>Would you consider professional athletes to be blocking content for the rest of us? There are many high school athletes. Only the best will be chosen to play in college. Only the best of those get chosen to play professionally. We aren't all equal. The few spend much more time and effort to become better. They earned the top professional spots. They get to do all the best content before the rest of us, if the rest of us will ever.<
I agree with everything you say, I just don't think it is relevant to the topic. Maybe I am having a bad day. Let me try again.
The point some people are trying to make - and it isn't a topic I care about as much as most - is NOT denial of content because some characters are better, get to it first and do it first. Your professional athlete analogy.
The point is that some characters after reaching that point go back and and try and block *earlier* content to keep anyone else from ever getting to be as good as they are.
To use your analogy - would you consider it appropriate if professional athletes could go back and take the spots of college and high school players? Not even for fun or nostalgia but with the express goal of keeping college and high schoo; players from getting experience. In an attempt to keep salaries higher by having almost no one go through college sports and get recruited into the major leagues.
That is the more appropriate analogy to a guild that sends teams to monopolize old content that the guild has no use for with the express goal of preventing competition for the top tier bosses from ever developing.
dorotea said:The point is that some characters after reaching that point go back and and try and block *earlier* content to keep anyone else from ever getting to be as good as they are.
This is a valid objection and something that can be remedied by content design. The fact is, many well known top EQ guilds were not skilled players, Fires of Heaven for instance was a top guild well known for zerging content and content blocking to keep other more skilled guilds from progressing with lesser numbers (which by the way their guild leader eventually became a content developer and instigator for 40 man dungeons in WoW, that is, 25 man dungeons were the initial design direction of WoW from release). Not to mention Furor (Leader of FOH) was a pompus little brat even back during EQ who threw enormous tantrums over the develpment and content of EQ.
While I think you can never eliminate this behavior, you can howerver design content in a manner that makes such behavior counter intuitive and does not reward such focus. This I think is done by avoiding the design of choke points in progression. Eliminate that and those tpes of guilds become powerless.
Tanix said:dorotea said:The point is that some characters after reaching that point go back and and try and block *earlier* content to keep anyone else from ever getting to be as good as they are.This is a valid objection and something that can be remedied by content design. The fact is, many well known top EQ guilds were not skilled players, Fires of Heaven for instance was a top guild well known for zerging content and content blocking to keep other more skilled guilds from progressing with lesser numbers (which by the way their guild leader eventually became a content developer and instigator for 40 man dungeons in WoW, that is, 25 man dungeons were the initial design direction of WoW from release). Not to mention Furor (Leader of FOH) was a pompus little brat even back during EQ who threw enormous tantrums over the develpment and content of EQ.
While I think you can never eliminate this behavior, you can howerver design content in a manner that makes such behavior counter intuitive and does not reward such focus. This I think is done by avoiding the design of choke points in progression. Eliminate that and those tpes of guilds become powerless.
INTENTIONALLY blocking content is an as*hat move and should be punished by the COMMUNITY, as much as possible.
However, if they are blocking content BY DOING THE CONTENT APPROPRIATELY, VR should not punish this behavior.
Keep in mind that most content is INTENDED to be done repeatedly. For example:
VP in EQ2 dropped an entire set of armor for each class, not too mention jewelry and other items. Since each raid mob only dropped a few pieces at a time, the whole raid had to be completed SEVERAL times in order to get the entire raid/guild their appropriate gear. A raid force/guild doing this specific raid for months to get their gear would be an APPROPRIATE and INTENDED use.
Now, EQ2 used instancing, so others could access VP simultaneously. But, there were also several open world mobs that dropped great pieces that everyone wanted also.
It would be APPROPRIATE for a raid/guild to hit the open world mob every time they could to ensure their guild got what they needed For each member. Although this may deny others the use of the mob, it’s still appropriate.
Now, if the guild got all they wanted, and continued to occupy the mob with the INTENTION of blocking others, that would be abuse and the community, not VR should do something about it.
However, since VR intends to allow most gear, including most raid gear, to be tradable, it would also be appropriate to continue to farm the mob to earn plat.
Good - we all seem to agree the conduct is inappropriate now that precisely what the conduct *is* has been clarified.
We may or may not agree on whether the conduct should be left in the hands of the community, the GMs, or should be obviated by careful content design as Tanix postulated but I choose not to comment on *that* point here.
Beefcake said:Now, if the guild got all they wanted, and continued to occupy the mob with the INTENTION of blocking others, that would be abuse and the community, not VR should do something about it.
However, since VR intends to allow most gear, including most raid gear, to be tradable, it would also be appropriate to continue to farm the mob to earn plat.
I think we are opening a can of worms here with regards to farming low level raid content for the sake of plat farming, but I also think its justifiable. I'm going to use Sleepers Tomb as an example. On my server I was in the 3rd ranked guild on our server. We were close to 2 but time zone sort of prevented us from getting some mobs to truly claim rank 2. Once our guild, and the guild ranked 2, were able to access Sleepers Tomb the number 1 ranked guild woke the sleeper elimanting many of the items that dropped in the game. High ranking guilds do... and will... attempt to content block other guilds that are climbing if top end raid content is finite. Two guilds farming AoW essentially meant you got half the amount of loot since there was only one AoW on a server and it had a long respawn timer.
Nagy and Vox were good ways of preventing high level guilds from taking easily beatable content in order to sell items for gold. They had level lock outs so anyone over level 52 couldn't kill them or participate in the fight. I would be for some form of this on "contested" raid content that is currently outpaced by the top guilds. This doesn't stop a guild from farming top tier content they don't need, but its a step.
Beefcake said:Tanix said:dorotea said:The point is that some characters after reaching that point go back and and try and block *earlier* content to keep anyone else from ever getting to be as good as they are.This is a valid objection and something that can be remedied by content design. The fact is, many well known top EQ guilds were not skilled players, Fires of Heaven for instance was a top guild well known for zerging content and content blocking to keep other more skilled guilds from progressing with lesser numbers (which by the way their guild leader eventually became a content developer and instigator for 40 man dungeons in WoW, that is, 25 man dungeons were the initial design direction of WoW from release). Not to mention Furor (Leader of FOH) was a pompus little brat even back during EQ who threw enormous tantrums over the develpment and content of EQ.
While I think you can never eliminate this behavior, you can howerver design content in a manner that makes such behavior counter intuitive and does not reward such focus. This I think is done by avoiding the design of choke points in progression. Eliminate that and those tpes of guilds become powerless.
INTENTIONALLY blocking content is an as*hat move and should be punished by the COMMUNITY, as much as possible.
However, if they are blocking content BY DOING THE CONTENT APPROPRIATELY, VR should not punish this behavior.
Keep in mind that most content is INTENDED to be done repeatedly. For example:
VP in EQ2 dropped an entire set of armor for each class, not too mention jewelry and other items. Since each raid mob only dropped a few pieces at a time, the whole raid had to be completed SEVERAL times in order to get the entire raid/guild their appropriate gear. A raid force/guild doing this specific raid for months to get their gear would be an APPROPRIATE and INTENDED use.
Now, EQ2 used instancing, so others could access VP simultaneously. But, there were also several open world mobs that dropped great pieces that everyone wanted also.
It would be APPROPRIATE for a raid/guild to hit the open world mob every time they could to ensure their guild got what they needed For each member. Although this may deny others the use of the mob, it’s still appropriate.
Now, if the guild got all they wanted, and continued to occupy the mob with the INTENTION of blocking others, that would be abuse and the community, not VR should do something about it.
However, since VR intends to allow most gear, including most raid gear, to be tradable, it would also be appropriate to continue to farm the mob to earn plat.
I would prefer VR not design a raid game, and focus on group based content design.
I can only speak for myself, but if VR goes the way of EQ in focusing on raid content as theri main design focus, I won't be playing.
/shrug
It's interesting. When I first saw this thread a few days ago, I didn't take the OP's concerns with a "top-heavy" game to be specifically about content denial or raiding. Rather, I took them to be about the consequences of having a majority of the playerbase all crammed into the same smaller portion of content, and both the conflict that comes from that, as well as the feeling of emptiness that anyone not in that situation has in the game world.
We can certainly have the whole raid-focus/content-denial discussion again for what will likely be the 237th time. It's a valid concern and important to many people. However, I feel that the "top-heavy" problem involves a lot more than just what guilds do with raid content.
Maybe that's just me though.
Tanix said:I would prefer VR not design a raid game, and focus on group based content design.
I can only speak for myself, but if VR goes the way of EQ in focusing on raid content as theri main design focus, I won't be playing.
/shrug
I highly suspect the number of people who will not play Pantheon, at least not for long, if multi-group content is not a significant component of the content is far higher than the number of people who will choose not to play if it is. Far, far, far higher.
That being said multi-group content and Max Level Raiding do not need to be forever tied together. Raids with max level requirements might just be one of the tools that they use to encourage horizontal progression rather than racing to max level and locking you out.
Nephele said:It's interesting. When I first saw this thread a few days ago, I didn't take the OP's concerns with a "top-heavy" game to be specifically about content denial or raiding. Rather, I took them to be about the consequences of having a majority of the playerbase all crammed into the same smaller portion of content, and both the conflict that comes from that, as well as the feeling of emptiness that anyone not in that situation has in the game world.
We can certainly have the whole raid-focus/content-denial discussion again for what will likely be the 237th time. It's a valid concern and important to many people. However, I feel that the "top-heavy" problem involves a lot more than just what guilds do with raid content.
Maybe that's just me though.
Level sync would be a good aid in preventing mid to low level content being ignored. I think it would also help with over crowding at the top end dungeons. If I could sync my level down and still get EXP at lower level camps it would allow me to group with people still leveling and also ensure more places for me to find a group if there is a 2 hour wait list at the content I'm currently of appropriate level for.
You would need to come up with a system to pick what level/power level you sync to but I think it's a really good option for solving two issues with one solution.
Tanix said:I would prefer VR not design a raid game, and focus on group based content design.
I can only speak for myself, but if VR goes the way of EQ in focusing on raid content as theri main design focus, I won't be playing.
Dont get me wrong, I just used a raid as an example. I still believe VR is building more of a group game than a raid game. The same analogy can be said for group content.
Nephele said:It's interesting. When I first saw this thread a few days ago, I didn't take the OP's concerns with a "top-heavy" game to be specifically about content denial or raiding. Rather, I took them to be about the consequences of having a majority of the playerbase all crammed into the same smaller portion of content, and both the conflict that comes from that, as well as the feeling of emptiness that anyone not in that situation has in the game world.
And this brings up a good point. World design has an impact on a player's feeling that they have enough (or not enough) 'out there' to keep them entertained. Pantheon will have 12 races and what, 9 starting cities. From that point, I'd hazard to guess that each racial city will have zones nearby up to about level 15. So for the first 15 level or so the population is dispersed across 9 different racial areas. I suspect that after that point the number of zones for a given tier of content will rapidly dwindle until, at level 50, the number of zones for that content will be only a couple.
Look at EQ1 at release. At level 50 what options did the players have for content? Only parts of Lower Guk and SolB really (maybe some parts of the original Cazic Thule zone?). The world design was a pyramid, wide at the bottom levels and growing ever smaller as you level up.
If you design a world where you keep or increase the number of zones appropriate to a given tier, it then does not matter so much if you have a significant portion of the population near/at the level cap as they still have many choices of places to go and things to do. Add in the atmospheres and environments that require you to have multiple sets of gear while also being very conservative with the 'Best in Slot' design of items and you can keep players entertained for a longer time even at the level cap.
EppE said:Nephele said:It's interesting. When I first saw this thread a few days ago, I didn't take the OP's concerns with a "top-heavy" game to be specifically about content denial or raiding. Rather, I took them to be about the consequences of having a majority of the playerbase all crammed into the same smaller portion of content, and both the conflict that comes from that, as well as the feeling of emptiness that anyone not in that situation has in the game world.
We can certainly have the whole raid-focus/content-denial discussion again for what will likely be the 237th time. It's a valid concern and important to many people. However, I feel that the "top-heavy" problem involves a lot more than just what guilds do with raid content.
Maybe that's just me though.
Level sync would be a good aid in preventing mid to low level content being ignored. I think it would also help with over crowding at the top end dungeons. If I could sync my level down and still get EXP at lower level camps it would allow me to group with people still leveling and also ensure more places for me to find a group if there is a 2 hour wait list at the content I'm currently of appropriate level for.
You would need to come up with a system to pick what level/power level you sync to but I think it's a really good option for solving two issues with one solution.
What you refer to as level sync, others refer to as Mentoring, which is definitely being considered by VR.
This, and potentially Progeny are my favorite content replay options.
Beefcake said:EppE said:Nephele said:It's interesting. When I first saw this thread a few days ago, I didn't take the OP's concerns with a "top-heavy" game to be specifically about content denial or raiding. Rather, I took them to be about the consequences of having a majority of the playerbase all crammed into the same smaller portion of content, and both the conflict that comes from that, as well as the feeling of emptiness that anyone not in that situation has in the game world.
We can certainly have the whole raid-focus/content-denial discussion again for what will likely be the 237th time. It's a valid concern and important to many people. However, I feel that the "top-heavy" problem involves a lot more than just what guilds do with raid content.
Maybe that's just me though.
Level sync would be a good aid in preventing mid to low level content being ignored. I think it would also help with over crowding at the top end dungeons. If I could sync my level down and still get EXP at lower level camps it would allow me to group with people still leveling and also ensure more places for me to find a group if there is a 2 hour wait list at the content I'm currently of appropriate level for.
You would need to come up with a system to pick what level/power level you sync to but I think it's a really good option for solving two issues with one solution.What you refer to as level sync, others refer to as Mentoring, which is definitely being considered by VR.
This, and potentially Progeny are my favorite content replay options.
Yes but that system hasn't been talked about in awhile so we don't know where it stands.
Vandraad said:
And this brings up a good point. World design has an impact on a player's feeling that they have enough (or not enough) 'out there' to keep them entertained. Pantheon will have 12 races and what, 9 starting cities. From that point, I'd hazard to guess that each racial city will have zones nearby up to about level 15. So for the first 15 level or so the population is dispersed across 9 different racial areas. I suspect that after that point the number of zones for a given tier of content will rapidly dwindle until, at level 50, the number of zones for that content will be only a couple.
Look at EQ1 at release. At level 50 what options did the players have for content? Only parts of Lower Guk and SolB really (maybe some parts of the original Cazic Thule zone?). The world design was a pyramid, wide at the bottom levels and growing ever smaller as you level up.
If you design a world where you keep or increase the number of zones appropriate to a given tier, it then does not matter so much if you have a significant portion of the population near/at the level cap as they still have many choices of places to go and things to do. Add in the atmospheres and environments that require you to have multiple sets of gear while also being very conservative with the 'Best in Slot' design of items and you can keep players entertained for a longer time even at the level cap.
I agree. I think inverting the pyramid (or at least making it more of a column or an hourglass shape) is something that Pantheon needs to do. In this, if they can do the same sort of thing that Vanguard was going for in terms of having multiple sets of content available at all level ranges, I think it's a good start.
Beefcake said:INTENTIONALLY blocking content is an as*hat move and should be punished by the COMMUNITY, as much as possible.
...
Now, if the guild got all they wanted, and continued to occupy the mob with the INTENTION of blocking others, that would be abuse and the community, not VR should do something about it.
How would you recommend the community respond to this kind of behavior? Bear in mind this is a big, powerful guild with the numbers and wherewithal to spend their time blocking others from that content.
Beefcake said:Tanix said:I would prefer VR not design a raid game, and focus on group based content design.
I can only speak for myself, but if VR goes the way of EQ in focusing on raid content as theri main design focus, I won't be playing.
Dont get me wrong, I just used a raid as an example. I still believe VR is building more of a group game than a raid game. The same analogy can be said for group content.
Where do you remember EQ group content being blocked or able to block player progression?
Tanix said:Beefcake said:Tanix said:I would prefer VR not design a raid game, and focus on group based content design.
I can only speak for myself, but if VR goes the way of EQ in focusing on raid content as theri main design focus, I won't be playing.
Dont get me wrong, I just used a raid as an example. I still believe VR is building more of a group game than a raid game. The same analogy can be said for group content.
Where do you remember EQ group content being blocked or able to block player progression?
Not every reference has to be EQ.
Beefcake said:
Would you consider professional athletes to be blocking content for the rest of us? There are many high school athletes. Only the best will be chosen to play in college. Only the best of those get chosen to play professionally. We aren't all equal. The few spend much more time and effort to become better. They earned the top professional spots. They get to do all the best content before the rest of us, if the rest of us will ever... There are only so many spots at the top. Not everyone gets to complete all content immediately. Some people will always be better and will get what we want first.
Wow... really? Blocking content has nothing to do with being the best. It's an anti-competitive strategy completely at odds with the idea of wanting the best to rise to the top. Using your sports analogy, content blocking would be akin to some wealthy families buying up a bunch of fields/courts in poorer areas across the country and shutting them down so that kids growing up in there wouldn't have an opportunity to play and develop their skills to compete.
Something that slows going top heavy along with horizontal progression is high promotion of replayability:
-Progeny system (combined with the ability to hand down high level gear to your alts)
-Including a new race and/or class with an expansion
-Mentoring system unlock after reaching max level (reduce effective level to group with and/or explore lower level areas that you may have missed when you were of the appropriate level).
-In addition to this, perhaps have something similar to Alternate Advancement that can only be increased while "mentoring".
-Have any new content be designed for ALL level ranges to allow players to obtain potential level cap raises in order to return to "mentoring" to experience the lower level areas of the new content.
-Ensure new content doesn't alienate original content by requiring passage through low to mid level areas.
Just a few things that could help.
Beefcake said:Tanix said:Beefcake said:Tanix said:I would prefer VR not design a raid game, and focus on group based content design.
I can only speak for myself, but if VR goes the way of EQ in focusing on raid content as theri main design focus, I won't be playing.
Dont get me wrong, I just used a raid as an example. I still believe VR is building more of a group game than a raid game. The same analogy can be said for group content.
Where do you remember EQ group content being blocked or able to block player progression?
Not every reference has to be EQ.
Well, I guess if they use EQ as an example in this design, it isn't a problem then. /shrug
It's interesting. When I first saw this thread a few days ago, I didn't take the OP's concerns with a "top-heavy" game to be specifically about content denial or raiding. Rather, I took them to be about the consequences of having a majority of the playerbase all crammed into the same smaller portion of content, and both the conflict that comes from that, as well as the feeling of emptiness that anyone not in that situation has in the game world.))
I think you are exactly right. If not, I am wrong too for that is what I thought the thread was about.
Somewhere in the middle of page 2 it started to shift focus.
dorotea said:It's interesting. When I first saw this thread a few days ago, I didn't take the OP's concerns with a "top-heavy" game to be specifically about content denial or raiding. Rather, I took them to be about the consequences of having a majority of the playerbase all crammed into the same smaller portion of content, and both the conflict that comes from that, as well as the feeling of emptiness that anyone not in that situation has in the game world.))
I think you are exactly right. If not, I am wrong too for that is what I thought the thread was about.
Somewhere in the middle of page 2 it started to shift focus.
Your instinct is correct! It was an obsvervation of what's happened to games in the past and quite literally what current MMO's do on purpose. We want to see a steady stream of new players entering the world month after month I was just curious what was being addressed to ensure a thriving, at least somewhat balanced playerbase with regard to content and interactivity, would be there to greet them! This thread blew up way more than I expected. Interesting perspectives and new concerns and alleviations. This community rocks, seriously.
The fact that people think the game wont be endgame focused is silly.
Yea. Maybe the focus will not be on endgame content initially. But they have already stated they want to release with x amount of raid encounters and various tiers. That thought process already indicates they are looking to establish a healthy endgame. And this is at launch.
The content that comes out after release will almost certainly begin to switch the focus to max level and end game play. It's natural progression. It will happen.
Also, you can have a meaningful leveling experience but also focus on endgame play. That's not impossible.
Porygon said:The fact that people think the game wont be endgame focused is silly.
Yea. Maybe the focus will not be on endgame content initially. But they have already stated they want to release with x amount of raid encounters and various tiers. That thought process already indicates they are looking to establish a healthy endgame. And this is at launch.
The content that comes out after release will almost certainly begin to switch the focus to max level and end game play. It's natural progression. It will happen.
Also, you can have a meaningful leveling experience but also focus on endgame play. That's not impossible.
A game needs a healthy endgame as much as it needs a healthy all teir game. FFXI is my largest reference, and their first 3 expansions were great about containing meaningful content for various level teirs. They did have a unique system where you could change classes and start over at level 1 for like 27 different jobs so it was more necessary, but certainly achievable. The debate of whether endgame is natural or not isn't really the issue.. it's about maintaining community and keeping new players engaged with everyone else more readily the longer the game exists without having to sacrifice design choice.
If Pantheon is top heavy due to fast/easy leveling with an endgame raid focus it will be a very small audience that plays it. The raiding community in MMORPGs is actually quite small. A big part of why the MMORPG genre is dying is the "endgame" focus. I get the feeling Porygon is correct because I read that post as well about having several raid tiers ready at launch...and that sounds like a raid focused game to me not a group focused one. Earlier discussions they stated a 20/60/20 design, solo/group/raid. But having multiple raids ready to go at launch with a small dev team worries me, that means they are putting a much larger emphasis on raiding than 20%. The only MMORPG population smaller than the hardcore raid community is the hardcore PvP community. And heres the thing: FF14 and WoW have the hardcore raiding covered. It's not as though the MMO market is wide open for that demographic. I've noticed most of us on these forums are in fact raiders, or have at least done some raiding in MMOs. But are most of the Pantheon fans here really looking for a raid focused MMORPG? I mean we already have options for that.
On content blocking that is something that happens in non instanced open world MMOs, especially where there are bottlenecks as others have stated. It happens in dungeons with various named mobs being permacamped if their drops are good enough. Gotta take the good with the bad when it comes to no instancing open world. Either players can affect you while engaged with a mob or they can't. If they can't, then a large part of the rationale of having no instancing is gone. I mean what's the point? People can watch you kill the dragon but cannot assist/hinder in any way? The last thing I want is another instanced raid heavy MMORPG.