What happened to MMO Communities?

Wiggin · March 4, 2012

It seems some of the problems we are having with community in SWTOR is the fact that it appears that Bioware has done everything in its power to limit the community.

/snip

You have hit on a point that I do agree with, and that is that the game's design does not encourage positive social interaction as much as it could.

Take "useful" endgame crafting for example, where a player might possess not only a rare schematic, but a rare schematic for an item that is considered an important item for players of a particular class or role to have in a given endgame stage.

Players who desire said item would be forced to interact with the crafter. Essentially nothing like "LF tailor to craft Spellstrike Hood. Have mats. Will tip," exists in TOR because the design decision was to avoid making crafting an integral part of the endgame experience.

In this particular example a tailor who knew the pattern would build good will in the community by crafting useful items for other people, or alternatively could decide not to respond if he had a negative experience in the past with the person looking for help. IOW -- the prospect of having to interact with people in the game to improve your character in the future offered incentive to be respectful throughout the process of playing the game.

A related point that applies to not just TOR but a number of modern MMOs: speed of leveling and the ease of acquiring relatively high-end gear on a regular basis diminishes the need for assistance from other players in the game. Even the concept of giving you markers on your map that show you the location of every quest objective has taken away the need to speak up and ask for something as simple as an item or mob location -- something that once upon a time resulted in people regularly asking for and giving advice...ie positive social interaction.

When you don't NEED other players to help you progress or to get the most out of your character, you lose one of the major incentives for being respectful and courteous toward them.

Just in general though, in earlier days, as new players were experiencing the genre for the first time, regularly interacting with strangers was a necessary aspect of playing an MMO. As time goes along, one becomes acustomed to a limited social circle that provides more or less everything the player is looking for. People who don't run in the same social circle are often not going to bother helping each other, so the incentive to be friendly and cooperative disappears. Instead, when Player X steals the chest you just killed a group of mobs to grab, you rage to the friends in your social circle while he has a good laugh at your expense with the friends in his social circle. Unfortunately, in this particular aspect, there is no going back to the way it used to be.

All IMO of course.

RabidPopcorn · March 4, 2012

Just in general though, in earlier days, as new players were experiencing the genre for the first time, regularly interacting with strangers was a necessary aspect of playing an MMO. As time goes along, one becomes acustomed to a limited social circle that provides more or less everything the player is looking for. People who don't run in the same social circle are often not going to bother helping each other, so the incentive to be friendly and cooperative disappears. Instead, when Player X steals the chest you just killed a group of mobs to grab, you rage to the friends in your social circle while he has a good laugh at your expense with the friends in his social circle. Unfortunately, in this particular aspect, there is no going back to the way it used to be.

All IMO of course.

Sadly, there is no going back to the days when players were MMO 'virgins'; not that it's all bad, because the good thing is now we can have higher expectations of other players in terms of their learning speed.

As you said, people form their own circles just like how players form guilds to be with other like-minded players; whereas in the 'past' when guild-less players could get along fine in progression, it is almost customary now for players to have to join a guild because of the amount of 'noise' that exists outside of a guild.

Malynn · March 4, 2012

I've been playing MMOs since UO days, and I miss the sense of community as well. However, it takes time and LOTS of effort to build a reputation. I've only been playing Star Wars a few months, so I can't expect much community recognition yet.

I think the legacy name will help a lot. The stories in Star Wars encourages people to make alts. The legacy name gives us an identity that carries from one character to another.

So far, my experience has been great. I've helped others or they've helped me; and we've ended up friends. A few times I've asked questions in general chat and received helpful answers.

Playing MMOs as long as Ive done, have perfected the survival skill on ignoring the jerks.

Edited March 4, 2012 by Malynn

Deirhese · March 4, 2012

I always thought that anonymity allows people to act out in ways that they wouldn't in real life to the general public. It is very bothersome when some people you whisper totally ignore you and go on with their virtual lives because they have their cliques and won't talk to you unless you are a l33t friend from their l33t guild.

Sometimes you ask an honest question in general chat and someone cannot live without blurting a profane word that is totally irrelevant or calling you a noob without even helping. They feel that putting people down online gives them strength because in reality they can't talk face to face with someone.

As someone posted earlier, look up the online disinhibition effect.

Blackardin · March 4, 2012

Richard Garriot tells a good story where a knight in UO comes across a poor man who is fishing on a riverbank. The knight is recently finished with a dungeon and says to the fisherman, "Here! I will share with you my loot from the dungeon! Fine weapons and armour with the best enchantments ever seen!"
The fisherman looks at the knight and says, "Why are you giving me these? I am a fisherman, I have no use for swords or shields, nor do I have use for magic or incantations! Begone!"

We always tend to romanticize the past. What actually happend in this situation was that the knight ran up on the fisherman and one shotted him with his OP bow, took all his stuff, then cut the body up and laughed as the fishermen could do little more then Oooooooo. ;p

As to what happend to community?

Addons, cross server LFG, DBM and everything else that turned the focus from a living breathing world where interaction was fundimental to a race to the top to take down Ragnaros. In short, gone from a MMORPG to a shooter that requires leveling.

Blackardin · March 4, 2012

No Global chat, only current planet.

Global chat does not lead to community, only nonsense arguments and chuck norris jokes.

No Individual Server Forums.

This does not help with server community.

Inability to chat with opposing faction

This just leads to trash talk, not community.

The key here is an entire shift in the paridigm along with full cooperation of the participants. Neither of which are very lucky.

origamikitsune · March 4, 2012

Interesting post, OP. Something I think about a lot. As a long time player of MMOs (most recently FF11, which had no PvP except two "sport" like games) and with a preference of PvE, I have found that games that offer only PvE have the best communities, games with PvE and PvP have a middle ground (like this one), and purely PvP have the worst. There are of course, exceptions that prove the rule.

Also, the smaller the community, the more cohesive it will be in general, and the more positive it will be in general.

Even so, there are ways around the ***-hattery. The golden rules still apply. And they still work.

Say hello to strangers, from time to time. Most will ignore you. Some will say hi. A select few will freak out.

Buff / Heal / Raise random strangers. In FF11 this was huge - but you took a massive XP deduction on death, on that was mitigated by Raise spells. I guarantee every one knew the name of the endd-game healers that refused to random raise, and they knew the name of every healer that would go out of their way to come to you - esspeicially the ones that would do so at risk to themselves. (I was one of those ones that multiple times daily would risk my own XP to raise people in difficult spots). Here it is less important for your character, but still reflects on you.

Don't kill steal / quest steal. There is nothing wrong with standing around and watching - if you wait near an objective while the other person kills, just so you can see if they take it, you might be surprised at how often they say thanks, or even give it to you even though they need it.

Kill mobs if the player needs help - if you are unsure, use your judgement, and don't be afraid to say, "Sorry if you didn't need help; I wasn't sure if you did or not, but I would have hated to see you die."

Join PUGs. Some times they suck. Most of the time they are slightly annoying. But when they work, they work great, and you get the lasting friendships and great stories. In FF11, I ended up with a BLM burn as a WHM - replacing their usual BRD/WHM. Some how I not only managed it, but was able to XP Chain Imps without the need for refresh. When their regular BRD quit, I took the spot as WHM/SMN. If you're not familiar with the game - basically, they took a chance on picking me; my class was not designed for what the party called for, but I knew my character enough that, with their willingness to change some tactics slightly, exactly the same overall, no XP loss for the risk.

Ask for help. The words "I haven't done this before, any tips?" works amazing. Ignore the trololol comments, because someone will answer, especially in War Zones. There are a good dozen people that I play with in WZs who always say Hi now. I'm not the best. Hell, I'm probably below average, still. But I try, and most importantly, I thank people when they offer help - EVEN when it is presented in a seemingly belligerent manner.

In my experience, reputation matters in SWOTR, at least on my server. I solo a lot (especially my dailies). But when people ask, I team up. I now have a full friend list of regulars that are constantly asking me to tank things for them. When they log in, I say hi. The ones I know personal information on, I talk about (Is your kid still sick?).

Two days ago, I was invited to my first PvE OPS. I was tanking eternity vault. This happened specifically because of the people I met in War Zones and on Ilum (my first time on Ilum pvp was four hours of Nascar - and four hours of shootin' the **** and laughing it up). I joined a guild for their run. They showed me the ropes. They were patient with me. Answered my questions. I tried my best. It was a perfect storm at the end, dragging the boss all the way across the room for that last final pull to the little beam thingy, me panicking 'cause I don't want to be known as The Tank That Sucks and is Always Picked Last For The Team, and BOOM! We won (Columi pants and body both dropped for me, and got two alloys, allowing me to make both my Rakata pieces - all in my first OP).

I haven't "tried" to make friends. I haven't worked at it. Sometimes I slip up (I get angry, too) especially here in the forums. But you know what? Just by being nice, people know who I am, and these philosophies are something shared by every last one of my guildmates. I can't say how respected or well known our guild is (Jedi Ninja Pirates, on Juyo), but a couple times a week at least, I get comments about "Oh, hey I met X from your guild. You guys are great!"

TLDR Version:

IF you are nice, you will quickly learn who is nice. And people will learn who you are. Good things follow.

Aethyriel · March 4, 2012

I know that I'm probably going to get a lot of "you old fogie" hate for this, but it's a question I can not stop asking myself lately. I've played MMO's for just about 11 years now. Started off with Everquest and have adventured my way through multiple others. The one thing that really drew me in to the genre was it's sense of community and companionship. I thought it was awesome that your character lived in a world with thousands of others.

Not only were the vast majority of those people helpful; they were friendly to boot! People actually went out of their way to help another player that they didn't know from a hole in the wall. It was astounding.

Now, however, I feel like every game that comes out gets worse and worse in regards to it's community. People live to grief, harass, and flame the **** out of each other. The worst part is that it's become accepted as the norm. No one says anything because they've given up trying to fix it.

So, is it just me? Is anyone else as disappointed as I am?

It's just the new thing... seriously, take a look at society and how it "evolved", people lying, cheating, doing everything to ruin others so they have a better standing, everywhere, politicians are the prime example as leaders of the country you're living in, it's all you see nowadays.. people just adapt, like children, see and copy, simple.

Dissapointing? Yes. But there are still people out there who are not like this, mostly people around 30 or older who came from a different generation... so gotta look for those and play within a smaller base (mostly guilds) to be able to enjoy grpcontent as a community instead of an individual who just tries to be better than anyone else.

souloferdrick · March 4, 2012

As a few posters touched on, you have to look outside the genre and gaming entirely if you want a real understanding why things are the way they are.

origamikitsune · March 4, 2012

As a few posters touched on, you have to look outside the genre and gaming entirely if you want a real understanding why things are the way they are.

And an understanding of history and sociology specifically to see what has and hasn't actually a changed (I have a fascination for studying up on things haven't actually changed but seem to have changed... there is a surprising amount of "change" that is simply increased awareness, frequently because of easier access to information, and new ways to obtain information; it is my personal experience that more often than not there isn't actually a paradigm shift in society, just a paradigm shift in what society *****es about at that point in time. Admittedly, my fascination for that subject will weight my observations towards seeing it).

Edited March 4, 2012 by origamikitsune

moowart · March 5, 2012

I always thought that anonymity allows people to act out in ways that they wouldn't in real life to the general public. It is very bothersome when some people you whisper totally ignore you and go on with their virtual lives because they have their cliques and won't talk to you unless you are a l33t friend from their l33t guild.

Sometimes you ask an honest question in general chat and someone cannot live without blurting a profane word that is totally irrelevant or calling you a noob without even helping. They feel that putting people down online gives them strength because in reality they can't talk face to face with someone.

As someone posted earlier, look up the online disinhibition effect.

Agree here but think too that for every bad there is a good .. when asking 'noob' questions I have found that despite and maybe because of the flaming that there are many who will PM you with the answer. This interests me too cause it appears that many are afraid to stand up for the little guy in MMOs for whatever reason.

I think many are worn out on mmos and as such have become weary of being open on the net. Not unlike RL. I remember when I started I was in awe of the guy who was soo well geared and looked cool and how I wanted to be like him. Now after time and experience in mmos its more a meh factor especially after so many bad experiences with this type.

Think small things can help community in big ways, like devs not changing classes to oft (credit to bioware here) making global chat, others standing up for that guy or guild being flamed, less emphasis on parsers more on teamwork etc etc

Devs provide the infrastucture, though its up to the 'community' to create the type of world they want.

Jeffor · March 5, 2012

The game companies bear some blame for the current state of MMO communities as well. Look at this game. BW fought tooth and nail against server forums and made the game world so instanced and compartmentalized that, even at the peak of this game's population (yes it's peaked already) you could play for quite a while and hardly see anyone. Other games have player run events. Do you ever see anything close to this in TOR? Not really. I think game companies like BW could care less about community. They just want our money and I guess they can take our money just fine with or without a vibrant community. I think the next step is Battlefield style servers where we all just log into a different server every time we play. It would make no difference to them at all.

Jeffor · March 5, 2012

Global chat does not lead to community, only nonsense arguments and chuck norris jokes.

This does not help with server community.

This just leads to trash talk, not community.

The key here is an entire shift in the paridigm along with full cooperation of the participants. Neither of which are very lucky.

Server forums absolutely help with a community. Guilds, events, PVP organization and planning and just getting to know people and being able to connect when you can't game. You sound like you enjoy the single player MMO format that BW has created.

Jeffor · March 5, 2012

As a few posters touched on, you have to look outside the genre and gaming entirely if you want a real understanding why things are the way they are.

Not entirely true. LOTRO has a great community. Partially because of the subject matter but also because Turbine puts effort into community building. They will post and announce player events on the main website and they even have server specific PVP forums and LOTRO is hardly a PVP giant amongst games. Turbine just realizes that people enjoy posting about PVP so they gave us a forum specifically for that. Heck, you can even get GMs and Turbine staffers to attend player events sometimes.

It's not all games but some are worse than others. I give SWTOR a 2/10 for overall community and BW 0/10 on their community building efforts. Judging from the server populations I can see it's paying dividends for them.

Arlanon · March 5, 2012

it's because parents are no longer allowed to beat their kids

MWidowmaker · March 5, 2012

I know that I'm probably going to get a lot of "you old fogie" hate for this, but it's a question I can not stop asking myself lately. I've played MMO's for just about 11 years now. Started off with Everquest and have adventured my way through multiple others. The one thing that really drew me in to the genre was it's sense of community and companionship. I thought it was awesome that your character lived in a world with thousands of others.

Not only were the vast majority of those people helpful; they were friendly to boot! People actually went out of their way to help another player that they didn't know from a hole in the wall. It was astounding.

Now, however, I feel like every game that comes out gets worse and worse in regards to it's community. People live to grief, harass, and flame the **** out of each other. The worst part is that it's become accepted as the norm. No one says anything because they've given up trying to fix it.

So, is it just me? Is anyone else as disappointed as I am?

you arent the only one. they have been infested with the obnoxious gimme now ur a scrub dbags ever since WoW introduced them to the world of MMOs

MWidowmaker · March 5, 2012

However, I feel that the "new breed" of younger player is a very solitary, very selfish bracket. Don't get me wrong, it's not ALL young people aged 11-16, and nor are some of us who are old enough to know better wholly innocent - but you'll generally find that people will want to solo everything, earn their gold, get "big shiny stuff" and then log off.
!

actually i dont think its really the young young players, rather the ones in the 20s-early 30s with the sense of entitlement who are the worst