Problem with today's MMO's

[Setanian]

 

As for me, I've been video-gaming since the 70's and I've no desire to go back to those days.

 

 

Really? What video gaming did you do in the 70's ?

[Andryah]

Always been a "majority rules" development path based on player demands. If that weren't the case, everywhere would be open world PvP with no safe zones and all the MMOs would still be fun.

 

But, people don't want to lose/die/not be the best; so we are stuck with the cookie cutters that are MMOs today.

 

Blame your peers.. not the developers. The latter is just meeting the demands of the majority.

 

/agree

[Tarmi]

The theme-park / MMO on Rails is fine, if they'd just slow down the leveling curve. Past games took MONTHS to get to level cap, not weeks. The perceived instant gratification is what's killing the genre as a whole.

 

Having leveling take months gives developers more time to get more content out. EQ1 / Aion were grindfests, but games like EQ2, and even Vanilla WOW had just enough grind to keep you from hitting cap without getting bored and frustrated from doing the same thing over and over again.

 

If you played an average of 2-3 hours per night and 5-6 hours on weekends you ended up hitting cap around the time the first major content patch came out, or even first expansion. This is what has kept people playing for years, not hitting cap in 3 weeks, then being handed the best loot in the game 3 weeks later from getting "tokens" (I'm talking PVE here, not PVP). The best gear in the game should be gained from defeating the hardest encounters, not from commendations/tokens. Unique/rare items keep the hardcores happy, and give the casuals something to gawk at. The fact that there's no loot difference between Hard and Nightmare modes is ridiculous.

 

Obviously people who have no job, or tons of playtime hit the cap sooner than that, but there was still stuff for them to do while everyone else caught up, such as farming for rare/unique loot. We have true casuals in our guild (a few hours of playtime a week) who are hitting the cap already, and there's been no substantial content patches that couldn't be blown through in a couple nights.

 

Yes, this game is very alt friendly, but for those people who have no interest in playing 8 different characters, are burning out running the same 15 or so dailys, a handfull of flashpoints and 2 raids per week.

 

TL:DR version:

I don't understand why most new MMO's think you should be hitting level cap a month or two from release. Slow down the leveling curve, and people WILL play longer and there will be more time to develop new content before people burn out.

 

Part of the reason that leveling is faster now is that the slower the leveling curve is the more content you need to level in. If you double the leveling time in SWTOR w/o adding additional quest/zones/flashpoints people will be left grinding mobs for level. As a developer with limited resources the slower the leveling the more resources required to create leveling content. It seems that most games have taken the fast level more end game content route these days.

[Andryah]

Past games took MONTHS to get to level cap, not weeks. The perceived instant gratification is what's killing the genre as a whole.

 

1) There are MMOs out there for those of you who want to slow down your leveling curve.

 

2) WoW expansions set (and reset, and reset) the bar for the industry on leveling curves. Other MMOs disregard it at their own peril. Imagine the QQ in the forums here if SWTOR applied the average Korean Grinder leveling curve to this game.

 

3) Many MMO veterans have become experts at blowing through content, specifically to get to cap so they can then grind endgame. But not every player plays this way.

 

The baseline for 1-50 for this game is ~200 hours played. That's 3-4 months for a casual player playing 10-25 hours a week. It's pretty much in the sweet spot for the industry norms for a non-Asian MMO product.

[Phaedrynn]

Really? What video gaming did you do in the 70's ?

 

Pong

[Terko_Koslah]

I'm thinking you wouldn't really have form a group by inviting people but just to go together with other players, every one would benefit from this. That's said, gray monsters are a fundamental flaw. The party system ruins gameplay and is also a fundamental flaw. Maybe you would have to decide who's tanking and so on. Now if 2 groups meet they can't join forces...

[Yeren]

1) There are MMOs out there for those of you who want to slow down your leveling curve.

 

2) WoW expansions set (and reset, and reset) the bar for the industry on leveling curves. Other MMOs disregard it at their own peril. Imagine the QQ in the forums here if SWTOR applied the average Korean Grinder leveling curve to this game.

 

3) Many MMO veterans have become experts at blowing through content, specifically to get to cap so they can then grind endgame. But not every player plays this way.

 

The baseline for 1-50 for this game is ~200 hours played. That's 3-4 months for a casual player playing 10-25 hours a week. It's pretty much in the sweet spot for the industry norms for a non-Asian MMO product.

 

That baseline sounds about right. I've only been 50 for a few weeks (but I haven't been able to get on alot the last few weeks). My 1 lvl 50 took almost 12 days of playtime to get there. almost 300hrs. I took my time . Even at 50 I've done a total of 1 hard mode flashpoint and I enjoy playing when i can get on.

[Kalfear]

The biggest problem with MMOs today are the players.

They just want want want and none have any care for the game they demanding from.

 

This whole Guild BS will turn out same way, mark my words.

They will have some specific guilds come give feedback and 90% of those people will request/demand items and concepts that will hurt the game long term but will help that one guild!

 

Bioware, seeing as they have already failed a number of times to think things out to their logical conclussions will think some of these good ideas and impliment them and the game will get even more broken.

 

These developers need to learn that just because someone has a opinion, it doesnt means its a good one or helpful one.

 

Find those players that been around for 16-21 years, that played 10-20- more MMORPGs and understand the differences and what worked and what didnt and why. Those are the ONLY PLAYERS a developer should listen to, if they listen to any at all (which actually isnt a for sure thing).

 

Many games would do very well ignoreing the "suggestions" outright and staying to their long term plan. Listen for bugs and exploits of course but when it comes to direction and future of game, follow what you designed, planned, created around.

 

The 2 biggest problems in TOR (for example) are the lack of socialization (community-interaction) and the insanely fast and easy leveling of all game concepts (levels, crafting, PVP Valor, everything is to easy and to fast).

 

YET you scan the boards and you more likely to see UI complaints, macro complaints, meter complaints, things that make the game easier for those specific players but does NOTHING to fix the long term viability of TOR!

 

Simply put its time for Developers to stop thinking everyone has a opinion worth hearing. If those people cant back up their opinions will long term (not WOW and on but actual long term) knowledge combined with a understanding how the genre works (IE if they demanding Sandbox, they dont get how and why this genre functions, despite having some longeviety at it). Stop listening to the masses, trust in their designs, if they need to go outside, find those that have something worth while to say thats outside whats best for just them.

 

One of the most creative people (in gameing) I ever meet continues to this day to putz around with a old school MMORPG design hes loyal to, and to best of my knowledge no ones ever gone to him to ask him to share his knowledge of the genre. His opinion would be far more knowledgeable and worthy then 100000 WOW/SWG players who dont even know where the genre originated and how it came to be.

 

Problem with todays MMORPGs are they have forgotten their root and the lessons learned along the way.

[Yeren]

The biggest problem with MMOs today are the players.

They just want want want and none have any care for the game they demanding from.

 

This whole Guild BS will turn out same way, mark my words.

They will have some specific guilds come give feedback and 90% of those people will request/demand items and concepts that will hurt the game long term but will help that one guild!

 

Bioware, seeing as they have already failed a number of times to think things out to their logical conclussions will think some of these good ideas and impliment them and the game will get even more broken.

 

These developers need to learn that just because someone has a opinion, it doesnt means its a good one or helpful one.

 

Find those players that been around for 16-21 years, that played 10-20- more MMORPGs and understand the differences and what worked and what didnt and why. Those are the ONLY PLAYERS a developer should listen to, if they listen to any at all (which actually isnt a for sure thing).

 

Many games would do very well ignoreing the "suggestions" outright and staying to their long term plan. Listen for bugs and exploits of course but when it comes to direction and future of game, follow what you designed, planned, created around.

 

The 2 biggest problems in TOR (for example) are the lack of socialization (community-interaction) and the insanely fast and easy leveling of all game concepts (levels, crafting, PVP Valor, everything is to easy and to fast).

 

YET you scan the boards and you more likely to see UI complaints, macro complaints, meter complaints, things that make the game easier for those specific players but does NOTHING to fix the long term viability of TOR!

 

Simply put its time for Developers to stop thinking everyone has a opinion worth hearing. If those people cant back up their opinions will long term (not WOW and on but actual long term) knowledge combined with a understanding how the genre works (IE if they demanding Sandbox, they dont get how and why this genre functions, despite having some longeviety at it). Stop listening to the masses, trust in their designs, if they need to go outside, find those that have something worth while to say thats outside whats best for just them.

 

One of the most creative people (in gameing) I ever meet continues to this day to putz around with a old school MMORPG design hes loyal to, and to best of my knowledge no ones ever gone to him to ask him to share his knowledge of the genre. His opinion would be far more knowledgeable and worthy then 100000 WOW/SWG players who dont even know where the genre originated and how it came to be.

 

Problem with todays MMORPGs are they have forgotten their root and the lessons learned along the way.

 

To go along with your last paragraph ..... That's because most WOW/SWG (I played both) are to young to even remember much of the RPG part of the game they are playing. That's where the games originated from .... paper and pencil and D4 - D200 and an imagination. Dr. Demento always comes to mind .... funny and stupid, but that's what it came from.

 

Most players anymore want a FPS in an MMO world. I think that's what Titan is supposed to be ... have fun .... I like the 'turn based' combat of the old RPG's . I'm having fun in SWTOR and enjoying the story makes it take longer to get to max level .... think console RPG's. I remember getting through FFVII and FFVIII faster than I did to max level in SWTOR.

 

Are there things they can improve ... yes. A few more sandbox more elements would be nice, but so far I'm enjoying myself more than I did in WoW.

[Kalfear]

To go along with your last paragraph ..... That's because most WOW/SWG (I played both) are to young to even remember much of the RPG part of the game they are playing. That's where the games originated from .... paper and pencil and D4 - D200 and an imagination. Dr. Demento always comes to mind .... funny and stupid, but that's what it came from.

 

Most players anymore want a FPS in an MMO world. I think that's what Titan is supposed to be ... have fun .... I like the 'turn based' combat of the old RPG's . I'm having fun in SWTOR and enjoying the story makes it take longer to get to max level .... think console RPG's. I remember getting through FFVII and FFVIII faster than I did to max level in SWTOR.

 

Are there things they can improve ... yes. A few more sandbox more elements would be nice, but so far I'm enjoying myself more than I did in WoW.

 

Oh im enjoying myself in TOR now.

I enjoyed it hugely in Beta but beta had a community on the servers. We were not allowed to use vent and other voice programs so everyone used genreal chat, pvp chat, trade chat. The game was in beta so while there was some complainers mostly people enjoyed the game for what it was.

 

The beta experience and retail experience are vastly different in TOR.

 

About 3 weeks after I got into game it started to die for me as the community wasnt there and I would try and try and try to get one going but honestly I think most players just close their chat window now.

 

So after a run in with a ill mannered x guildy I switched servers (smart enough to know it was only the start and I just didnt want to deal with the childish crap of being spit on and such) and started playing the game as a multiplayer game where you group but there is no community. Its basically you and your group mates.

 

Game is great fun (while leveling up) that way.

 

But thats not a MMORPG, thats Diablo, Star Craft, any assortment of multiplayer games where its you and your groupmates logged in.

 

Till they get community in this game, its going to be a revolving door for subscribers.

Come in, level to max (maybe play any alt classes interested in)

Leave

Next person comes in

Till there no more next people

 

The long term hook not there and no amount of Guild stuff, Macros, UIs, Meters, ect ect (what the modern kids ask for) will change that fact!

 

Any MMORPG is only as good as its content and post wOW games give their concept away to fast and easy as the customer demands.

 

TOR is a REALLY LONG Single/multiplayer (4) RPG

or

A REALLY FAST MMORPG with no community

 

Right now

 

If you play it as the first, you will have a great experience while you level up.

Play it as the later and your going to be left wanting.

 

But this isnt just TOR, all games since (and including) WOW have just given it away.

 

As for Sandbox designs, guess depends what you call sandbox cause I read ALLOT of these posts by UO and SWGers and strike me they have no clue what sandbox is. NONE at all. They just dont want to be typecasted as supporting Themepark so if they like something, well its gotta be sandbox design!

 

Like I said, devs better off not listening to these people as they just want whats good for them personally and not whats good for any game or title.

[Nitewolfe]

*** Anti-social quest on rails theme park.. ***

 

Today's formula for MMO gaming is a the bread crumb trail of quest.. Do A, B, C and D, then move on to location 2 for quest E, F, G, and H.. After that, you move to location 3 for I, J, K and L.. This formula discourages grouping in my opinion because most people are never on the same questline.. Because of this games have to be somewhat soloable, compared to the old days..

 

Back in the day when I played EQ1 (before Kunark) one didn't have to worry about being on the same level or pace in questline to group.. Maybe that is the trick, is to not focus so much on theme park questlines.. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE, absolutely LOVE the class storyline in SWTOR, however, I would of loved to have the option to camp areas of a zone.. Which I do, for the purpose of crafting mats.. BUT, I feel I'm giving up exp & rewards for not doing the missions..

 

If I could change one thing, is to make the "heroic" quest repeatable as OFTEN as I want per day.. Honestly at level 20.. I'm not there long enough to do that daily day after day anyways.. However for those of us that enjoy social grouping, it gives us a reward and challenge to do so.. I would seriously think about skipping some of the NON class questlines for the exchange of doing heroics 3, 4 or 5 times that night..

 

Just food for thought..

 

I prefer the new mmo of today! No i am not a new player. I have been in the genre since its start.

Also its not a problem its game companies creating a product for the majority of the mmo market!

 

Todays majority of online games do not want socializing to a heavy extent. They want to play a online game and do their socializing on sited made for it like facebook.

Edited February 15, 2012 by Nitewolfe

[Napalm_AKI]

...

 

One of the most creative people (in gameing) I ever meet continues to this day to putz around with a old school MMORPG design hes loyal to, and to best of my knowledge no ones ever gone to him to ask him to share his knowledge of the genre. His opinion would be far more knowledgeable and worthy then 100000 WOW/SWG players who dont even know where the genre originated and how it came to be.

 

Problem with todays MMORPGs are they have forgotten their root and the lessons learned along the way.

 

Thats the last thing we need, going back to the roots. Now lets all make a remake of what was done before and dress it in pretier colors.

[NoxiousAlby]

*** Anti-social quest on rails theme park.. ***

 

Today's formula for MMO gaming is a the bread crumb trail of quest.. Do A, B, C and D, then move on to location 2 for quest E, F, G, and H.. After that, you move to location 3 for I, J, K and L.. This formula discourages grouping in my opinion because most people are never on the same questline.. Because of this games have to be somewhat soloable, compared to the old days..

 

Back in the day when I played EQ1 (before Kunark) one didn't have to worry about being on the same level or pace in questline to group.. Maybe that is the trick, is to not focus so much on theme park questlines.. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE, absolutely LOVE the class storyline in SWTOR, however, I would of loved to have the option to camp areas of a zone.. Which I do, for the purpose of crafting mats.. BUT, I feel I'm giving up exp & rewards for not doing the missions..

 

If I could change one thing, is to make the "heroic" quest repeatable as OFTEN as I want per day.. Honestly at level 20.. I'm not there long enough to do that daily day after day anyways.. However for those of us that enjoy social grouping, it gives us a reward and challenge to do so.. I would seriously think about skipping some of the NON class questlines for the exchange of doing heroics 3, 4 or 5 times that night..

 

Just food for thought..

 

Hate to break it to you but

Gordon Walton, the co-studio director at BioWare Austin, gave a packed beyond capacity speech at GDC Austin.

Lesson Four

 

One thing that WoW is frequently recognized for is its solo play. Walton's fourth lesson was: support this, because gamers want it. According to Walton, older games that forced players into groups missed the point: "[the] truth is that people soloed every game to the best they could and when they couldn't anymore, they quit. Embracing solo play that was a true innovation for WoW."

 

It was pointed out that players who hit the level cap are pretty much forced to group in WOW; Walton still felt like the game "feels like it's a level playing field for all people at that level" and thus isn't quite as sinful as it could be. He offered a Blizzard quote on the solo issue -- "We look at soloing as our casual game." Given the weight of the phrase "casual game" in 2007, you can bet the audience was scribbling that one down

It is the preferred method of play by the majority of players, if anything it's a shame that their isnt any solo content once you hit 50.

 

But back on topic sure I support your right to farm heroics, why? because they become obsolete so fast due to leveling so quickly you only ever get to do them once.

[DesonEQ]

The problem isn't the MMO, it's the players.

 

This is what the majority wants, so this is what we get.

 

I question if it really is. Soloing has inherent advantages by being on demand and not having to deal with other people. Grouping with people you don't already know is an adventure all its own from the wildly varying experience, gear, and competence. Add in LFG woes, people being people,possibly not getting loot, and the minimum time commitment and it's just not as accessible. Where there's rewarding group content like EQ/EQ2 had and ease of grouping( like being in a guild;game supplied tools for it like voice chat), it gets used.

 

I wonder if there was a PvE equivalent of Warzones, how popular would they be; simple reward system, no commitment, few of the typical group hassles and immediate fun.

[tekkamansoul]

This is one of the more interesting, civil, well-thought out threads on the forums, so I'll contribute my opinion.

 

Let's talk about MUDs for a second. I don't know how everyone elses' experiences were with MUDs, but in mine, there was no grouping. The engine didn't support anything like group mechanics -- if you wanted help hunting, you and a friend just pounded on the same mob at the same time. I don't recall "grouping" if you can call it that at any point. I do remember minor global chat on certain servers, but it was largely a text-based RPG you played during down time at school. The "grinds" were usually really light, because once it took more than a few hours to gain a level people got bored. Actually, now that I think about it, this is closer to the modern model of MMO than I thought.

 

Anyway, moving on... Let's talk about Diablo.

Diablo didn't have a monthly fee, but it had a great number of hours of gameplay in it, which created a community around it. Let's look at the group-finding interface in that, shall we?

Text.

Separated by channels when they got to be too populous.

No level dividing, no difficulty dividing, just everyone lumped into a room and forced to talk to each other if they wanted to group.

If you wanted to actually play the game, you would be by yourself until people joined -- and THAT, oh THAT was fun. Maybe in the beginning, you had people that wanted to join and help kill monsters and have a good old time, but then trainers came out, and every other **** that joined your game was a level 99 in full plate of the whale and maxed stats with dual-wielded Grandfathers that wanted nothing more to hit you once, kill you and corrupt your save data.

And then there were anti-trainers, and anti-anti-trainers, and so on...

Well, Phantasy Star Online (if anyone played that) was similar, and actually faced a similar downfall, except Sega actually banned a couple people that were caught cheating (though people still logged into your games, corrupted your saves, and lolled away).

 

TL;DR to this point: No good MMO community yet...

 

So then Meridian59, Ultima Online, and Everquest came out, (and Ragnarok Online if you'll pardon it) and people actually started talking to each other. As someone said earlier, it was probably out of necessity. These games (I can't speak much for Meridian however) had pretty indepth crafting and job systems. You could be a blacksmith or alchemist in UO, same in RO, and merchants lining the streets of Prontera are a memorable sight for anyone. They also had something modern MMOs don't, though; a smaller game world. People complain nowadays if there's one other person killing their mob that they have to kill 1 to 10 of on their server at the same time. I remember waiting in lines to kill MVP and world bosses in these MMOs. I remember wandering around looking for a small little square of hunting ground that wasn't occupied by another party so that I could sit there and grind for hours. People grouped because they were flat-out BORED. The difficulty of the grind was so extreme that if you didn't fall asleep at your keyboard then your character, if he wasn't super over-leveled, would die soloing anyway. But with this smaller world, it was easier to do. You couldn't really go anywhere without running into a few people. Modern MMOs, SWTOR included, have so many tiny towns, so many planets, and such huge areas, because they're so worried about people complaining about lack of content, or lack of production value, or overcrowding on servers (a lot of this is solo players) that it spreads everyone paper thin.

 

This grouping out of necessity is realized in modern MMOs with raids.

TL;DR2: Basically: solo until it gets hard enough so that you're forced to group. This was touched on earlier in the thread.

 

So basically it's a no win situation for ANYONE. You either make not enough socialization and have very little grouping, causing the community to turn into ******es, or you give everyone a open world and force them to group on occasion, causing other problems...

 

I kind of lost focus halfway through writing this, but, really now, you can't please everyone, and don't forget to take off the rose goggles once in a while.

[Uruare]

I think the problem with today's MMO's isn't the players, but rather the design philosophy of trying to please too many subsets of gamer at once and doing all of them poorly to just tolerably enough to be 'good' in some peoples' opinion most of the time as a standard.

 

I have no idea how exactly would be best to break away from that either. Aggressively advertising your MMO as the PVP game to end all PVP games for example? May as well make a MOBA; hardcore PVPers probably aren't going to want PVE garbage swilling up their PVP experience when it doesn't have to anyway.

 

Could throw in some light exploration and free roaming components for spits and giggles if that were wanted, but in such a game, the chief and absolute focus should be on PVPing with little to no deviation into other interests.

 

But then you still exclude segments of your own market, as 'PVPer' isn't a totally unified niche. Hardcore PVPer isn't necessarily exclusive of Hardcore PVEer or Hardcore Crafter or what-have-you either.

 

I think that's where WoW continues to excell, to drag the ten ton brick into the conversation; they have a very good idea of how to keep most of the people happy most of the time, and they do it across the broadest spectrum of MMO appeal in the market.

 

That's a towering task to replicate even in function, but nowadays, WoW must be considered not merely the benchmark, but the minimum spec.

 

If anything doesn't do this or that or this other thing as well as WoW, as conveniently as WoW, as efficiently as WoW or as whatever-dee-do as WoW, not many are going to care if the comparison is even fair in how it's being made; the perception will win any argument against facts in the largely biased-towards-self-interest mind.

 

Every time, the perception will win. Not because people are stupid (a common misconception), but because very few individuals give a flying cowpie about being fair and fact-oriented in how they form their opinions about what pleases them more.

 

Thing A pleases them this much; Thing B only pleases them this smaller amount. Thing A is better, but they want to like Thing B more since they bought it and want their money and time to not have been a waste.

 

They complain that Thing B should be more like Thing A. Would they actually be happier if it were just so? Probably not, actually.

 

But what can be taken from that that is valuable is that Thing B is not doing its job sufficiently. It is not more interesting than Thing A. It is not perceived as being of -greater value- than Thing A.

 

Equivalent value? Not good enough. -Lesser- value? Put on your HAZMAT-certified asbestos suits, 'cause it will be Flame On and there will be blood.

 

So, are people stupid and wrong for perceiving things as they do? It'd be very easy to say so. From a foundation of reason, very frequently the answer would be yes, as most people will not be guaging their forms of entertainment with a whole lot of concern for empirical rationality in mind.

 

They want to be entertained. And if you're in the entertainment business, you sometimes very well do have to work twice as hard to get the same results as the already established go-to's, especially if those go-to's aren't exactly unpopular as it is.

 

Here in the MMO industry, nobody's going to frame a valid argument that WoW is unpopular. May as well try to argue that gravity impregnates snails if you're going to go for being absurdly wrong.

 

Nobody could form a reasonable argument that it doesn't form and define a lot of the expectations many have of an MMO. Rightly? Wrongly?

 

Wrong questions to ask. Absolutely the wrong questions to ask.

 

Some of the right questions would be in address of what about the ten ton brick in the room appeals to people?

 

Where does its crafting system fail and succeed?

 

Where does its PVE leveling game fail and succeed?

 

Where does its dungeon and raidgame fail and succeed?

 

Where does its loot structuring fail and succeed?

 

Where does its proliferation of holidays and world events fail and succeed?

 

These questions could go on ad nauseum, and they should be asked about not just WoW, but other popular games as well.

 

And the standards of Failure and Success should be measured against the one central theme your game is going to shoot for.

 

With SWTOR, that central theme is undisputably story. Or, at least, that's the only arena it's got the chops to pull a win for itself in the long term off with.

 

It will never out-raidgame WoW; Blizzard isn't gonna stand still and let them. From a business perspective, they don't have to at all and trying to -beat- WoW is a horrible goal to fix on.

 

Beat the expectations. Now there's a goal worth shooting for. They're not formed by just WoW even if Blizzard's giant monster occupies the lion's share of the space in the room.

 

Find out what those expectations are and beat them by exceeding them just enough to impress while leaving yourself with enough extensibility to draw the continuation of that impression out over time and you might well look around one day and realize you've become the new standard.

 

But to do that, you have to start at beating the expectations in the first place, and all SWTOR's got on that is story.

 

I hope they make the most of it. It could at least buy them enough leeway to bring the rest up to par since they're trying to please most of the people most of the time.

 

Cheers!

[thominoh]

Thanks for responding ladies and gents.. I'm glad to see some agree there are issues, and appreciate the opinions of others.. I did want to point out tho, in case it was not clear, I was not saying MMO's are bad entirely, I"m just saying one problem I have with today's MMO is the anti-camp (farm) development.. Lets take TOR for example, which could apply to any MMO in the past 7 years..

 

I love the storyline and questing.. It's part of the immersion factor, however I miss some sandbox elements that make my character different then others.. Not just in equipment, but HOW I got there.. We all ride the same MMO train the first time, but is it necessary to ride that same ride again and again on ALTS? I think not, and for even just that reason we should be allowed the sandbox element of farming or roaming wherever we please..

 

I'm an altaholic and this game really promotes it, BUT.. My first Sith Inquis is a Sorcerer focusing on healing, however I would love to do an Assassin and maybe another Sorcerer (different race/sex light/dark) that is lightening dps.. In any case, I don't mind being forced to repeat the same storyline quest, but do I really have to ride the same general world missions as well? WITHOUT forfeiting credits / exp and equipment upgrades? This also makes it difficult with inner guild socializing too.. I know I'm not the only one playing alts, and often within a guild you have people that are discouraged to group together because they are on different parts of the questlines.. grrrrrr IF we had the option to farm heroic missions or have repeatable "AREA" missions, it would make guild grouping a lot easier..

 

Someone in guild or not, could yell out.. "WTG to farm heroics or ( location )".. Yes, I realize that rewards would have to be tweaked, but I do feel people should have the option in group or solo an isolated location for EQUAL exp/reward..

Edited February 18, 2012 by thominoh