Why is "server community" used as an argument against cross-server LFD?

[Pinely]

That is too bad, I however have met lots of people who Id love to cross server friends with, but cant either becuase they didn't want to do the whole real ID thing or becuase clearly the support for making a manual group cross server group wasn't there.

 

This issue is an artificial problem created by the server architecture which is really not needed.

 

My solutions below >>

 

Agreed, although no game seems to be there yet from a technological perspective. WoW is introducing Battletags, which allow you to have a cross-server friend list that doesn't use Real ID. And they added the feature to create groups with people from other servers (although this feature is going to be premium). Maybe Titan will have those kinds of features?

[Xmok]

Fostering a server community can mean several different things, but one thing in particular is to help keep the ninjas and griefers in line. Ninjaing items or griefing people in flashpoints has no accountability in cross realm flashpoints but would in server only flashpoints. Better yet give us the option in LFG to choose cross realm or server only flashpoints. Then everyone is happy.

[ferroz]

Quality raiding guilds cared, because having that guy in your guild meant you would tolerate that sort of thing. And when he pulled that crap outside a guild run, it reflected back badly on the guild.

Depends on what you mean by quality...

 

If you mean "cares what other people think about them", then a "top 5 progression raiding guild on the server" may or may not be a "quality raiding guilds" ... often it's not the case. I've seen several where it wasn't.

 

So yes, while that person may be able to get into a guild, they'll have a hard time getting into any sort of actual quality guild on the server.

So, he's find a guild of like minded people, still be able to continue his a**hattery on random unsuspecting people, still get into groups, still be able to raid the top tier progression content. How exactly has shunning done anything to him again? It looks to me like the answer is nothing. Edited December 29, 2011 by ferroz

[DMuehlhausen]

I'll admit did not read the replies but this is why I do not like the Cross Server Option.

 

If the tool is your server only you can still police people. If I go into a group and a total dbag to people. Calling them names rolling need on loot I don't need etc..than I can be put on an ignore list. The tool will no longer put me with those people. You do this enough and you will never be able to use the tool or find a group through chat. It would be your own problem so you need the behave accordingly so people want to be around you.

 

If it's cross server the above is thrown out the window. People join there is no talking, or there is constant berating. GO GO GO GO. Being called all sorts of names. You are already seeing it if people aren't willing to skip cutscenes.

 

The community needs to be able to police itself. Just like back in EQ. You knew who you could group with and trust to get the job done, or who was going to stick around even if you wiped. You also knew those people who had to take the dog out or smoke a cig every 5 min hoping to be pulled through stuff. You stayed away from the people you didn't want to be around. In a cross server LFG tool you go with who the server gives and it gives them the right to be as big of aholes as they want.

 

Just go read some responses on sites like CNN when racism and stuff is brought up. You would think we are back in the early 1800s when slavery was at it's peak. And some comments would even make the slave owners blush. And it's done simply because they can and nothing can be done to them about it.

[ferroz]

Fostering a server community can mean several different things, but one thing in particular is to help keep the ninjas and griefers in line.

It doesn't do that.

 

ninjalooters still ninja.

griefers still grief.

 

period.

[imtrick]

It doesn't do that.

 

ninjalooters still ninja.

griefers still grief.

 

period.

 

If you're trying to deny that it's far easier to hold them accountable on their own servers if they do this, I'm afraid I'd completely disagree.

[GraunKrynn]

I'm not sure why a lot of forum posters seem to think that it's important to foster a sense of "server community". What's up with that? I've played in MMO's a long time and it was never important in the least. I hope Bioware does a cross-server LFD tool. I get really tired of having to spam trade chat and then have to spend a lot of time traveling to the instance. The LFD would simply make it easier.

 

Spamming trade chat with "lfg/lfm for <instance name here> is just simply annoying. And even though I've done most of the instances this way, I don't have any more friends than I had before I started. So I never bought into the "fostering server community" as a valid argument against a cross-server LFD tool. To those of you that don't want it, you don't have to use it. But just because you don't want to use it doesn't mean that the rest of us shouldn't.

 

/end of rant

 

Fostering a server community is important for finding good players that you group up with on a regular basis. If you have a cross server LFD tool and get a good group you don't want to disband and keep going, but what about later? You take your chances and roll the dice and hope you get another good PUG.

 

And honestly "spend time traveling to the instance" doesn't take long considering it's on your home fleet and all the planets have flashpoint shuttles, not to mention emergency fleet passes, quick travel points back to your starship...I mean come on dude.

 

Just because you don't want to buy into a server community doesn't mean the rest of us don't want to. You don't have to 'spam chat' to get a group either. Flag yourself LFG use the /who feature. Type in a level range and start sending tells. Find yourself a good group of people this way and /friend them. Later you have a player base to pick from that you're familiar with and who you know are competent instead of playing the MMO version of Russian Roulette with a cross server LFD tool.

 

I same server LFD tool I'm much more willing to accept, but a cross server one brings an increased risk of ninja looting and a load of other problems.

Edited December 29, 2011 by GraunKrynn

[Pinely]

Do any of the people complaining about ninja looters and griefers actually play WoW today?

 

It is incredibly rare to get into a Random Dungeon group with either a griefer or a ninja looter. I've run 7 or more Heroics a week for the past year and have had less than 10 instances in which someone deliberately griefed the group. I can only think of 5 times when someone rolled need on something they didn't need and refused to give it to the correct class. It is far outside the normal experience to run into these kinds of players.

 

And when it does happen, you simply kick them from the group and put them on ignore. Or if they outnumber you, ignore them, and then drop group. It's far easier than trying to find a sympathetic ear on /trade to start a blacklist or trying to convince their guild they were in the wrong.

[Pirate_Ron]

everything you just said, happened long before cross realm dungeon finder.

 

people were ninjas, elitist, douche bags, and just plain scum since day 1 of classic. The wow community has ALWAYS been horrible, LFD just made queue times faster, so you got to see more people in a shorter amount of time, so you saw more of the douche baggery that was alraedy there.

 

you're right. People were DB's before any dungeon finder/LFG tool was implemented in any MMO. The thing was, they were always on your server and you could choose to ignore them and tell others on the server about their bad behaivour. The person then had to clean up their act or fly solo.

 

Cross server LFG allows people to be DB's without repercussions. I can even be a total DB if the Dungeon Finder put me into a group of people from the same server and just claim it must have been someone from another server with my character name and play it off as coincidence.

 

The fact that the modern MMO can for the most part be played solo except for select content has helped foster the bad behaviour. No one is forced to group up so no everyone is selfish.

[iceperson]

I'm not sure why a lot of forum posters seem to think that it's important to foster a sense of "server community". What's up with that? I've played WoW a long time and it was never important in the least.

 

I don't have any friends.

 

/end of rant

 

fixed the OP

[Jedi_Wannabe]

I'm not sure why a lot of forum posters seem to think that it's important to foster a sense of "server community". What's up with that? I've played in MMO's a long time and it was never important in the least. I hope Bioware does a cross-server LFD tool. I get really tired of having to spam trade chat and then have to spend a lot of time traveling to the instance. The LFD would simply make it easier.

 

Spamming trade chat with "lfg/lfm for <instance name here> is just simply annoying. And even though I've done most of the instances this way, I don't have any more friends than I had before I started. So I never bought into the "fostering server community" as a valid argument against a cross-server LFD tool. To those of you that don't want it, you don't have to use it. But just because you don't want to use it doesn't mean that the rest of us shouldn't.

 

/end of rant

 

I would like to see a LFD (LFF?)tool, though I'm not convinced it needs to be cross server yet.

 

It's nice to be able to jump into a PvP instance from anywhere, I don't see why the same shouldn't be applied to PvE.

 

I still can't believe a LFG channel wasn't added by default.

[Xzulld]

Agreed, although no game seems to be there yet from a technological perspective. WoW is introducing Battletags, which allow you to have a cross-server friend list that doesn't use Real ID. And they added the feature to create groups with people from other servers (although this feature is going to be premium). Maybe Titan will have those kinds of features?

 

I believe its only a matter of time before a seamless cross server platform exists. Its not technological in the sense that the hardware is a problem, or that the coding platforms are a problem, its architecture. You would need to build it up from the beginning like that.

 

Do any of the people complaining about ninja looters and griefers actually play WoW today?

 

It is incredibly rare to get into a Random Dungeon group with either a griefer or a ninja looter. I've run 7 or more Heroics a week for the past year and have had less than 10 instances in which someone deliberately griefed the group. I can only think of 5 times when someone rolled need on something they didn't need and refused to give it to the correct class. It is far outside the normal experience to run into these kinds of players.

 

And when it does happen, you simply kick them from the group and put them on ignore. Or if they outnumber you, ignore them, and then drop group. It's far easier than trying to find a sympathetic ear on /trade to start a blacklist or trying to convince their guild they were in the wrong.

 

QFT. This matches my experiences. Its uncommon, and when it occurs its a simple thing to deal with. FAR simpler than the alternative witch hunt.

Edited December 29, 2011 by Xzulld

[LilSaihah]

With sharding in mind, I don't understand why MMOs need such rigid server structures. It'd be a feat, but a very rewarding one IMO, to remove server restrictions completely- Then you wouldn't need to worry about cross-server LFGs ruining your community because everything's cross-server anyway.

[ferroz]

If you're trying to deny that it's far easier to hold them accountable on their own servers if they do this, I'm afraid I'd completely disagree.

Yes, I'm saying that people think that it's the case, but it actually doesn't do anything to them.

 

I'm saying there is no actual way of holding them accountable, whether you have only single server groups, or also have cross server groups.

 

I'm also saying that it's just as easy for you to avoid them, whether they are cross server or single server groups.

Edited December 29, 2011 by ferroz

[ferroz]

you're right. People were DB's before any dungeon finder/LFG tool was implemented in any MMO. The thing was, they were always on your server and you could choose to ignore them and tell others on the server about their bad behaivour.

Up to this, and you're correct.

 

of course, telling others about their bad behavior doesn't necessarily do anything, even single server.

 

The person then had to clean up their act or fly solo.

False. There are always new people to victimize. Ther are always people who aren't going to believe the rumors. The vast majority of the player base of every MMO is uninvolved in any outside forums, or anything like that and isn't going to keep up on your personal blacklist. People will still get into groups. They'll still get into guilds. They'll still be able to raid. You've done nothing to thing.

 

if you think that every time you announce an alleged ninja looter in chat, everyone who hears believes you and marks them on their blacklist... well, you're delusional. I sure as hell don't; I've seen far too many people run character assassination campaigns against people they didn't like to be that gullible.

 

I can even be a total DB if the Dungeon Finder put me into a group of people from the same server and just claim it must have been someone from another server with my character name and play it off as coincidence.

If you do that in wow, and they add you to ignore, how are you going to explain anything and play off anything? Ignore works just fine cross server there. Edited December 29, 2011 by ferroz

[ferroz]

Do any of the people complaining about ninja looters and griefers actually play WoW today?

I doubt it. Probably they ran into a couple of problem chracters and have blown it way out of proportion. That's why the quote wait times so much higher than what I've been seeing for the last 6 months.

 

I came back after the last cata expansion, and I had, all in the first 2 days that I was running the new heroics, 4 really good groups. 1 ran all 3 dungeons with my main, explained the fights, chatted, the other 3 were friendly folks, but I had a bit less interaction with them. I'm really sad that I couldn't friend them (that's wow's biggest failure with LFD imo).

 

 

It is incredibly rare to get into a Random Dungeon group with either a griefer or a ninja looter. I've run 7 or more Heroics a week for the past year and have had less than 10 instances in which someone deliberately griefed the group. I can only think of 5 times when someone rolled need on something they didn't need and refused to give it to the correct class. It is far outside the normal experience to run into these kinds of players.

Ive actually run into it far less in lfd groups than I did before lfd was released. and I've run... well, I've lost track. 3 80s during wrath, 5 85s now in cata. Three of the toons I leveled primarily in lfd groups. Edited December 29, 2011 by ferroz

[WuphonsReach]

I don't get why that is an argument against x-server LFG especially if its optional. Anyone you ignore in wow be it same server or cross server will never group with you again.

 

When your potential pool of ninjas / griefers numbers in the thousands / tens of / hundreds of thousands or more, a personal blacklist does not work.

 

It simply doesn't scale.

 

Especially since you could only have about 50 people on your /ignore list. So even if you /ignore them - it has near zero impact on their ability to get future groups because the odds of you being put in the same group as them again (at max level) is a few thousand to one.

 

(The other half of the problem is that MMO designers don't grasp that /ignore needs to be account-based, not character based and that you should be able to /ignore entire guilds.)