There are plenty of single player RPGs that are always going to have better immersion and player impact than an MMORPG.
There are even plenty of online Adventure RPGs that are player community interactive but the game play is still solo or small group (though they tend to be digital hamster wheels of hack and slash).
The fundamental difference in MMORPGs is the massively multiplayer aspect. MMORPGs (Not to be confused with MMOFP[Shooter or Sworder]s) are all about groups and the game design both in and out of combat needs to be focused on interdependence and synergy. There is still room for some solo activities and goals but they should be the slow and inefficient outliers not the Kirito path to overwhelming power.
Considering it's an MMO social dynamics and grouping is definately more important. At the risk of sounding redundant, a balance with solo content is necessary.
When I play, the majority of the time I would prefer to group. But my play time is not in sync with the majority of players so I look for other things to do like farming mats for crafting or some quest parts I can solo or box. When things get really slow I organize bank space.
I think solo content is important but the focus should be on group and social content so full time soloing isn't really an option.
A belief that the greatest sense of accomplishment comes when it is shared - and earned.
"Shared" and "Earned" are the keywords for me here. The content in Pantheon should be designed to challenge groups of players -- this should be the rule, not the exception. Solo viability should be limited (you can grow into it rather than having "solo content" designed for players) and the world and it's challenges should never be watered down to compensate for that reality. Whether it's overland zones or dungeons, I want to see a world full of NPC's that I have no business messing with while I'm alone. Whether it's questing, exploring, or leveling ... I will never be able to appreciate a sense of accomplishment (particularly if I'm doing anything for my level range) if these activities aren't reliant on other players.
A sincere commitment to creating a world where a focus on cooperative play will attract those seeking a challenge.
Activities that require the aid of fellow adventurers are an integral component of the socially driven and challenging experience that I am looking for. Leveling up is a big part of the journey and I don't want the accomplishment of doing it to be neutered for the sake of convenience or accessibility. Enemies should swat down solo players with ease and the idea of emergent gameplay should continue growing in significance as more players are added to the equation. Quad kiting shouldn't be a thing in Pantheon. Mass AoE carnage shouldn't be a thing in Pantheon. Multi-boxing should be rendered highly ineffective when it comes to meaningful progression. There should be plenty of gatekeepers that prevent content circumvention via sneak/invis/feign death.
Content is king.
The more solo content you offer, the less players you'll see available for grouping. Sometimes less is more and as far as I'm concerned designing content for the solo player is only going to detract from the overall experience that Pantheon is seeking to deliver. We either want an intensely social and group-centric game or we don't. I understand that some people don't like the idea of challenging content that requires strong/balanced group compositions. I understand that some people will remember the days where they could quad kite 4 challenging mobs simultaneously and soak in mounds of XP. I remember first-hand playing through games where you could create an AoE group and mass-pull entire rooms of NPC's and watch them all melt before your eyes for a nice chunk of XP. That isn't what I'm looking for with Pantheon. I want the "average" NPC to be challenging with high HP and damage. I don't want to steamroll content by playing the game the way it's meant to be played -- with a full group of adventurers that seek a challenging experience centered around their ability to work together.
I'm not trying to knock on solo play at all ... FFXI had the best solo play I have ever seen in an MMO but it's mostly because of how the "progression" was reversed compared to MMO's these days. You didn't start off soloing and mature into a person that could play in groups. Everybody started off as a group reliant player early on and it wasn't until later after you achieved higher levels, earned meaningful gear, unlocked new spells/abilities, or access to new areas that you could actually go out and do some cool things by yourself. You wouldn't be able to kill at-level content (unless you were a beastmaster) but you could navigate "some" of the stuff in the tier below your level (10 levels = tier) if you were well versed in the area and came prepared with consumables. Because of all the wonderful horizontal progression in that game ... solo play was still pretty viable. That is the recipe I would like to see in Pantheon. Vertical progression requires grouping for at-level content. Having a wide range of horizontal progression would ensure that there is always something meaningful to work on, even if it's lower level. Allowing players to tie up loose ends, even while solo, is perfectly fine.
For this game, grouping above all. I expect there will be "solo content" in the form of tradeskills, exploring (carefully), inventory management, etc. Adventuring should be almost entirely group content imo, just as it was in EQ.
Solo adventuring makes a game little more than a single-player RPG with a chat room full of other players. While that has it's charms I'm really hoping Pantheon isn't that game. We alreay have tons of others that are and, frankly, they're boring.
at the end of the day its an MMO. Back in the old days the only reason you weren't in a clan/guild/alliance was because you A.) Didn't have any friends in any clan/guild/alliance, or B.) You weren't good enough to get in on your own. The goal for just about everyone in the early days (up to like 2006 or so?) was to get in on end game raid content and the likes. Even if you were in to crafting or other things like that at end game you still needed a group of people to help you farm the best mats in the highest level zones and areas.
Soloing is just something you do to pass the time while you wait for a group or for your friends to come on so you can do the real fun stuff.
Edit: Just to clarify I was only in any clans/guilds/alliances because of people I knew IRL, I suck.
That's a no-brainer: "Social dynamics with deep grouping mechanics"
In this game I want NO solo content (ie content specifically designed to be solo'd). All content should be designed with a group in mind (that doesn't mean it will be tuned to force a balanced group), but some classes may have the ability to solo certain content over others due to types of spells and abilities (movement impairing, fear based, stun, etc... to kite, reverse kite, and so on).
The early levels due to the lower end HP spectrum of characters and NPCs naturally will provide a larger means for players to be able to solo with their class, but as they get higher level solo ability will deminish to all but classes with key ablities.
Kilsin said: If given the choice, what do you rate as being more important in an MMORPG - Social dynamics with deep grouping mechanics or Solo-ability with content to do without the help of anyone else and why?
Not sure what 'social dynamics' means in this context, so I won't comment on that. Deep grouping mechanics, though? Yes please. Bring on the synergy/co-op/group-only-combo's/group-only-status-exploitation!
Solo-ability.. sure, but make consuming that content ten times (mathematically) slower XP and 10% of the rewards, when compared to a full group. I don't care how much solo content there is, as long as the group content is 10 times more rewarding in every measurable way.
I value grouping over solo, by importance, but I would rather have incredibly unrewarding and slow solo content, versus nothing to do. Having nothing to do just makes me want to logout and/or cancel my subscription.
Grouping preferred, and soloing for testing myself to see what I can do. or seeing what is hard as a solo but would be easier with 1 or more, that way I am in a position to suggest places to go and things to do because I have tested the waters so-to-speak.
However I think the topic also touches on a key point, that is the need for others as well as accepting the limitations of your class and dealing with it. By dealing with it I mean: if you want to do stuff and can't because of the limitations of your class, they you have to wait untill those that can help are on. Sometimes the waiting is taken to the extreme and one will only go with certain classes or not move unless ceretain classes are on; this behavior is also sometimes transferred into gear requirements, instead of staying with the ideal of having fun and doing what you can with what you have. For doing what you can with what you have is an indicator of playerability that better gear or twinking is only a cover or panacea for bad playerability. You can be a bad player with good gear and because of the twinkage/gear be a ok player and never "get gud". Likewise a player with "normal" gear can excell in their class, you can see it, they make same class groups look good and often similar classes learn their tricks form them.
Therefore if no one is on, make new friends make more friends or deal with it. It is the not dealing with it that I think created the motivation to have alts for some, not all. In Most MMO's where the race to level is key and constant advancement, If I am a friend with someone and we do good things I dont want to have to deal with stopping my progression because this good player I know all of a sudden wants to level an alt. It forces me to make new friends to go on. I would prefer consistency. Often the "alt-armies" are created because the player has a goal in mind and gets frustrated because they cannot reach that goal, so they create alts or beget boxxing.
All of the above give me hopes for the not-so-greatly named "matchmaking" (panthe making?/Path making?)thing that Pantheon may/will have. I think this should be ranked up there with Perception and atmpspheres because it will be a change from the "dungeon finder" that people have learned from current MMO's. I fear people might be predjudiced to the idea of the "Panthe-making" system because of the bias towards current matchmaking-like tools out there and the level of anonymity it provides (like being alone in NYC).
This means that everyone starting the game at whatever time or years in, will have to go through the same socialization process by meeting others to play with their chosen class- and dealing with it if none of their friends are on. I have seen popular guilds with 20 people on-line or more unavailable to the one person who wants to get a group going so they look outside the guild, I mean whats the point of a guild? This sidetracks me on the habit some guilds have in inviting anyone or plying them with unearned gear. I'd rather earn the gear and fight a few times with some members to get it, in my group, before my whole group decides to join said guild, and that could take a year or so before we decide- heh if we are of the same mind or no other guild has gotten to us first and it fits with our goals/interests, times in the path-making tool.
if it is suppose to be an mmo then group content, otherwise i'd go play skyrim if i didn't want to deal with other players.
I choose - Social dynamics with deep grouping mechanics.
Why? Becuase I'd rather work as a team toward something than do it alone. Also, meeting people along the way is a great perk.
But not having to spend the time looking for a group just to complete 1 small detail would be ideal for soloing.
I thought VR's direction was always "Social dynamics with deep grouping mechanics"?
Is this changing or is this question just for fun?
To answer the question if I had to choose it would be "Social dynamics with deep grouping mechanics".
I would also like some "Solo-ability with content to do without the help of anyone else" simply because of my schedule. But for the greater good of the game please focus on grouping!
Kilsin said:If given the choice, what do you rate as being more important in an MMORPG - Social dynamics with deep grouping mechanics or Solo-ability with content to do without the help of anyone else and why? #MMORPG #communitymatters
Social dynamics with deep grouping mechanics is the answer I would hope everyone here would rate as more important. I'd say it is an 80/20 split for me, some soloing has to be there but personally I hope it's like 1/8th as effective as grouping.
((Which is more important, food or water?))
A wonderfully concise and accurate answer. As others have said we need both - and we need both desperately. Without more focus on group play than is typical in other MMOs we lose much that will make Pantheon different and better. We do *not* lose all of it. We may not even lose *most* of it. Slow leveling, challenging content, meaningful death penalty, emphasis on finding things not being led by the hand, difficult travel etc etc are all important and the focus on grouping is one of *many* important factors that will make Pantheon great. But it is an *important* factor and without it we will lose many supporters and much of what we will rely on to attract new players.
Some would say that without this focus we would just be another WoW or EQ2 or Rift so why bother? While I disagree as noted above - it is unfair to VR to treat Pantheon as a one-trick pony that has only one reason to play it - the kernel of truth in this misstatement is a very *large* kernel. I start out by emphasizing the critical importance of focusing more on group play than is normal today because I am known to emphasize the importance of also having solo content. I have emphasized it because I judge that it *needs* emphasis here since most of us and VR as well are focusing on the importance of group play. But let it not be said that I want Pantheon to be a solo game with more challenge. WoW on steroids. That is not and has never been my opinion.
But the best MMO in the world without any significant solo content will have *such* a small niche that it appeals to that it may well fail - and even the most dedicated "I group 110% of the time" groupie will get no benefit from a game that has failed. Almost all of us have significant periods when we just don't have the time to join a group, get to the group, and finish any significant chunk of group content. Almost all of us will have have times when we simply won't be in the mood. Many of us won't be all that eager to subscribe to a game when maybe 75% of the time we have less than a large chunk of uninterrupted time there is nothing for us to do other than crafting.
((Whether it's questing, exploring, or leveling ... I will never be able to appreciate a sense of accomplishment (particularly if I'm doing anything for my level range) if these activities aren't reliant on other players.))
Sorry, you wrote a long and well written post, as usual, but this is *not* the way Pantheon needs to go. Pantheon needs to have this available. Pantheon needs to have this important - *more* important than solo play. But Pantheon will not survive with just this. Pantheon will not attract and keep players used to modern games with just this. Pantheon needs a *significant* chunk of solo content to keep any of us busy when we cannot or will not group, and to attract and keep solo-oriented players while they check out how good our grouping systems also are. Solo content that lets us get to maximum level eventually - although more slowly than by doing group content. Solo content that is *real* not just a sop for levels 1-5 and after that it is group or craft.
Kilsin said:If given the choice, what do you rate as being more important in an MMORPG - Social dynamics with deep grouping mechanics or Solo-ability with content to do without the help of anyone else and why? #MMORPG #communitymatters
To answer your question Kilson, I would lean toward group dynamics if you strickly want a one or the other choice but I really feel that the question leaves too many variables out.
The problem with so many folks is the either/or, the black/white, the left/right argument. No subject should be limited to just one or the other. Its the various shades of gray (fancier word is Continuum). 75% Group, 20% Solo, and 5% multi-group.
The focus of the game seems to be on grouping and inter-dependancy to a degree (but not to an absolute). The continuum that really should be talked about is the mobs for a full group vs the mobs for a partial group to include all the way down to duoing. There are a few streams that demonstrate that a less than a full group is functional at this point in time. For other major aspects of the game such as crafting, gathering, and salvaging - just the opposite, 80% solo - 20% dependance on others. I don't really need an armorsmith to crack my beer to fish or pick a flower.
everyone knows solo content involves a tradeskill of some sort to prep for group content. oh wait they did state some of the rare stuff would require a group to get. how exciting is that? i'm going to be a alchemist and i need a flower from the frozen lands. i should look for a dwarf guide and equip for the cold. you there stalward ale drinker! (leaves to harass the longbeard)
fazool said:Which is more important, food or water?
You can't live without either.
Grouping is more important, but you have to have solo content for non-group times or everyone will drift away every time they cant find a group
I would have to agree more along the lines of this person.
Also depends on number of people on the server, are they doing something related to what I'm working on. Is there someone whose willing to help me with what I'm working on? How long does it take to find these individulas?