"Content Finder" - Please be careful

[ellohwell]

Yoshi said MMOs are like themeparks. At no point in time has he mentioned the virtue of MMOs as virtual worlds, so I think we can expect a version of this feature as seen in Rift or WoW, since it seems like (at least from the impression I get) that the dev team no longer values nor sees merit in creating a virtual world or trying to maintain the illusion of one.

FFXI was an extreme in that you had to physicall traverse the landscape in order to get, well, anywhere! And you had to painstakingly form parties the old fashioned way (with the help of a search feature).

And I think SE are trying to step as far away as possible from this "old fashioned way" of doing things. They don't trust their instincts anymore. And will therefore embrace anything that WoW and Rift ever did (because those games are money makers right?).

So I think it's pretty safe to say that we will get the WoW style of dungeon finder.

I honeslty hope we don't, but i think we will. They've mentioned wanting to pair players up with other players from other servers, and also that they want to convert all dungeons to instanced dungeons, so when taking these two factors into account, one is almost forced to draw the conclusion that we will be entering a very different (entrance-lobby-esque) game come Version 2.0.

[Answa]

Yoshi said MMOs are like themeparks. At no point in time has he mentioned the virtue of MMOs as virtual worlds, so I think we can expect a version of this feature as seen in Rift or WoW, since it seems like (at least from the impression I get) that the dev team no longer values nor sees merit in creating a virtual world or trying to maintain the illusion of one.

FFXI was an extreme in that you had to physicall traverse the landscape in order to get, well, anywhere! And you had to painstakingly form parties the old fashioned way (with the help of a search feature).

And I think SE are trying to step as far away as possible from this "old fashioned way" of doing things. They don't trust their instincts anymore. And will therefore embrace anything that WoW and Rift ever did (because those games are money makers right?).

So I think it's pretty safe to say that we will get the WoW style of dungeon finder.

I honeslty hope we don't, but i think we will. They've mentioned wanting to pair players up with other players from other servers, and also that they want to convert all dungeons to instanced dungeons, so when taking these two factors into account, one is almost forced to draw the conclusion that we will be entering a very different (entrance-lobby-esque) game come Version 2.0.

Where do you come off reading what he said completely ass-backwards? He said in that same analogy that you can decide to do whatever you want in a theme park: take in the sights, ride the thrill rides, ride the wimpy rides, but everything is there for everyone to enjoy.

Seriously.

[ellohwell]

but everything is there for everyone to enjoy.

That's why WoW and Rift put in dungeon-finder though.

Ease of access at the expense of the game's scope.

[Answa]

That's why WoW and Rift put in dungeon-finder though.

Ease of access at the expense of the game's scope.

You can still run around, nothing is taking that away from you.

[Tsukino]

I posted this somewhere else, but I think my ideal "content finder" would basically just be a cross-server search/seek function.

When you go to make a party for something you can look on just your server or you can look at all of them, read their comments and see what classes/jobs they have, then send them a tell before inviting and to provide more information ("Hi, we're currently 4/8 for <dungeon you want>, PLD WHM CNJ DRG. Interested?"). Then once you have everyone invited you can "meet" at the dungeon entrance on your respective servers and it will take you all in together. I think there should be a kind of pseudo-party structure in place for this, where you can chat but still do solo stuff until you have enough people and are ready to go. That would allow you to talk more about what you'll do on the run, and also give people the chance to search their respective friend lists, linkshells, and companies for more members if there somehow aren't enough seeking across all the servers.

I think this way you get the advantages of being able to find enough people to do things with and play with people from other servers, but without the disadvantages of getting completely random people you haven't even spoken to or destroying a sense of world continuity by turning the game world into a dungeon lobby.

Of course, I'm trying to prepare myself for a wholesale import of WoW's dungeon finder, because the team won't likely listen to our concerns about it. If they do though, it's a chance to really make some improvements and stand out in the sea of modern MMOs.

[ellohwell]

You can still run around, nothing is taking that away from you.

How do you know that?

If they make most content instanced, then you can't just run around freely.

Also, even if they did leave players that one vestige/scrap of gameplay to play with, they'd still be depriving the servers of other elements, such as solidarity and community.

[Crica]

solidarity and community.

Join or form a Linkshell or three with players like yourself and build up your friend list with players you enjoyed meeting while leve questing if you want solid community.

Leave the casual gamers alone who do not wish to be a part of your solid community and prefer to play with random folks like themselves via a grouping tool instead.

Forcing them to join your solid community of Linkshells or be on your friend list in order to run content is only going to piss you and them off.

[Answa]

How do you know that?

If they make most content instanced, then you can't just run around freely.

Also, even if they did leave players that one vestige/scrap of gameplay to play with, they'd still be depriving the servers of other elements, such as solidarity and community.

Why are you saying everything is instanced? The notes say cross-server party-finder AND dungeon finder. I can very well see everyone being ported to the same server for the duration of the party. It would be fun times.

[ellohwell]

Why are you saying everything is instanced? The notes say cross-server party-finder AND dungeon finder. I can very well see everyone being ported to the same server for the duration of the party. It would be fun times.

Yeah... but that's what I've been saying is bad this whole time...

[Crica]

Yeah... but that's what I've been saying is bad this whole time...

Then don't use the optional tool to play with random people if you won't enjoy it - just play with your friends and linkshell mates instead.