Did you know not performing as you think another player should in a group

[ArcanoJones]

I remember the old days when I first started playing MMOs. People would take there time. They would talk. It was a social event. It was an adventure. I go into PUGs now. Nobody says a word to anyone as the entire group speedruns the dungeon. I sure miss those old days playing Everyquest and WOW when it first came out of 2006. Those where the MMO heyday. Now nobody says a word to you and most people ar enot helpful and will kick you out of the group at the slightest provocation. However I have met some nice people in groups so I am not saying everybody is that way. But it seems the majority are.

[Kosmos992k]

I remember the old days when I first started playing MMOs. People would take there time. They would talk. It was a social event. It was an adventure. I go into PUGs now. Nobody says a word to anyone as the entire group speedruns the dungeon. I sure miss those old days playing Everyquest and WOW when it first came out of 2006. Those where the MMO heyday. Now nobody says a word to you and most people ar enot helpful and will kick you out of the group at the slightest provocation. However I have met some nice people in groups so I am not saying everybody is that way. But it seems the majority are.

To me, it seems as though many players in the community treat other players as little more than NPCs who are there to meet their expectations and be quick about it. That's not necessarily my complete experience in game, but on the official forum, it often seems that it is so.

[Malzian]

I remember the old days when I first started playing MMOs. People would take there time. They would talk. It was a social event. It was an adventure. I go into PUGs now. Nobody says a word to anyone as the entire group speedruns the dungeon. I sure miss those old days playing Everyquest and WOW when it first came out of 2006. Those where the MMO heyday. Now nobody says a word to you and most people ar enot helpful and will kick you out of the group at the slightest provocation. However I have met some nice people in groups so I am not saying everybody is that way. But it seems the majority are.

To me, it seems as though many players in the community treat other players as little more than NPCs who are there to meet their expectations and be quick about it. That's not necessarily my complete experience in game, but on the official forum, it often seems that it is so.

Once upon a time people would play MMOs specifically because they were interested in playing the game. You would invest a lot of time and a lot of money just to get in and spend a few hours progressing and hanging out. Playing these games was difficult and expensive which meant that the majority of the people that played them were very, very invested in getting the most out of it. It's the same way that as when D&D came out the people that played it were so much more invested, because you had to buy all the books, you had to set the adventures and then you had to do the party sessions to get through them. The people that played it were the ones that were REALLY INTERESTED... at least for the most part.

Today things are different. The barrier of entry is significantly lower, the games are easier to get into and easier to play. This means that a large quantity of players are there not because the game is their passion, but because it's another place for them to go and get their shinies. Most modern MMOs have changed to adapt to the idea that a strong game has amoung the highest sub numbers and hence amoung the largest of playerbases. Unfortunately the only real way to keep the people there for the shinies is to make its so they get those rewards easily and often.

What this means them is that you create an expectation in the playerbase that everyone should be out to get the shinies as fast as possible. The idea of enjoying the game for the experiences and the social aspects gets eroded by the pursuit of the next great piece of gear or the next amazing mount or glamour piece. Are there people who still play for the pure love of the game? For its interesting environments and its social features? Yes, there are, but your odds of running into those people creeps down and down the more people pile in chasing the rewards of the game instead of immersing into the game itself.

It's the unfortunate reality, but this is how games measure success these days... Just another metric in the pile.

[ArcanoJones]

Good Post Malzian..and a good description of what has happened to MMOs. I used to play D&D back in the 1980s and early 90s with several groups at the local Comic Book store. That is what MMOs where like back in there infancy. A virtual session of D&D. Good times.

[Kosmos992k]

Good Post Malzian..and a good description of what has happened to MMOs. I used to play D&D back in the 1980s and early 90s with several groups at the local Comic Book store. That is what MMOs where like back in there infancy. A virtual session of D&D. Good times.

D&D, AD&D, GURPS, Traveller, etc....yep been there, done that, still got my dice and character sheets if I look hard enough. Even played the original MUD, and I mean the game called MUD that was so named for the phrase 'Multi-User Dungeon'. Played text based games, rogue-likes and so forth. I* am old school.

I belong to the school of thought that says that the journey matters more than the destination.

I believe I am quite probably considered a dinosaur, and I really don't care about that.

[Malzian]

D&D, AD&D, GURPS, Traveller, etc....yep been there, done that, still got my dice and character sheets if I look hard enough. Even played the original MUD, and I mean the game called MUD that was so named for the phrase 'Multi-User Dungeon'. Played text based games, rogue-likes and so forth. I* am old school.

I belong to the school of thought that says that the journey matters more than the destination.

I believe I am quite probably considered a dinosaur, and I really don't care about that.

I remember MUD... I have Legends of Infocom (Zork ftw) on my iPad and still maintain a subscription to a text-based game called Dragonrealms... I'm probably a dinosaur too in that case. Unfortunately I've even seen in in that text-based game where people just run scripts now to get to the highest level possible and taunt you for not having the best stuff. Everything is keeping up with the Joneses these days...

[ArcanoJones]

D&D, AD&D, GURPS, Traveller, etc....yep been there, done that, still got my dice and character sheets if I look hard enough. Even played the original MUD, and I mean the game called MUD that was so named for the phrase 'Multi-User Dungeon'. Played text based games, rogue-likes and so forth. I* am old school.

I belong to the school of thought that says that the journey matters more than the destination.

I believe I am quite probably considered a dinosaur, and I really don't care about that.

I used to play Rolemaster a lot to. I agree the journey is more important than the destination. People just rush through the content to the end game these days.

[missybee]

I remember the old days when I first started playing MMOs. People would take there time. They would talk. It was a social event. It was an adventure.

I wanted to comment on this wistful nostalgia as someone who has also been playing MMOs for a long time.

While it was great to be able to binge games like iRO, WoW, and XI back when I was in high school, the fact of the matter is that I grew up and I can't invest that many hours in the game per day. I place a much higher value on my time now as opposed to 15+ years ago, and I that seems to be a pretty common mentality. The average age of MMO players nowadays seems to hang out around the mid to late twenties and people of that age demographic are going to have full-time jobs and other responsibilities. Not everyone is going to want to spend an hour doing something that can be done in 12 minutes.

I will happily make exceptions and offer advice to people who are willing to learn and improve, but no one should be expected to sympathize with obstinate dingdongs who have no respect for other people's time (such as Destatiredux's BLM, etc).

[bswpayton]

I remember the old days when I first started playing MMOs. People would take there time. They would talk. It was a social event. It was an adventure. I go into PUGs now. Nobody says a word to anyone as the entire group speedruns the dungeon. I sure miss those old days playing Everyquest and WOW when it first came out of 2006. Those where the MMO heyday. Now nobody says a word to you and most people ar enot helpful and will kick you out of the group at the slightest provocation. However I have met some nice people in groups so I am not saying everybody is that way. But it seems the majority are.

Just have to adapt

[InfiniDragon]

I remember the old days when I first started playing MMOs. People would take there time. They would talk. It was a social event. It was an adventure. I go into PUGs now. Nobody says a word to anyone as the entire group speedruns the dungeon. I sure miss those old days playing Everyquest and WOW when it first came out of 2006. Those where the MMO heyday. Now nobody says a word to you and most people ar enot helpful and will kick you out of the group at the slightest provocation. However I have met some nice people in groups so I am not saying everybody is that way. But it seems the majority are.

I'm kinda with you. I love XIV and don't need all aspects of classic MMOs, but this is an apt image to compare modern MMOs to the old ones: