Wellspring said:
Haseno said:
From a friend named "Demethir."
I think the deviation from the early EQ model of raiding is a result of three things:
1 - The learning curve was a lot smoother. In the early days of EQ1, most players were comfortable with their toons by they time they reached a raiding level. The game was hard enough and challenging enough that by the time a player reached level 50, he/she was mostly accustomed to playing with other people and contributing as a piece of the puzzle. Most games today allow players to get to "Raid" level without ever grouping at all. The learning curve is very shallow below 50, and then suddenly prohibitively abrupt. Vox and Naggy were easy raid mobs in retrospect, but they served as good intro mobs. I actually got most into raiding in Vanguard's APW zone because the mobs taught you how to raid as you progressed.
2 - Contested mobs dropped a set quantity of Raid loot. In the early days, you could raid a dragon with 50 people, but only 4 or 5 would get anything. However, it behooved you/your guild to bring fewer because your chance of getting loot was better, and your entire team would be geared up faster. Thus, "hardcore" raiders progressed faster because they were more skilled/organized. The "casual" raiders were still able to defeat these mobs, but typically only after the more structured crews had farmed what they needed, and then more slowly as they pulled more players through. Once games changed to instanced or lockout raids, the mob itself was no longer a bottleneck, which meant the loot-to-player ratio had to be more carefully ballanced. This led to set numbers of players per raid.
3 - Developers now design encounters around margin for error. In early EQ raids, lack of skill could be overcome with sheer numbers. Once the raid size was standardized, the measure of a successful raid shifted from how quickly you could field a large force to how well you understood the mechanics of the encounter. Theory crafters and max/min players became king. Thus began the cat-mouse game between players and devs as the devs scrambled to make content that could keep players occupied just a little longer, requiring certain levels of dps, healing, crowd control, and so on - all balanced just under what was available at that tier. Each new encounter took more time to develop and more testing to ensure that everything was balanced. The top 5% of players are now so skilled at reverse engineering new content that a developer is lucky to see a mob survive the first week in game. However, the GAP between these players and anyone less than completely dedicated to raiding has grown wide as a result.
What does this mean for us? I think it means we need to look at the REQUIREMENTS or MOTIVATORS that made developers think raiding was a good idea in the first place...
Raiding meets players needs for:
- Teamwork
- Achievement
- Mechanics
- Social Atmosphere
- Progression
Raiding meets developers needs for:
- Progression Control
- Item/Loot metering
- Lasting (repeatable) content
The current raiding model evolved as these requirements surfaced over time. Each time a new problem arose, a "fix" was implemented to address that one new problem. No developer has ever taken a holistic look at raiding and how it fits within the overall game in the context of these requirements because they assume the current equation is correct. Ironically, each time a "fix" is added to the raiding beast, it becomes more monsterous and unwieldy, more daunting for new players to try out.
I often wonder if the raiding "sphere" could exist more tangentially to adventuring, crafting, etc. Is there a way to integrate raiding into world progression, without forcing it upon individuals (or if it must do, somehow accessible with appropriate rewards)? Guild Wars 2 has taken an extreme approach to this by introducing "Open" raids, but they seem to ignore social organization, challenge, and long-term teamwork. I would love to see a dialogue that looks at the MMO as a whole to try to understand how raiding could synergistically fit into the overall world.Very well thought out post. When you put it that way, that reinforces my belief that the early EQ1 model for raiding is the way to go in Pantheon.
I believe the EQ1 model was a success, but it does definitely need some improvements/innovations in order to appeal to a new age in the genre. I'm really worried about the idea of raids having population caps in Pantheon (if they do). I'll still have fun, but, population caps will force players to join and participate in guilds (which isn't a bad thing necessarily). However, what EQ1 did was offer freedom with its simplistic raid design. Players could choose to take many, or choose to take a bare minimum in order to achieve victory. Organized guilds and players required less and less players to compete a raid, and a Pick-up Raid you would often find twice as many people in a raid in comparison to the "elite" raid guilds.
Raiding guilds works on the concept that you must have a roster larger then what is required for any given encounter. Just like a sports team has backups for its main team. If the quarterback gets sick you need someone ready to fill in at any moment. No matter what the number is as long as there is a hard cap you always build your team/guild with extras. This creates a system where every night your raid someone is sitting out. Eventually you create conflict between friends simply because you force people of the same class to compete for that spot they both want.
As far as I’m concerned this is the biggest issue facing raiding. The worry that someone might zerg an encounter really falls on the devs to create a game that makes this hard through natural means rather than artificial methods.
If I could lay a challenge on the table for the dev team it’s this:
Come up with a way to make raiding fun, challenging and to not use hard caps.
Xonth said:
I really hope people relies that every word you say holds huge weight. I’m all for brainstorming and discussing topics but that not how these were portrayed. Coming out and saying this is what we want or are thinking then back peddling and saying after the fact those are just thought is the wrong approach. I mingle with allot of gamer from allot of games and this round table did more harm than good to a lot of them that consider raiding as their holy grail, especially for those that are not here every day reading forums. I urge future talks to be more mindful that some issue is not to be taken lightly.
To simple mention raid caps as a possibility….
Please understand...
There could be 20 ToV type of Raid bosses in the game, your Guild will Conquer them..! Along with all the trivial 15-person raids, or 35-person raids.
But I think you are missing the big picture.
What about the guild of 45..? Whom never field more than 12~35 on, at any one time...? Do you think they need more members..? Or the size of Your guild is too big..? I know of a few EVE guilds/clans of 500+ members, that are discussing running many Sister-guilds(8) instead of one large one. (Each officer becomes a guild leader, etc)
Coincidentally, I am sure there will be many large-scale raids too. I am sure they will have the tech, to allow the raid-battles to scale depending on how many monkeys you brought along. Pantheon will still remain the holy grail. The prize will just be a moving target now...
Fingurs said:
Kilsin said:
Hahaha Fingurs is a fellow Rogue and knows me from VG, it would of been tongue in cheek to stir me up I am sure ;)
Sneaky Rogues, can't use distraction techniques on a fellow Rogue but nice try punk! :)
P.S. I love nearly all things Spanish!
I'm not going to apologize. According to my wife I am funny.
It was just cool to see Kilsin in his role. This dude ran raids .... in the most dire circumstances with any/all people. I mean you ever been in an MMORPG and see one of those 'family and friends...blah blah everyone can join raids'? Sounds awesome right? Then you show up and its all unorganized mess, and half the time you want to rip your hair out, other half you're laughing. Kilsin did those a lot, except it was NOT like that. I joined one of those (1am PST raids!) Patience, class, and overall good culture were always to be found at those raids, and it started with him. I believe he will add the same here as a community manager.
As for the rest of this thread... hell yeah. Love the passion. I am sure the team loves it too. Excited for the next installment when they discuss classes. VERY excited to hear about that.
Lol I would never ask you to mate, I thought it was funny! :P
Thank you for the kind words too mate, I appreciate it a lot, we had a lot of fun in those raids and got a lot of people gear and experiences that they would otherwise never see, it made for some great memories and we killed nearly everything in game as a PUG! That's something to be proud of for sure! :)
Oh and I had help from my awesome Reverence Officers, guildies and close friends in Exile and Unleashed (among other great guilds but they were the main ones!).
Xonth said:
Raiding guilds works on the concept that you must have a roster larger then what is required for any given encounter. Just like a sports team has backups for its main team. If the quarterback gets sick you need someone ready to fill in at any moment. No matter what the number is as long as there is a hard cap you always build your team/guild with extras. This creates a system where every night your raid someone is sitting out. Eventually you create conflict between friends simply because you force people of the same class to compete for that spot they both want.
As far as I’m concerned this is the biggest issue facing raiding. The worry that someone might zerg an encounter really falls on the devs to create a game that makes this hard through natural means rather than artificial methods.
If I could lay a challenge on the table for the dev team it’s this:
Come up with a way to make raiding fun, challenging and to not use hard caps.
As a high end Guild/Raid leader I see where you are coming from but I think that is part of the whole process and management of a guild and it's raids/raiders, it's what helps promote that camaraderie when you sit aside for someone sacrificing your place to help someone else and creating a bond with them. When you do get to raid you feel the importance of your position/role and give it your absolute best because you want to impress and be invited back.
These days I don't see that in many MMORPG raids. In VG it was solely locked raiding but it varied in sizes so the guild could break off into divisions and raid different targets or complete different content but it was basically 12, 18, 24 man limits and I thoroughly enjoyed organising, managing and leading raids of those locked sizes, the friendships and partnerships that were formed during those times were strong and you valued your place and knew that if you didn't perform (like your sports team analogy) your had to sit on the bench, it promoted healthy competition and rivalry to bring the best out in you, make you learn your class and push yourself to your limits, I loved that it made us do that.
I have no problem at all with locked raids or hard caps and I also enjoy open raids a lot, anyone who has played EQ will like open raids and anyone who has played VG will like locked raids, they both worked well for each game and I think we can find a nice mix of both in pantheon that would cater to all raiders and raiding guilds and the community as a whole with some open world events/raids that have no restrictions but would scale depending on how many people engaged.
in EQ2 we used to have a roster of max 35 people for 24 man raids. i loved it but prolly couldnt play like this anymore unless there is some guild raiding in the mornings (EU time) :-)
edit: since Kilsins main character is a rogue you better make sure it's a good class since that's my main also.. preferably a swashbuckler ;)
The more I hear about locked capped raid sizes the more I really just want to punch a kitten. It's absolute insanity to even think of bringing this into a niche game that is designed for older more seasoned MMO players. Taking freedom away from players in such a strong armed move as capped raid sizes is completely crazy.
Trivializing content by "zerging" is every players right, if you want to bring 100 people to kill an encounter 20 people could kill, that is your choice, but you make that choice knowing full well the 4-5 items that drop will have to be split between 100 people, and we all know what kind of drama that can cause. Let natural social aspects of the game manage this, not hard capped hand-holding raid sizes.
Dragons were given AOE's in Everquest for a reason, because if you brought 20 good people and 40 scrubs, the 40 scrubs would die off and you'd be left with the 20 good people left to carry the encounter anyways, but at least you didn't have to disclude the other 40 scrubs from having fun and enjoying content with you just because the dev's said so. Some of us have family members who have mental disorders and are a bit slow, not being able to raid with them because they are taking up a valuable slot is absolutely unacceptable. This is a social based MMO, we are going back to the days of being able to talk with your group while fighting monsters, community building. Full inclusion on all raids.
Imagine how bad this is for game revenue as well, I am raiding and playing Pantheon and telling all my friends how great this game is, but our raids are capped at 25 people and my friends want to come play with me, oh well sorry you can't we don't have room, better form your own guild... completely ridiculous, BLASPHEMY!
Rallyd said:
The more I hear about locked capped raid sizes the more I really just want to punch a kitten. It's absolute insanity to even think of bringing this into a niche game that is designed for older more seasoned MMO players. Taking freedom away from players in such a strong armed move as capped raid sizes is completely crazy.
Trivializing content by "zerging" is every players right, if you want to bring 100 people to kill an encounter 20 people could kill, that is your choice, but you make that choice knowing full well the 4-5 items that drop will have to be split between 100 people, and we all know what kind of drama that can cause. Let natural social aspects of the game manage this, not hard capped hand-holding raid sizes.
Dragons were given AOE's in Everquest for a reason, because if you brought 20 good people and 40 scrubs, the 40 scrubs would die off and you'd be left with the 20 good people left to carry the encounter anyways, but at least you didn't have to disclude the other 40 scrubs from having fun and enjoying content with you just because the dev's said so. Some of us have family members who have mental disorders and are a bit slow, not being able to raid with them because they are taking up a valuable slot is absolutely unacceptable. This is a social based MMO, we are going back to the days of being able to talk with your group while fighting monsters, community building. Full inclusion on all raids.
Imagine how bad this is for game revenue as well, I am raiding and playing Pantheon and telling all my friends how great this game is, but our raids are capped at 25 people and my friends want to come play with me, oh well sorry you can't we don't have room, better form your own guild... completely ridiculous, BLASPHEMY!
I am unsure how openly discussing this topic and the pros and cons of each system in a mature fashion can make you so upset Rallyd, there is reasonable suggestions and favour for both styles of raiding mate.
Revenue has nothing to do with raiding though (hardcore raiding is usually the smaller percentage in most MMORPGs), we will have a business plan/structure in place to support us going forward but games like VG did not lose revenue or players due to the raiding being capped at 12, 18, 24, raiding was one of the best parts of max level gameplay, it lost revenue because it was buggy and not supported properly. ArcheAge does not lose revenue over raiding caps, Rift does not lose revenue over raiding caps, they are a few examples but the list goes on.
We need to be fair and try to find a balance for everyone, we are making this game for a niche target audience that played both EQ and VG. We need to respect everyones opinion and discuss mechanics and features like this in a reasonable manner, there will be many things that get debated throughout the life of this development cycle for Pantheon, I understand where you are coming and I like open raiding too but I also enjoyed capped raiding and understand where others are coming from as many of us enjoyed that for many years in VG and other games.
Wellspring said:Zandil said:
Australian, Spanish easy mistake lol
Let's put another burrito on the barbie?
Kilsin said:
Rallyd said:
The more I hear about locked capped raid sizes the more I really just want to punch a kitten. It's absolute insanity to even think of bringing this into a niche game that is designed for older more seasoned MMO players. Taking freedom away from players in such a strong armed move as capped raid sizes is completely crazy.
Trivializing content by "zerging" is every players right, if you want to bring 100 people to kill an encounter 20 people could kill, that is your choice, but you make that choice knowing full well the 4-5 items that drop will have to be split between 100 people, and we all know what kind of drama that can cause. Let natural social aspects of the game manage this, not hard capped hand-holding raid sizes.
Dragons were given AOE's in Everquest for a reason, because if you brought 20 good people and 40 scrubs, the 40 scrubs would die off and you'd be left with the 20 good people left to carry the encounter anyways, but at least you didn't have to disclude the other 40 scrubs from having fun and enjoying content with you just because the dev's said so. Some of us have family members who have mental disorders and are a bit slow, not being able to raid with them because they are taking up a valuable slot is absolutely unacceptable. This is a social based MMO, we are going back to the days of being able to talk with your group while fighting monsters, community building. Full inclusion on all raids.
Imagine how bad this is for game revenue as well, I am raiding and playing Pantheon and telling all my friends how great this game is, but our raids are capped at 25 people and my friends want to come play with me, oh well sorry you can't we don't have room, better form your own guild... completely ridiculous, BLASPHEMY!
I am unsure how openly discussing this topic and the pros and cons of each system in a mature fashion can make you so upset Rallyd, there is reasonable suggestions and favour for both styles of raiding mate.
Revenue has nothing to do with raiding though (hardcore raiding is usually the smaller percentage in most MMORPGs), we will have a business plan/structure in place to support us going forward but games like VG did not lose revenue or players due to the raiding being capped at 12, 18, 24, raiding was one of the best parts of max level gameplay, it lost revenue because it was buggy and not supported properly. ArcheAge does not lose revenue over raiding caps, Rift does not lose revenue over raiding caps, they are a few examples but the list goes on.
We need to be fair and try to find a balance for everyone, we are making this game for a niche target audience that played both EQ and VG. We need to respect everyones opinion and discuss mechanics and features like this in a reasonable manner, there will be many things that get debated throughout the life of this development cycle for Pantheon, I understand where you are coming and I like open raiding too but I also enjoyed capped raiding and understand where others are coming from as many of us enjoyed that for many years in VG and other games.
Rift doesn't have a subscription based system and hasn't for a long time, I am speaking of the revenue you lose when a player can't invite his friends to come play because there is no room in the 24 whatever man crew for them to come play with him/her. Archeage has no raiding at all, any dungeon resembling a raid definitely doesn't feel like one. I don't mind a healthy debate over the subject, but it's also my right to show how viscerally I feel about the subject.
This is one of the major points of difference between VG and EQ, EQ took the all inclusive direction, VG took the all exclusive direction. The VG direction is the WoW direction is the Rift direction is the every other MMO in the past 10 years direction that I feel a lot of the EQ community disliked. While hardcore raiding may be the small percentage in MMO's, there is no doubting the fact that hardcore raiders are generally the "hero" that most people strive to be like, whether they be limited by play time, or skill. If you lose the hardcore raiders, you lose the "hero" that is needed for the rest of the audience to strive to be like.
You talk in your discussions about it being important to see that guy in town with the crazy looking armor and OH MAN I wanna be like him, but then you call them the 1% and denigrate their needs because they aren't important to the other 99%, but they are important in that they give people who aren't that good or are interested in other facets of the game something to look forward to.
I have seen a lot of posts in this thread and elsewhere about why it's important to make sure people can't trivialize fights by bringing more people, but the question that should be asked instead is, why do you feel that is so important? If someone wants to kill something with 40 instead of 20, that is their choice is it not? How does that affect you? The social management of a larger amount of people, as well as the tactical management of more people makes the fight more difficult as well. By capping raids you are basically telling people that they can not enjoy the game their way, they must enjoy it YOUR way.
It goes completely against the entire premise of Pantheon from the start.
The best part of it is? This can co-exist, some mobs can be open and some locked.
I am a crafter and group content player, I raid a little, led a few in EQ, attened some in VG. But I hope everyone gets what they are looking for, and this seems an easy one for both sides to have some of what they want.
@Kilsin you must have had some great guild mates because your experiences is 100% opposite then I have had across many different games.
This is how it plays out for me when I raided.
I played a Troubadour in EQ2. Every night I would log on at raid time and say my little prayer hoping the other troubadours did not show up. We had 4 troubadours total in the guild. Some nights we needed one some nights we needed two. When the others showed up I instantly knew my chances of “another night of killing time” was increasing with every one that logged on. Then you get the dreaded, “we need the best equipped” troubadours which I was not so again I’m sitting out. What’s that? Some ones wife wants to join the guild and they play a Troubadour? Ok now my chances of raiding drops again. This encounter needs more dirges then troubadour’s? My chances drop again. Add in Flagged raids and soon you don’t have the right key or update so you have to sit out again.
Now throw in those X2 raids that only needed two groups to kill them. Guess what, now you have double the amount of people sitting on the bench.
I know I was not the only one that had this problem; several of my game mates left EQ2 and Rift for this EXACT reason, and they were not even in my guild.
I would say I would spend 50% of my raid time not in a raid. But on the bench ready for my turn. We were required to be in a “Stand By’ mode ready to fill in at any time during official raid time. This was repeated in Rift exactly in the two separate raiding guilds.
You know what game I Loved raiding because I spent all my time actually raiding? A little game called EverQuest. Every night I logged at raid time I raided. Did I ever hate it when others logged on? Never once. Did I ever hate when members where added to the roster of my class? Never Once.
Imagine that the only reason you play an MMO is to raid but the mechanics that the game designers created forces you to sit on the side lines. Just so they can "balance" content easier. To me this sounds like a lazy way for developing games.
I really don't care if content is meant for less people, just don't force caps on things.
imo you should have joined a hardcore raiding guild Xonth.. with a capped roster you don't have that problem anymore.
i remember in my old days raiding in EQ2 ( when i was burned out ) i would log in pretty late and be quiet hoping the raid would be filled before they noticed i was around :)
Gelax said:
imo you should have joined a hardcore raiding guild Xonth.. with a capped roster you don't have that problem anymore.
i remember in my old days raiding in EQ2 ( when i was burned out ) i would log in pretty late and be quiet hoping the raid would be filled before they noticed i was around :)
My Rift guilds was one of the top raiding guilds for my server...
My EQ2 raided 5 nights a week
One of the questions I would like to ask of Brad/Joppa/Developers is the following with raid size:
How feasible would it be to design a system that adapts to guild/raid size? For example - we code for an encounter to be rigid in the sense of '24' etc.. because as Brad said we fear zerging. The downsides are apparent, like having people sit out.
Is there a possibility to make the raid_mobs adapt to our size? For example - in Destiny, if I solo a strike the mobs hit a little differently, and have a certain amount of Hps. when I come in with 3 people it adjusts for difficulty.
Is this a nightmare to code in an MMO? The positives would obviously be, full inclusion, and less worrying about recruiting just to make it. If your group is 8, well then its 8.
Maybe setting a minimum, and possibly a maximum? However anything in between you would be able to scale.
Curious to hear thoughts, or maybe thats a Roundtable 3.0 discusssion question.
Thanks.
Rallyd said:
Or better yet a minimum with no maximum, and Fingurs idea. That would actually sound really good. Now if we can just figure out a way to keep instances out of Pantheon...
Amen brother!
Rallyd said:
Kilsin said:
Rallyd said:
The more I hear about locked capped raid sizes the more I really just want to punch a kitten. It's absolute insanity to even think of bringing this into a niche game that is designed for older more seasoned MMO players. Taking freedom away from players in such a strong armed move as capped raid sizes is completely crazy.
Trivializing content by "zerging" is every players right, if you want to bring 100 people to kill an encounter 20 people could kill, that is your choice, but you make that choice knowing full well the 4-5 items that drop will have to be split between 100 people, and we all know what kind of drama that can cause. Let natural social aspects of the game manage this, not hard capped hand-holding raid sizes.
Dragons were given AOE's in Everquest for a reason, because if you brought 20 good people and 40 scrubs, the 40 scrubs would die off and you'd be left with the 20 good people left to carry the encounter anyways, but at least you didn't have to disclude the other 40 scrubs from having fun and enjoying content with you just because the dev's said so. Some of us have family members who have mental disorders and are a bit slow, not being able to raid with them because they are taking up a valuable slot is absolutely unacceptable. This is a social based MMO, we are going back to the days of being able to talk with your group while fighting monsters, community building. Full inclusion on all raids.
Imagine how bad this is for game revenue as well, I am raiding and playing Pantheon and telling all my friends how great this game is, but our raids are capped at 25 people and my friends want to come play with me, oh well sorry you can't we don't have room, better form your own guild... completely ridiculous, BLASPHEMY!
I am unsure how openly discussing this topic and the pros and cons of each system in a mature fashion can make you so upset Rallyd, there is reasonable suggestions and favour for both styles of raiding mate.
Revenue has nothing to do with raiding though (hardcore raiding is usually the smaller percentage in most MMORPGs), we will have a business plan/structure in place to support us going forward but games like VG did not lose revenue or players due to the raiding being capped at 12, 18, 24, raiding was one of the best parts of max level gameplay, it lost revenue because it was buggy and not supported properly. ArcheAge does not lose revenue over raiding caps, Rift does not lose revenue over raiding caps, they are a few examples but the list goes on.
We need to be fair and try to find a balance for everyone, we are making this game for a niche target audience that played both EQ and VG. We need to respect everyones opinion and discuss mechanics and features like this in a reasonable manner, there will be many things that get debated throughout the life of this development cycle for Pantheon, I understand where you are coming and I like open raiding too but I also enjoyed capped raiding and understand where others are coming from as many of us enjoyed that for many years in VG and other games.
Rift doesn't have a subscription based system and hasn't for a long time, I am speaking of the revenue you lose when a player can't invite his friends to come play because there is no room in the 24 whatever man crew for them to come play with him/her. Archeage has no raiding at all, any dungeon resembling a raid definitely doesn't feel like one. I don't mind a healthy debate over the subject, but it's also my right to show how viscerally I feel about the subject.
This is one of the major points of difference between VG and EQ, EQ took the all inclusive direction, VG took the all exclusive direction. The VG direction is the WoW direction is the Rift direction is the every other MMO in the past 10 years direction that I feel a lot of the EQ community disliked. While hardcore raiding may be the small percentage in MMO's, there is no doubting the fact that hardcore raiders are generally the "hero" that most people strive to be like, whether they be limited by play time, or skill. If you lose the hardcore raiders, you lose the "hero" that is needed for the rest of the audience to strive to be like.
You talk in your discussions about it being important to see that guy in town with the crazy looking armor and OH MAN I wanna be like him, but then you call them the 1% and denigrate their needs because they aren't important to the other 99%, but they are important in that they give people who aren't that good or are interested in other facets of the game something to look forward to.
I have seen a lot of posts in this thread and elsewhere about why it's important to make sure people can't trivialize fights by bringing more people, but the question that should be asked instead is, why do you feel that is so important? If someone wants to kill something with 40 instead of 20, that is their choice is it not? How does that affect you? The social management of a larger amount of people, as well as the tactical management of more people makes the fight more difficult as well. By capping raids you are basically telling people that they can not enjoy the game their way, they must enjoy it YOUR way.
It goes completely against the entire premise of Pantheon from the start.
Rift still uses subs: https://rift.trionworlds.com/commerce/purchase/subscription/purchase-subscription-flow
There is no need to twist my words around mate, I am not the enemy, you just have to realise that not everyone is going to agree with you and not everyone came from EQ.
I am a raider at heart, I have ben hardcore raiding for 10+ years, I was the guild leader of a hardcore guild that turned casual due to population issues and I have led raids for around 5 years, I get what you're saying and as much as I don't like to admit it, we are the minority but to say we are 1% (no idea where you pulled that percentage from, can you provide evidence?) is simply not true.
I can honestly never say that we ever had (or I ever heard of it happening) an issue with someones friend or family member not being able to raid in VG or any other game that I have played with capped raid sizes.
Whether you like to admit it or not ArcheAge does have raiding of different capped amounts, 5 man, 10 man etc.
It is important for the players to look up to heros, those heroes are not always going to be raiders. There will be other ways our players can achieve great things in game that will be equally challenging and rewarding.
We need to find a balance as I said in my last post, that is what we are doing, while we work on that we like to hear from our community and get their thoughts, that is what we are doing, everyone has different opinions, not all of them will be similar to your views, you need to keep that in mind when posting your opinion mate.
I personally like both styles of raiding but I have spent more time raiding under capped rulesets and can see why developers go that way, as it's easier to balance and release content for specific player groups while keeping itemisation in check. They both have their pros and cons and we are working through that to find the best balance for Pantheon.
Xonth said:
@Kilsin you must have had some great guild mates because your experiences is 100% opposite then I have had across many different games.
This is how it plays out for me when I raided.
I played a Troubadour in EQ2. Every night I would log on at raid time and say my little prayer hoping the other troubadours did not show up. We had 4 troubadours total in the guild. Some nights we needed one some nights we needed two. When the others showed up I instantly knew my chances of “another night of killing time” was increasing with every one that logged on. Then you get the dreaded, “we need the best equipped” troubadours which I was not so again I’m sitting out. What’s that? Some ones wife wants to join the guild and they play a Troubadour? Ok now my chances of raiding drops again. This encounter needs more dirges then troubadour’s? My chances drop again. Add in Flagged raids and soon you don’t have the right key or update so you have to sit out again.
Now throw in those X2 raids that only needed two groups to kill them. Guess what, now you have double the amount of people sitting on the bench.
I know I was not the only one that had this problem; several of my game mates left EQ2 and Rift for this EXACT reason, and they were not even in my guild.
I would say I would spend 50% of my raid time not in a raid. But on the bench ready for my turn. We were required to be in a “Stand By’ mode ready to fill in at any time during official raid time. This was repeated in Rift exactly in the two separate raiding guilds.
You know what game I Loved raiding because I spent all my time actually raiding? A little game called EverQuest. Every night I logged at raid time I raided. Did I ever hate it when others logged on? Never once. Did I ever hate when members where added to the roster of my class? Never Once.
Imagine that the only reason you play an MMO is to raid but the mechanics that the game designers created forces you to sit on the side lines. Just so they can "balance" content easier. To me this sounds like a lazy way for developing games.
I really don't care if content is meant for less people, just don't force caps on things.
I did have great guildies man, a lot of guilds in VG were exactly the same, some had to sit, it was guild leaders and raid leaders jobs to manage that and keep it fair while being able to take the raid target down, it was just part of the experience but I think Vg was a lot more mature than most other games, so the age difference was higher and the maturity and patience was much greater, not to have a go at other games but this was just how it was with VG.
I had similar experiences as a main Rogue in VG, I had to sit a lot until I became one of the top Dpsers and my sitting would hurt the raid Dps but that was something I had to work on, I am not saying this system is perfect by any means either, because it's not, both have flaws but I just think we need to try both to see which works best for us all, including the developers who have to create and balance these encounters.
I did post that I would like to see a nice balance of capped and open world mobs, possible implementing a scaling system, exactly how Fingurs described in his Destiny example. I actually played Destiny too and that is where I got the idea from in my previous post.
The main point I want to get across is that I am a hardcore raider and want the best for the raiding community and to get the best possible outcome for Pantheon and everyone is by getting feedback and balancing accordingly. Both systems have pros and cons, so can we implement both and make it work?
These are things we will need to test to find out.
After rereading some good responses here and on other external sites, I believe other's have summarized why not having a raid cap is better than I have. It is mainly just due to allowing the player to control the social norms rather than placing artificial restrictions. This will also allow casual guilds as Haseno said to have more of a chance at the raid mob just due to strength in numbers versus a hardcore raid guild's strategy/skill. It is almost a dynamic encounter in and of itself based off player skill.
Also, if the established norms are broken/abused, etc. that's where the server infamy/fame starts being established - which truly hasn't been seen in a game since EQ.
Obviously we could argue about this point forever but all I can say was I was 100% sure Pantheon was going for uncapped raid based on everything the Devs had been saying and the tenants and such so I was just so shocked when it was not. This was my main selling point to allot of people and honestly I still have not seen a good reason to have locked raids beyond it makes it easier to balance the encounter for a developer.
Really a locked encounter is nothing more than instancing a single encounter without giving its own zone. That’s why I I’m in disbelief.
I have a 7 month old so raiding probably off my plate for a while anyway. Guess I’ll just have to stop campaigning for Pantheon till I know more about the game because obviously I have been way off.
Xonth said:
Obviously we could argue about this point forever but all I can say was I was 100% sure Pantheon was going for uncapped raid based on everything the Devs had been saying and the tenants and such so I was just so shocked when it was not. This was my main selling point to allot of people and honestly I still have not seen a good reason to have locked raids beyond it makes it easier to balance the encounter for a developer.
Really a locked encounter is nothing more than instancing a single encounter without giving its own zone. That’s why I I’m in disbelief.
I have a 7 month old so raiding probably off my plate for a while anyway. Guess I’ll just have to stop campaigning for Pantheon till I know more about the game because obviously I have been way off.
There is one fact that everyone keeps missing and that is - this has not been decided yet - this is not set in stone, this is merely being discussed, if discussing something turns you off the game, then I am sorry but we need to hear from all of our supporters and discuss everyones opinions before we go ahead and try to implement something, no matter what the subject is.
We will weigh up all options and gather all feedback from our supporters and make a decision based on these discussions and feedback while working within our own vision for the game. We have been transparent from the start so i hope you guy's would be confident in us making the right decisions by listening to our community.
Xonth said:
@Kilsin you must have had some great guild mates because your experiences is 100% opposite then I have had across many different games.
This is how it plays out for me when I raided.
I played a Troubadour in EQ2. Every night I would log on at raid time and say my little prayer hoping the other troubadours did not show up. We had 4 troubadours total in the guild. Some nights we needed one some nights we needed two. When the others showed up I instantly knew my chances of “another night of killing time” was increasing with every one that logged on. Then you get the dreaded, “we need the best equipped” troubadours which I was not so again I’m sitting out. What’s that? Some ones wife wants to join the guild and they play a Troubadour? Ok now my chances of raiding drops again. This encounter needs more dirges then troubadour’s? My chances drop again. Add in Flagged raids and soon you don’t have the right key or update so you have to sit out again.
Stories such as Xonth described here, is precisely why raid population caps are counter-productive for guilds. It forces guilds to be exclusive to certain members, and sometimes it even forces guild to cease the recruitment of certain classes. The game design shouldn't force people into such bottlenecks, IMO. It's understandable that bottlenecks are sometimes unavoidable. However, when you consider what raiding is at its core. It's all about amassing an army to defeat a challenging foe/encounter. Capping raid population contradicts the very core of what raiding is suppose to be.
My preferences are clear, at this point. However, I will have fun irregardless of what happens. My goal isn't just fun with Pantheon, my goal is a revival of the very spirit of this genre. And my understanding of that spirit comes from the beginning, EQ1.