Vanguard: Round 1 - FIGHT!

[ajax34i]

Ideally, to me, the time to get a group+run the dungeon should be less than the time to run the dungeon once solo, unless there's just no one willing to group. 

I think it's easy to agree with this principle, but in quite a few of the implementations out there, the "less time" part is so significantly less that solo-play is severely discouraged.  You could even look at some of these MMO's and say that "yes, it's possible to solo, but the time it would take you to finish the instance solo would approach infinity."

It's a fine line.  I'd be ok with groups taking half the time to finish, compared to the solo player, but wouldn't be ok with groups taking 1/4 of the time, because a 2 hr group dungeon just becomes 8 hours solo then, and I certainly don't have 8 continuous hours to play a game.  The principle of your statement is fine, but once you quantify it, people might argue against it.

[Nebu]

Here's what really irritates me.  Who cares if the solo guy can get exactly the same gear as the group person?  I mean really... in a PvE game all the gear allows is for you to kill even tougher mobs.  It's a game.  The solo guy has every bit as much right to have fun as the group person... the fun should just be different while remaining equal.  Currently the solo guy is like the kid standing next to the "You must be this tall to ride this ride" line.   The only thing that changes is what point in the game you're faced with being the little guy (i.e. WoW delays it longer than most).

People need to realize that games are for having fun, not for building self-esteem. 

[palmer_eldritch]

Um - I don't have cool loot. It's been a long time since I had the time or energy to put into games that would allow me to be one of the most uber on the server. The difference is that I don't give a crap.

Also, it's not about telling anyone what kind of gear their character should have, personally I'm talking about what sort of game I would like to play. If someone does prefer a game with lots of instances and scaled encounters, that's cool  . . . doesn't mean they have emotional problems:)

Edit - added a smiley to sound less confrontational!

[Ixxit]

Vanguard - The Anti-Review
Elysium – Thu, 02/22/2007 – 7:38pm
Perspectives
"We will have a lot of work to do post-launch and the first couple of months post-launch will be just as busy as beta 5 with lots of patches, bug fixes, new feathres[sic], etc." – Brad McQuaid on beta concerns for Vanguard: Saga of Heroes performance ..............................

blah BLAH blah BLAH

Vanguard has many technical and balancing issues, yet this is a pretty poor analysis of the game.  If he found the game hard to understand (the parts he experienced) he is as obtuse as  what he is saying Vanguard is.  Also looks like someone just finished an AP English  class and pen in hand, has a Sony Axe to grind.

[Afropuff]

Ideally, to me, the time to get a group+run the dungeon should be less than the time to run the dungeon once solo, unless there's just no one willing to group. 

(sniped some)

The principle of your statement is fine, but once you quantify it, people might argue against it.

Yeah, this is true.  You can say "make soloing a bit harder, but not too much  :-D"  if you want, but all that's going to do is make people bitch that the content isn't balanced properly.  At any rate, just what problem are we trying to solve here? Making MMO's accessible for solo playstyles?  Couldn't one argue that the solo vs. group balance question is solved, since WoW seems to be doing quite nicely on paying customers?  

[ajax34i]

Here's what really irritates me.  Who cares if the solo guy can get exactly the same gear as the group person? 

The people looking to form a group care.  Often, one look at someone's gear can tell you how well that person is in a group situation.  If said person could acquire MC gear or BWL gear solo, then you wouldn't be able to tell if he's an asshole or a ninja or what.  If said person could acquire MC or BWL - quality gear (same stats, different name) solo, via quests or whatever, then this person wouldn't be invited to groups because he obviously hasn't grouped before, and will behave like an idiot.

You either look at the guy's gear (and the group gear is obviously different than the solo gear), or you need his resume, where he grouped and with whom and how it went.

[Nebu]

The people looking to form a group care.  Often, one look at someone's gear can tell you how well that person is in a group situation.  If said person could acquire MC gear or BWL gear solo, then you wouldn't be able to tell if he's an asshole or a ninja or what.  If said person could acquire MC or BWL - quality gear (same stats, different name) solo, via quests or whatever, then this person wouldn't be invited to groups because he obviously hasn't grouped before, and will behave like an idiot.

You either look at the guy's gear (and the group gear is obviously different than the solo gear), or you need his resume, where he grouped and with whom and how it went.

Sorry, I don't buy it.  I've seen way too many shitty players get carried by a group to think for a second that their gear defines them as a player.  The only way to know if a person can play is to group them and find out.  Running on a raid and rolling a 100 for a drop does not make anyone skilled at their class.

[squirrel]

Here's what really irritates me.  Who cares if the solo guy can get exactly the same gear as the group person? 

The people looking to form a group care.  Often, one look at someone's gear can tell you how well that person is in a group situation.  If said person could acquire MC gear or BWL gear solo, then you wouldn't be able to tell if he's an asshole or a ninja or what.  If said person could acquire MC or BWL - quality gear (same stats, different name) solo, via quests or whatever, then this person wouldn't be invited to groups because he obviously hasn't grouped before, and will behave like an idiot.

You either look at the guy's gear (and the group gear is obviously different than the solo gear), or you need his resume, where he grouped and with whom and how it went.

I can't buy this argument, at least in this context. I've met way to many asshats decked out in tier 2+ gear to believe this. Getting good gear in 40-mans is in no way equivalent to a skilled player. In fact I'd rather group with someone who can get that gear solo - at least they know their class. I understand what you're saying, but in the context of WoW this just isn't true. Raidtards are often the WORST people in a 5 man.

[trias_e]

because with 5 people you have much greater room for error.

I think this is the opposite.  A challenging group encounter gives 5 times more oppurtunities to fuck up.  If I'm solo, the only person that can screw up is me.    If you're grouped, 5 people can screw up, each of them having a chance to blow the ecounter.  And if this isn't the case, then it's not exactly a challenging encounter.

Think of say basketball.  A crossover 'solo' drive to the basket has alot less chance to fuck up than a serious play involving 5 players, 3 backdoor screens and 2 cuts.  If any one person didn't do their bit, it goes to shit quickly. 

Now I'm pushing it one way to an extreme.  The basketball example shows that each player has less individually to do than the solo player.  So it might be easier on a per-player level.  But it's harder as a whole in my opinion.  And it introduces a whole new concept of diffucutly that isn't present in solo play:  That concerned with teamwork and communication.  I think it's the last two concepts are the only reason why it's more fun to watch 5v5 basketball than 1v1, and more fun to play 5v5 basketball than 1v1, and often more fun to group in MMORPGs than solo.


And please note that given xp/loot split, a solo player will need to clear 1/5 of the dungeon in the time the other group clears the whole thing to get the same reward (at least in base xp/loot terms, not counting quests or psychological fulfilment of completing the dungeon.)

[trias_e]

Raidtards are often the WORST people in a 5 man

This is because raids go so far away from individual action (that, is actually being good at your character) and too far towards the whole communication deal.  I like grouping for a happy medium between the two.

[Venkman]

Um, they probably don't WANT to "tear through" it. I think the whole point of group content is that it is a challenge for a group.

The first time, yea. The 20th though, when that is the only way to continue progressing your character at all (through gear)? No. It's not about the challenge. It's work, grinding to continue the improvements you got used to when you were still gaining levels. At that point, gear upgrades (gear tiers, or keys for events) become levels, the only way to unlock new content (as in, access to new zones).

Grouping outside of a social circle is inherently more time consuming. Some games minimize the sucky parts by allowing quick porting, easy rezzing and so on. But a lot more could be done here. It's not, as evidenced by the amount of general complaints about PUGs in any game.

Something to the effect of making at least 1-2 classes that are solo only and/or have altered abilities upon grouping

I loved in EQ1 how each class could solo what was deemed group-content in some areas in some ways. Like, as a Bard in the outdoors, I could solo just about anything with kiting. Any kiter could. Indoors though, not so much. Meanwhile, Necros could.

If you allow for that and allow for players to figure it out on their own to get that sense of idea ownership AND you don't slap them into submissive contrived gameplay like WoW does, then you're onto something.

Otherwise, I do actually agree that groups should get better gear than soloers. Soloers don't need the bestest gear if they're not going to go to places that require it. And e-peen waving isn't enough. But games should strive to soften the differences. In WoW I was never going to Naxxramas. Ever. It was three tiers beyond me and I'd wager at least 50% of the playerbase. So all that content made for that place and events surrounding is only for a small-ish subset of players. That seems wasteful.

Which is why I think they learned, as evidenced by the structure of the newer places.

[Nebu]

Otherwise, I do actually agree that groups should get better gear than soloers. Soloers don't need the bestest gear if they're not going to go to places that require it. And e-peen waving isn't enough. But games should strive to soften the differences. In WoW I was never going to Naxxramas. Ever. It was three tiers beyond me and I'd wager at least 50% of the playerbase. So all that content made for that place and events surrounding is only for a small-ish subset of players. That seems wasteful.

If there's no PvP, why do people even care what gear other people have?  This is what annoys me to no end.  You're killing mobs... solo or grouped it's still the same situation.  Why does my solo toon having the best gear affect the group player's gaming?  It's not about a yardstick, it's about having fun.  If there's no PvP then what does it really matter what I have for gear?  Is this some form of the e-Joneses or something?

How about the incentive for grouping being something crazy... like it's more fun?

[Trouble]

I think one of the issues here not being discussed with group vs. solo is that actually creating content that is equally difficult for a soloer vs. a group is difficult. Even designing difficult content for smaller groups is much harder than designing difficult content for large groups. Basically it comes down to making the players work around the encounter versus working the encounter around the player.

The problem is that a single player can only be a single class. That means they will only have a set amount of tools (spells/abilities/etc) to work with. Some players are healers. Some do damage but have no ability to heal. Some are hybrids. The nuances go on from there. In a group encounter you can say "ok we're going to require they have someone who's able to tank and someone who's able to heal and then a bunch of people who can do damage". You can't normally walk into a group encounter with say 5 healers or 5 tanks or 5 damage dealers and expect to win.

In the end you only have two options. Either dumb down the encounter enough so that any class/role can beat it or create a unique version of the encounter for every class that would attempt it. If you dumb it down you just get back to the argument of difficulty vs. reward. Your original goal was to create something as difficult while soloing or in a group so you've failed your goal. If you create a unique version for every possible class you end up multiplying the cost of creating the encounter.

Blizzard has stated this before in explaining why 40 (now 25) man raids give the best rewards. They can make them the most difficult because they can require relatively precise group composition. They can demand that there are multiples of every single class in a raid, that there a number of capable tanks, a number of healers, and a number of damage dealers. This allows them to precisely design encounters that place the most demands on every single one of the tools available to players.

Almost all of the difficult content I've seen playing dikus requires a combination of tanking, damage dealing, and healing. I personally can't come up with a way to make a difficult encounter where any one of these is variable from non-existant to being the only ability the player has.

[Alkiera]

Almost all of the difficult content I've seen playing dikus requires a combination of tanking, damage dealing, and healing. I personally can't come up with a way to make a difficult encounter where any one of these is variable from non-existant to being the only ability the player has.

Someone call up the CoH devs.  Best character balance EVER, eventually.  Groups of scrappers are good.  Groups of defenders are good.  Groups of tankers are good.  It's all good.

--
Alkiera

[Morat20]

Almost all of the difficult content I've seen playing dikus requires a combination of tanking, damage dealing, and healing. I personally can't come up with a way to make a difficult encounter where any one of these is variable from non-existant to being the only ability the player has.

Someone call up the CoH devs.  Best character balance EVER, eventually.  Groups of scrappers are good.  Groups of defenders are good.  Groups of tankers are good.  It's all good.

--
Alkiera

Hehe. Back in the day my Supergroup (Three Mile Island Boy's Club for Boy's -- rad/rad defenders. (You can guess where our powers come from)) cleaned up anything. It might have taken forever to kill some things, but we could waltz through encounters like nobody's business.

But part of the reason CoH's can get away with that is the way power pools and such work -- pretty much all classes are hybrids, with potential for even more hybridzation.

[Venkman]

Exactly. A game full of hybrids simply has more options. Yet ANOTHER something I wish would be emulated from CoH. But alas, the game doesn't have enough subs for people to take notice of what's worth copying. Damn Cryptic for not bowing to the oligarchy that is Fantasy.

If there's no PvP, why do people even care what gear other people have? 

As I mentioned, I consider gear to be the levels that occur once the levels themselves run out. Just KNOWING there's better gear to get is about as compelling as knowing there's another level to get or another quest to complete.

[Murgos]

Exactly. A game full of hybrids simply has more options. Yet ANOTHER something I wish would be emulated from CoH. But alas, the game doesn't have enough subs for people to take notice of what's worth copying. Damn Cryptic for not bowing to the oligarchy that is Fantasy.

I disagree.  Damn Cryptic for bowing to the conformist idea that grind == long term subscriptions.

[Venkman]

Oh I definitely agree there. But the game in general has some very interesting features I wish others would pick up. Gamewide hybrids, low level friend summoning, low level flight/superjump/speed, fights while flying (at least they used to), character customization at creation and not just through massively-grinded, unlockable unique classes that aren't just templates and so on.

The level grind sucks and contributes to their attrition. I'm hoping they learn that someday.

[Trippy]

Why shouldn't the rewards be as lucrative, too? You get yours by grouping as you like to play, I can get mine from soloing as I like to play. Outside of the vantards who feel cheated because they saw others level at a faster pace.

Again, I don't expect to solo Nagafen. But I should be able to solo Crush and get the same drop as a group would, imo. Ideally in an instance where I wouldn't be intruding on some guild's group night or some other solo player just looking for a heroic gaming experience.

And again, Valmorian, CoH/V. Scaled content (they even scale in the public zones to a degree iirc)

CoH/CoV may have scaled content but there's also a boring repetitiveness to it. All the missions have the same "clumps" of mobs standing around -- there's very little "hand crafting" to them where the mobs are fiendishly placed in interesting ways unlike in games like EQ and WoW.

[Signe]

Why shouldn't the rewards be as lucrative, too? You get yours by grouping as you like to play, I can get mine from soloing as I like to play. Outside of the vantards who feel cheated because they saw others level at a faster pace.

Again, I don't expect to solo Nagafen. But I should be able to solo Crush and get the same drop as a group would, imo. Ideally in an instance where I wouldn't be intruding on some guild's group night or some other solo player just looking for a heroic gaming experience.

And again, Valmorian, CoH/V. Scaled content (they even scale in the public zones to a degree iirc)

CoH/CoV may have scaled content but there's also a boring repetitiveness to it. All the missions have the same "clumps" of mobs standing around -- there's very little "hand crafting" to them where the mobs are fiendishly placed in interesting ways unlike in games like EQ and WoW.

And that's why I play for a bit and take long-ish breaks.  I enjoy the game but there is just not enough to do and not enough difference in missions.  It gets to the point that you know all the tilesets, although there are a couple of rare ones.  I don't know how interesting the crafting will be but I'll give it a go when it goes live.

[Morat20]

Why shouldn't the rewards be as lucrative, too? You get yours by grouping as you like to play, I can get mine from soloing as I like to play. Outside of the vantards who feel cheated because they saw others level at a faster pace.

Again, I don't expect to solo Nagafen. But I should be able to solo Crush and get the same drop as a group would, imo. Ideally in an instance where I wouldn't be intruding on some guild's group night or some other solo player just looking for a heroic gaming experience.

And again, Valmorian, CoH/V. Scaled content (they even scale in the public zones to a degree iirc)

CoH/CoV may have scaled content but there's also a boring repetitiveness to it. All the missions have the same "clumps" of mobs standing around -- there's very little "hand crafting" to them where the mobs are fiendishly placed in interesting ways unlike in games like EQ and WoW.

CoH/CoV missions are basically very well done versions of SWG terminal missions. What I'd like to see is handcrafted missions that pepper that -- not just endgame, but scattered through the game itself. Hire a few instance designers to do nothing but craft those, and put some variety in there.

As for hybrids -- I do know CoH had a bitch of a time with balancing, especially once PvP was added (which adds an entirely new type of balance to be dealt with).

[Trippy]

As for hybrids -- I do know CoH had a bitch of a time with balancing, especially once PvP was added (which adds an entirely new type of balance to be dealt with).

CoH has had tons of balancing issues (at least in the developers' minds) but that's different than having gimpy classes. You can gimp yourself if you make odd power selection/slotting choices but ignoring that like Morat20 said you can throw together pretty much any combination of players together and expect to make it through a mission unless there's an AV at the end in which case group composition does matter more (e.g. you may not have enough DPS to overcome the AV's regen/healing rate). Sure if your group doesn't have the FotM in it it may take you longer to complete the mission but you'll still be able to do it.

[Morat20]

As for hybrids -- I do know CoH had a bitch of a time with balancing, especially once PvP was added (which adds an entirely new type of balance to be dealt with).

CoH has had tons of balancing issues (at least in the developers' minds) but that's different than having gimpy classes. You can gimp yourself if you make odd power selection/slotting choices but ignoring that like Morat20 said you can throw together pretty much any combination of players together and expect to make it through a mission unless there's an AV at the end in which case group composition does matter more (e.g. you may not have enough DPS to overcome the AV's regen/healing rate). Sure if your group doesn't have the FotM in it it may take you longer to complete the mission but you'll still be able to do it.

Don't get me wrong. I loved CoH -- I keep meaning to try CoV, but haven't had the time. It was a slick, well-designed game, the classes were awesome -- I just didn't have any friends that played at the time, so....it's one I go back to, create a character, have fun at the lower levels, then quit from lack of a steady group of people to actually click with.

What's ironic is a guy I work with (literally the next desk to me) loves the game and plays it all the time -- he just keeps weird hours and plays when I sleep. :)

Combat in CoH was always fun, and once they added in those new buffs (blasters got one called what, defiance?) I really started having a blast. I just don't have time for three MMORPGs right now (I really don't have time for one, to be honest).

[Trippy]

Heh, I didn't even realize I was quoting you. That looks weird now.

[Strazos]

Life isn't fair.

[Engels]

Every time I crash to desktop, I get a secret snicker sending Microsoft the error report. I wonder if anyone at Microsoft is in charge of sifting through the error message sent by program used, and has sent off a note to the Microsoft Games dept thanking them for having ditched Sigil when they did.

[Nebu]

Life isn't fair.

Games are not life.  :-D

That's the whole point, isn't it?  Escapism. 

[Hound]

http://vgplayers.station.sony.com/newsArchive.vm?id=069&section=News

Double exp weekend to show appreciation for those sticking with it. Just a coincidence that it happened at the same time you have to start paying the monthly fee I suppose. All sarcasm aside that is good marketing SOE, it does not scream desperation quite as loudly as free ten day trials do.

[Falconeer]

Nice. And don't forget this:

Adventuring Kill Experience Increase
As we continue to gain more and more valuable data about player progression, we will also continue to tweak the experience curve as needed. In the next patch, we will be increasing the overall rate at which adventuring kill experience is gained by a small but noticeable amount to more properly align with our originally planned leveling times. This is separate from the double adventuring kill experience weekend.

So basically, bye bye Vision(tm), long live to WoW.

Jokes aside, here's the enhancement to the group and dungeon experience:

Four Dot Mobs
Players will soon find that fighting four dot mobs will yield much better experience rewards. Right now, they are not granting the experience that they should be. That issue will be fixed.

It'll definitely ease the grind. I hope they have high end content ready somewhere in their servers.

[Glazius]

Why shouldn't the rewards be as lucrative, too? You get yours by grouping as you like to play, I can get mine from soloing as I like to play. Outside of the vantards who feel cheated because they saw others level at a faster pace.

Again, I don't expect to solo Nagafen. But I should be able to solo Crush and get the same drop as a group would, imo. Ideally in an instance where I wouldn't be intruding on some guild's group night or some other solo player just looking for a heroic gaming experience.

And again, Valmorian, CoH/V. Scaled content (they even scale in the public zones to a degree iirc)

CoH/CoV may have scaled content but there's also a boring repetitiveness to it. All the missions have the same "clumps" of mobs standing around -- there's very little "hand crafting" to them where the mobs are fiendishly placed in interesting ways unlike in games like EQ and WoW.

Though what I can only call "emergent placing" this still presents an interesting challenge at times. Every blind corner is a potential deathtrap, and in a large team spawn sizes are usually big enough that you get one or two minions wandering far enough afield to be visible around the corner.

Somebody always leeroys into the two minions, and then realizes that the minions had two dozen angry friends when the bullets start flying. (For added hilarity there are several geomorphs set up where your instinctive bolthole is also angrily occupied.)

Custom-placing mobs works exactly once. Emergent ambushes are the gift that keeps on giving.

--GF

[Sky]

CoH/CoV may have scaled content but there's also a boring repetitiveness to it. All the missions have the same "clumps" of mobs standing around -- there's very little "hand crafting" to them where the mobs are fiendishly placed in interesting ways unlike in games like EQ and WoW.

A little from pile A and a little from pile B, yes? Groups and soloers can have challenging fights that give good loot. Really, anything less is a shitty compromise imo, because you're penalizing one or the other for the way they play. Despite what a lot of mmogtards might believe, I think penalty-based gameplay is a losing proposition.

Glaz - the nice thing about that style of emergent gameplay is that it's a challenge to groups and to soloers. And both can handle it...most of the time.

And in CoH you still have named mobs and lots of story within the instances, even if the stock layouts get old after a while. Like I said, you need some of the stuff from pile B to make it work.

On group makeup: early EQ (prekunark) seemed a lot more friendly to non-trinity grouping. When I was in the EQ beta, we always had wacky groups, just some friends and I. Then in the early release, I had an all-wizard group and belonged to a mostly paladin guild. So either we'd field the all-wiz team (if we were all on, we also had an open slot that would often be a necro) or it'd be 4 paladins and 2 wizards (our normal adventuring team). Later, playing my monk, we had a mostly hybrid team that was my monk, 2 rangers, a paladin, a rogue and an open slot.

And all those teams worked in dungeons, with few wipes. It made the game so much more fun than 'looking for cleric!'.

[Trippy]

And all those teams worked in dungeons, with few wipes. It made the game so much more fun than 'looking for cleric!'.

In regular exp groups, Clerics weren't about the healing -- a Shaman or Druid could do it just about as well and had many other things to offer -- it was about having the best possible rez available for your group's level range (yes Pallys could rez but it was gimped compared to a Cleric's).

[Sky]

I didn't play with a healer until my dumbass eqholic buddy 'married' one ingame. After the fallout with my stupid backstabbing political guild, it was just the three of us (my necro, his wizard and her druid) playing the post-50 game for the few months until I quit). A few guild raids, planes and whatnot, the most boring shit possible and of course my lord of the undead was supposed to play mana cleric. Heck, using lifetaps and my necro heal, I was able to keep a rogue alive once :)

[Venkman]

The trinity was not defined by pre-endgame EQ1. In fact, most ways players play in a veteran MMO are not. Trinitys and ways to playe emerge when enough people hit that endgame and want to bust through the non-endgame stuff as fast as possible so they can do the endgame again.

There was no required group configuration in WoW for the first few months after launch too. And DAoC. And so on (except CoX I think, or maybe that's just nowadays).

[Sky]

Post-Kunark, the design heavily favored trinity gameplay. I don't mind if the race-to-the-enders develop gameplay methods. It's when the design then changes to reflect that niche mindset and it becomes the norm.