RasereiAmok Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 The tank, healer, DPS mindset for grouping. This doesn't work in the long run. You will force certain players to play a healer or tank when they really just want to DPS. The ONLY MMO that I have seen that makes this work is World of Warcraft. Don't flame cause I said WoW, I have played just about every single MMO for the past 14 years. Keywords: Cross server dungeon finder Bioware said that they don't want dungeon queues (even per server) because they want the community to interact. Well Bioware, what happens in a few months when there barely is a community and this "cross server queue" is still demanded. You are in the same boat as you are now except minus a ton of players. The amount of players who enjoy playing a DPS class outweighs the amount of tanks and healers. It makes no sense for games to expect every group to have a role not many people want to play. You need to consider the PSYCHOLOGICAL aspect. There might be 5 tanks on, but maybe all of them ONLY group with friends/guildmates. Thats perfectly fine, but what about that large chunk of playerbase that is a solo player or plays with a few friends who happen to be all DPS. The entire mechanic of tank, healer, DPS makes no logical sense except for a timesink. Let's wait 2 hours to do a 1 hour dungeon.... That's 3 hours and that is assuming you complete it. Risk vs. reward.... Why waste 3 hours? I'll honestly play a different game. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meldwyn Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 You may be in luck... GW2 says they are doing away with the MMO trinity. However, that's a ways off. Until then, enjoy SWTOR! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
inseeisyou Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 I have often considered the same points you are making, but you don't propose a solution. What would the difference between classes look like? You can't let tank or healers DPS as well as dedicated DPSers or the DPS class would be pointless. So what do you do just make everyone the same? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jhonen Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 The tank, healer, DPS mindset for grouping. This doesn't work in the long run. You will force certain players to play a healer or tank when they really just want to DPS. The ONLY MMO that I have seen that makes this work is World of Warcraft. Don't flame cause I said WoW, I have played just about every single MMO for the past 14 years. Keywords: Cross server dungeon finder Bioware said that they don't want dungeon queues (even per server) because they want the community to interact. Well Bioware, what happens in a few months when there barely is a community and this "cross server queue" is still demanded. You are in the same boat as you are now except minus a ton of players. The amount of players who enjoy playing a DPS class outweighs the amount of tanks and healers. It makes no sense for games to expect every group to have a role not many people want to play. You need to consider the PSYCHOLOGICAL aspect. There might be 5 tanks on, but maybe all of them ONLY group with friends/guildmates. Thats perfectly fine, but what about that large chunk of playerbase that is a solo player or plays with a few friends who happen to be all DPS. The entire mechanic of tank, healer, DPS makes no logical sense except for a timesink. Let's wait 2 hours to do a 1 hour dungeon.... That's 3 hours and that is assuming you complete it. Risk vs. reward.... Why waste 3 hours? I'll honestly play a different game. Only person I've had trouble finding is a healer, and not even that much trouble. My Sorcerer is a healer, Trooper a tank, and Knight a DPS. Also, it's tough trying to get rid of the "holy trinity". City of Heroes (and Guild Wars 2 TBA) has also tried this, but then it only boils down to steamrolling the instance with little to no effort because everyone is a jack-of-all-trades. Guild Wars 2 will probably end up being more facerolling because it's publisher (NCSoft, who insisted this mechanic) also developed City of Heroes. And we all know how that went. P.S., I know the difference between developer and publisher, but the publisher has much more sway in the development process than you think Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kaphik Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 Ever play any sort of organized team sport? There are different positions, i.e. roles. A group in an MMO is like a team, everyone has their specialty. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RasereiAmok Posted January 5, 2012 Author Share Posted January 5, 2012 Players nowadays want convenience. It is not convenient to have to search for hours in LFG for a healer or tank. That died a long time ago... Even Everquest has adopted a dungeon finder. RIFT adopted a dungeon finder. Some didn't join that "bandwagon", but honestly, this new automated dungeon finder is the way to go. And cross server, so all players are connected somehow. If that is not interacting with a broader community, I don't know what is. Let's think about it... Connected to 1 server spamming a dead LFG channel - OR - being linked up with ALL servers and meeting new people everyday via the dungeon finder. Heck, this game could even offer a quest finder and teleport people into there quest instance. But that is asking too much, literally. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hardicon Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 its why the have respecs. want to find a group respec to tank for the flashpoint. then respec back to dps. the only problem with that is having to have two different sets of gear. but most people wont do that, they will try to tank in their dps gear and heal in their tank gear. which is the biggest reason i dont like dual spec. most people wont gear out multiple specs but still think they should be invited. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jHawkes Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 On the other hand, go read the city of heroes forums. Although there is a tank class in COH the game was designed to avoid the whole "holy trinity" gameplay mechanics, and still it is impossible to log on without seeing a dozen "need tank for x" or "need healzor for x" requests. And in COH referring to someone as a healer is grounds for a fight Even if the game avoids the mechanics the players will tend to slide back into the mentality that they are comfortable with. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vydor_HC Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 Ever play any sort of organized team sport? There are different positions, i.e. roles. A group in an MMO is like a team, everyone has their specialty. Yup. I play MMO's for character development in a specific role. I like the fact that I have to team up with others to accomplish a goal and do not begrudge the game for it. When I want to play a game where I can be anything I want, I play CS or Battlefield or any of the other instant action lobby games out there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Snozberries Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 Wasn't SWTOR even supposed to abolish the trinity? I like that the roles aren't quite as pronounced as in some other mmos, but they are definitely still there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rylixav Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 Yeah, I too am sick of the Tank/Heal/DPS holy trinity. But developers know it works, and coming up with a new and creative system is hard. It's much easier to just copy what worked from other games and go with it. The really sad thing is there aren't even any promising MMOs on the horizon that might break the trinity. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RasereiAmok Posted January 5, 2012 Author Share Posted January 5, 2012 It's really common sense... Think to yourself one second. Do you want to wait anywhere from 20 minutes to 2 hours searching for a dungeon group. (Very random) OR Be able to queue up with every server and get a dungeon group in less than 10 minutes. (Probably instantly if you are a tank or healer) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scrimpton Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 This game discourages any sort of social interaction anyway. everybody is taught to just solo everything. bored. as. ****. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Turando Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 I would agree, most people like to dps, I know I do. I will be so bold to say, there is no good alternative to the trinity system. If you appease the player base, and everybody get's to dps. Then what does that mean? If nobody heals, there really can't be any damage going out. That reduces encounters to obeying fight mechanics and dps race before an enrage timer. This gets old really quick. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RavenGlenn Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 It's really common sense... Think to yourself one second. Do you want to wait anywhere from 20 minutes to 2 hours searching for a dungeon group. (Very random) OR Be able to queue up with every server and get a dungeon group in less than 10 minutes. (Probably instantly if you are a tank or healer) Or...I could just ask folks in the guild or on the community channels that I'm in and get a group nearly instantly. Hmm...I think I'll stick with my community situation so that I know the people I'm with and we all work together as friends. Hey! Maybe you should try that! Make some friends! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rylixav Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 (edited) I have often considered the same points you are making, but you don't propose a solution. What would the difference between classes look like? You can't let tank or healers DPS as well as dedicated DPSers or the DPS class would be pointless. So what do you do just make everyone the same? Well making everyone the same is a potential solution. You can give DPS, healing, and tanking abilities to everyone. Get rid of the whole concept of aggro, and have the enemy mobs attack players at random instead of focusing on a single tank. You wouldn't be able to just stand in the back of the room and lay down dps on the boss. When a mob targets you, it's time to use your tanking abilities to survive (maybe switch from a dps rotation to a tanking rotation), until it switches to someone else. Now everyone is a tank, and all encounters demand a basic knowledge of tanking from all players (as opposed to the standard system of "take Patchwerk over there and keep him still, while I throw fireballs at his head"). Then get rid of dedicated healing specs as well. Attach healing secondary effects to players' DPS abilities (think RIFT's chloromancer). The more DPS you do, the more healing you do. Now every player is equally responsible for damaging the boss, protecting themselves from attack, and healing themselves and their fellow raiders. I'm not suggesting they'll ever implement this in SWTOR, but there are alternatives to the holy trinity that has become standard in every game now. Edit: Giving every class tanking, healing, and DPSing abilities doesn't mean they would all work the same way though. They could still have unique abilities and rotations/priorities. Marauders and Gunslingers are both pure DPS, but they don't play the same way. Edited January 5, 2012 by rylixav Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zedakah Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 (edited) I have often considered the same points you are making, but you don't propose a solution. What would the difference between classes look like? You can't let tank or healers DPS as well as dedicated DPSers or the DPS class would be pointless. So what do you do just make everyone the same? One problem is dungeon design. Most dungeons are linear and require all party members for every encounter. This constitutes the necessity of someone to soak damage and another to heal. Most all dungeons have this singular design. Now, I will say they are trying a lot harder in this game to be different in flashpoints than a lot of other games. For example, the Calicoid flashpoint. If you haven't done this instance, it is new and innovative with minigames and puzzles that require teamwork and not heals or tanks. There's an arcade style shooter minigame for all players as well as a nice puzzle that requires 1-2 team members to be left out of the fights, because they must hold the gate open. You still need a tank and healer for the last boss, but this seems to be the first step to getting out of the trinity mentality. Props to you dev team for a new style of instance. The first flashpoint is a 2-man flashpoint. I have done this with 2 pure dps classes and our companions just fine. If we had more 2-man flashpoints, that would alleviate the trinity mentality as well. Leveling up feels like doing solo instances (which I really enjoy the feeling of fighting through the story), but having 2 or 3 man instances would be a treat. We all have a tank or healer companion that can always fill a role if needed. Another option for a 4-man flashpoint without class requirements that I rarely ever see is a non-linear instance. For example, there is a fork in the road where 2 people must go one way and 2 go the other. The mobs would be easier or fewer so that any combination could take them down. But both pairs would have to achieve a goal for each side to proceed. Not only does this get rid of the classes, but it has better replay value as you could go different directions. The Thorim boss encounter in Ulduar (WoW) has a similar mechanic here, however it still requires the tank/healer makeup. The most notable problem I have with the necessity of classes in this game is world heroic quests. It is very difficult to find players willing to group up to do heroics in this game while leveling. Many players choose to go dps while questing to level, even if they intend to tank or heal at max level. Finding a group (as a dps) for those heroic (4) quests is time-consuming and difficult to organize. At higher levels, there are many heroic (4) and hardly any heroic (2). Even a heroic (3) could get by without a dedicated tank or healer if done properly. Anyway, the tl;dr is that creative dungeon design and/or more 2-person flashpoints will negate the need for the mmo trinity. Colicoid is a good example of this and a step in the right direction, despite still needed those roles. I am not against having instances with tanks and healers, I just get bored when every single flashpoint in all mmo's have the same linear design and require certain classes. Edited January 5, 2012 by Zedakah Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dreadpirateandy Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 (edited) I think they need to change the difficulty of flashpoints to require a group of around 10 people, but still only 1 tank and 1 healer. That way you won't have queues since almost three times as many DPS can get through the queue than in the standard 5 man group. Either that or make them all so stupidly easy that you just need 5 dps. Edited January 5, 2012 by dreadpirateandy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Qoojo Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 Games that abolish the need for tanks and healers are called single player games. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dranzen Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 (edited) Players nowadays want convenience. It is not convenient to have to search for hours in LFG for a healer or tank. That died a long time ago... Even Everquest has adopted a dungeon finder. RIFT adopted a dungeon finder. Some didn't join that "bandwagon", but honestly, this new automated dungeon finder is the way to go. And cross server, so all players are connected somehow. If that is not interacting with a broader community, I don't know what is. Let's think about it... Connected to 1 server spamming a dead LFG channel - OR - being linked up with ALL servers and meeting new people everyday via the dungeon finder. Heck, this game could even offer a quest finder and teleport people into there quest instance. But that is asking too much, literally. Then maybe you need to roll a healer or tank As others have said, games that deviate from the trinity become far too easy. The dungeons and raids are steam rolled. If Bioware did something like Rift where each class had a number of respec options then the game would lose the Advanced Class mantra, which is one of the things that makes this game unique. In my opinion the only difficult role to find currently is the healer and I believe that people aren't rolling heals because the UI is horrible, it's not conducive to tight healing, and there are no macros ie @mouseover macros. Edited January 5, 2012 by Dranzen Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rylixav Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 (edited) If Bioware did something like Rift where each class had a number of respec options then the game would lose the Advanced Class mantra, which is one of the things that makes this game unique. If by "unique" you actually mean "just like every other big name MMO." Edited January 5, 2012 by rylixav Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elyons Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 The tank, healer, DPS mindset for grouping. This doesn't work in the long run. You will force certain players to play a healer or tank when they really just want to DPS. The ONLY MMO that I have seen that makes this work is World of Warcraft. Don't flame cause I said WoW, I have played just about every single MMO for the past 14 years. Keywords: Cross server dungeon finder Bioware said that they don't want dungeon queues (even per server) because they want the community to interact. Well Bioware, what happens in a few months when there barely is a community and this "cross server queue" is still demanded. You are in the same boat as you are now except minus a ton of players. The amount of players who enjoy playing a DPS class outweighs the amount of tanks and healers. It makes no sense for games to expect every group to have a role not many people want to play. You need to consider the PSYCHOLOGICAL aspect. There might be 5 tanks on, but maybe all of them ONLY group with friends/guildmates. Thats perfectly fine, but what about that large chunk of playerbase that is a solo player or plays with a few friends who happen to be all DPS. The entire mechanic of tank, healer, DPS makes no logical sense except for a timesink. Let's wait 2 hours to do a 1 hour dungeon.... That's 3 hours and that is assuming you complete it. Risk vs. reward.... Why waste 3 hours? I'll honestly play a different game. Again. My signature Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xioix Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 300 million dollars couldn't come up with something better than the Holy Trinity? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elyons Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 If by "unique" you actually mean "just like every other big name MMO." Better voice over system then EQ. Better class mechanic then WoW. (Minus the skill delay.) The only players who don't find this game unique are the ones who play there operatives like they would a sniper. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Astron_ Posted January 5, 2012 Share Posted January 5, 2012 Again. My signature The fail is strong in this one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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