The Laws of Online Gaming Revisited...

[Dark Vengeance]

The point doesn't work, because it's a game.  PvE players don't want to be dependent on PvP players (who may not even be on that evening) in order to enjoy their game.

Yeah, and grouping doesn't work in CoH or EQ for the same reasons.....oh, wait.

Sure, we don't want something as inane as forced grouping....but we also don't want a situation where the PvPers are totally independent, and PvE folks are at their mercy....or vice versa. The key is INTERdependecies, not just dependencies.

Additionally, you need to provide some meaningful content that players could even do alone....but teamwork should play a big part in making the group better than the sum of its parts. This would allow for players to band together to go after the toughest challenges.

I'm quite sure everyone would like to be CAPABLE of playing the entire game solo, and being able to do everything alone. Well, it's all well and good to want it....but I wouldn't buckle to the "if I cant solo everything, then I walk" mentality. Some things, sure....but not everything. And if that means people want to walk, and it's a niche, so be it.

Thinking that the PvEers will get the Antis to guard them from the PKers is like Mythic hoping that their realm populations will balance themselves out.

If you look at it as two wholly segregated groups, sure. The bottom line is that they aren't....the two groups don't exist in a vacuum unless the devs allow them to do so. This is why subtle interdependencies throughout the game can work wonders.

We aren't trying to get Israel and Iran to have buttsex here....we're merely trying to get players with different specialties will band together for mutual benefit. You guys seem so determined to preclude that as even being a possibility that we've eschewed any sort of conversation about design, and fixated on "yes it can/no it can't".

We can chatter about what players want to do all day long....that ignores the reality of design. You give the players something they can accept, which will drive them toward the desired behavior....and if done properly, it will feel organic, instead of feeling artificial and forced.

The devil, of course, is in the details.

Bring the noise.
Cheers.............

[Zaphkiel]

You're once again ignoring the point that humanity does not rely on God/fate/karma/the force/luck/random chance to provide justice or enforce a set of collective values....we handle it ourselves.

Would you care to address that point, or do you prefer to keep ducking it?

Bring the noise.
Cheers............

    Because it's not a point, it's a feeble excuse.  Billions of people pray every day for justice and winning lottery numbers.  Are you saying they are all whiney little bitches because they want a higher power to change things?  Now, imagine if there really was a God who actually listened to people occasionally, do you think that would increase or decrease the number of people asking for changes?   The only DIFFERENCE is that in one case, people are wasting their time because the rules of the universe aren't going to change, and in the other, they change all the time.  

 Are you saying the Commissioner of Baseball was wrong for making rules about intentionally hitting players?  He should have just let the teams handle it themselves?   Sure, a lot of players would have their careers cut short, but at least they wouldn't have gone "outside the game" to resolve conflict!!!  
   Get a clue.

[Dark Vengeance]

Because it's not a point, it's a feeble excuse.  Billions of people pray every day for justice and winning lottery numbers.  Are you saying they are all whiney little bitches because they want a higher power to change things?

For winning lottery numbers? Yes....those folks are indeed whiny bitches. Praying for justice...well, to a certain extent the faithful should believe that God is going to work His will through mankind....so you're essentially asking God to provide people with the wisdom to see the truth.

That's a tad different from asking God to smite your enemies on your behalf.

Now, imagine if there really was a God who actually listened to people occasionally, do you think that would increase or decrease the number of people asking for changes?

I don't particularly like where this is going, but so be it.....what's to say that he doesn't really exist, or that he doesn't actually listen to people? The ideas behind free will suggest that there is evidence about the existence of God all around us, but that He gave people the choice to acknowledge or deny Him. As my cousin (a minister) once explained to me....you are free to be willfully ignorant.

But let's go ahead and say something happened to prove that God exists, and that he listens to prayers. It could have either effect....I'm sure some would begin asking for everything under the sun, while I imagine others would probably look into the Word, and be mindful about questioning God's plan.

Now before you go off on me as some sort of Bible-thumper....bear in mind that I'm an agnostic. I just know that based on my personal study of the Bible, some of these questions are answered in such a way that they can neither be proven nor disproven.

That being said, I'd prefer we not see this thread devolve into a debate on theology.

The only DIFFERENCE is that in one case, people are wasting their time because the rules of the universe aren't going to change, and in the other, they change all the time.

Well, that's not the only difference. God doesn't have to contend with profit margins and stockholders.....not to mention that an omniscient being is going to have a tad bit more wisdom about what wishes should and should not be answered than your average dev.

Are you saying the Commissioner of Baseball was wrong for making rules about intentionally hitting players?  He should have just let the teams handle it themselves?   Sure, a lot of players would have their careers cut short, but at least they wouldn't have gone "outside the game" to resolve conflict!!!

Beaning someone on purpose is "going outside the game to resolve conflict". The conflict is pitcher vs batter.

I don't see that intentional beanballs were ever considered a legitimate part of baseball, nor that charging the mound, or bench-clearing brawls were condoned either. That's why they kick players out of games for doing so.

The rule was consistent with the spirit of many rules surrounding athletics.....acting with the intent to injure another player is frowned up by the league, the players, and most of the fans. That being said, I think such a rule has to be enforced carefully....apply it too liberally, and you can really limit a pitcher's ability to throw inside, and keep the batter from crowding the plate. So far, they seem to have done pretty well with it.

By comparison, in games that allow non-consent PvP, PKers aren't even breaking the rules by doing so. Asking for that to be removed is more akin to asking the Commissioner to disallow stealing bases.

Bring the noise.
Cheers..............

[daveNYC]

We aren't trying to get Israel and Iran to have buttsex here...

Mildly amusing considering the habit some PKs had of emoting ass rape over peoples corpses, but that's besides the point.  The problem with the situation is that the PvE players are dealing from a position of weakness.  If there were some loose alliance between Antis and PvEers, guess who has hand?  If the PvEers walk, they end up getting crushed by the PKs, and the Antis have to do a little farming for items.  If the Antis walk, well, the same thing happens.  The PvE players are in a weak position.  I don't see the mixing of playstyles working out anytime soon.

[Dark Vengeance]

The problem with the situation is that the PvE players are dealing from a position of weakness.  If there were some loose alliance between Antis and PvEers, guess who has hand?  If the PvEers walk, they end up getting crushed by the PKs, and the Antis have to do a little farming for items.  If the Antis walk, well, the same thing happens.  The PvE players are in a weak position.  I don't see the mixing of playstyles working out anytime soon.

Well, that gives us a very valid design point to address, doesn't it? How do we strengthen the position of PvE and crafters in that scenario?

One way might be to get the players to specialize their characters to one of those diverging paths....different skillsets, equipment, etc for PvP and PvM. A great example of this existed with bards and tamers prior to UO:R....they could easily handle creatures that PvP characters couldn't, yet they were worth shit in PvP.

Now if those PvM characters are essential for obtaining potent items for PvPers, now you've got some actual incentive to work together. The anti wants a powerful item for fighting PKs, and wants to keep them out of the hands of the Pks.....meanwhile, the PvE character needs someone to watch his back and possibly provide support (heals, etc) against high-end creatures, even moreso if PKs know that he might have a powerful PvP item on him (because that makes them a bigger target).

In a way, it let's the playerbase self-stratify into templates of PvPers and non-PvPers. Once that happens, if you find that PKs are still causing too much havoc with PvEs, you can provide combat penalties when a PvP template is matched against a miner template, etc. Actually make the PK less effective against certain non-PvP templates, which gives the PvE a greater chance to survive.

That's at least the type of direction I'm thinking....it's not truly consentual PvP, because a miner can always try and whack a bard or whatever, leaving room for some degree of player justice. But the folks who are going to be the most effective at PvP, they're going to have to pretty well dedicate the character to PvP....toss in a system to clearly separate the PvPers into PK/anti, killer/protector, good/evil or whatever else you want to call it and now you've pretty well got it down. Everyone ends up pigeonholing themselves into a few broad categories just through the natural development of the character and typical gameplay habits. It's all based on players specializing in what they want to do the best....and throwing away a measure of ambiguity about certain skillsets. The guy with the human_slaying_sword_07 and specialties in humanoid combat is probably going to be PvP oriented....the guy with specialties in cooking and wielding a rolling pin is probably a crafter...the guy with a_dragon_axe_03 and specializing in large creature combat is most likely a PvMer.

I know it's a concept that can probably be shredded and dissected, but it's at least getting into the details of how to attack this problem, which is better (and more productive) than simply throwing our hands up in the air and saying "nope, you can't get PvEs and PvPs to work together".

Bring the noise.
Cheers.............

[El Gallo]

DV, what you need to do is give PvErs a reason to play your game where they:
-have to pay the antis (or the PKs) off for "protection" so they can happily farm away,
-pray that those antis actually protect them while they happily farm away,
-still get azzraped at least once in a while while they happily farm away, and
-have to put up with a dev team that spends a big chunk of its time working on PvP issues rather than "happily farming away" issues

and not another game where they can just happily farm away and the development team spends 100% of its efforts making my happy farming experience even happier?

Your plan might have worked for pre-EQ UO, but only because there was (realistically) nowhere else for people who wanted a MMOG to go.  Do you really think that there are people out there thinking "man, you know what's wrong with EQ?  It's that I am not utterly dependent on my big, strong daddy Dark Vengeance protecting poor widdle old me every second that I play, and I don't get to give him half of my l3wtz as part of a protection racket.  Man, that would really rule."  Nobody is going to pay for that.

[Dark Vengeance]

DV, what you need to do is give PvErs a reason to play your game where they:
-have to pay the antis (or the PKs) off for "protection" so they can happily farm away,

You're obviously content to believe that no amount of design can make PvM and PvP interdependent, nor that such players will EVER associate with one another. An unrealistic, defeatist attitude, if you ask me....but so be it.

-pray that those antis actually protect them while they happily farm away,

Only a moron pays anything more than a small deposit in advance.

If the group is going out and saying "you'll get whatever PvP-oriented items I uncover in exchange for watching my back", that certainly gives the anti incentive to stick around. And that's even if you have near strangers working together.

And you do realize that people form guilds, and play with friends...right? Do you think it's possible that various people will fill in to the different roles within the game so they can actually get things accomplished?
 

-still get azzraped at least once in a while while they happily farm away, and

People that NEVER want the risk of being PKed should NOT be playing a game where it is possible.

-have to put up with a dev team that spends a big chunk of its time working on PvP issues rather than "happily farming away" issues

This is an issue in every game that isn't exclusively PvE or PvP. PYHO man.

and not another game where they can just happily farm away and the development team spends 100% of its efforts making my happy farming experience even happier?

Hmm yet another game just like all the rest. That's not too innovative, if you ask me.

Your plan might have worked for pre-EQ UO, but only because there was (realistically) nowhere else for people who wanted a MMOG to go.  Do you really think that there are people out there thinking "man, you know what's wrong with EQ?  It's that I am not utterly dependent on my big, strong daddy Dark Vengeance protecting poor widdle old me every second that I play, and I don't get to give him half of my l3wtz as part of a protection racket.  Man, that would really rule."  Nobody is going to pay for that.

Yknow, because people don't want to play with their friends, and people don't form guilds, and everyone only wants to associate with people who play exactly like they do, and nobody wants to ever have to depend on anybody.

Fuck man, this is pointless. If you assume the l33t EQ fucktard that wants nothing to do with PvP, and the r0xx0r1ng PvPers make up the entire audience for MMOGs, then yeah...it's never going to work. But did you ever consider that we have so many of those shitsucking morons in the genre because THAT'S who the current games appeal to the most??

Did it ever occur to anyone that a LOT of people DON'T fit squarely into the PvE/PvP categories? Just like MOST people don't fit squarely into the Bartle archetypes....the majority is somewhere in the middle.

It's pointless though.....we have a thread about breaking the current paradigms, and a good chunk of the people in the thread are arguing about why things have to stay EXACTLY AS THEY ARE.

Bring the noise.
Cheers............

[daveNYC]

It's pointless though.....we have a thread about breaking the current paradigms, and a good chunk of the people in the thread are arguing about why things have to stay EXACTLY AS THEY ARE.

Bring the noise.
Cheers............

More like how creating interdependence between the two groups won't work.  

If you want to have PvE and open PvP in the same game setting (not segregated) you'll have to change the way combat works, change character design so that 'build of the week' templates don't dominate, allow the use of NPC to create temporary safeish areas, incorporate player accountability, and allow combat to have outcomes other than death for one side.

Just creating dependence between the two groups will not work,  the power differential is just too great.

[Dark Vengeance]

More like how creating interdependence between the two groups won't work.

Not by itself, no. I believe I stated that I was only suggesting one means of strengthening the position of the PvEs in that relationship.

If you want to have PvE and open PvP in the same game setting (not segregated) you'll have to change the way combat works, change character design so that 'build of the week' templates don't dominate, allow the use of NPC to create temporary safeish areas, incorporate player accountability, and allow combat to have outcomes other than death for one side.

I agree on some, not on others (outcomes other than death?), but at least we're talking about how something COULD be made workable, instead of dismissing it as any type of possibility.

Just creating dependence between the two groups will not work,  the power differential is just too great.

I agree, but I think that interdependence is *A* key to the "online world" type of paradigm. Note that I didn't say *THE* key. Players that have no need for one another, particularly of different playstyles, are much less likely to group together.

Bring the noise.
Cheers..............

[daveNYC]

I agree on some, not on others (outcomes other than death?),...

Basically the ability to either avoid combat by seeing opponents coming and running away, or being able to break off combat and run like hell.  Between CC and ludicrous damage output in modern games, once you're engaged in combat someone is going to die.

If you want PvE types to be willing to go up against PvPers, I believe you need to offer them the chance of being able to cut and run if things don't go their way.  If they know that they have a 40% chance of winning the fight, and that once they start fighting they'll have to see it throught, the smart money is that they'll avoid fights like the plague.

[Dark Vengeance]

Basically the ability to either avoid combat by seeing opponents coming and running away, or being able to break off combat and run like hell.  Between CC and ludicrous damage output in modern games, once you're engaged in combat someone is going to die.

Works for me....basically you're saying don't make it so bloody easy for players to kill each other that virtually every fight ends in a matter of seconds. I'm all for that.

If you want PvE types to be willing to go up against PvPers, I believe you need to offer them the chance of being able to cut and run if things don't go their way.  If they know that they have a 40% chance of winning the fight, and that once they start fighting they'll have to see it throught, the smart money is that they'll avoid fights like the plague.

Agreed.

Bring the noise.
Cheers.............

[Ezdaar]

So Raph, when you were working on UO way back when did you ever dream people would be having long winded philosophical debates about it 7 years later?

[Raph]

So Raph, when you were working on UO way back when did you ever dream people would be having long winded philosophical debates about it 7 years later?

Yes.

[HaemishM]

This genre is yet to create a truly great PvE game OR a truly great PvP game.  

Ok, I'm trying to catch up on a shitload of posts, and am going to interject here with a disagreement with this statement. There HAS been and is a truly great PVE game, IMO. City of Heroes. It has a singular focus and does what it does quite well. It's main drawback MAY be (and this has yet to be proven by time) lack of depth.

As for a truly great PVP game, I think DAoC is coming close these days, Shadowbane flirted with the concept and CoH and WoW both have potential to be either great PVP games or colossal PVP fuckups. I don't think either one will be worse at PVP than DAoC; which means that the people who like the sort of PVP those games develop will like what they do but it may not substantively expand the PVP user base.

[HaemishM]

Socialization requires downtime
Whatever the rewarded activity in your game is, it has to give people time to breathe if you want them to socialize.

This law is true, one of the most important laws, and probably WoW's biggest problem right now.  You literally cannot talk in a group doing an instance, because you are constantly clicking.  Cantinas are not the answer (at least not alone), you need the downtime built into the rewarded activity, like EQ does.  Now, you don't need EQ caliber downtime, but there is a happy medium between EQ on the one hand and WoW/CoH/Diablo on the other.

Again, forgive my postings in a row, but I'm catching up.

The answer is twofold and is about 3-5 years out, IMO; Voice communication and "voice fonts." I've talked about this before, and I know Raph and I have bandied this about on P2P if nowhere else. Right now, socialization requires downtime because typing is the only non-metagame form of communication above the level of hieroglpyhics (i.e. emotes). Voice fonts are like the X-Box Live voice filters that mask your real voice with a faux voice, because most people's real voices sound less like heroic actors in a story and more like Mr. Mackey from South Park. Witness the shock and awe of the House Daenyr guild when my voice had a thick Southern accent and not a harsh Scottish brogue. :)

Being able to talk freely and easily without typing will completely invalidate the "socialization requires downtime" law. But it won't become widespread until the tech is there - TeamSpeak has the voice transmission part, it just needs to be built into the client. The voice fonts will take a bit.

By the way R.K. (does anyone else feel odd calling someone they have never met by their first name...

I think that's one of the cool things about the Internet, the familiarity you can have without any form of body language or actual voice interaction.

[HaemishM]

So there is no justice in the USA, because we never get to do it ourselves?   Bullshit.

The PEOPLE do it themselves....the law, government, enforcement are all things done BY THE PEOPLE. We don't simply rely on God to handle it for us, at least not in this life.

Here's where your missing something. Sure, the administration of justice in the real world is done by the people. But unless you are in the beginning stages of a revolution/coup/overthrow of government, that justice is following a set of laws that you had no hand in creating. The Justice system exists almost as a physical law, and in MMOG terms, HAS to be coded in by the developers. Like a deity, justice existed before you, will persist after you, and likely won't involve you taking time out of your day to administer it.

How many people welcome the thought of jury duty with glee? How many people like chasing down a purse snatcher in Central Park? How many people get sued or put through the justice system for defending their property with lethal force when a burglar breaks in?

Unless the game world ALLOWS players to be cops/policemen/judges instead of independent vigilantes, VERY FEW WANT TO BE A FUCKING COP.

[El Gallo]

Being able to talk freely and easily without typing will completely invalidate the "socialization requires downtime" law.

Agreed.  Though I prefer "you talk and your words appear as written text that other players can see" to "you talk and your words appear as spoken words said in a different voice" for a number of reasons (most importantly that it is easier to handle larger groups that way) and presume that it is technologically easier as well.

I think that's one of the cool things about the Internet, the familiarity you can have without any form of body language or actual voice interaction.

I guess.  I have no problem calling you "Haemish" or "Haem" but that isn't your real first name I presume.  Maybe I am just a neo-Victorian prig.

[HaemishM]

Luddite! :)

I've been using the Haemish identity/persona so long, it's almost second nature to respond to it in all its forms, even Haemsamwich.

Besides bandwidth issues and client lag, the biggest hurdle to voice comm in an MMOG is chatter. I cannot fathom the stabby feelings I would get if I had to listen to East Commons style OOC chatter when walking through a zone, not to mention the immersion breaking effect. I think that voice comm would of necessity have to work somewhat like ToonTown's friending system. You could only voice chat to someone who specifically allowed it, or within groups. Perhaps creating an explicit separate chat channel for voice comm would be necessary. One of the biggest necessities for moving forward in the MMOG genre is to once and for all rid ourselves of the goddamn chat box as the primary social interface. City of Heroes goes a long way towards this with the word balloons. I wouldn't mind seeing word balloons used as the "say" channel for local, non-voice allowed communications. Shunt zone-wide OOC communication into a box that's easily ignorable. Accepted voice communications friends would come in somewhat like call-waiting; you'd get an indicator that you had a "tell" voice comm incoming, and be able to answer or listen to it at your leisure. Group chat would be all voice comm.

We're still a ways away from this, but the MMOG that can get it right will, IMO, have 2 legs and a chicken wing up on any other MMOG in the area of social dynamics. But like PVP, accepting incoming Voice communications will have to a consensual thing. You will need to know and accept whoever sends you voice, otherwise they'll have to contact you via text.

[Honkwomp]

It’s a SERVICE. Not a game. It’s a WORLD. Not a game. It’s a COMMUNITY. Not a game. Anyone who says, ‘it’s just a game’ is missing the point.
No, you’re missing the point. It’s a damned game!

Wow, that rule explains a lot.  It's like when you wonder why people used to beat their kids, then you find the childrearing manual from 1800 that says, "Rule 10: Beateth yor childe liberally."

     A multiplayer game is much much more than game and I hold griefers out as proof of that.  MOG's last simply because the have within them at least some reality in the form of conversations and other player interactions At the very least, MOGs are big chat rooms.  Are words real?  Is this web site real?  The only person I know of on this website is Raph, but I have never shook hands with him, or seen him other than in pcitures.  Is he real?  Can what he says here put in motion "real life" events?  What we are typing here is just as real as what is said in online games

[HaemishM]

Eh?

Yes, a multiplayer game is more than "Just a game" but in essence it is a game. It could best be defined as a "social game" but as I've said before, social games don't require worlds for them to be social. They just require interaction among a community of players.

Until these MMOG's are not sold/marketed/developed as games, the game needs to come first, the service second and any world stuff should be third at best.

[Alluvian]

It is really too bad that speach to text translators are so awful right now or that would be the easy no downtime solution.  You could take that text and turn it back into speach on the other end covering up the problems with spelling and such, but it would tend to carry over accents if you just went with a phoenetic recognition system.  A system like this would solve the bandwidth problems, but whether speach to phoenetic alphabet back to speach would end up anything other than gibberish is unknown.

EQ actually has voice recognition built into it.  Been there since launch.  You need to have Dragon naturally speaking or another compatible speech to text codec, but all the commands are in there.  I um... pirated a copy of DNS once to check it out and the results were pretty far from satisfactory.  Not really EQ's fault as I could not get DNS to reliably convert my speach patterns to text anyway.  I mumble a lot and don't enunciate very well.  I did have a whole lot of fun reading back what DNS THOUGHT I was saying.  It didn't take long to delete that ill gotten software and mark the technology up as 'not ready for primetime'.

A phoenetic system might work much better though.

[Alkiera]

EQ actually has voice recognition built into it. Been there since launch.

Well, not quite, but yes, shortly after launch, anyway.  I remember the introduction of it, and I started in early October, about 4 months after launch.   I too attempted to get it working, but never managed, and didn't care all that much anyway.  It was a neat idea, but I agree that the technology really isn't mature enough.

--
Alkiera

[josher]

I wouldn't call a PvE system GREAT if it has no depth.  It might be really fun, but fun for a few weeks isn't great when you're talking subsciptions.  COH is pretty shallow, but does fill a void many gamers are looking for.  I personaly find no joy in shallow simplistic games anymore.   ATM, COH is pretty shallow by MMORPG standards.