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Friday, December 15, 2006
Choice vs. Random
So why am I doing PvP, if that isn't my natural favorite occupation and the honor points have been nerfed? Well, besides the fact that I already did everything else, the main attraction for me is that in the PvP reward system I get to choose what reward I want.
This contrasts sharply with raid loot, which is completely random. If I go on a raid, I don't know if something for my class will drop. And I don't get to choose which part either. I know which boss mob drops which part, I can only hope that when we kill the boss who drops the part I need, he won't be dropping the part for another class instead. When people complained to Blizzard about shaman loot now already dropping for Alliance and paladin loot for Horde, Tseric just replied with "Plain fact is that this is about production schedules and not about you." (and later deleted that post when he realized that isn't wasn't great customer service). But even before that move, which basically reduces your chance of finding raid loot by 11%, raiding for one specific item was an exercise in frustration. Especially getting an epic weapon is hard, because usually more people can use it, and weapons drop less often than armor.
In the new PvP, I can plan ahead to get the epic sword I want, without having to count on chance. My rate of progress towards that goal might not always be as fast as I wish, but I always know exactly where I am and how far I still have to go. I don't need luck, and there is no random chance that I get a mage robe instead of a warrior sword.
Which of course makes me wish that raid loot would involve more choice. And apparently even Blizzard thinks that this would be a good idea, and is experimenting. For example the Naxxramas tier 3 loot is based on tokens. A specific boss drops a token for a specific slot, but the token can be used by one of several classes. You get the actual item by handing in the token, plus wartorn armor scraps, and some crafting materials.
In the Burning Crusade it seems you get tier 4 tokens which are specific to one slot and one class, but not specific to a talent tree. So if you get a druid bracers token, you can choose between three different druid bracers, one for moonkins, one for feral, and one for restoration druids. That is a step backwards from the tier 3 loot, because you probably aren't changing your spec very often, and you still need the luck that the piece for your class and the specific slot you are looking for is dropping.
I wonder why raiding loot can't be handled like PvP rewards. Imagine you get "MC honor points" for every kill in Molten Core, plus *everybody* in the raid gets "MC victory token" for every boss killed. And then everybody just goes and buys tier 1 armor with a combination of points and marks. With every raid member getting the same amount of points and marks as long as he participates in the same amount of kills, guilds wouldn't even need DKP or other loot distribution schemes any more. It might not be as exciting as finding phat loot on a killed boss, but it is inherently a lot more fair.
- posted by Tobold @ 8:12 AM Permanent Link
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Choice is exactly why I tried PvP before trying for Tier 0 in instances. I found that liked PvP, so I stuck with it.
I like the time flexibility, too. RL chops up my WoW time with interruptions and bedtimes (day job). I can jump into PvP if I have a spare 1/2-hour. And I feel bad to leave an instance group (especially since I'm typically the tank). But since battlegrounds are queued I can leave on short notice and someone will step into my place.
I like the time flexibility, too. RL chops up my WoW time with interruptions and bedtimes (day job). I can jump into PvP if I have a spare 1/2-hour. And I feel bad to leave an instance group (especially since I'm typically the tank). But since battlegrounds are queued I can leave on short notice and someone will step into my place.
As a feral druid I have found PvP is hands down the best way to get the gear for my specc, and has ironically allowed me to perform feral role in raids. What feral gear I have gotten from raids has only complemented my set.
I disagree that tier 4 system is step back from tier 3. With tier 3 tokens there isn't any choise for the player on what he gets (heling set for a druid no matter what you do in the raid) - if there is choise it is on raid level about what class gets the token. Combine that with the fact that for example for feral druids drops aren't plentiful in Naxxramas. What tier 4 system allows, is to build your character more the way you choose and less the way the loot drops.
And I don't think some randomness is bad thing. There is excitement in waiting to see what dropped this time, without which raiding would come few steps closer to spread sheet management. Personally I'm at the moment in fafor of tier 4 & 5 style tokens combined good variety of random drops.
I disagree that tier 4 system is step back from tier 3. With tier 3 tokens there isn't any choise for the player on what he gets (heling set for a druid no matter what you do in the raid) - if there is choise it is on raid level about what class gets the token. Combine that with the fact that for example for feral druids drops aren't plentiful in Naxxramas. What tier 4 system allows, is to build your character more the way you choose and less the way the loot drops.
And I don't think some randomness is bad thing. There is excitement in waiting to see what dropped this time, without which raiding would come few steps closer to spread sheet management. Personally I'm at the moment in fafor of tier 4 & 5 style tokens combined good variety of random drops.
I wonder why raiding loot can't be handled like PvP rewards. ...It might not be as exciting as finding phat loot on a killed boss, but it is inherently a lot more fair.
It's about money. If Blizz did what you think seems to be such a great idea for raid loot, people would quickly complete their "tier x 8-piece set" then get bored or have no reason to continue raiding.
The reason end-game raiding loot is highly desireable is the fact that is Hard to get. Before 2.0 if you saw a guy with GrandMarshall Weapons that meant something, you might possibly even envied the gear, but you knew you could never invest 12-16 hours a day to wow for 2months straight to get that stuff. Now... (pardon the jab) even alt warriors of semi-hardcore non-experienced PvPers can get them. =]
It's about money. If Blizz did what you think seems to be such a great idea for raid loot, people would quickly complete their "tier x 8-piece set" then get bored or have no reason to continue raiding.
The reason end-game raiding loot is highly desireable is the fact that is Hard to get. Before 2.0 if you saw a guy with GrandMarshall Weapons that meant something, you might possibly even envied the gear, but you knew you could never invest 12-16 hours a day to wow for 2months straight to get that stuff. Now... (pardon the jab) even alt warriors of semi-hardcore non-experienced PvPers can get them. =]
# posted by 
: 15/12/06 15:34
: 15/12/06 15:34
I'm currently running Strat and Scholo to finish off my Tier 0. The frustrating thing about it is that the two items I want are drops off the Baron and Gandling, which means a couple of hours play or more each time I go there, and as the drop rate is only 10%, there is still no guarantee that I will get my items even if I do another dozen runs(and that's not counting the time spent in the hopeless LFG, trying to find a decent PUG, and lag spikes leading to wipes).
Meanwhile, my friends have been grinding PvP for the same amount of time, and have now got their Epic items.
Am I a fool for not PvPing?
Meanwhile, my friends have been grinding PvP for the same amount of time, and have now got their Epic items.
Am I a fool for not PvPing?
# posted by : 15/12/06 15:47
: 15/12/06 15:47
Now... (pardon the jab) even alt warriors of semi-hardcore non-experienced PvPers can get them.
Which in my opinion is better game design. I think that in a MMORPG every player should be *able* to reach every item and every place in the game. Of course not all at once, having to choose is part of the fun. But the existence of content which you can't reach at all, because it can only be reached by people with no life, or even only by a group of 40 people with no life, is not good for a game.
The game Archlord offers a way for a player to become the archlord over all other players. Only that in 2 years that the game already ran in Korea nobody ever got that far. Outside Korea the game sold so badly that it is now offered without monthly fee. One should send the truth in advertising people after them.
WoW isn't that bad in comparison, but for example the Netherdrake has been widely advertised as content for the Burning Crusade. But as far as I heard this is very exclusive content, something that only very few players will achieve. The rest of us will also get flying mounts, but not Netherdrakes. People being disappointed because they can't reach what the advertising promised them are bad for the long-term health of a MMORPG.
Which in my opinion is better game design. I think that in a MMORPG every player should be *able* to reach every item and every place in the game. Of course not all at once, having to choose is part of the fun. But the existence of content which you can't reach at all, because it can only be reached by people with no life, or even only by a group of 40 people with no life, is not good for a game.
The game Archlord offers a way for a player to become the archlord over all other players. Only that in 2 years that the game already ran in Korea nobody ever got that far. Outside Korea the game sold so badly that it is now offered without monthly fee. One should send the truth in advertising people after them.
WoW isn't that bad in comparison, but for example the Netherdrake has been widely advertised as content for the Burning Crusade. But as far as I heard this is very exclusive content, something that only very few players will achieve. The rest of us will also get flying mounts, but not Netherdrakes. People being disappointed because they can't reach what the advertising promised them are bad for the long-term health of a MMORPG.
The main problem with a raid loot system as you describe is that it would quickly gear up players a lot faster since the random factor would not be involved.
Example: As your raid molten core for your tier-1 set the chances of you getting an upgrade decrease as you collect more pieces. Until finally only 1/10 the bosses has a 1/9 chance of dropping a upgrade for you. And of course since it takes a guild your expected to play the entire instance every time.
No matter how low the rate at which you would earn points in your system it would be faster then the current loot system. And for some reason developers think end game raiding has to be a time sink to hold onto the hardcore that get there first.
Example: As your raid molten core for your tier-1 set the chances of you getting an upgrade decrease as you collect more pieces. Until finally only 1/10 the bosses has a 1/9 chance of dropping a upgrade for you. And of course since it takes a guild your expected to play the entire instance every time.
No matter how low the rate at which you would earn points in your system it would be faster then the current loot system. And for some reason developers think end game raiding has to be a time sink to hold onto the hardcore that get there first.
"The reason end-game raiding loot is highly desireable is the fact that is Hard to get. ... even alt warriors of semi-hardcore non-experienced PvPers can get them."
Your last statement answers the first. Sure people would eventually get them, there still would be incentive to play, in the form of alts.
And note there's no reason the cost couldn't be increased to make it take longer.. after all once you learn a boss encounter it's really just a matter of time until everyone gets everything they want from that boss. So it's not so different, you just get more choice, and don't need to deal with the drama of "should +damage and healing go to dps or healers" or whatever else.
The main drawback is there would need to be a way to keep people from simply farming trash for the points. Some sort of diminishing returns for trash like the current rep systems would have to be implemented along with the points buying.
Your last statement answers the first. Sure people would eventually get them, there still would be incentive to play, in the form of alts.
And note there's no reason the cost couldn't be increased to make it take longer.. after all once you learn a boss encounter it's really just a matter of time until everyone gets everything they want from that boss. So it's not so different, you just get more choice, and don't need to deal with the drama of "should +damage and healing go to dps or healers" or whatever else.
The main drawback is there would need to be a way to keep people from simply farming trash for the points. Some sort of diminishing returns for trash like the current rep systems would have to be implemented along with the points buying.
# posted by : 15/12/06 16:32
: 15/12/06 16:32
Sometimes I think making it hard enough (or maybe not "hard" but take long enough or making it aggravating enough) to appeal to "hardcore" players is not really necessary. People quit wow all the time because of the boring grind. Even though it is the most popular mmo out there.
Many people think the raids and grind is necessary to keep subscribers. But what if the grind actually keeps less players playing than it turns away? How many people actually raid, 5% of the population is what I commonly hear, I'm not sure if that's true. But let's say it is, that means 95% of the population is rolling alts and eventually getting bored and quitting.
But what if the end game content was implemented either like Tobold suggested or differently, in such a way so that it was more appealing to the 95%? Would that not increase the number of subscribers that stick around instead of encouraging people to quit as it is assumed? Considering WoW's popularity is really based around how accessible it is, not how hardcore it is, maybe coding for the majority of players is different than coding for the "hardcore" players.
Many people think the raids and grind is necessary to keep subscribers. But what if the grind actually keeps less players playing than it turns away? How many people actually raid, 5% of the population is what I commonly hear, I'm not sure if that's true. But let's say it is, that means 95% of the population is rolling alts and eventually getting bored and quitting.
But what if the end game content was implemented either like Tobold suggested or differently, in such a way so that it was more appealing to the 95%? Would that not increase the number of subscribers that stick around instead of encouraging people to quit as it is assumed? Considering WoW's popularity is really based around how accessible it is, not how hardcore it is, maybe coding for the majority of players is different than coding for the "hardcore" players.
# posted by : 15/12/06 16:40
: 15/12/06 16:40
Blizzard's purpose is to keep people playing WoW. One aspect of that is to make certain goals take a long time to accomplish. Specifically in instancing, three methods are employed to do just that: random loot, gear-check bosses, and set instance resets.
Note that I didn't say "raiding". This trifecta is true for any instance, no matter what level requirements. It's just not often talked about for lower level runs because you can give up and go back to quest grinding without missing much.
If you take one of the three progress speedbumps away, you end up with people running out of content long before new is added. Then you loose even your gear-inpsiring players to boredom.
Yep, that's the purpose of keeping the top 5% busy (imo). They motivate others to try for the same goals. They've adjusted the PvP honor gaining rate to preserve the speedbump. If everyone has it, then no one wants it.
Specifially, the reason why PvP-type rewards won't work for raiding is because you would end up with 40 people all completing their tier sets at the same time. If that had happened for my guild, then we would no longer have needed to run BWL after less than 2 months from when we started it.
Likewise, this one change would make the gear-check bosses obsolete. The only thing keeping people from beating WoW would be the instance reset timer and guild politics.
PvP's saving grace is you never run out of other players to kill. You exchange random boss drops for random bosses.
-Mart
Note that I didn't say "raiding". This trifecta is true for any instance, no matter what level requirements. It's just not often talked about for lower level runs because you can give up and go back to quest grinding without missing much.
If you take one of the three progress speedbumps away, you end up with people running out of content long before new is added. Then you loose even your gear-inpsiring players to boredom.
Yep, that's the purpose of keeping the top 5% busy (imo). They motivate others to try for the same goals. They've adjusted the PvP honor gaining rate to preserve the speedbump. If everyone has it, then no one wants it.
Specifially, the reason why PvP-type rewards won't work for raiding is because you would end up with 40 people all completing their tier sets at the same time. If that had happened for my guild, then we would no longer have needed to run BWL after less than 2 months from when we started it.
Likewise, this one change would make the gear-check bosses obsolete. The only thing keeping people from beating WoW would be the instance reset timer and guild politics.
PvP's saving grace is you never run out of other players to kill. You exchange random boss drops for random bosses.
-Mart
# posted by : 15/12/06 17:58
: 15/12/06 17:58
Just one correction based on what I've heard and the blue post referenced.
The boss drops a "token" for a certain slot for a certain set of classes (emphasis mine)
The tier 4 tokens are actually a step forward from the tier 3, in that each token can be used by several classes, and most classes have several choices for a set specific piece.
Now, I certainly haven't been to Kharazan, but that was my understanding.
The boss drops a "token" for a certain slot for a certain set of classes (emphasis mine)
The tier 4 tokens are actually a step forward from the tier 3, in that each token can be used by several classes, and most classes have several choices for a set specific piece.
Now, I certainly haven't been to Kharazan, but that was my understanding.
# posted by : 15/12/06 21:15
: 15/12/06 21:15
End game material needs to feel more diablo 2 like imo. Sure people get their hands on the linear type of gear (set gear) but there needs to be stuff that is ultimately rare and neat for people to look at (ie ethereal repairing uniques from diablo 2). One simple way to do this is to introduce more BoE world drops that are verrrrrrrrrry useful endgame (Such as a Archon staff with +20 all stats and +25 to jewelcrafting or some profesion and some unique Use: ability like "use:create recipe for jewelcrafting 325(rare something here)." Just as an idea, this would keep ppl treasure hunting and keep really cool items that benefit people macro-economically and individually.
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# posted by : 16/12/06 04:46
: 16/12/06 04:46<< Home
