Why do people want solo play in an MMORPG?

[Nix]

LOL! Checking under your bed was only your imagination!

WHAT. I distinctly remember banging my head on the floorboards as I lowered my head over the edge of the bed, and once again forgetting how tall I am allowed noggin' and wood to come into contact quite severely. I have the bumps to prove it!

[Starlord]

Hopefully we'll all get to see it soon (beta). And please make me one of those sausage sandwiches... I'm soo hungry right now!

Haha! I would but it would take awhile for UPS to ship it.. and I don't think they ship Cooked food.. ( they might be tempted to eat it LOL).

[Orophin]

The only things that I'm against requiring parties are the storyline and to a lesser extent levelling.

Sounds like their intent is to make it to where you will have to group up for key moments in the storyline. Which I'm ok with, as usually story content isn't AS difficult as some other end-game stuff. I agree with Yoshi-P though in his philosophy that it was pretty silly that the DoL and DoH could mostly talk their way out of every situation.

Some people don't like the time syncs it is to wait for others. There is a lot of stand around time for sure. Then you always get the guy who didn't get their cosmo cleaner, or forgot to change their subjob or something like that where you have to wait some more.

This is definitely a turn-off (and I've even been guilty of it myself) but humans will be human. The fact that it took forever to do anything in FFXI is probably a big part of why many people don't want forced grouping for everything shoved down their throat.

[Starlord]

WHAT. I distinctly remember banging my head on the floorboards as I lowered my head over the edge of the bed, and once again forgetting how tall I am allowed noggin' and wood to come into contact quite severely. I have the bumps to prove it!

You were sleepwalking using your hands as if you were holding your relic, you were swinging it around and you hit your self in the head really hard!. XD

[Shougun]

This is definitely a turn-off (and I've even been guilty of it myself) but humans will be human. The fact that it took forever to do anything in FFXI is probably a big part of why many people don't want forced grouping for everything shoved down their throat.

I'm hoping the content finder will eliminate this by ensuring everyone is on the right phase or that they are the right level. Perhaps they can even add a content checker - like if you are already in a party you can run the content finder on your group and it will find out if someone is missing a chain of the quest or items required for the fight.

With any luck we will get a couple more years for all contents life span (since it checks all servers). After those years (where now the content isnt being run and new people would be screwed) I hope they consider making it require less or no people though with different combat structure.

[Nix]

You were sleepwalking using your hands as if you were holding your relic and you were swinging it around and you hit your self in the head really hard!. XD

This would not surprise me, I talk a LOT in my sleep... sleepwalking is only another step further XD

[Mjollnir]

75% of my time spent in 1.0 was solo play. I would have loved to spend more time in group content, but so much of the content that I completed was better off done solo; the vast majority of quests, levelling, gathering, crafting, achievements, exploration, even the market system. Some of those things have to be solo, but others needn't be.

So I would always stop whatever I was doing to help LS members or if I heard a shout for *any* content that was group-oriented (apart from spiritbond parties) I would offer my services. However, that was a rare event. Now there was a lot of content (older primals/dungeons) I couldn't attempt because of a lack of LS members and lack of help offered from folk idling in Ul'dah.

I've spent an entire evening before shouting for help (in as many pseudo-witty ways as possible) to just kill the pre-req NMs for Moogle. It was something I was never able to do. Conversely, as Darnus was relatively new content, it was simple enough to join up with an Ul'dah shout group and beat him in short order.

I agree with the OP that an MMO should encourage group content, but in order to do so, the game design needs to facilitate co-operation between players. In my opinion, this means either helping randoms complete content you have already done needs to be more rewarding than trying to get all your DoH classes to 50 (or whatever your post end-game activities might be) or it needs to be easier for other players to stop being randoms and become part of your group.

I think the latter option is preferable and that gives me great hope for Free Companies. If you are encouraged to recruit a lot of players and the leaders/officers have a vested interest in ensuring their members complete content (perhaps through an 'FC Rank' system that offers FC bonuses based on members' Achievement points), it may well encourage a game where the 'hardcore' and the 'casual' (damn, I said it) need each other to take full advantage of the game.

#wishfulthinking

[Duelle]

Do they even know what an MMO is? This is just a little gripe that I been having everytime the subject arises.

My troll-o-meter is going into the red from this, because I know this has been covered before.

Ease of progression is the shortest answer. Answering to three/five other people as far as your gameplay choices go is not fun, and it gives way to extreme pigeonholing during a time you shouldn't be seeing much of it: the leveling process.

It isn't a perfect system, but it's a lot better than requiring a party for everything in-game.

[IronSoup]

I agree with the OP that an MMO should encourage group content, but in order to do so, the game design needs to facilitate co-operation between players. In my opinion, this means either helping randoms complete content you have already done needs to be more rewarding than trying to get all your DoH classes to 50 (or whatever your post end-game activities might be) or it needs to be easier for other players to stop being randoms and become part of your group.

I think the latter option is preferable and that gives me great hope for Free Companies. If you are encouraged to recruit a lot of players and the leaders/officers have a vested interest in ensuring their members complete content (perhaps through an 'FC Rank' system that offers FC bonuses based on members' Achievement points), it may well encourage a game where the 'hardcore' and the 'casual' (damn, I said it) need each other to take full advantage of the game.

The Speed-run-only loots were part of that problem... Why waste time with helping people learn it when we have 8 hardcore players there everynight to make runs with? No LS needed more than 8 people to do everything in the game... the others were fillers or replacements.

Speed runs are now gone and the quickly-repeatable dungeons too in ARR. It should change a bit but unless there are some multi-party events, the "we only need 8" mentality will stay.

[Aldora]

I've had people tell me I'm maybe not cut out of MMOs anymore because I don't have enough patience to grind out a dungeon 500 times for a Darklight drop, but am willing to put over 120 hours into FFXII.

Maybe they're right. *shrug*

I don't mind interacting with people, but sometimes I just want to do things alone.

Don't think to hard about it. An "MMO" mearly states that a lot of people are playing the same game online in a shared environment where you and other can interact with each other. It does not mean you have to grind a dungeon 500 times just to get a certain equipment set or a rare item drop.

What ever the type of game you are playing, be it single player, multiplayer pvp, multiplayer co-op or an MMO... It's still a game in which you should have fun. It purely depends on your definition of fun. Do you like to invest a lot of hours partying with people and tackling dungeons for loot? Or do you see it as a challenge to tackle these dungeons and improve your skills in the process? Or, do you prefer to do quests in order to learn more about the game and it's lore? Perhaps you want to solo content like Guildleves, quests or crafts. It's all up to you. It doesn't make you less "cut out to play an MMO". Not by a long shot.

There are even people playing this game, just to socialize. If that's their game, then why not? (^_^ )

I personally solo content if i don't have much time to play during the night. I don't want to "waste time" searching for a party in order to do a dungeon, if i only have 2 hours of playtime that night. It's as simple as that.

What i find fun, is to group up with people you know and level classes/jobs or tackle content (like dungeons) together. Even if it's just to help them progress through their first (few) run(s) of a dungeon. Just as long as we are having fun.