On Grouping and Server Transfers

[MrHat]

On Grouping:

My largest complaint about WoW is the act of grouping.  I love to actually be in a group that is doing something, but I hate LFG and LFM.

I have no idea who the fuck was responisble from taking away the /lfg flag and putting in an /lfg channel.  That person needs to be fired, then set of fire, then rehired to be beaten by that 6' statue of an orc they have at Blizz headquarters.

Anyone who has played EQ2 knows that it absolutely trumps WoW in both group (LFG menu) and guild functionality (oh the cool guild stuff abounds).  I don't see how this isn't a top priority for Blizzard to fix.  I guess they assume that the mod community will take care of it.  But something as universal as grouping and looking for groups needs to be implemented directly from the main client.

I recently resubbed and started playing a few of my older characters that I wanted to level up a bit further (48 shaman, 48 mage, and 18 warlock).  I don't really want to bother with any guilds, because I want to be somewhat MMOb free (massively multiplayer obligation, we all know what it means).  So I find myself sitting in Orgrimmar for a 1/2 hour shouting /LFG.  It's just so hard after coming back from EQ2 where I simply flag myself, and go about my business.

So, what all systems do you guys use to combat this? I know there are a couple of mods, but I can't be bothered to search, and I'm curious what you all think anyways.

At least some gamers are thinking.

On server transfers:

I was thinking the other morning in the shower (like you do) and was wondering a bit about pay transfers.  I know somewhere Blizzard said that they would eventually have some sort of pay transfers to a server of your choice.  That got me thinking about a free market system.

I've got a couple characters on Kel'Thuzad that I'd like to move to a Bonecrusher because I have some RL friends there now and would like to play with them.  What if when they opened the transfers, transfers per character to Bonecrusher was $15/character (high enough to discourage bouncing, low enough that it's not a huge deal).  Lots of people start transfering, and the rate goes up.  The next hour comes around and now it's $22/character.  Supply/demand.  As the demand to transfer to a server goes up, the cost to do so goes up.  Soft-cap at $200/character.  If people really really really want to do it, they will.

[Rodent]

More MMOGs need to look at what CoH did/does. Their LFG and Exemplar/Sidekick systems should be made industry standard.

In WoW the only groups I'm in are ones formed in our guildchat.

[Venkman]

For a number of innovations, I truly wish CoH was more successful than it was. The Exemplar/Sidekick and LFG systems are among those. Apparently, emulation only happens from success though... stupid to only think with subscriptions but I guess expected.

Anyway, yea, WoW's group tools, like the Guild ones, are no better than EQ1s.

[Sairon]

This is one of the flaws with having a very decentralised world and a low population limit. In AO it solved it self, some places simply turned into lfg hubs where people gathered. Finding a decent team was a fairly swift task.

[Xanthippe]

There are things in taverns that you can hook into called meeting stones - if you talk to an innkeeper, the innkeeper can put you on a waiting list for a particular dungeon.

But it's a very flawed system, so no one uses it.  The LFG thing in beta was so much better.

I do like that I can queue up for a battleground and then go about my business.  I don't like that when the battle is over, I'm dumped into Ironforge.  I'd rather be dumped back to where I was - or at least the continent I was on.

[Threash]

There are things in taverns that you can hook into called meeting stones - if you talk to an innkeeper, the innkeeper can put you on a waiting list for a particular dungeon.

But it's a very flawed system, so no one uses it.  The LFG thing in beta was so much better.

I do like that I can queue up for a battleground and then go about my business.  I don't like that when the battle is over, I'm dumped into Ironforge.  I'd rather be dumped back to where I was - or at least the continent I was on.

You can queue up from stormwind and darnassus also and get dumped there, not ideal but at least you can go back to the right continent.

[MrHat]

There are things in taverns that you can hook into called meeting stones - if you talk to an innkeeper, the innkeeper can put you on a waiting list for a particular dungeon.

But it's a very flawed system, so no one uses it.  The LFG thing in beta was so much better.

I do like that I can queue up for a battleground and then go about my business.  I don't like that when the battle is over, I'm dumped into Ironforge.  I'd rather be dumped back to where I was - or at least the continent I was on.

The BG queue system should always dump you back to the nearest hearthstone site to where you left.  So if you are fucking around in Blackrock, it ports you to AB, then back to Kargath.  Or maybe an option for Kargath or Ironforge.  Hell, if they're porting you around anyways to make it easy, why stop there.

Edit: On that note: why not just have battlemasters at the inns that have hearthstones.

[Evil Elvis]

For a number of innovations, I truly wish CoH was more successful than it was. The Exemplar/Sidekick and LFG systems are among those. Apparently, emulation only happens from success though... stupid to only think with subscriptions but I guess expected.

Anyway, yea, WoW's group tools, like the Guild ones, are no better than EQ1s.

If you're going to make a level-based mmorpg, why put in a mechanic to bypass it?

Sidekicking is just a band-aid to old-school mmorpg design.  Something.  New.  Please.

[Azazel]

For a number of innovations, I truly wish CoH was more successful than it was. The Exemplar/Sidekick and LFG systems are among those. Apparently, emulation only happens from success though... stupid to only think with subscriptions but I guess expected.

Anyway, yea, WoW's group tools, like the Guild ones, are no better than EQ1s.

Actually, EQ1's group and guild tools kick the arse of WoW's ones.

[Ironwood]

That made up group tool looks fantastic.

[Venkman]

If you're going to make a level-based mmorpg, why put in a mechanic to bypass it?

Because if you don't allow people greater freedom to group on their terms, they'll whine for more soloable content, and then leave anyway. Some people hate grouping for personal reasons. Others just don't like it because it's very inconvenient. You can't solve the hate problem with anything but direct pandering. But the inconvenience one certainly can be, and we're seeing some put some creativity to it.

Actually, EQ1's group and guild tools kick the arse of WoW's ones.

I forgot to put in "when I played it". My knowledge of EQ1 is about 2 1/2 years out of date :) Just drives home the point of how bad WoW's are. Also indicates how much Blizzard is traveling in footsteps long tread by both EQ teams. Funny that.

At least it's good to hear EQ1's stuff is being used now. I was there for when some of it went in, but it was too new to be used much yet by the vets.

[cevik]

The BG queue system should always dump you back to the nearest hearthstone site to where you left.  So if you are fucking around in Blackrock, it ports you to AB, then back to Kargath.  Or maybe an option for Kargath or Ironforge.  Hell, if they're porting you around anyways to make it easy, why stop there.

This is probably the most needed thing in WoW as it stands right now.  With the f'ed up honor system and the queue times (in the less than 60s brackets) that are non-zero, yet too fast to get anywhere to quest/grind, it makes pvping a binary activity.

Last night I had a quest turn in in Silithus (at that stupid hermit guy fairly far from the flight path).  I went into a bg, got out, hoped on the bat to tanaris, then to silithus.. then just as I landed I got into a bg.. to far away to make the run to the turn in in 2 minutes, but close enough that I had just wasted 10 minutes on a bat.  Jumped into the BG.. Then repeated the whole mess 4 times before I finally decided to give up on turning in the quest for the night.. only to have pvp pretty much end at that point but then I found myself sitting aroung og "just in case" there was another game.. :/

In fact, 99% of nights where I pvp I find myself sitting around og "just in case" there is a game, because I don't want to take a bat someplace to get a game 2 seconds after I get there.

The best solution I can think of is to just save the last bat location we landed at and put us there after the game, just like we had landed on a bat (and remove the pvp flag, just like it does when you jump on a bat, so that we don't die while zoning)..

[Evil Elvis]

If you're going to make a level-based mmorpg, why put in a mechanic to bypass it?

Because if you don't allow people greater freedom to group on their terms, they'll whine for more soloable content, and then leave anyway. Some people hate grouping for personal reasons. Others just don't like it because it's very inconvenient. You can't solve the hate problem with anything but direct pandering. But the inconvenience one certainly can be, and we're seeing some put some creativity to it.

You missed the point.

The whole EQ/WoW/Diku-Mud leveling style of mmorpg's is to cockblock the user as much as possible, so they'll have a reason to log in tomorrow.  They need to hit level x to play with their level x friends.  They have to hit level x so they can experience content y and get loot z.  Etc, etc. 

How about we just get rid of it completely.  Then you won't have to worry about not being able to group with your friends.

[Trippy]

If you're going to make a level-based mmorpg, why put in a mechanic to bypass it?

Because if you don't allow people greater freedom to group on their terms, they'll whine for more soloable content, and then leave anyway. Some people hate grouping for personal reasons. Others just don't like it because it's very inconvenient. You can't solve the hate problem with anything but direct pandering. But the inconvenience one certainly can be, and we're seeing some put some creativity to it.

You missed the point.

The whole EQ/WoW/Diku-Mud leveling style of mmorpg's is to cockblock the user as much as possible, so they'll have a reason to log in tomorrow.  They need to hit level x to play with their level x friends.  They have to hit level x so they can experience content y and get loot z.  Etc, etc. 

How about we just get rid of it completely.  Then you won't have to worry about not being able to group with your friends.

People already have. Go play a traditional MP FPS if you want that sort of gameplay. Anytime you have persistent character development (it's doesn't matter if it's level-based or some other scheme) that has a meaningful impact on individual encounters you will have this grouping problem.

[Xanthippe]

People already have. Go play a traditional MP FPS if you want that sort of gameplay. Anytime you have persistent character development (it's doesn't matter if it's level-based or some other scheme) that has a meaningful impact on individual encounters you will have this grouping problem.

The difference, though, is that the world in a traditional FPS is very shallow.  I am not sure that persistent character development based upon characters is a necessary condition to having depth in a world/game.

I wonder how many people would play a MMO that had no levels, and I'm very surprised no one has come up with one.

[MrHat]

If you're going to make a level-based mmorpg, why put in a mechanic to bypass it?

Because if you don't allow people greater freedom to group on their terms, they'll whine for more soloable content, and then leave anyway. Some people hate grouping for personal reasons. Others just don't like it because it's very inconvenient. You can't solve the hate problem with anything but direct pandering. But the inconvenience one certainly can be, and we're seeing some put some creativity to it.

You missed the point.

The whole EQ/WoW/Diku-Mud leveling style of mmorpg's is to cockblock the user as much as possible, so they'll have a reason to log in tomorrow.  They need to hit level x to play with their level x friends.  They have to hit level x so they can experience content y and get loot z.  Etc, etc. 

How about we just get rid of it completely.  Then you won't have to worry about not being able to group with your friends.

I like level-based games.  It is fun for me.

Give me a bigger bandaid, or some fucking gauss or something.  Give me a fucking /lfg flag and BG's I can Q to from any inn in the world.

[Evil Elvis]

People already have. Go play a traditional MP FPS if you want that sort of gameplay. Anytime you have persistent character development (it's doesn't matter if it's level-based or some other scheme) that has a meaningful impact on individual encounters you will have this grouping problem.

The difference, though, is that the world in a traditional FPS is very shallow.  I am not sure that persistent character development based upon characters is a necessary condition to having depth in a world/game.

Ding ding ding.

I don't hate level based games, I'm just ready to see something different from daoc/eq/eq2/wow/ao/etc.

Here's the thing about level-based mmorpgs: you're not going to see anything that does it better than WoW for quite some time.  People making mmorpg's can scrap for the left-overs, praying to achieve daoc/eq2 numbers, or they can differentiate themselves.  That doesn't necessarily mean ditching levels, but it's one way to set yourself apart.

[Xanthippe]

The difference, though, is that the world in a traditional FPS is very shallow.  I am not sure that persistent character development based upon characters is a necessary condition to having depth in a world/game.

I meant to say, I am not sure that persistent character development based upon _levels_ is a necessary condition to having depth in a world/game.

(But you all knew that, right?)

[El Gallo]

WoW's lfg is stupefyingly horrid.  Back in beta when we had regular /lfg flags it worked much better than the current system.  That, combined with the lack of global channels, makes it a huge PITA to form pickups.  I used to kludge this by taking advantage of the fact that you can join out-of-zone channels (i.e., be in Orgrimmar's general and lfg channels from any other zones) but I heard that they took away the ability to do that in a recent patch (I haven't played in a while, so I don't know if that's true).  It's really, really stupid and quite un-Blizzardlike.  Hell, in EQ1 we had /lfg tags and global channels (and serverwide channels to boot).

[cevik]

They either put the ability to join those channels back in in a recent fix, or are putting them back in in 1.10, I forget which.

The lfg system on wow is 4 steps back from the rest of the industry and it's a very very sad thing to see.  It's worse than even EQ1, and EQ1 was terrible.  The good news is, they keep saying that they will be adding a lfg tool that will be complete.  I suspect 1.10 will be hitting the test servers soon (this week or next?) and thus we'll know if it's possible for the tool to be in 1.10, I suspect it will be in 1.11 (but hopefully not later!)..

I found a decent workaround, in the fact that when I need a group I just type:

/g so, what are we doing tonight?

Of course, since I'm a Warlock, the response usually is:  "You're going to brs and summoning all of us there" or something along those lines.. :)  Of course I can't bitch to much since I'm basically a raid on wheels.  The moment that I and 2 others get to the raid location the raid starts.  I just immediately start summoning and within 5 minutes we are rolling through the dungeon (whereas on my priest, I could be sitting around FOREVER waiting on people to show up to the entrance).. :)

[bhodi]

Of course, since I'm a Warlock, the response usually is:  "You're going to brs and summoning all of us there" or something along those lines.. :)  Of course I can't bitch to much since I'm basically a raid on wheels.  The moment that I and 2 others get to the raid location the raid starts.  I just immediately start summoning and within 5 minutes we are rolling through the dungeon (whereas on my priest, I could be sitting around FOREVER waiting on people to show up to the entrance).. :)

I wish our guild warlocks are more like you.. they basically refuse to summon ANYONE unless it's an absoloute necessity, because "it makes them feel as if they are the guild's bitch" and either: "You should have logged in sooner" or "You still have time to get to sone". "I'm low on shards" is always a popular choice.

[cevik]

I wish our guild warlocks are more like you.. they basically refuse to summon ANYONE unless it's an absoloute necessity, because "it makes them feel as if they are the guild's bitch" and either: "You should have logged in sooner" or "You still have time to get to sone". "I'm low on shards" is always a popular choice.

Well, I keep a 24 slot shard bag on me that is always full and a 24 slotter in the bank.  Plus my guild has an understanding that I will be doing nothing but farming shards for the first 20 or so trash mobs in any instance (I usually call it "painting the target", since it gives a nice purple lazer beam so that everyone knows what to attack!)..

But really it's selfishness on my part that makes me do it.. I can show up and start summoning and I know the raid will be under way in 5 minutes and I don't have to worry about "ohh I need to go afk while I'm on the bat" then not seeing the guy for 2 hours.. or "ohh I need to get some bullets, hold on" or "ohh I just started a wsg", etc.. I just start summoning and they better be clicking YES if they want to go.. :)

[HaemishM]

Ahhh, memories of Summon Chains in Shadowbane.

I weep.

[cevik]

Ahhh, memories of Summon Chains in Shadowbane.

I weep.

Everytime I start summoning people to an instance I am reminded of Shadowbane.. :)

[HaemishM]

Does WoW shit itself in a screaming fit of agony when you do?

If not, you should hammer your toes into your house's foundation just to make sure the memory is complete.

[cevik]

I think I enjoyed Shadowbane quite a bit more than you.. :)

[HaemishM]

You were a scout. Of course you did.

[bhodi]

Well, I keep a 24 slot shard bag on me that is always full and a 24 slotter in the bank.  Plus my guild has an understanding that I will be doing nothing but farming shards for the first 20 or so trash mobs in any instance (I usually call it "painting the target", since it gives a nice purple lazer beam so that everyone knows what to attack!)..

But really it's selfishness on my part that makes me do it.. I can show up and start summoning and I know the raid will be under way in 5 minutes and I don't have to worry about "ohh I need to go afk while I'm on the bat" then not seeing the guy for 2 hours.. or "ohh I need to get some bullets, hold on" or "ohh I just started a wsg", etc.. I just start summoning and they better be clicking YES if they want to go.. :)

Our guild's a little too organized to worry about that; you show up at 8:30est, at the instance and ready to rock, or you get waitlisted.

[cevik]

Our guild's a little too organized to worry about that; you show up at 8:30est, at the instance and ready to rock, or you get waitlisted.

Eh, every guild behaves the same way, but the reality is reality occurs and fucks the nicety of theory all to hell..

But this is the internet, so now you'll tell me that you've never had anyone late to a raid ever..

[Calantus]

Of course you get occasions when people are late for raids. That doesn't mean you set up a summons to get them to the instance. We have it so that you don't get a summons before ontime DKP is given out for people in the instance (unless the boat dumps you or some other silly reason beyond your control). After that point we'll summon you if we need you ASAP, but if not you can just haul ass down while we start clearing. Doing otherwise just encourages people to be lazy.

Now if it's an unscheduled raid like UBRS or w/e then that's different of course. I could definately see myself summoning in that case if I wanted to get it started right away. Although I'd probably just tell em to get off their lazy asses and fly down while I go make myself a sandwich or something, my char safely tucked away inside the instance portal.

[cevik]

Now if it's an unscheduled raid like UBRS or w/e then that's different of course. I could definately see myself summoning in that case if I wanted to get it started right away. Although I'd probably just tell em to get off their lazy asses and fly down while I go make myself a sandwich or something, my char safely tucked away inside the instance portal.

I'm in a pvp guild, not a raiding guild.  UBRS/Scholo/Strath is what I'm talking about.  About 75% of the time our "scheduling" is, "/g WE'RE RUNNING UBRS IN 1 HOUR FOR THOSE INTERESTED"..  The other 25% of the time it's "hey, anyone want to go to ubrs, pvp is dead tonight!"..

And I happen to like the people in my guild, if I'm closer to the instance and have enough people for summoning I have absolutely no problem with summoning people.  If I need to go piss, they will gladly fly..

It will be plenty understood that when/if we start doing > 10 man raids (ZG, AQ, MC, whatever) they will be on time or they will not be there.. that's a totally different story..

[Calantus]

When I see "raid"...

[cevik]

When I see "raid"...

Yeah.. We "raid" it in the fact that we take the max possible into the instance, run it through and kill the bosses as fast as possible, get the blue loot that people need, exit, reset, then do it again until everyone is equiped.  Most of us are in all blues and a few epics, and I think there are maybe 2 item slots I have left to upgrade in those places (and it won't be a whole lot of upgrade), so I suspect we will be moving on to real "raids" soon.. None of us are PvE people, but when you're going against teams in full teir 2, it's hard to just sit back and say "bah, we'll never try for that stuff"..

[Calantus]

Yeah, on my old server all the PVP guilds either broke up or converted into raiding guilds with strong PVP cores (there are no pure PVP guilds of note on my current server). The PVP game is ust not really set up to be self-sufficient in WoW unless you can catass more than any raider would ever have to.

[bhodi]

But this is the internet, so now you'll tell me that you've never had anyone late to a raid ever..

Remember I'm in a "hardcore" raiding guild that has BWL on farm status. People are late, or don't show, but as I said, they get waitlisted if they don't arrive on time. We normally have more people at instance zone-in than who get to play. Raid invites begin 15m before start time. Often times, on more popular nights, such as BWL, the raid is full on the first invite. Our attendance is generally 45-55 people (5-15 in waitlist) on any given raid night. For less popular instances where most people have all the stuff, such as MC, we have an alt rule where people start gearing their alts. That tends to keep the attendance up.

Before the questions start, no, I don't have a poopsock handy and yes I do hold down a full time job. Raids are from 8:30-12:30est Mon ,Wed, Fri,Sat (expanded to add AQ20 on Sunday/Tuesday); there is no signup, but you have to make at least 1/3 of the raids or become inactive. DKP for loot.