Dungeon Finder Needed Badly

[Skaara]

I'm all for a toggle for single server or cross server myself. There is no reason anyone should be forced into using a cross server system if they do not want to. That goes for all the chat spammers as well ... spam your heart out ... I support you and your style of play.

[SFAMerken]

Wow, did you really call people who just want another option to do groups selfish.

 

How is it not selfish that you want EVERYONE to conform to your style and only your style. Hypocrite much??

 

Again, how are we selfish for wanting a solution that you in absolutely zero way are forced to use??

 

Can be me but he stated something about common ground, while you just want it "your" way and if someone doesn't agree it's your view that that person is wrong and selfish.

 

I for 1 will be glad if they will never ever implement a cross-server LFG because that is what lets annoying ppl ruin the fun for others.

 

Yes in principle LFG is a great tool, but it won't work for the same reason as a socialist society would never work:

In general a person will only look out for himself in the first place and when he/she has to step over other ppl to get what they want they more often will do so then don't.

 

Now i assume you are going to call me selfish again because i say something else then you want me to say but in that case: you can prevent aggravation with properly reading before you judge.

[Skaara]

Can be me but he stated something about common ground, while you just want it "your" way and if someone doesn't agree it's your view that that person is wrong and selfish.

 

I for 1 will be glad if they will never ever implement a cross-server LFG because that is what lets annoying ppl ruin the fun for others.

 

Yes in principle LFG is a great tool, but it won't work for the same reason as a socialist society would never work:

In general a person will only look out for himself in the first place and when he/she has to step over other ppl to get what they want they more often will do so then don't.

 

Now i assume you are going to call me selfish again because i say something else then you want me to say but in that case: you can prevent aggravation with properly reading before you judge.

 

Read my previous post, I support his as well. I would never be that close minded as to state that their way is not right for them. I also missed the part where you would be forced to use it.

Edited January 27, 2012 by Skaara

[Nemmar]

Wow, did you really call people who just want another option to do groups selfish.

 

How is it not selfish that you want EVERYONE to conform to your style and only your style. Hypocrite much??

 

Again, how are we selfish for wanting a solution that you in absolutely zero way are forced to use??

 

Did you even read what i posted? Because it doesnt sound like it.

 

I stated "lets work to find common ground to please both crowds" and you're acusing me of beeing hypocrite? I'm sorry, but my personal opinion is not to bother keeping this debate with you. I dont think you have the abilities to understand what is beeing said here. And, from what i can tell you are a perfect example of someone who would abuse the system.

[Manathayria]

There is a deterrent for cross server wich is it beeing a paid service.

 

Just cause you deny the problem exists doesnt make it go away. It is very real. If its in the same server, that person can be "publicly" pointed out for their behaviour as a warning to others in the server. That will definitly makes it alot harder for them to get into groups and guilds.

Cross-realm? sure pay up and do it. Do it every time? Sure, At least you're supporting "our" game. Also, one day he will run out of servers to cross to.

Now, I want to address something, because I realize as well that some among us may not be aware of this or just gloss over it because they don't mind what actually occurs in other games, and it just occurred to me.

 

Now, I'm on an RP server - in my experience, rp servers are generally a tighter knit community than most. However, when I see people ***** in general about a 'ninja' I usually see the response in general of:

 

Put him on ignore and move on.

You'll out level it soon anyway.

Lol there's better in Ops.

 

So... where's the social pressure that's so paramount in people getting blacklisted on a server now? Oh, right, people realized that there have been massive grief campaigns by larger guilds to get one person blacklisted off many other people's groups because that individual left their guild, or decided to go against one of their decisions.

 

The player base is more jaded, and overall, ignore the screams of 'ninja!' more. They realize at this point that the person rolling on that piece of gear/other may also be the same class/have the same itemization as you need, and, therefore, need the same gear even though you need it too. People also realize, as has been stated elsewhere, that a larger guild has full capability of ruining someone's reputation and griefing them off a server if they chose. Also, many of us realize mistakes happen - which is why a change in loot rules (as mentioned in my post) would help solve some of the issues to keep honest people honest.

 

Which is the reason you usually see 'ignore them and move on'.

 

There is a kick option - or should be - for a reason. It should not only be in the leader's control. There is also an ignore option for the same reason.

 

This said - I have personal experience with the masses griefing a few. This was on a PvE server this time, not an RP server.

 

I was in a guild which had issues with a few other guilds on our server. Now, the issues stemmed from our guild leader making armor for materials. Essentially - you bring him materials, he makes you your stuff free or for tips, you go on your merry way. The other reason was, our guild leader saw no reason not to be honest and blunt with what he had to say - he was not afraid to share his opinion, or admit he was wrong when he was. But the bigger guilds hated that he was like that. They also looked down on the guild for accepting anyone as long as they didn't act rudely to guild, or act too far out of line in general chat.

 

Stepping over the line in chat included insulting any of the guilds we knew had an issue with us - realize, we didn't have issues with them, they had issues with us. We congratulated those guilds for their achievements, we did not step our of our way to belittle them as they did us. Though I do remember getting into arguments with them off and on.

 

Now, I joined this guild knowing they were called spammers, scrubs and all kinds of other things. I ran with these people for a full year - I saw the commentary about them, and on joining some groups I got a negative reaction for my association with them. At the end of the runs I always got commentary on how well I did, and that they didn't understand why the guild I was in had a bad rep. I told them what I said above, and usually, they walked away better educated and without issues with the guild - and started grouping with us more.

 

If I had been a sheep and let others dictate who was good enough, and let them dictate who I could be in guild with to run content, I wouldn't have been in such good company while I played in AoC, and I probably would have left the game sooner. The AoC community can be far worse than anything in WoW on a good day, it was a very toxic community. On a bad day, they make the WoW community look perfect.

 

Just as community can be helped by people warning you about others - it can also be hurt. Keep that in mind next time you have the urge to follow the crowd in shunning someone without having been in group with them and knowing all the facts.

[SFAMerken]

Read my previous post, I support his as well. I would never be that close minded as to state that their way is not right for them. I also missed the part where you would be forced to use it.

 

Agreed

Edited January 27, 2012 by SFAMerken
missing the quote i agreed to

[Sczisnad]

I would like to point out the fact that if you do not want to have the LFG system added, it must be the case that you are against other people using it to find groups for content.

 

This is because if you hate the idea of the LFG system then you yourself would not use it.

 

That much is obvious, so then the problem, for the person who does not like the LFG system, is that they do not want others getting into Flashpoints this way. And further they probably are worried that because people are using the LFG system it will be harder for them to get groups.

 

Despite any argument either way on the LFG issue, one cannot deny that it is selfish to want to inconvenience others just so you can have your way.

[Skaara]

Did you even read what i posted? Because it doesnt sound like it.

 

I stated "lets work to find common ground to please both crowds" and you're acusing me of beeing hypocrite? I'm sorry, but my personal opinion is not to bother keeping this debate with you. I dont think you have the abilities to understand what is beeing said here. And, from what i can tell you are a perfect example of someone who would abuse the system.

 

Yeah, I read it and I don't believe you. I don't think you have any intention of finding a middle ground and instead just want to keep your I got mine club going as it is instead of finding solutions. Many solutions have been provided and your kind just keeps beating to the derp lfg killed wow drum. I think it made wow better than it has ever been .... ever.

Edited January 27, 2012 by Skaara

[Nemmar]

Hi again Manathayria.

 

Your post is very sensible. I just want to add that the regular rules of real life society also apply to an online society aslong as there are consequences for behaviour.

So while a party that has a bad experience with a ninja can try to shun him, im sure normal people will give him/her a chance. This sort of bad rep isnt built in a day, but in several days of always griefing the community.

 

Now if you remove this ability to the community, they will sadly have free reign to do whatever they want with no possible reprisal.

Edited January 27, 2012 by Nemmar

[Neiloch]

Hi again Manathayria.

 

Your post is very sensible. I just want to add that the regular rules of real life society also apply to an online society aslong as there are consequences for behaviour.

So while a party that has a bad experience with a ninja can try to shun him, im sure normal people will give him/her a chance. This sort of bad rep isnt built in a day, but in several days of always griefing the community.

 

Now if you remove this ability to the community, they will sadly have free reign to do whatever they want with no possible reprisal.

 

So your stance is that there are people who just ALWAYS grief on cross server LFG? Well even if they exist they definitely don't exist en masse. Isolated incidents DO NOT justify putting something down.

 

Otherwise the person who griefs same server and cross server only a few times is the same, little to no bad reputation, very little chance of social reprisal. Anyone who would grief enough in either same server or cross server would draw enough reports to merit punishment, either officially by CS or the community. If someone is managing to grief repeatedly with no report, that would be the communities fault.

 

I wouldn't be surprised even if people were brought around to accepting a DF they would vehemently oppose the optional cross server. It would just be 'step 2' of a likely more popular option being available thus dwarfing others.

 

But yeah, I'm all for it being optional.

Edited January 28, 2012 by Neiloch

[Manathayria]

We do want to give people the option to take part in cross server or not.

 

[]server only

[]cross server

 

Where the people that are looking to go [server only] have that option to avoid cross server, or can venture cross server if they wish due to slow q times. Understand, those picking cross server could still end up in group with those that are cross as long as the person qed for cross server is on their server. We need more tools, not less for finding groups.

 

However, as it stands right now we don't know what tool they're putting in, but everything right now indicates that the system they're looking at (for now) will be server only. So we 'should' be looking at the social checks people keep mentioning, however, bioware has mentioned being willing to revisit the concept of cross server later.

[Rikia]

LFG tool will not increase the amount of tanks and healers available. You may have the option to queue and do your things, which in many thread people actually mentioned it that you want to use your time wisely. Which is fine, but it will not shorten the wait time. Due to this, people will probably ask for Dual-Spec.. or even Adv-Class respec. If they do this they have to think of another loot rule cause it WILL cause issues. Hell it already causes conflict for companion loot, vendor loot and so on.

 

Those people who are actually forming groups as a guild will pretty much have no impact having LFG tool or not, since they don't actually pug much. The very sentences when you see a Post on WoW forums writing about their awfull experience during the LFG tool is usually followed by "Guild Group" or "DO it with friends". Makes sence doesn't it? But if you are actually doing with them you don't need a LFG to begin with.

 

I will not write down my experience in the LFG tool. It had more bad than good. But that is as many say "Thats your experience not mine". My opinion is no more important than anyone else. It could be only me, but whenever I form up a group be it Heroic 2/4 or Flashpoint, and I finally get a group together (or not) I always try to make the group a success by trying to communicate with others. Sure that is true aswell with LFG tool, however you also have the other aspect of "What the hell, I will drop this group and look for another". As a DPS thats really not much of an option since you know how awfull it is to wait for a long time for another group to be available. As a tank and healer not so much. This, has been said countless time so I won't go any further. But you cannot deny the logic behind it.

 

Did these problems existed before the LFG? Yes it did. But also it did existed the value of your reputation in your server. (this will not be much of an issue if it was server wide tool). Did tanks leave dungeons pre-LFG. Yes, but not to the extent of 1 wipe = leave. At least they had more tolerance.

 

I could suggest an improvement that may be easy to implement. Basically whenever you accept a Heroic 2/4 mission or a Flashpoint mission let the system ask you if you want to put your LFG flag on, if possible to insert the quest/flashpoint name aswell. What does this help? Well at least for those people who want to start a group has an easier time.

 

Finally, would I want a LFG tool like wow? Only to a certain extent. I can live without it, I have played FFXI for 10 years which used the exact same lfg system SWTOR has, I can live with what I got now. Not comfortable but works if everyone else start using them. Should LFG tool gets implemented, just to form up group automatically and server wide only. I know about the queues, just look at lvl 50 bracket PVP. At the very least you will start recognizing people in your server, instead of a random person every single group which you will never group again. If you like your group mate... maybe you can add your friend list, or even invite in your guild if he/she is guildless. On cross server, you can't really do that.

Edited January 28, 2012 by Rikia

[subrosian]

I like how we have a group of 10 people basically repeating the same posts over-and-over again and attacking anyone who disagrees with them. If Bioware makes the mistake of listening to basically 10 people who are complaining to each other until they hit thread cap, and ruins the game because of it, at least we'll know who to blame.

 

You haven't refuted, at all, the issues that finders cause, in fact, you've only demonstrated your ignorance of how they ruin MMOs. I've written the devs privately on the issue, and frankly? I won't stick around to see what the game becomes if they ever implement such a system.

 

Rewarding lazy players is a poor design choice. It ultimately leads to the downfall of the game, as only the worst players (by your own admission - since you claim the guild / social-network type players won't use it) will be in the queue, you will simply be queueing fail group after fail group.

 

You then claim you won't come on the forum whining for nerfs... and yet we have dozens upon dozens of posts by your own supporters who are asking for an easy mode... so it's bogus. This is a veiled way of trying to force nerfs on Flashpoint and Operations content, nothing more, and any further argument against it is simply an admission that you are a bad and want to see the game destroyed.

 

-

 

Period.

 

WoW has all your finders. You're not playing WoW, why? Because WoW died... and it died because of its culture of easy-mode content, DPS meters, gearscore and other "we don't actually want to have to be good at the game to complete content" type thinking. It died because of the entitlement generation going "we pay $15 a month, we get whatever we want".

 

No, you don't.

 

I'm not adding further to this, it's not happening, make as many threads as you want, such a tool being implemented just because 10 people and their alts want to spam the forum would be the death toll of the game.

[Neiloch]

I like how we have a group of 10 people basically repeating the same posts over-and-over again and attacking anyone who disagrees with them. If Bioware makes the mistake of listening to basically 10 people who are complaining to each other until they hit thread cap, and ruins the game because of it, at least we'll know who to blame. - Much more than 10 people have posted in favor, just not all of them keep up with this thread as well as many of them simply not posting on the forum.

 

You haven't refuted, at all, the issues that finders cause, in fact, you've only demonstrated your ignorance of how they ruin MMOs. I've written the devs privately on the issue, and frankly? I won't stick around to see what the game becomes if they ever implement such a system. - The 'issues' finders cause have been refuted by their very existence. People use them, people like them, so much so they are GAINING popularity across MMO's.

 

Rewarding lazy players is a poor design choice. It ultimately leads to the downfall of the game, as only the worst players (by your own admission - since you claim the guild / social-network type players won't use it) will be in the queue, you will simply be queueing fail group after fail group. - OH THE LAZY PLAYERS ARGUMENT. Yes because I don't spend time that would equate to a part time job on the game all in effort to get groups, not raids, groups, I am lazy. 'Fail group after fail group' again refuted by the existence of DF's in MMO's and this simply not happening. I would suggest not basing your arguments on absolutes as any exception destroys your argument.

 

You then claim you won't come on the forum whining for nerfs... and yet we have dozens upon dozens of posts by your own supporters who are asking for an easy mode... so it's bogus. This is a veiled way of trying to force nerfs on Flashpoint and Operations content, nothing more, and any further argument against it is simply an admission that you are a bad and want to see the game destroyed. - Dozens of people crying for nerfs? elsewhere I assume. Nothing more than a veiled nerf attempt? OH WE'VE BEEN FOUND OUT GUIS! what are we gonna do?! Our huge coup to get content nerfed, and nothing more, has been found out! And this only step one in our plan to have this game destroyed, for some reason. That's right we are secret agents drawn from several other MMO companies to come and take down SWTOR from the inside.

 

-

 

Period. - lol.

 

WoW has all your finders. You're not playing WoW, why? Because WoW died... and it died because of its culture of easy-mode content, DPS meters, gearscore and other "we don't actually want to have to be good at the game to complete content" type thinking. It died because of the entitlement generation going "we pay $15 a month, we get whatever we want". - WoW died? When? It's doing worse than Warhammer Online? What an upset! Why hasn't anyone told me this! Also lol at DPS meters being part of it. DPS meters biggest supporter are from people who love hard content.

 

No, you don't.

 

I'm not adding further to this, it's not happening, make as many threads as you want, such a tool being implemented just because 10 people and their alts want to spam the forum would be the death toll of the game. - lol at us using alts to trump this up. I'd love to hear your stance on various conspiracy theories which I am sure you have.

 

It is STAGGERING how much of this post isn't true.

 

FYI I am a hardcore raider, if raiding isn't in a game I won't even look at it to try casually. I love spending several nights in a row working on a single, insanely hard fight for that HUGE reward at the end. So much so I am currently in a top world wide raiding guild on EQ2. (http://eq2.guildprogress.com/ revelations on butcherblock)

 

As a raider and hard content loving player, I am in FULL SUPPORT of a DF because if I want to participate in hard content and raids with specific set of players it will be ENTIRELY POSSIBLE even with a cross server DF tool. thank you.

Edited January 28, 2012 by Neiloch

[Sendrel]

I'm not adding further to this, it's not happening, make as many threads as you want, such a tool being implemented just because 10 people and their alts want to spam the forum would be the death toll of the game.

 

You're delusional if you don't think a fully functional, cross server LFD will, at some point, be implemented.

 

Delusional.

[Touchbass]

You're delusional if you don't think a fully functional, cross server LFD will, at some point, be implemented.

 

Delusional.

 

Yeah, Bioware didn't have time to implement a proper tool ... just look at the current tool, if anyone thinks that is anything other then a joke I don't know what to say.

 

 

BTW ... why the hell did the thread cap I was sleeping ...

[BlueSkittles]

Going through the old thread looking for nuggets of truth. Found nothing new so far, but I did find this funny post from carnac_fett, who I think has thus far unsubscribed from SWTOR. At the early stages of this thread he was a great Pro-LFG poster.

 

 

ofc sitting on fleet waiting until something happens will not work, you have to talk and socialize with others.

 

Good day, sir!

 

Why, good day to you.

 

Lovely weather we're having.

 

Yes, I quite agree.

 

I was wondering if perhaps you would like to run a flashpoint with me?

 

Sir! I am offended. We must SOCIALIZE first or we risk DESTROYING our great server community.

 

My sincerest apologies. What have you had for lunch today?

 

Tea and a lunchable. Delectable.

 

My mouth waters!

 

Yes indeed.

 

Well, I do believe we have socialized enough.

 

I suppose so! Has our group filled up yet?

 

I am aghast. It has not. Somehow our idle conversation has not automatically filled our group.

 

It does seem that way. Looks like we're out of options.

 

Indubitably. We return to the old standby!

 

LF2M FOR HAMMER STATION NEED HEALER

 

LF2M FOR HAMMER STATION NEED HEALER

 

LF2M FOR HAMMER STATION NEED HEALER

 

LF2M FOR HAMMER STATION NEED HEALER

 

My deepest apologies, but we have been searching for twenty minutes. I must go and water my considerable garden. My begonias are looking dreadful. Good day!

 

LF3M FOR HAMMER STATION NEED HEALER

 

LF3M FOR HAMMER STATION NEED HEALER

[BlueSkittles]

Yeah, Bioware didn't have time to implement a proper tool ... just look at the current tool, if anyone thinks that is anything other then a joke I don't know what to say.

 

 

BTW ... why the hell did the thread cap I was sleeping ...

 

Touch! We've left some space for you on Page 1. Just send me/Aeon any info you want posted and we'll edit our posts.

[Skaara]

Yeah, Bioware didn't have time to implement a proper tool ... just look at the current tool, if anyone thinks that is anything other then a joke I don't know what to say.

 

 

BTW ... why the hell did the thread cap I was sleeping ...

 

It was a while ago, something about too many posts blah blah blah and this one was opened.

[Touchbass]

Touch! We've left some space for you on Page 1. Just send me/Aeon any info you want posted and we'll edit our posts.

 

Thanks Blue Yeah I work a spilt shift so nights/days rotations starting this morning and tomorrow morning so I ended up sleeping in. I was thread watching early in the week and the devs didn't cap it

 

I got your message, thanks for thinking of moi! Would you mind inserting my Mega-Post in? I believe someone mentioned earlier we need to have a Q&A thread on the matter, I can or someone else can work on that tonight or we can all work on it bit by bit and when it's finish put it in place of my mega post.

 

What do you think?

[BlueSkittles]

Thanks Blue Yeah I work a spilt shift so nights/days rotations starting this morning and tomorrow morning so I ended up sleeping in. I was thread watching early in the week and the devs didn't cap it

 

I got your message, thanks for thinking of moi! Would you mind inserting my Mega-Post in? I believe someone mentioned earlier we need to have a Q&A thread on the matter, I can or someone else can work on that tonight or we can all work on it bit by bit and when it's finish put it in place of my mega post.

 

What do you think?

 

Done! Either message me with it or make a new post and I'll copy it from there. Whatever works for you.

[Touchbass]

It's over the message Threshold so I'll just put in down here rather then chop it up a bunch of times

[Touchbass]

Dr. Blizzard or: How I learned to stop worrying and love the X-LFD

 

Before we begin our discussion, I'd like to start off with two extremely positive things X-LFD has brought to the MMORPG community. I'm not saying these two particular benefits make the X-LFD mandatory, but for us to have any kind of a civilized conversation you need to first recognize the inherent benefits X-LFD has brought to these two issues.

 

1) The saviour of low population servers/factions

 

The global LFD tool basically prevented low population servers from hemorrhaging players and salvaged a ton of communities from what a lot of players had previously written off. For those who are unaware, there are currently servers in WoW with less than 30-40 players on a faction at max level at a given time during peak hours. You can literally spam for hours and not receive any replies, its quiet depressing in fact. To be an unfortunate individual stuck on one of those servers, you tend to have one out of threeoptions: spend real life money to transfer off, quit the game, or play the game in a limited capacity. I don’t have the numbers for each of those three options but I’m sure to some of those left on the server felt as if they were on a ‘sinking ship’. When the LFG hit, populations took surges and people came back again. Players could gear themselves up independently of the server being in shambles and guilds were allowed spend their time tackling raids instead of searching for the elusive member(s) to fill out the dungeon group.

 

2) Access to low level content

 

I’ve seen some servers with more naked BE’s running around Orgimmar begging for doubloons than the entire max level base of other servers, even with these massive populations problems can still exist. While the good times were rolling (or dancing on mailboxes), hardly anybody was running low level dungeons. The problem wasn't lack of interest (as inherent of how easy it is now to get a group for lower level dungeons regardless of your group role), the issue was that it is time consuming and a pain in the butt to track down people and fill out the trinity for content that you could of probably leveled out of by the time you finished the bloody dungeon in the first place. With the addition of LFD, leveling became less of a pain if it wasn't your thing and created access. I don't think a lot of people realize that with the LFD a lot of players for the first time got to see these dungeons within the appropriate difficulty parameters.

 

 

The next section is some insight into why the whole LFD crisis came up in the first place

 

1) Gaming demographics have changed

 

The average face of a MMORPG gamer has changed dramatically over the past, we are melting pot of veterans, power games, stay at home dad/moms, the unemployed, the mentally ill, casual gamers and multi-platform gamers. Due to the mass appeal, subscriptions have soared like never before and have brought unforeseen consequences when the play styles of some of these gamers have clashed. The challenge is how we accommodate players of differing extremes: some want tight-knit communities that encourage and require players to work together, players who support grouping within same server but demand working reliable tools to facilitate the process, and finally players who frankly just want access to the game they paid for at their convenience.

 

2) Why should we be catering to these different crowds?

 

Money. The things money buys is good for an MMORPG, it allows it to evolve and address the concerns of players in a reasonable amount of time. The wheeled engine of WoW costs a tremendous amount of money to run, if we got rid of all those players that didn't fit 100% into our ideologies of what a gamer should be we'd see substantial loss of customer service, R&D and free content patches to just name a few things. More importantly, life sometimes makes you transition your availability due to work/school/annoying wife, if a game you truly enjoy is built around one play style you'd be up the creek without a paddle if you can't obligate that time anymore. All of us are probably guilty of taking advantage of the benefits brought to us from our fellow gamers; we need to be more sympathetic to their plight.

 

3) This isn't Kansas anymore

 

Don't let anyone fool you, traditional MMORPG's were built on the concept of ludicrous grinds that basically required an obscene amount of time to reach max level. Now don't confuse my words, this isn't a discussion of how long the leveling process should take or am I advocating the hitting of max level of not being an accomplishment - what I am trying to say is the gaming atmosphere of old which doesn't exist in any practical sense to the target markets Western MMO's are trying to reach out towards. We are spending countless resources trying to redo the leveling process and making it alt friendly, why would we do that when the hard cores spend most of their time at max level? We do this because they are no longer the majority of the player base and the genre has evolved for better or worse, the pockets of the many out weight the pockets of the few.

 

 

4) The Rise of the Titans

 

The height of MMORPG's are communities (think of the name itself), they are living bustling entities that evolve even when you aren't logged on. One of the most efficient and memorable ways of binding a community is the requirement of other players to facilitate something, whether a crafting ingredient or his/her help in a group for example. This created an atmosphere were people who put any resemblance of effort to becoming actually integrated into server and those who caused any problems where chastised and shunned. Imagine advertising your group intentions in whatever deemed appropriate channel and being able to categorize all of your responses with the notation of whether that person is worth grouping with or a waste of time. Don't underplay the notion that servers felt distinctly different from one another and had an identify, rolling need for an off spec item if that was taboo on the server could literally blacklist you. Wait, why is any of this deemed a problem?

 

5) Square peg meets the round hole

 

I'd like to take a moment to introduce myself at this point, hi my name is Charles and I'm a tank. I was the living breathing personification of the aforementioned lifestyle, I'd log to receive a plethora of tells to clear up dungeons for friends on off nights and raid like men on main nights. Everything was going great until I had my son; life and my game time started to change drastically for me at this point. No longer could I commit set chunks of time to play due to child raising duties and I was conversely dropped off the guilds active roster as the tank. I was still able to complete dungeons and occasionally fill in to OT but something fundamentally changed, getting premade groups became difficult for me. What changed wasn't that I become unpopular or my skills had waned to the point of “noobery”, what had fundamentally changed was how much of a hassle everything had become. Before I’d plan to play only 3 hours due to other obligations, I’d log on, see who’s on and we’d negotiate when we’d start. This would allow me to delay my set chunk of time to later or start it immediately and get off, now when I tried to get groups together it was a one shot deal and if people were indisposed at the moment I was unable to get anything done. After weeks of incomplete game time I regrettably said my farewells to my server top guild and only came back for expansion releases (when groups are easy to find) and permanently when the LFD came out.

 

This next part I attempt to highlight why certain situations paved the way for the LFD in the first place, I’ll be making some assumptions but anyone with a dog in the fight (aka has a job and/or family life) will understand that they are reasonable and fair.

 

 

1)Not everyone has 24/7 availability

 

If you work a full-time you only really have between 3-4 hours of playtime a night before you are significantly affecting other areas of your life. Weekends are a different story, sometimes you get to play a lot and sometimes you have less time then weekdays, but let’s say you squeeze in 10 hours total across the weekend. I’m being very generous with the above allotted times, if you have any outside obligations, hobbies, studies, other games of interest or a family, those times allotted are going to skyrocket down. That equals 25 hours of playtime roughly week for a medium to borderline hard core gamer, where I personally think most people are between 11-16 hours. Some people think spending an hour to form a group of “friends” online is acceptable gameplay, while I won’t say that they are wrong but I’m going to say a lot of others disagree strongly.

 

 

2)Think LFD causes problems? The old model was worse

 

Now picture you log on for your daily bread (I mean hours) and instead of going out and enjoying the world you have to stand around a capital city to ask for a group. You just got off work and already you’re not having fun, you’re being forced to work to enjoy yourself. Under the old model it used to take around 20 minutes at minimal for assembling the group and arrival at the instance, some people could get it done faster and others, well couldn’t get it done at all for various reasons. Now imagine someone has to go, god forbid it’s a tank and that means someone has to leave the instance to ask again, by this point another player may drop and your run could be over. Having a run collapse can eat upwards of 2 hours of someone’s play time, if not more. Losing that time may not be a big deal to someone but if they only have 11-16 hours to play a week, not being able to get a dungeon off the ground is going to cost them a significant chunk of their playtime for the week and not including the time it takes to assemble another one.

 

3)The solution that worked for most gamers

 

With the addition of the LFD tool, gamers where finally given a tool that could maximize a person’s time in an efficient manner. When you click that button you know you have roughly between 10 and 30 minutes at longest before you group starts. This gave players the option of doing some dailies, farming some particular items or doing something quick in real life, regardless of their choice they were finally using their time to something they wished. This isn’t as much about the length of time but the expected duration of how long a particular task will take which is important. If I know I that when I log on and I have 3 hours to play and I can calculate it’ll take me 30 minutes to assemble a group, 1 hour to complete it and 45 minutes to do my dailies afterwards I’ll be a happy customer. Now imagine I log on, spend over an hour trying to find a group and can’t complete the group, by the time I reach the point where I can no longer finish the dungeon due to time constraints I’m going to rush through my dailies in a bitter mood. This doesn’t have to happen many times for people to throw up their hands and say to “hell with it”.

 

4)Work odd hour or strangely irregular hours

 

One of the biggest groups that got punished were those who didn’t game when the rest of us were online. Think you got issues assembling a group in the pre-LFD days, trying being online when there aren’t even 5 people online at your level. For years they were told to relocate to a server that best fits their needs, ignore the content entirely or quit. I shouldn’t have to go into why there is something substantial wrong with the above helpful advice and in fact I won’t.

 

5)The player level bubble

 

This sort of ties within an earlier point but I just wanted to expand on it quickly. Group content is great when it’s accessible now imagining having no one around you to complete it. If the majority of players are at max level how are you supposed to perform group activities prior to the level cap? The old model was beg in /1 or coerce a guildie into feeling bad enough to run you through it. This is the reason WoW removed the majority of elite group quests, not because people weren’t interested in them but because people couldn’t get them done in a reasonable amount of time.

 

The next section is my attempt to reconcile the two crowds and try to break the ignorance that is plagued towards us “second class citizens”

 

1)The LFD destroys communities rant

 

This is the biggest and loudest argument and deservers the most attention, we need to think about what the perspective is of the person who is advocating this and what are his intentions. His premise is very understandable, why on earth would you want anything you cherished to be besieged? The players from this perspective are happy with their current gaming experiences and view anything dramatically changing as threatening their positive experiences. They may claim they are community individuals, but they aren’t in fact they really only looking out for their own interests and have no regard for the majority of the player base.

 

2)The LFD killed WoW (or severely crippled it)

 

This has to be the most erroneous statement I’ve heard in the debate and I have to applaud who came up with that conjecture for how much is has swamped the MMORPG community. First off, how would you analyze this statement for any shred of truth? I’m not going to take your anecdotal evidence as fact, because quite frankly the LFD tool brought me back to the game and I know countless others who came back to the game because of it. In fact, the only evidence we can look at that is considered fair is how many subscriptions came back with the addition of the LFG feature versus who left the game at the same time. I wonder who’s going to come out on top of that one

 

3)The majority of these people opposing the LFD are hypocrites

 

The only thing that changed was that we could no longer force people to communicate with others when they didn’t wish it or it wasn’t convenient. If you had a laundry list of friend’s pre-LFD to always do groups with, you should have seen absolutely no change at all in your gameplay experience. What could have possibly changed? You would log on, talk to your guildies and friends and come up with a time to run dungeons as you always did prior. If you were unable to facilitate a group as it sometimes can happen, you’d ask if anyone knew anyone or you simply just ask in trade. When someone refers to bad experiences with the LFD tool, I ask myself how they found themselves interacting with the tool in the first place. You clearly couldn’t find anybody to group with so instead of sitting around in Orgimmar spamming for groups you realized what the rest of us realized years ago that it that wasn’t fun. You then took the approach of joining a queue intended for a different gaming experience and got upset when it wasn’t to your liking. I can’t be the only one who is baffled by this, can I?

 

 

4)Ask not what your server can do for you but what you can do for your server

 

With every major patch people leave and quit which swings servers into mayhem. One of the servers a buddy of mine played on was Smolderthorn, it had a top 100 guild and a fair balance till WOTLK server instability issues forced transfers. Within a few content cycles the server was completely damaged and people jumped ship. If someone quit during TBC and came back after the LFD was introduced he’d logically think it killed the server when it fact did not. Become part of the solution and not the problem, post your attentions on the server forums that you want to participate in a server event. You don’t even have to do know what to; you can usually leverage someone with ideas that has no warm bodies to fill them. Start small and work your way up. There is tons of information on Google on this so happy hunting!

 

5)Players have diminished in quality since the LFD for reason X,Y, and Z

 

No, what has happened is people are of different skill backgrounds and you’ve just never realized just how many of them take up your player base who keeps your game running. This isn’t the days of yore when everyone who plays strongly understands the genre, blizzard has opened up the market for different crowds and it’s their playing experience too. Think of it from the other side of the coin, how do you think it is for us more casual player base to deal with you people on a more regular basis? Don’t got 100% optimized gear and talent spec for an encounter that don’t require it, get ready to get instructed on the values of life and potentially booted. Ask to a do all the bosses to a geared tank, better believe that’s a vote kick.

 

6)The Z in “X,Y, and Z” is for laZy

 

One concern is that queue based systems will make people lazy and lethargically spend their time throughout the game world. We’re living in the country that works one of the most hours per person in the world and has severe time poverty and you’re confused why people are trying to take shortcuts? You’d have to be insane or unemployed not to take every time related advantage that doesn’t spoil your own experience in a game that soaks them up like nothing. Being lazy has no discrimination for which it strikes, whether it’s elites afking in bg’s for High War Lord titles or Johnny McNoob /afking in the raid finder

 

7)People are ******es in the LFD

 

This is the only argument I particularly agree with, it is true that anonymity breeds people to make actions that may have not made in a different situation. Blizzard has given us a tool to deal with it; it’s called the vote kick. If you DO NOT abuse the vote kick, it is available almost every time you’ll ever need it. The majority of incidents that I’ve personally witnessed have been people taking someone’s words to seriously or someone “ninjaing” something. Now, for the latter it’s impossible to ninja in this game, I need you to understand that. “Ninjaing” for the sake of this argument is taking something that didn’t belong to you, entering into a rolling chance with someone when both parties legitimately want an item is not stealing. If someone has the same armour class or item proficiency, then casually speak to them in public or private to get their intentions, you’d be shocked in how people are civil once you make that communication leap and instead of assuming. For the attitude part, that is everyone’s job to try and keep a cool head. If you see people fighting over something in game, first off don’t make it worse by saying who’s right and who’s wrong. Secondly try and defuse the situation, I’ve been able to do this a few times or at least get to the point where everyone agrees it’s best to move on but be silent. Lastly, if else fails, Blizzard has given us the vote kick for these types of measures, use accordingly though or be warned it may not be there when you require it.

Edited January 28, 2012 by Touchbass

[BlueSkittles]

It's over the message Threshold so I'll just put in down here rather then chop it up a bunch of times

 

Copied onto front page. Let me know if I should change formatting, etc.

[Touchbass]

In before the trolls

 

Touch, do us the honor, compile a post with all the good points in our argument, all the links and stuff, I know you've been gathering them. Blue or I can copy it and edit our posts to make sure it's on page one, or better yet we can get Malign to do it, since he got first post.

 

There too many ... I think i'm going to do this