Kalgore said:Raidan said:@Sevens
You do raise a good point with guilds, but, regardless if guilds existed or not, players would form clicks based off skill level, familiarity, friends lists, etc. and would form the same subcultures where people would intermingle exclusively even with the lack of a formal system. The only thing missing would be the convenience of the UI elements, chat, etc. I also think it depends on the player as well. Even while I was guilded I joined many pick-up groups; whereas, I knew others who viewed the guild as an exclusive tag and only wanted to group with other guildies that they viewed were up to par - similar to Liav's stance.
But, I do think there are areas where Pantheon could be innovative and/or more social with guilds. I hope Pantheon has guild halls within the world versus instanced zones like EQ where players could visit. And, like most fast travel things, not include items like ports through a guild hall like EQ ultimately did. And, any items, vendors etc. that were in the guild hall I would want to be crafted, obtained, etc. and not just magically appear. It could also be a place where players traveled to buy items from that specific guild, etc. with shops and vendors set up.
Further, to Akailo's point, it would be interesting to test how sub-guilds could work. I always liked the idea of having a Thieves Guild, Warrior's Guild, etc. and not just training at the guildmaster. It could be a guild exclusive to class/races, but, still more opportunity to meet others. And, I could see many epic sprawling quests spanning out of the guilds.
And, back on topic, /agreed with Xtnpd & Krixus
I loved the guild halls in EQ2 we spent thousands upon thousands of plat decorating it so when peple came to visit they were awestruck with the grandness of it. So many members became woodworkers to help make it a grand palace of badassness.
My biggest problem with the Guild halls in EQ2 was they destroyed the cities. Before hand the cities were hubs of activity, afterwards dead ghost towns
Sevens said:Kalgore said:Raidan said:@Sevens
You do raise a good point with guilds, but, regardless if guilds existed or not, players would form clicks based off skill level, familiarity, friends lists, etc. and would form the same subcultures where people would intermingle exclusively even with the lack of a formal system. The only thing missing would be the convenience of the UI elements, chat, etc. I also think it depends on the player as well. Even while I was guilded I joined many pick-up groups; whereas, I knew others who viewed the guild as an exclusive tag and only wanted to group with other guildies that they viewed were up to par - similar to Liav's stance.
But, I do think there are areas where Pantheon could be innovative and/or more social with guilds. I hope Pantheon has guild halls within the world versus instanced zones like EQ where players could visit. And, like most fast travel things, not include items like ports through a guild hall like EQ ultimately did. And, any items, vendors etc. that were in the guild hall I would want to be crafted, obtained, etc. and not just magically appear. It could also be a place where players traveled to buy items from that specific guild, etc. with shops and vendors set up.
Further, to Akailo's point, it would be interesting to test how sub-guilds could work. I always liked the idea of having a Thieves Guild, Warrior's Guild, etc. and not just training at the guildmaster. It could be a guild exclusive to class/races, but, still more opportunity to meet others. And, I could see many epic sprawling quests spanning out of the guilds.
And, back on topic, /agreed with Xtnpd & Krixus
I loved the guild halls in EQ2 we spent thousands upon thousands of plat decorating it so when peple came to visit they were awestruck with the grandness of it. So many members became woodworkers to help make it a grand palace of badassness.
My biggest problem with the Guild halls in EQ2 was they destroyed the cities. Before hand the cities were hubs of activity, afterwards dead ghost towns
The Cities were dead long before the guild halls came to light. By the time Guildhalls made it to the game Population was spread across to many servers. There was never anything to DO int he cities before that either so very few people had a reason to hang out in the city
Kalgore said:The Cities were dead long before the guild halls came to light. By the time Guildhalls made it to the game Population was spread across to many servers. There was never anything to DO int he cities before that either so very few people had a reason to hang out in the city
Debateable. On the time-locked progression servers for EQ2, the cities (Qeynos, Freeport, Neriak, etc.) were absolutely packed with people. They disabled guild halls on these servers and I would notice huge gatherings of people with the same guild tags inside the cities.
Back to the topics though I feel anyway to force more guilds to be opened in the sake of "Socialness" is doomed to fail If you suck Im not going to group with you regardless of if im in a guild or not in a guild. Like someone pointed out if the mechnics dont exist they will find a way to make it themselves and still form those clicks. I believe the best way to tackle the downfall of the social aspect is to bring back meaningful and long leveling that slows down the game giving the groups chances to talk and bond is much more efficient then trying to rework guild mechanics that have proven to be successful for the rest of the games aspect.
I honestly thought this post was going downhill fast, and then it righted itself. Great job keeping things on-track and friendly, folks!
Reading all the comments on the guild subject was extremely interesting. I never really thought much about the impact that guilds have on the "socialization" aspect of the game. I'm on the fence with this one.
One the one hand, guilds provide a fairly stable, predictable gaming environment for a player-base. Players will find other players with similar gaming styles / social habits, and they will appreciate each other's company. On the other hand, as we associate with other players in our guild, it only follows that we spend less time with others outside the guild. The question isn't if guilds are good or bad, but what effect guilds have on the game dynamic for players, both inside and outside the guild environment, and whether this effect is a positive one.
My guess is, that as game populations have grown far beyond the original estimated player base, guilds arose out of a player need to avoid anonymity. Friends banded together, invited more friends, and wha-la! guilds were born. As the goals of the original MMORPGs were primarily group-based, guild content was added to appease the masses, and guild content has become the "norm" in most games for end-game content. If the goals of the game remain group-to-guild based in scope, guilds will surely run the show (like multi-national corporations in today's socio-economic climate).
My hunch is that something must now go beyond guild-level content to bring everyone together again. I'll take a stab at this one, and guess that server-level / faction-level "super quests" are the next evolution. Something along the line of the war effort in WOW culminating in the opening of the AQ gates. Although that was a rudimentary and early example of a faction-based event, it had everyone on the server working toward a common goal. It truly transcended guild-level activity, and had entire servers working together.
When such large goals are attainable, populations pull together, and the result is a more "social" gaming environment that bypasses guild-level goal fixations.
The lack of required interdependence as well as the absense of meaninful reputation has all but killed most social aspects of MMO's.
Lets also not overlook that back in the day most MMO'ers were all pretty much like minded. Now that spectrum is all over the place and people all too often clash more than they get along. This also leads to players not wanting to be social for fear of verbal/text altercations.
xtnpd said:I honestly thought this post was going downhill fast, and then it righted itself. Great job keeping things on-track and friendly, folks!
Reading all the comments on the guild subject was extremely interesting. I never really thought much about the impact that guilds have on the "socialization" aspect of the game. I'm on the fence with this one.
One the one hand, guilds provide a fairly stable, predictable gaming environment for a player-base. Players will find other players with similar gaming styles / social habits, and they will appreciate each other's company. On the other hand, as we associate with other players in our guild, it only follows that we spend less time with others outside the guild. The question isn't if guilds are good or bad, but what effect guilds have on the game dynamic for players, both inside and outside the guild environment, and whether this effect is a positive one.
My guess is, that as game populations have grown far beyond the original estimated player base, guilds arose out of a player need to avoid anonymity. Friends banded together, invited more friends, and wha-la! guilds were born. As the goals of the original MMORPGs were primarily group-based, guild content was added to appease the masses, and guild content has become the "norm" in most games for end-game content. If the goals of the game remain group-to-guild based in scope, guilds will surely run the show (like multi-national corporations in today's socio-economic climate).
My hunch is that something must now go beyond guild-level content to bring everyone together again. I'll take a stab at this one, and guess that server-level / faction-level "super quests" are the next evolution. Something along the line of the war effort in WOW culminating in the opening of the AQ gates. Although that was a rudimentary and early example of a faction-based event, it had everyone on the server working toward a common goal. It truly transcended guild-level activity, and had entire servers working together.
When such large goals are attainable, populations pull together, and the result is a more "social" gaming environment that bypasses guild-level goal fixations.
I can see where you are going with this and i do agree with you on many of the points, i would love to see the evolution of social aspects in mmos to grow but you must be careful that what you thought would bring people together wont instead rip them apart.
rivalry is just as needed in the long run as basic friendships as it pushes people forward to strive to be better (although as anyone who has been in or fought for mobs in high end elite guilds will know how easy it is to backfire).
Server based mega quests are a great idea and as some one who played the AQ event i know why that feeling of completion when you finally get the last few things and the bell is rung so to speak, but there was a massive dark side to it as well as certain guildes tried to keep the whole event for them selves and their close friends so they could farm rep.
this is all casued by the atitude of "i'm better then you" (even if it might be true) which at it's core is one of the biggest anti social problems mmos have and that isnt easily fixed by anything but the players them selves.
I do however believe that bringing back the social aspects of games is the first major step to fixing these problems. allowing people to group as they level and create an understanding of who is around and who wants to do what on the server, to establish the big names on the servers (this is why guilds are still needed 100% and why they always formed, people wanted to know who did what leveling raiding pvp etc) and to be able to punish people on the server for bad behavor when it crops up.
i may have gone off topic here a little bit but there is more to think about on this then just "i dont want to have instant groups or instant dungeon warp ins" as the old social aspects of games like eq DaoC even very early wow were more then just these things.
Edit: sorry i missed the final point i wanted to make with all of this, the idea of anonimity needs to go to stop the problems that wow and eso have with their instant group dungeons. By this i don't mean that people need to know who you are in real life but that you charicter is you and needs to be held acountable for your actions in game. back in early wow ninjaing was a big thing but if you did it you were majorly blacklisted and thus no one would group with you but if you were known as a good tank durring your leveling time people would want you and want to be firends with you. heck it isnt even mmos any one who has played a moba like LoL Dota or smite knows what i mean here.
by allowing people to never see each other again people dont feel the need to be nice and end up venting and becoming toxic and really that is the major problem with the anti social nature of mmos these days before anything else even the lack of talking in dungeons.
Great points throughout this thread, many great examples of where MMOs have gone wrong.
To me...
Pace- To me this is the culprit. Games have become so fast paced that players never have to say much or act responsible because it does not matter. They move on and on and on, questing, questing, questing... Modern game conveniences feed this like fire.
Trick is, how do you slow a game down where it is not all about pace to get to max level, yet keep everyone fully entertained and committed to the game?
What if levels did not matter or were no levels per say? What if it came down to a completely different "leveling" system that changed the way MMOs are commonly structured? Food for thought...
Pyye said:What if levels did not matter or were no levels per say? What if it came down to a completely different "leveling" system that changed the way MMOs are commonly structured? Food for thought...
EQNext is trying to do this, although the game will never get made.
Pyye said:What if levels did not matter or were no levels per say? What if it came down to a completely different "leveling" system that changed the way MMOs are commonly structured? Food for thought...
EVE Online is all skill based. Though if you don't have a lot of skills like EVE does, you'll run out of things to train faster than you will run out of levels + skills.
If guilds did have a negative impact or were formed just so people could down "raid" content. Maybe the game that is being made here shouldn't focus a lot of man hours to the small percent of raiders that rush to end content.
Most of the articles I have read for seveal big MMOs state anywhere from 2% to 35% of people that play the game raid. That could be a pretty small percentage. I know I didn't play EQ for end game content. I played for the social aspect as did a lot of other people. The raiding did come a little later down the road, though the exploring and meeting new friends was the big deal for me personally. However everyone is different and plays for different reasons.
People rushing to the end in days or a few weeks(because it was allowed and doable) and wanting instant everything is what I believe ruined the social aspect of MMOs.
I'd also go out on a limb and state that two monitors being affordable has caused some of that as it's easy to get distracted by alt tabbing or playing in window mode while you're chatting with people via social media, or watching a movie, or surfing the net during your downtime. Just a thought though... No real proof except my own personal experience.
Niien said:If guilds did have a negative impact or were formed just so people could down "raid" content. Maybe the game that is being made here shouldn't focus a lot of man hours to the small percent of raiders that rush to end content.
Most of the articles I have read for seveal big MMOs state anywhere from 2% to 35% of people that play the game raid. That could be a pretty small percentage. I know I didn't play EQ for end game content. I played for the social aspect as did a lot of other people. The raiding did come a little later down the road, though the exploring and meeting new friends was the big deal for me personally. However everyone is different and plays for different reasons.
People rushing to the end in days or a few weeks(because it was allowed and doable) and wanting instant everything is what I believe ruined the social aspect of MMOs.
I'd also go out on a limb and state that two monitors being affordable has caused some of that as it's easy to get distracted by alt tabbing or playing in window mode while you're chatting with people via social media, or watching a movie, or surfing the net during your downtime. Just a thought though... No real proof except my own personal experience.
I honestly think you have hit on something major here, even if the game is slowed down will that improve socialization? Or will people just continue to ignore the group as they chat on VOIP with other friends or watch movies etc etc etc...it use to be a bannable offence for people to run EQ in windows mode, could something like that be an option or would it cause more harm than good? Is it even possible? and just so we are clear...I am not calling for any of this, Just conversing with others about it. Seems every time I ask a question certain people think Im advocating extreme anti social positions.
I think some of the negative effects of guilds comes down to a lack of things to do in the game. Think about it, in most MMOs today, you have a very limited amount of content to grind each day. You might grab guildies for dailys, for 1 of a few dungeon runs, or for a raid. In EQ, you had dozens of items and major quests to work on, and so often you couldn't find a full group of guildmates to assist you with every random thing. You also had a longer leveling process, so getting a full group of guild mates in your level range and on at the same time was problematic. I remember, despite being a part of major guilds for my entire duration of EQ (on 2 different servers), playing with non-guilded /friends and randoms on a regular basis was the norm.
Regarding guild halls, I think they could be a great thing as long as, like everything else, they exist in the open world. There is no doubt that splintering the population by allowing every player in a guild to hang out in another dimension will have a negative effect on the server.
My hope for guild halls would be that both cities and the zones around them would have a few plots that could be claimed by guilds and which they could build a hall of the size and style of their choosing. That way people are always coming and going from those guild halls into the city itself.
Dullahan said:I think some of the negative effects of guilds comes down to a lack of things to do in the game. Think about it, in most MMOs today, you have a very limited amount of content to grind each day. You might grab guildies for dailys, for 1 of a few dungeon runs, or for a raid. In EQ, you had dozens of items and major quests to work on, and so often you couldn't find a full group of guildmates to assist you with every random thing. You also had a longer leveling process, so getting a full group of guild mates in your level range and on at the same time was problematic. I remember, despite being a part of major guilds for my entire duration of EQ (on 2 different servers), playing with non-guilded /friends and randoms on a regular basis was the norm.
Regarding guild halls, I think they could be a great thing as long as, like everything else, they exist in the open world. There is no doubt that splintering the population by allowing every player in a guild to hang out in another dimension will have a negative effect on the server.
My hope for guild halls would be that both cities and the zones around them would have a few plots that could be claimed by guilds and which they could build a hall of the size and style of their choosing. That way people are always coming and going from those guild halls into the city itself.
As far as the guild halls go, I hope they are in the open world too. What I dont want is for there to be no reason to leave the guild hall....Make it so you can pretty it up all you want but please keep all the utiilites out in the city...The bank, the Tradeskill area, the merchants....all that needs to stay in the city and not be hidden away in the guild halls, thats what makes ghost towns
Sevens said:I honestly think you have hit on something major here, even if the game is slowed down will that improve socialization? Or will people just continue to ignore the group as they chat on VOIP with other friends or watch movies etc etc etc...it use to be a bannable offence for people to run EQ in windows mode, could something like that be an option or would it cause more harm than good? Is it even possible? and just so we are clear...I am not calling for any of this, Just conversing with others about it. Seems every time I ask a question certain people think Im advocating extreme anti social positions.
Is so hard to tell what will happen, however I know I personally get distracted much easier with another monitor and other things I have going on. However if people actually chat in groups then I think I can turn a monitor off and try to be respectful and give them my full attention instead of a piece of it.
I don't mind VOIP when I'm pvping or raiding or hanging out with friends, though I like to listen to the music and sound of the game if it's good enough. So I would prefer to type in a group setting.
At the very least, can we all agree that having a healthy social environment in a game is not the same thing as forcing a social aspect into every single part of the game?
Here's my argument:
Does that make sense? For reference, I think that the following are sufficient to this end, considering they have been used in EQ for years and work well to separate people from eachother:
I would consider the following things to have a negative influence on the social aspect:
Edit: Can't get rid of these forums soon enough. The formatting is absolute balls.
Liav said:At the very least, can we all agree that having a healthy social environment in a game is not the same thing as forcing a social aspect into every single part of the game?
Here's my argument:
- A healthy social environment is desired for Pantheon.
- Players will invariably dislike some other players and/or want to avoid eachother.
- Removing ways for players to isolate themselves from eachother will force players who do not want to interact with eachother to be required to interact.
- Toxicity is an inevitable example of 3, therefore having avenues for players to isolate themselves from eachother is required for 1.
Does that make sense? For reference, I think that the following are sufficient to this end, considering they have been used in EQ for years and work well to separate people from eachother:
- Chat channels with optional passwords
- Zonewide chat channels (shout, ooc, etc.)
- Proximity text chat (/say, /emote, etc.)
- Groups
- Guilds
- External or internal VoIP with optional passwords
I would consider the following things to have a negative influence on the social aspect:
- Worldwide default chat channels (General Chat, etc.)
- Proximity VoIP (please **** no)
Edit: Can't get rid of these forums soon enough. The formatting is absolute balls.
I doubt Pantheon will come with any sort of built in VoIP. That should be left to guilds to provide since it is reasonably cheap to get 100+ slot VoIP server ($5 a month for hosting both a guild forum / blog / 100+ slot VoIP server if you go with someone like Digital Ocean). Mumble being free and open source is easy to configure on your server and with other options like Discord you don't even need to run your own server to get VoIP these days.
I agree with you on most points but I do think a world wide global general chat channel can be useful. You can deal with annoying people just by adding them to your ignore list. I'd also say that if you have a person on your ignore list they shouldn't show up for instance if you do a search to see who is LFG for example.
Cromulent said:I doubt Pantheon will come with any sort of built in VoIP. That should be left to guilds to provide since it is reasonably cheap to get 100+ slot VoIP server ($5 a month for hosting both a guild forum / blog / 100+ slot VoIP server if you go with someone like Digital Ocean). Mumble being free and open source is easy to configure on your server and with other options like Discord you don't even need to run your own server to get VoIP these days.
Yeah, we've had that discussion before here on these forums. I agree, built-in VoIP is a waste of money, time, and effort.
Cromulent said:I agree with you on most points but I do think a world wide global general chat channel can be useful. You can deal with annoying people just by adding them to your ignore list. I'd also say that if you have a person on your ignore list they shouldn't show up for instance if you do a search to see who is LFG for example.
Unfortunately people demonstrably would rather argue than use ignore lists, myself included. I've never seen a game with a worldwide general chat channel that wasn't cancerous.
Liav said:Unfortunately people demonstrably would rather argue than use ignore lists, myself included. I've never seen a game with a worldwide general chat channel that wasn't cancerous.
I'm kinda hoping that Pantheon will have a somewhat more mature audience than most other games and things can be resolved amicably. One can always hope at least :).
But I see where you are coming from. I just enjoy being able to talk to other people when I am LFG or doing crafting or something. Takes my mind off things for a little while.
Cromulent said:Liav said:Unfortunately people demonstrably would rather argue than use ignore lists, myself included. I've never seen a game with a worldwide general chat channel that wasn't cancerous.
I'm kinda hoping that Pantheon will have a somewhat more mature audience than most other games and things can be resolved amicably. One can always hope at least :).
But I see where you are coming from. I just enjoy being able to talk to other people when I am LFG or doing crafting or something. Takes my mind off things for a little while.
I agree. I'm just a part of what most people would consider to be the toxic element. I have an unnatural desire to argue with people I disagree with on the internet, my MMO interests just happen to be strongly biased towards older game mechanics than most newer ones.
I'd like to say I can trust myself to not be a raging douchebag in Pantheon's public chat channels, but I already have difficulty containing it on the forums. I think I'm justified most of the time but I know the better answer would be to just not reply, but I have trouble just "turning it off".
Either way, maybe general chat channels would work, maybe they wouldn't. All I can hope is that I don't get myself suspended/banned for textual altercations.
Liav, a natural debater!!
I like all forms of chat channel options. To me it comes down to user friendly options like being able to easily whisper someone by clicking their name in chat. I like chat that is super efficient and user friendly. Another big one is being able to set-up group or guild windows seperately and filter fight spam or general chat channels as needed.. I am always suprised at games that don't do this well.
I don't know if I am alone on this or not, but I noticed that when ever I do any kind of voice chat, I do not get into the game as much. I think it brings in too much reality into the game, which means I think I love escaping into the game world. So if I cannot truly escape what's real around me, it just does not have the same effect. I think chat still allows your mind to interpret situations differently, where your imagination can lead you into many different scenarios. Another good example of what I mean is if you are really into a game situation, cautious, dangerous, the music grips your every nerve... the the damn doorbell rings and the dogs start barking. /sigh
If and when I PvP I prefer voice chat, but this is often a game that I do not sink into anyway.