End game and crafting: a topic for discussion

[raelgun]

Yeah sure did suck when people had to be social in a MMO.

Depends, you can look at this in a few ways, spend 30 plus minutes to find that right crafter at the right price etc..., the searching alone for that 1 person isn't very social.
Raiding with 7/23 others in a common goal for a few hours a night is more socialable no?

[Moomba33]

I personally do not enjoy crafting and do not want to have to rely on crafters for gear progression.
I would accept crafted equipment as bring equal to dropped equipment but I do not want it to be necessary.

[Jynx]

the searching alone for that 1 person isn't very social.

Yeah that's why games would form communities and guilds. You would know multiple crafters and the crafters would know multiple gatherers, who would in turn know you.

Everyone would work together to accomplish their goals instead of raiding with 7(23 you can't pick who to raid with so that's pointless to mention) other people isn't a social experience it's a experience in silence for the most part.

Knowing people allover the world, working together, traversing a dangerous overworld to gather materials and bring them back to your comrades to in turn make you gear to be more powerfull...now that is a social experience, not hitting the qeue button.

[raelgun]

Everyone would work together to accomplish their goals instead of raiding with 7(23 you can't pick who to raid with so that's pointless to mention) other people isn't a social experience it's a experience in silence for the most part.

You can actually form a full 24 premade group btw.

Also everything you have just described is also identical for raiding.

working together to accomplish a goal in raiding is the same concept, its just subjective preference, and its up to the person themselves what is deemed a social experience, not you as an observer.

[Jynx]

Also everything you have just described is also identical for raiding.

Can't say I agree with you but your entitled to your opinion.

I'm just not how you equate a dungeon to Crafting/gathering/battle all in one, spanning a community wider than 7 other players (Sorry even if you can pre-made Crystal tower the only relevant content happens with 7 other people and you can only do it once a week) involving a entire overworld.

But you could be right...in perspective that's all the same as a tightly controlled corridor.

[Hyrist]

Can't say I agree with you but your entitled to your opinion.

I'm just not how you equate a dungeon to Crafting/gathering/battle all in one, spanning a community wider than 7 other players (Sorry even if you can pre-made Crystal tower the only relevant content happens with 7 other people and you can only do it once a week) involving a entire overworld.

But you could be right...in perspective that's all the same as a tightly controlled corridor.

Except the corridor works both ways. The crafting market really isn't a social function, in fact, most people in an 8 man raid group is bound to find at least one dedicated crafter among their static.


It's a failing of logic to say that a singular game mechanics is responsible for encouraging social function. A mechanic a veteran of FFXI often makes. This is simply not true. The higher social functions of older MMO titles such as Everquest and FFXI was due to a large, overcast environment of progressive inconveniences that forced players to interact. A lack of recruitment functions, exorbitant pricing and investments for any sort of accomplishments, high participation requirements for content to be completed and long... oh so long grinds.

People grouped out of desperation to get things done, not out of a desire to connect. This lead to many abusive social systems and stigmas that we are still dealing with in the genre today, in addition to it being one of the major factors that kept the MMO market highly niche.

If anything, the ease of play availability is allowing players who are more social in nature to actually socialize, to gather together for player-made content and open events, and the ease of FC recruitment and social interactions. The difficulty is, the scope of an individual player is narrowed the larger the actual player base becomes. The narrower the base, the more repeat faces you see, and the more social you become with them. The less you see them due to the wider group you're dealing with, the less social they become.

Thus having the social skills to actually get involved with someone becomes all the more important. The mechanics of the game aren't doing the work of establishing familiarity for you, at least, not unless you find yourself in more remote corners of the game where you see the same people more frequently. (PvP, high end crafing, Roleplaying, etc.) And still, more legwork on behalf of the player is needed because the average requirement for a play session is lower. Far less waiting around, more getting things actually done. A player with outside interests or obligations are far less likely to be social. And in a game with greater ease of time investment, there are going to be more present than before.

So, no, tieing crafts to progression isn't going to magically make the game more social. FFXIV 1.0 was more social due to the much smaller, closer knit base that stuck around in spite of the game's faults, not due to any one mechanic. Players who want to socialize in a modern MMO, need to do the necessary legwork require to sift tough the players who are not interested in a the trappings of old MMOs as an excuse or instrument to get others to socialize with them. It actually takes some networking.