Very much looking forward to the first time I can get into the game. I am still playing Everquest. It's changed a lot over the years since I started in March of '99, some good, some bad. The community has taken a serious nose dive. Community standards are not enforced. There are a lot of me now kiddies playing games these days, and it shows. I'm very interested to see how VR handles this. I hope they have GMs that will get IN the game and resolve issues. I personally do not enjoy having to deal with jerks who figure that the end justifies the means, and will do whatever they want as long as they can get away with it. A good example of this is the guy wearing incredbile gear who rolls need on an item that is obviously not an upgrade so he can sell it. Then when he's removed from the group, he arranges for his guild to train the area where you are exping to force you out of the camp. If VR allows this sort of crap, then there won't be much reason to play Pantheon. I mean I can get this sort of lame behavior in a game with a lot more content. If VR does enforce community standards, then I am willing to play a game with less content initially, because as I said, I really can't stand butt heads who ruin the game play of others.
The simple fact is that gamers have changed over the years. There used to be a sense of honor in games. People would be respectful. Now they just don't care. I'm not saying everyone is like that, but it's way more prevalent than it was in '99.
EQ has a parcel system. It is not a secure trade. It relies on you trusting others to do the right thing. An example of honor. Someone paid me for a piece of gear via parcel in EQ. I sent the item to the wrong person by mistake. I returned the guy's money, then talked ot the person I sent it to incorrectly. He returned the item. I was then able to make the trade with the person who wanted the item. Honor.
I hope they put in game mechanics that will help to keep things fun without sacrificing game play too much. Unfortunately, if they do not, there will be plenty of "end justifies the means" guilds who will stomp on anyone they feel like to get what they want.
You may be speaking to the wrong crowd here, my friend.
The general consensus around here seems to be that the problem with modern games it that they don't allow the option of self and community policing simply by virtue of their mechanics. I.E. It's hard to get someone's name out there as a tool when you can simply join a cross-server dungeon queue.
While I agree (And there have been many threads on this. You should take a look!) that there should be times when a GM should intervene - those times should be as a last resort and for very particular and serious reasons; reasons that don't involve game play. Such as racial, or religious hate speech or threats. Aside from that, you'll pretty much most likely get the majority of the community here advocating contested content and community enforcement through reputation and commonal blacklisting.
Honor is great, sure - but GM intervention doesn't force people to be honorable. Nothing can. The best thing we can hope for is reputation to matter in a game where grouping is CORE for advancement. Hopefully GM's and the Pantheon team can spend their time creating quality content instead of policing the crowd.
To say honor doesn't exist in today's gamer is a bit misleading. This is where you usually surround yourself with like-minded individuals in a guild to rectify that issue, but of course the general population serves as another issue. With that being said, GMs will usually help enforce the "rules" and thats it. Basically ensuring that any form of harassment or intentional trolling is kept to a minimum. I wouldn't go as far as to say they will enfocre a community standard, that is up for the community to enforce. But you will never escape those kind of players as they exist in every game.
If a game has the reputation that if you run trains over a group trying to play the game, you will be banned, that sort of behavior would be greatly dinimished. How do you propose to "police" this? Train them back? I don't have an issue with contested content, but if it's just a free-for-all where people can use whatever tactic they want to take the content away from you, then it will have negative consequences to the overall health of the game.
I guess I was not clear. Yes, game mechanics are an integral part of this. For instance, you are killing a named. A bard runs up, charms it, runs off at supersonic speed, then finishes the kill and gets the loot. How do you propose to police that? Do it back?
I don't plan on playing on a pvp server. This sort of crap should not be allowed in a PvE environment. Once a group/raid has engaged, they should be immune to tactics like training, charming, memory wiping, etc.
I said that honor still exists, but there are a whole lot more people who don't give a crap about honor.
There are huge guilds of people who pride themselves on ruining the game play of others. They simply do not care. I respect other peoples' time. Some don't. I know the GMs cannot "make" anyone honorable. Why do I feel like my words are being misinterpeted and/or twisted. With proper game mechanics, and a GM crew that will intervene if repeated bad behavior occurs, this game can have a great community.
I guard my reputation very carefully in mmos. I believe they reflect on me as a person. Intentionally training a group to get their "camp", then saying "hey, I was just roleplaying an evil person" does not cut it. In order to counter that, you have to either fight fire with fire, or have a bunch of people guarding your back while your group does its thing. It's like PvP in a PvE environment. I want the community to be strong, yes, but I don't think it's very fun to have to stand around and intercept trains all day so others can have fun. I'd rather be having fun with a group or raid myself.
Everquest basically gives its blessing on being a tool. Act like an ass. Ruin the fun of others. Once your rep is to the point you can't get anything done, just buy a name change option for real money, and do it again.
What good will blacklisting do? If the whole guild does this stuff, then they will still be able to advance, especially at the expense of others. You act like the trouble makers are few and far between. I'm not sure what game you've been playing lately, but they seem more prevalent than ever.
I guess i was thinking more back to the early days. When a server had 2k people and such, and the 100 or so that played at primetime you knew of a lot of them at least.
I did play on Phinny, so all your points are very valid dealing with modern day issues.
It will be interesting, a lot of "newer guilds" are used to just doing there own thing in a instance world, not contesting or interacting with other guilds or people in general.
Griefing and being a ass should have a defined defination, where something will be done about griefing or ruining another players experince purposely.
Well encounter locking does prevent the whole bard-charming and running off (not sure that is applicable here). But what you just described is a form of harassment and is something GMs would step in for. And believe me when I say this, no matter how much of an ass a player may be, if they know how to play they will end up in a good guild. Been like that since day 1. Its unfortunate but true. If entire guilds do it and it steps over the lines for the GMs, then the appropriate action will be handled. It may not be an outright ban on the first offense, but I'm sure there is a procedure that has to be followed before that kind of action can take place.
Reputation carries alot more weight once you enter a much tighter community. Like say if we're talking on the high-end, no server, or name transfers where you are stuck with every action. Believe me if say the guilds band together to keep players like that out, they will fade away (if all of those things are true). But if the player can play and some folks get desperate, they'll stick around much longer.
I hear you all. I just want a fun game. I know not everyone is going to share my views, and a basic concept of what is reasonable will certainly be subjective. One thing is for sure. If they enforce community standards as aggressively in game as they do about closing threads on the same subject, there will be a whole lot of enforcement. :p
Anyway, I expect this thread to be locked. There is bound to be another one out there. I didn't mean to violate a rule by making this thread, so I will just quietly fade away.
Ashenor,
I'm on Phinigel now... I'm sure I could name some guilds, and you'd know exactly who I'm talking about. I won't, but I could.
I'm Gruffus there by the way. 54 troll shaman at the moment.
The root of this problem is in the players ability to disrespect another without consequence. Players look at things like solo progression, instancing and cross server grouping as the culprit, but its way beyond those things.
When you add systems that allow players to become more self-sufficient or more reliant on people they already know, the value of the average player is diminished, the opportunities for interaction are reduced, and it decreases the scale of the community. This includes things like caravans, mentoring and anything else that allows a single player or collective to rely entirely on each other.
This more cordial environment and wider sense of community could be seen especially with early EQ. Even as a member of a large guild of players, you still needed to interact and even group with people from other guilds or unaffiliated players. A player or guild that was disliked by the general playerbase was afforded less groups, less people to trade with and a less enjoyable game experience in general.
Of course, it was a friendlier era of the internet, but I believe when we bring back true interdependence among players and systems which encourage inclusion by design, it will bring back player reputation that matters and a better atmosphere for everyone.
/agreed Dullahan on the self-sufficiency point
EQ basically killed the remainder of the group game after allowing mercenaries. Sure, people still group with mecenaries, and I did there as well, but reputation doesn't matter nearly as much as it did at launch as there's always the ability to solo and be self-sufficient.
Further, just the vastness of EQ's world itself added to the removal of player reputation mattering. You could literally level 1 to 100 (105?) whatever the cap is now and hardly see another soul if you played in the less populated areas. In early EQ, there was no avoiding other players if you wanted to get exp in the good "exp spots."
So, I hope it's three fold. Pantheon grows inwardly, by expanding old dungeons versus building new continents with expansions so players remain together, and, also, that tools aren't integrated into Pantheon that allows players to be anonymous/self-sufficient like mecenaries. Also, I would look into having a moving goalpost as far as the server population. I'll use random numbers for an example: 1500 players with 30 zones at Launch; 40 zones after first expansion - 2000 players, 50 zones, 2500 players etc.
And, on Dullahan's last point, I do think you could make a general statement on it being a friendlier era "back then in 1999," but I'd also argue that the friendlier era occured due to the strong community, and the nonsense that you see in Barrens type general chats occurs due to the lack of a strong community today. I still think the strong community "could" exist. But, it's easier today to just /leave general, or /ignore creamofsumyunggui types versus dealing with that player (s) as there's no need to - you can simply avoid having to interact with the player (players) and manage to progress just fine.
Ashenor said:Hey Hacker, i played from day one on Phinny i stopped a bit before Velious when i moved. I have a 60 rogue and necro there and i am OGC (worst guild name ever).
I have been kicking around coming back.
LOL! I've heard others say it's the worst name ever. I actually was in Halls of Testing with OGC last night. One of a few they invited not in their guild. I got two drops. Boots and chest. They let me roll as an equal. I was pleasantly surprised. With the name, I figured they just wanted my shaman for his slows and malo. :p
I hope the community for Pantheon turns out great. I can't imagine how incredibly difficult it is to come up with a design that encourages group play while also curbing the tendency for bad apples to prosper.
Mercenaries became almost necessary given the population of EQ and the sheer amount of content in the game. I mean its bound to happen when your 10+ years down the road in a game. If you want player reptuation to matter, simply do not allow server transfers or name changes and guilds keep communication amongst another. The people can easily set the tempo of denying certain players content of the game. Its not an overly-complicated system. I do believe that there is no community thats all hugs and kisses. You can get close, but there will always be those rowdy few who will attempt to get under your skin.