crazy people who do play intense games for hours and hours on end. They usually need to depend on stimulants to do it. In general, the more sustained high action and attention a game demands, the more exhausting it is, and the shorter the game is. That is because the game itself has architected downtime BY ENDING. A high-intensity game that lasts eight hours would have few players precisely because people wouldn't be able to handle it by and large.

A side effect, of course, of constantly incentivizing action is that those who try to choose to have downtime within the environment will often fail. There will be no "quiet spots," and they will either get sucked in or decamp.

This human cycle is pretty much inevitable. This whole forum is premised on the "ramping attention" phase ("come check out this new KRPG!") phase and the "story sharing, evaluation, rest" stage of activity. It happens on long cycles (the still active SWG forum) and on session-level cycles (your various guilds).

Arguing about whether a game should have downtime in it is arguing whether the game should have those phases within itself, in the environment, or have them elsewhere, in forums and other communities. There are benefits and tradeoffs to each. Either way, socialization DOES require downtime.

Leaving aside design mistakes of the past, those of you who want none in your MMO are basically saying you want it to be a game more like Quake -- a game where the other phases exist outside of the game framework. Those like me who want it in the game want the virtual world to be a setting, a space, a place, and be able to at least be able to choose it. And when we did architected downtime, we were just trying to make sure that the world didn't force out the quiet times.

I'm not in the Quake camp because virtual worlds ARE places, spaces, persistent, and encompass way more than gogogogogo.

I agree, and I think a better term when talking about this would be 'Pacing'. Everquest, for example, had shitty pacing. Too much downtime build into the system.

Fising, crafting, collecting minipets, achievements, all are examples of activities that do not require laser-beam-focus attention while still playing the game.
And that is why I resist the concept of 'twitchifiying' crafting with sub-games BTW. That's my idea of a low-impact game activity. Whenever someone suggest using Tetris to forge swords, I usually go "Can't I just craft, here? Leave me alone!"

[Slyfeind]

The problems come if people are forced into downtime when they're still in the gogogo phase, or they feel they have to stay alert and contributing when they either want to rest, or for the Quake types want to log out.

This is why I think UO doesn't have any downtime at all, even though it has plenty of opportunities for rest. In UO, I can relax with friends in a tavern if I want. Or if it's action I'm after, I go to the orc fort or a dungeon or whatnot. In EQ, relaxing happens between pulls, so if I want to relax, I...raid the Plane of Hate? WTF? I HAVE to fight shit first? Or...if I want to fight shit, I have to relax a bunch of times? WAT WAT BIZARROGAMEWHAT?

Edit: Quoted Lant cause I accidentally deleted it. >.<

[Draegan]

Give people game play options at all times.  If they want to sit around and have downtime it's their choice.  But there should never be just one choice that is "wait".

And don't use the term "forced uptime".  It's rediculous.

[Raph]

I guess my problem with what you are saying, Raph, is in how to manage the 'story sharing, evaluation, and rest' stage of activity.  The usual proclivity of most WoW players, if I may be so bold as to speak for the teeming horde, is to spend this time on vent.  It's not something that is really coded into the game beyond the fact that there exists the opportunity to experience content in groups, and some content cannot be accomplished without others.  In other words, I don't need you to hold my hand to reach the conclusion that other players help me, and that by socializing with them, I better my chances for success.  I knew that coming it.  And I did all my story sharing, evaluation, and rest on Vent or in the Battlegrounds Mortal Striking people's faces off with my friends.  So you're right it does require downtime.  But it doesn't require a hard coded conductor, unless you count the guys who wrote Ventrillo.

Yep. Makes perfect sense. I don't use Vent. (Most people don't, I suspect?)

The reason why I & many others say that WoW is not very social is because it is HUGELY geared towards "people who all know each other already." Anyone who joins without a guild or group of friends finds it very hard to meet anyone, because everyone is moving all the time -- running from one quest to another, etc.

But the whole "meet strangers" piece has gotten hugely de-emphasized over the years, until now the assumption is the reverse: you come in with friends.

[Raph]

And don't use the term "forced uptime".  It's rediculous.

Just trying to make the actual dynamics clear. :)

[Calandryll]

Yep. Makes perfect sense. I don't use Vent. (Most people don't, I suspect?)

The reason why I & many others say that WoW is not very social is because it is HUGELY geared towards "people who all know each other already." Anyone who joins without a guild or group of friends finds it very hard to meet anyone, because everyone is moving all the time -- running from one quest to another, etc.

But the whole "meet strangers" piece has gotten hugely de-emphasized over the years, until now the assumption is the reverse: you come in with friends.

When people who never played UO ask me what made it so special, one of the examples I always use is this... 

In most recent mmogs, my friends and I would always figure out what to do and where to go before we logged in. Usually on the forums or in e-mail. And of course, there were only a few things to choose from (at level X you can go to locations Y or Z). Once in game, we rarely failed to go to the arranged location and complete the quests/tasks.

But in UO, we always decided what to do and where to go IN the game once we all arrived at a tavern in one of the towns. We could have done the same thing on the forums or e-mail, but we didn't. And sometimes, we'd decide to stay where we were and just hang out. While we were there, we'd run in to at least a half-dozen people who we didn't know and some would stick around and hang out with us. That never happens anymore in my experience as a player.

[Merusk]

Yep. Makes perfect sense. I don't use Vent. (Most people don't, I suspect?)

You'd be very, very wrong.  It's mandatory for most PUGs I've ever been on.  Again, this is an age thing. The 25 and unders I've encountered never have a problem "Vent Hopping" for pugs and chatting away on their guild's vent otherwise.  It's been the married and 30-somethings who won't talk or login to vent other than when "forced to" during a raid.

Hell, Vent is so ubiquitous these days it's joined "We have a tabard" "we have a website" and "we have 2 guild bank slots" in the "yeah big deal, you SHOULD" category of guild advertisements.

[sidereal]

No game mechanic will ever turn WoW players into people who played MUDs and MUSHs.  There is a profound, categorical difference in personality between people who were and are willing to interact with a world entirely through text through an interface that was difficult to obtain and install and those who pick up WoW at a Gamestop because all of their friends are playing it.  Just as there is a categorical difference in personality between people who chat through IRC and those who chat through AIM.  At the apex of MUD popularity they still required that people go out of their way to seek the experience that MUDs offered, and therefore selected for people interested in that experience, and therefore the likelihood that any random person I run into on the server is going to be that sort of person and I might enjoy interacting with them.  They were a self-selecting community.  WoW has no selection criterion.  Neither did SWG.  In fact, the more popular a game is (a trait that the developers and publishers very much want) the less successful at selecting certain types of players that game will be.

Attempting to turn WoW players into MUD players with some game mechanic is akin to thinking there's some feature you could add to the vault message boards that would transform them into the f13 forum.  There is no such feature because the population isn't up to it.  And attempting to jam the productive social experience square peg into the Madden-competing MMORPG round hole just causes grief and lost investment for everyone.  If you want the MUD socialization experience back, create an invite-only server.  The mechanics are mostly irrelevant.

[Musashi]

I guess my problem with what you are saying, Raph, is in how to manage the 'story sharing, evaluation, and rest' stage of activity.  The usual proclivity of most WoW players, if I may be so bold as to speak for the teeming horde, is to spend this time on vent.  It's not something that is really coded into the game beyond the fact that there exists the opportunity to experience content in groups, and some content cannot be accomplished without others.  In other words, I don't need you to hold my hand to reach the conclusion that other players help me, and that by socializing with them, I better my chances for success.  I knew that coming it.  And I did all my story sharing, evaluation, and rest on Vent or in the Battlegrounds Mortal Striking people's faces off with my friends.  So you're right it does require downtime.  But it doesn't require a hard coded conductor, unless you count the guys who wrote Ventrillo.

Yep. Makes perfect sense. I don't use Vent. (Most people don't, I suspect?)

The reason why I & many others say that WoW is not very social is because it is HUGELY geared towards "people who all know each other already." Anyone who joins without a guild or group of friends finds it very hard to meet anyone, because everyone is moving all the time -- running from one quest to another, etc.

But the whole "meet strangers" piece has gotten hugely de-emphasized over the years, until now the assumption is the reverse: you come in with friends.

You know I'm tempted just to let it go.  But I really think you're wrong here.  I didn't know anyone before I started my WoW guild.  None of the people I recruited knew each other either.  I really think you're on the totally wrong track with this.  In my experience it's EXACTLY the opposite.  I would say that MOST people don't come into WoW knowing people already.  Maybe one or two friends or something like that.  If there's one thing I learned leading a guild it's that the only constant is turnover.  And while most guilds may seem intimidating for outsiders looking in, that's just part of the internet initiation process.  In reality most guilds dream of having a random warm body show up and fill the slot of that asshole who's always late for raids.

After all the increase in the MMO subscriber base in between EQ and WoW came from somewhere.  They weren't all just a bunch of Counterstrike clans that came to pwn noobs.  Of course there were those, and to be honest, the organized guilds at the beginning of WoW did have an advantage.  But it only lasted for so long.

While it's true that WoW doesn't emphasize meeting other people in the process of leveling up, I really think that is more of an advantage.  In WoW, leveling up is meant to be relatively painless, and the true group dynamic doesn't kick in until after the leveling is done.  There are exceptions of course.  But that's pretty much what I think what people are saying.  Most WoW players don't think of leveling up in the same terms as older MMO players did.  You can either group, or not.  But you never really have to wait for a group if it's not your thing.  Thing is, that's exactly WHY I think it's much more easy to meet other people.  Because after a while, I think the solo players realize that there is more fun in finding other people to play with.  But it sounds like you're thinking of the leveling up process in terms of an EQ like time commitment.  A kind of time commitment where it would be sad to never meet anyone.  But it's not the same with WoW.  Leveling up in WoW is about 7-12 days played of learn2play, after which the real social aspects of the game begin.  Or not.  You can always just PvP and enjoy gearing your dude up like you were playing Diablo.

When people who never played UO ask me what made it so special, one of the examples I always use is this... 

In most recent mmogs, my friends and I would always figure out what to do and where to go before we logged in. Usually on the forums or in e-mail. And of course, there were only a few things to choose from (at level X you can go to locations Y or Z). Once in game, we rarely failed to go to the arranged location and complete the quests/tasks.

But in UO, we always decided what to do and where to go IN the game once we all arrived at a tavern in one of the towns. We could have done the same thing on the forums or e-mail, but we didn't. And sometimes, we'd decide to stay where we were and just hang out. While we were there, we'd run in to at least a half-dozen people who we didn't know and some would stick around and hang out with us. That never happens anymore in my experience as a player.

Like I said, In WoW it's just different.  In WoW our 'Tavern' is Vent.  You kill a guy, you hop on his vent and say, "Hi there!"  You want to join a guild, ask if you can join their Vent, and say "Hi fags!"  Want to lead sucessful PUG's?  Buy a Vent server and ask people to get on it.  Pretty soon your vent has regulars, 'cause you're such an awesome guy.  In a year or so, you've got yourself enough dicks swinging to start a guild.  OMG Onyxia died, server first wtf.

And yes, Raph, you gotta have Vent.  It's a free download, dude.  Hell I haven't logged into WoW in over six months, but I still occasionally hop on Vent to say what's up to the guys.

[Mrbloodworth]

How do you jump around to peoples "Vent"? Last i used it (the other day) you need an IP address, and possibly a user name and password. Unless you are talking about the current trend of built in VOIP (Wow, LOTRO, others...)

[Raph]

Yep. Makes perfect sense. I don't use Vent. (Most people don't, I suspect?)

You'd be very, very wrong.  It's mandatory for most PUGs I've ever been on.  Again, this is an age thing. The 25 and unders I've encountered never have a problem "Vent Hopping" for pugs and chatting away on their guild's vent otherwise.  It's been the married and 30-somethings who won't talk or login to vent other than when "forced to" during a raid.

Hell, Vent is so ubiquitous these days it's joined "We have a tabard" "we have a website" and "we have 2 guild bank slots" in the "yeah big deal, you SHOULD" category of guild advertisements.

Ah, let me back up.

I don't have a guild either. Nor do I want to join one. That's my point.

Edit to address some of what you say above:

All you're saying is that you use vent for the other phases. That's basically exactly like what i said about using forums. You're not using the game, you use something else.

[sidereal]

You want to join a guild, ask if you can join their Vent, and say "Hi fags!" 

You're part of the problem.

See, Raph, this is the issue.  I do not want to be friends with people who jump into Vent servers and say "Hi fags!" and no game mechanic will encourage me to want this.

[Draegan]

Also the whole figuring out what to do in game vs. emails/forums is that communication and information handling is incredibly different from UO to today.

--

If you don't want to join a guild then it you're own fault for not participating in functions that bring people together.  I chat on vent all the time with one or groups of people.  And Schild is right, to many of you are looking at "communities" of MUDs with really rosy glasses.  Most MUD communities held 10's or 100's or 1000's of people.  Compare that to the millions of WOW.  Good anology is small town vs. Big City.  You know a lot of people in your small town but everyone in the Big City is a stranger.

[IainC]

You know I'm tempted just to let it go.  But I really think you're wrong here.  I didn't know anyone before I started my WoW guild.  None of the people I recruited knew each other either.  I really think you're on the totally wrong track with this.  In my experience it's EXACTLY the opposite.  I would say that MOST people don't come into WoW knowing people already.  Maybe one or two friends or something like that.  If there's one thing I learned leading a guild it's that the only constant is turnover.  And while most guilds may seem intimidating for outsiders looking in, that's just part of the internet initiation process.  In reality most guilds dream of having a random warm body show up and fill the slot of that asshole who's always late for raids.

I'm with Raph here. You and your friends are either outliers or you aren't fully aware of the way in which everyone came together. In general a lot of community nucleation happens outside of the game and before logging in for the first time. Especially in this day and age where there are a lot of multi-MMO veterans with existing social networks that transcend individual games. It's by no means universal and there are of course individuals who buy a game without knowing anyone in it, log in and randomly blunder into a guild or two but these people are almost certainly a minority.

In a new game, a community tends to form prior to launch and guilds form before the servers open. Unguilded players who are part of the initial metacommunity very often gravitate towards these proto-guilds and things snowball from there. I would say it's pretty unusual for a player like this to enter the game without some rough affiliation already staked out. After launch, the biggest marketing asset for a provider is word of mouth and people generally want to hook up with the guy they know who turned them onto the game in the first place.

Churn is universal as you say but not every player who is new to your guild is necessarily fresh off the boat.

[Calandryll]

Also the whole figuring out what to do in game vs. emails/forums is that communication and information handling is incredibly different from UO to today.

Yes and no. We had forums, ICQ, and e-mail in 1997-2000. In fact, we all still use the exact same e-mail list from UO right now. And yet, we didn't use them to plan ahead of time. We could have just as easily as we do now, but we didn't.

But that wasn't really the crux of my point. In UO, there was no pressure to "level up", no pressure to "go here and do this", because it didn't really matter. I could game with my friends and with strangers without being the same level. So hanging out, staying in the same place and just chatting with people, never felt like a "waste". In newer mmogs, it does to a lot of people.

As an example...

I played DAoC with largely the same people I played UO with. People who together we spent days doing nothing but chatting in the taverns in UO, talking to people as they stopped by, and doing things that had no bearing on character advancement. Basically hanging out. In DAoC, after a little bit of hanging out, inevitably someone would make the comment in chat "how is this helping me level?". It was said sort of jokingly, but funny enough, within a few minutes of someone saying it, we were on our horses riding to the spot the game told us was best to fight in order to level. Same people, different game. The mechanics of the game changed what was important to us, and hence, it changed our play-style.

Keep in mind, I'm not saying WoW isn't a social game. I'm just saying it's different, and imo it's different because of the game design.

[Musashi]

Yep. Makes perfect sense. I don't use Vent. (Most people don't, I suspect?)

You'd be very, very wrong.  It's mandatory for most PUGs I've ever been on.  Again, this is an age thing. The 25 and unders I've encountered never have a problem "Vent Hopping" for pugs and chatting away on their guild's vent otherwise.  It's been the married and 30-somethings who won't talk or login to vent other than when "forced to" during a raid.

Hell, Vent is so ubiquitous these days it's joined "We have a tabard" "we have a website" and "we have 2 guild bank slots" in the "yeah big deal, you SHOULD" category of guild advertisements.

Ah, let me back up.

I don't have a guild either. Nor do I want to join one. That's my point.

Oh.  I don't know if you need to like guilds to understand the point.  We're really just talking about communication here.  Speech makes excessively forced player interaction redundant.

How do you jump around to peoples "Vent"? Last i used it (the other day) you need an IP address, and possibly a user name and password. Unless you are talking about the current trend of built in VOIP (Wow, LOTRO, others...)

Yea, you have to ask people.  It's this whole social thing that Raph is advocating even though he doesn't like guilds inexplicably.

You want to join a guild, ask if you can join their Vent, and say "Hi fags!" 

You're part of the problem.

See, Raph, this is the issue.  I do not want to be friends with people who jump into Vent servers and say "Hi fags!" and no game mechanic will encourage me to want this.

Oh come off it guy.  I didn't mean it literally.  I meant it to illustrate that the social nature of online multiplayer has left the tavern and gone on to vent.  You should always be respectful of other people's Vent servers, and make sure you have permission to be on them.  Happy?

You know I'm tempted just to let it go.  But I really think you're wrong here.  I didn't know anyone before I started my WoW guild.  None of the people I recruited knew each other either.  I really think you're on the totally wrong track with this.  In my experience it's EXACTLY the opposite.  I would say that MOST people don't come into WoW knowing people already.  Maybe one or two friends or something like that.  If there's one thing I learned leading a guild it's that the only constant is turnover.  And while most guilds may seem intimidating for outsiders looking in, that's just part of the internet initiation process.  In reality most guilds dream of having a random warm body show up and fill the slot of that asshole who's always late for raids.

I'm with Raph here. You and your friends are either outliers or you aren't fully aware of the way in which everyone came together. In general a lot of community nucleation happens outside of the game and before logging in for the first time. Especially in this day and age where there are a lot of multi-MMO veterans with existing social networks that transcend individual games. It's by no means universal and there are of course individuals who buy a game without knowing anyone in it, log in and randomly blunder into a guild or two but these people are almost certainly a minority.

In a new game, a community tends to form prior to launch and guilds form before the servers open. Unguilded players who are part of the initial metacommunity very often gravitate towards these proto-guilds and things snowball from there. I would say it's pretty unusual for a player like this to enter the game without some rough affiliation already staked out. After launch, the biggest marketing asset for a provider is word of mouth and people generally want to hook up with the guy they know who turned them onto the game in the first place.

Churn is universal as you say but not every player who is new to your guild is necessarily fresh off the boat.

I think it's just a matter of degrees.  You think the majority of nucleation happens outside the game.  The fact that that's possible is part of the point that I'm trying to make, so I'm not disagreeing.  But the closer a guild gets to raid time minus that one or two dudes they need to go, the lower that barrier to entry gets.  And it doesn't take a genius to figure out how to be in the right place at the right time.  Most people think they can go to some guild's website drop an app and hope to hear from an officer.  But I always required people to have a voice on my vent before I'd let them in.  I would say that roughly 75% of the recruits we added over my guild's lifespan came from guys who got our Vent by getting to know us in PvP groups, and were in there when we needed a guy.  I hardly think we are outliers in this phenomenon.

I mean if we're talking about engineering retention incentives for the 7 guys on Earth who don't know somebody who's playing WoW, I guess I'm willing to concede the point.

[Draegan]

Also the whole figuring out what to do in game vs. emails/forums is that communication and information handling is incredibly different from UO to today.

Yes and no. We had forums, ICQ, and e-mail in 1997-2000. In fact, we all still use the exact same e-mail list from UO right now. And yet, we didn't use them to plan ahead of time. We could have just as easily as we do now, but we didn't.

But that wasn't really the crux of my point. In UO, there was no pressure to "level up", no pressure to "go here and do this", because it didn't really matter. I could game with my friends and with strangers without being the same level. So hanging out, staying in the same place and just chatting with people, never felt like a "waste". In newer mmogs, it does to a lot of people.

As an example...

I played DAoC with largely the same people I played UO with. People who together we spent days doing nothing but chatting in the taverns in UO, talking to people as they stopped by, and doing things that had no bearing on character advancement. Basically hanging out. In DAoC, after a little bit of hanging out, inevitably someone would make the comment in chat "how is this helping me level?". It was said sort of jokingly, but funny enough, within a few minutes of someone saying it, we were on our horses riding to the spot the game told us was best to fight in order to level. Same people, different game. The mechanics of the game changed what was important to us, and hence, it changed our play-style.

Keep in mind, I'm not saying WoW isn't a social game. I'm just saying it's different, and imo it's different because of the game design.

Your superior nostalgia is dripping all over the floor.

[Calandryll]

Your superior nostalgia is dripping all over the floor.

That's cute, but to be nostalgia I'd have to be arguing that it was superior. That's a matter of opinion. What isn't, is that the games were played differently and that there we very good and very real reasons for those differences.

[Raph]

Let me get this straight. I'm saying "I want to casually meet folks, chat a bit, maybe play some, and not feel pressured or commitment to show up X days a week or whatever."

You are saying "You can do that! You just need to install separate software, ask permission to join a social group in advance of knowing the people in it so you can get the password and IP and other required info, then join the formal group that adds tribal identification to your name and profile. Not all of these formal groups have time requirements! It's as social as ever!"

We are talking past each other. :)

[Ratman_tf]

Let me get this straight. I'm saying "I want to casually meet folks, chat a bit, maybe play some, and not feel pressured or commitment to show up X days a week or whatever."

You are saying "You can do that! You just need to install separate software, ask permission to join a social group in advance of knowing the people in it so you can get the password and IP and other required info, then join the formal group that adds tribal identification to your name and profile. Not all of these formal groups have time requirements! It's as social as ever!"

We are talking past each other. :)

I don't know what these boogers are saying, but I think that socalization happens, and the first step is to make a fun and entertaining space to play in. The socalization is a side effect. (Chatting in guild chat, hopping on vent and shooting the shit, etc...)

Artifical attempts to force people to interact are usually detected as such, and thus resented as being forced upon a person. Naturally occuring social interactions that come about because of gameplay are much better.
Hairdressing = good*. Healing mind wounds = bad.

*In that no one is forced to cut hair or seek it out.

[Musashi]

Ug.  That's fair enough, man.  But it sounds like you'd rather be playing an online RPG.  Maybe Diablo 3 is the real heir to your MUD throne.

[schild]

Let me get this straight. I'm saying "I want to casually meet folks, chat a bit, maybe play some, and not feel pressured or commitment to show up X days a week or whatever."

Welcome to the forum.

[Raph]

I have often analogized to a village green, the gazebo in the small town's park, that sort of thing. If you are regular there you do get to know people, and end up joining a guild or whatever over time.

I am not at all antiguild. I used to be a guild leader, back in the day. :) I just enjoy more of an ambience.

By contrast, when I played WoW, i went six hours without anyone even saying hello. And nobody I said hello to stopped running to talk. Everyone had somewhere to go.

I agree with the city vs small town analogy, it has a lot of that feel to it.

[schild]

I have often analogized to a village green, the gazebo in the small town's park, that sort of thing. If you are regular there you do get to know people, and end up joining a guild or whatever over time.

I am not at all antiguild. I used to be a guild leader, back in the day. :) I just enjoy more of an ambience.

By contrast, when I played WoW, i went six hours without anyone even saying hello. And nobody I said hello to stopped running to talk. Everyone had somewhere to go.

I agree with the city vs small town analogy, it has a lot of that feel to it.

Who are you talking to now?

[Yoru]

I think there may be some demographic shift going on here as well, as noted above. (Warning, generalizations impending.) The younger set these days has no problem with being social butterflies on the internet, jumping around social groups and such. It's natural for them, because they've never known differently.

I think that as you move up the age brackets, you find people drifting closer and closer to external social groups and drawing away from internal social groups. (Partially, also as noted above, due to culture shock when faced with today's 4chan kids.) Most of the folks I know never touch MMOs on their own, it's always a group of friends from university or work or the local poker circle joining a game en-masse, playing for a few months and quitting. I'm more or less the same way these days.

Time likely also factors in here. In an advancement-based game, as Cal noted, you're pressured to move up the ladder. If you have preexisting social networks to rely on, and you're pressed for time, you're more likely to draw on those existing social networks instead of seeking out new people so as not to "waste time" sifting through the crowds for the people you actually get along with. If you've got time to spare, or have broken free of the Need to Grind, then you can waste that extra time putzing around and meeting folks.

Combine the fact that the older set tend to have less free time with the above, and you have a powerful disincentive to mix with the server's body politic.

[Calandryll]

I think there may be some demographic shift going on here as well, as noted above. (Warning, generalizations impending.) The younger set these days has no problem with being social butterflies on the internet, jumping around social groups and such. It's natural for them, because they've never known differently.

I think that as you move up the age brackets, you find people drifting closer and closer to external social groups and drawing away from internal social groups. (Partially, also as noted above, due to culture shock when faced with today's 4chan kids.) Most of the folks I know never touch MMOs on their own, it's always a group of friends from university or work or the local poker circle joining a game en-masse, playing for a few months and quitting. I'm more or less the same way these days.

Time likely also factors in here. In an advancement-based game, as Cal noted, you're pressured to move up the ladder. If you have preexisting social networks to rely on, and you're pressed for time, you're more likely to draw on those existing social networks instead of seeking out new people so as not to "waste time" sifting through the crowds for the people you actually get along with. If you've got time to spare, or have broken free of the Need to Grind, then you can waste that extra time putzing around and meeting folks.

Combine the fact that the older set tend to have less free time with the above, and you have a powerful disincentive to mix with the server's body politic.

I agree with all of this. I also think that games could do a better job of encouraging socialization in all of the age and play style brackets.

I think the issue for me though isn't about adding features to force socialization (as Ratman correctly pointed out - this is bad) but removing the obstacles or changing designs that currently limit or impair socialization. A lot of them do just that, without meaning to.

[Musashi]

I have often analogized to a village green, the gazebo in the small town's park, that sort of thing. If you are regular there you do get to know people, and end up joining a guild or whatever over time.

I am not at all antiguild. I used to be a guild leader, back in the day. :) I just enjoy more of an ambience.

By contrast, when I played WoW, i went six hours without anyone even saying hello. And nobody I said hello to stopped running to talk. Everyone had somewhere to go.

I agree with the city vs small town analogy, it has a lot of that feel to it.

Okay so like Kant didn't realize that there were different kinds of lies, I'm not realizing there's different kinds of people who like to socialize differently. 

That's cool.  But you can't say that big city socializing isn't real, either.  You're just not used to it.  All I can say, as I've said, is that it's not as bad as it seems from the outside.  And I AM an old guy who had to overcome his preconception before he could get along with younger people than me, as I'm reading Yoru point out as I type this.

It might also be a demographic thing too.  Because the demographic for MUDs was so much smaller, it was probably much more likely for Raph to log in and find someone who shared a common play style with him in his six hours.

[Merusk]

I have often analogized to a village green, the gazebo in the small town's park, that sort of thing. If you are regular there you do get to know people, and end up joining a guild or whatever over time.

I am not at all antiguild. I used to be a guild leader, back in the day. :) I just enjoy more of an ambience.

By contrast, when I played WoW, i went six hours without anyone even saying hello. And nobody I said hello to stopped running to talk. Everyone had somewhere to go.

I agree with the city vs small town analogy, it has a lot of that feel to it.

I don't talk to folks athe village green, the town gazebo or anything else, either.  I've got shit to do and if I'm there, i'm meeting folks or I'm with my family.  If I want to meet people I'll go to parties or join a club. If folks say "hi" to me, I'll say "hi" or "how's it going" back and continue on my way.  Hell this even happens at work, too.  In the break room while waiting on the microwave - the epitome of downtime in reality - there aren't spontaneous conversations breaking out unless there's 2 people from the same work social circle there.  People don't talk or socialize in that fashion anymore.

You're coming at things from a completely different social process than exists on the 'net or in reality today.  You're thinking small-town 1950, this is big-city 2009. If you're not there to help me you're irrelevant.  Unless fate throws people together and ONE of them makes the effort - and there's a lot of effort required - they don't socialize.