Counter to Elitism

[Minai]

This all makes me think of competitions where everyone earns a medal just for participating.

My husband calls this "big wiener contests" :P

[KaiTBF]

but good player over...less good ones.

Imagine if the "gambits" list a series of actions that "you should have done" while progressing in the dungeon. (Since it's a bunch of "If...then", it reacts dynamically). If you did 100% of what "you should have done", you get à 100% drop rate. If you "missed" 50% of the "good" actions, you get a drop rate of 50%, etc...Everyone will try to hit a "perfect score".

No. Everyone trying to hit a perfect score is terrible. Determining the worth of a player (and his likelihood of gettin lootz) based off how well he matched a predetermined set of values will do nothing but force people to gear and play their jobs in a single (and not necessarily the most effective) way. It would be the bane of innovative strategies.

Let's say a player finds a brilliant new method for tanking a fight on white mage, and he and his group come up with an effective strategy that allows them to win the fight more quickly and with less risk if they have him whm tanking and a couple paladins for their melee DD. What would this do to them? It would fuck them over, that's what. The paladins aren't keeping hate and the whm isn't curing anyone but themselves so both the paladin and the white mages suck according to the system, and none of them get rewarded despite the fact that they're accomplishing the fight more consistently than any of the normal groups. They're all good players who know their job so well that they can use it to its greatest potential in a fight, even if that means putting it in a strange role, but they will all be labeled as baddies by the system and be punished for being good.

That's not even the end of it either.
What if a white mage gets hit by a crack and dies? He's bad right?
What if dodging the crack would have interrupted his casting and caused the tank to die? The whm understood that the tank dieing would end the run, and that his buddy could raise him in a few seconds with little consequence. He made the right call, and is a fine whm, but the system can't tell that.

What if you have two different monks, one that did 50,000 damage and took 3,000, and one that dealt 65,000 but took 15,000? Is the one who took less damage better because he put less strain on the whm? or is the on who dealt more damage better because he kept the fight from dragging out despite putting more strain on the whm?

You can say that they'll have gambits determining this crap but there's just no way in hell a team can cover every variable. It's impossible. The system would either have to be progressively improving (in this case the changes would take a while and whether a set of players is good or not would be determined by a single set of subjective human minds) or it would have to be adaptively improving (The system itself would observe players and add values as players successfully did content or reacted to a series of actions differently and survived. Issue is this would be really fucking hard to make even a little effective, and it could encourage players to abuse glitches and get rewarded as the system may not know the difference between an off the wall strategy and an in the wall mob) One method takes resources, is slow, and won't see any significant results for a very long time, the other is pretty much impossibru at the moment. So basically the only ones who would really benefit from this sort of system wouldn't be the skilled players, but the testers (who I can assure you would find the hidden values within a month) and the mindless zombies who copy whatever they see the good players doing without ever questioning why they do it.

And on a side note...
The idea that they should make skill (which can mean any number of things: reflexes, knowledge, preparation, quick thinking, careful planning, etc. ) > time invested doesn't work in the mmo world anyways for the simple reason that for MMOs, time is literally money. Time invested is #1 on any company's list, ideally everyone in the world should be playing their mmo whenever they're not working to get the money to pay for their mmo. There's a limit on how quickly they can develop content, so they reduce your chances of obtaining something so that you have a carrot on a stick dangling in front of you. If it takes hardcore players a hundred runs to get all their shit (As you wished this could actually be because they got their asses kicked 99 times first, or because drop rates blow, or anywhere in-between) then they have some time to develop and release new content. Problem with making content difficult to stall people is it's either too easy and the hardcore player have it beat and have their loots within days, or it's so absurdly hard that only the best players in the game will be able to beat it at all, which is terrible for business because there's very few leets, and very many not so leets. So to keep people playing for the maximum amount of time you add a rng in there and balance the content so that it takes the leets a bit to figure it out and it challenges the average player, and everyone does the content a bunch of times to get all their shit and then, a couple months later something new and shiny comes out and everyone keeps the clink clink flowing into the company. In other words your time in the game is more valuable to the company than your skill in a game, and as such when you're playing the game you'll find that people who invest more time are better rewarded than those who just have leet skillz despite not playing much (all like, 4 of them).

[KoujiGeki]

No. Everyone trying to hit a perfect score is terrible. Determining the worth of a player (and his likelihood of gettin lootz) based off how well he matched a predetermined set of values will do nothing but force people to gear and play their jobs in a single (and not necessarily the most effective) way. It would be the bane of innovative strategies.

Let's say a player finds a brilliant new method for tanking a fight on white mage, and he and his group come up with an effective strategy that allows them to win the fight more quickly and with less risk if they have him whm tanking and a couple paladins for their melee DD. What would this do to them? It would fuck them over, that's what. The paladins aren't keeping hate and the whm isn't curing anyone but themselves so both the paladin and the white mages suck according to the system, and none of them get rewarded despite the fact that they're accomplishing the fight more consistently than any of the normal groups. They're all good players who know their job so well that they can use it to its greatest potential in a fight, even if that means putting it in a strange role, but they will all be labeled as baddies by the system and be punished for being good.

That's not even the end of it either.
What if a white mage gets hit by a crack and dies? He's bad right?
What if dodging the crack would have interrupted his casting and caused the tank to die? The whm understood that the tank dieing would end the run, and that his buddy could raise him in a few seconds with little consequence. He made the right call, and is a fine whm, but the system can't tell that.

What if you have two different monks, one that did 50,000 damage and took 3,000, and one that dealt 65,000 but took 15,000? Is the one who took less damage better because he put less strain on the whm? or is the on who dealt more damage better because he kept the fight from dragging out despite putting more strain on the whm?

You can say that they'll have gambits determining this crap but there's just no way in hell a team can cover every variable. It's impossible. The system would either have to be progressively improving (in this case the changes would take a while and whether a set of players is good or not would be determined by a single set of subjective human minds) or it would have to be adaptively improving (The system itself would observe players and add values as players successfully did content or reacted to a series of actions differently and survived. Issue is this would be really fucking hard to make even a little effective, and it could encourage players to abuse glitches and get rewarded as the system may not know the difference between an off the wall strategy and an in the wall mob) One method takes resources, is slow, and won't see any significant results for a very long time, the other is pretty much impossibru at the moment. So basically the only ones who would really benefit from this sort of system wouldn't be the skilled players, but the testers (who I can assure you would find the hidden values within a month) and the mindless zombies who copy whatever they see the good players doing without ever questioning why they do it.

And on a side note...
The idea that they should make skill (which can mean any number of things: reflexes, knowledge, preparation, quick thinking, careful planning, etc. ) > time invested doesn't work in the mmo world anyways for the simple reason that for MMOs, time is literally money. Time invested is #1 on any company's list, ideally everyone in the world should be playing their mmo whenever they're not working to get the money to pay for their mmo. There's a limit on how quickly they can develop content, so they reduce your chances of obtaining something so that you have a carrot on a stick dangling in front of you. If it takes hardcore players a hundred runs to get all their shit (As you wished this could actually be because they got their asses kicked 99 times first, or because drop rates blow, or anywhere in-between) then they have some time to develop and release new content. Problem with making content difficult to stall people is it's either too easy and the hardcore player have it beat and have their loots within days, or it's so absurdly hard that only the best players in the game will be able to beat it at all, which is terrible for business because there's very few leets, and very many not so leets. So to keep people playing for the maximum amount of time you add a rng in there and balance the content so that it takes the leets a bit to figure it out and it challenges the average player, and everyone does the content a bunch of times to get all their shit and then, a couple months later something new and shiny comes out and everyone keeps the clink clink flowing into the company. In other words your time in the game is more valuable to the company than your skill in a game, and as such when you're playing the game you'll find that people who invest more time are better rewarded than those who just have leet skillz despite not playing much (all like, 4 of them).

This. But reading more and more from Reynhart he just seems to be one of those gimme gimme players.

[Riv]

I've got your elitism counter right here: Stop being so touchy feely and sucking at the game.

[Reynhart]

Ok, I give up.
Too many people consider that "random" equals "challenging" and "repeating the same content" equals "being a good player".

Good news is, every MMO is lazy enough to think that way too, so you'll be well served.

[SkyeWindbinder]

Ok, I give up.
Too many people consider that "random" equals "challenging" and "repeating the same content" equals "being a good player".

Good news is, every MMO is lazy enough to think that way too, so you'll be well served.

Well come on, Reyhart. Let's be honest here. The system we have works, and it keeps players coming back for more. Therefore, it succeeds. If you have a better system, you should present it. Note, I said "better" system. This is just my humble $0.02, but your paint by numbers gambit "things you shoulda done" system idea, well, it kind of... sucked. No offense meant, of course.

[Reynhart]

Well come on, Reyhart. Let's be honest here. The system we have works, and it keeps players coming back for more. Therefore, it succeeds. If you have a better system, you should present it. Note, I said "better" system. This is just my humble $0.02, but your paint by numbers gambit "things you shoulda done" system idea, well, it kind of... sucked. No offense meant, of course.

Honestly, I don't understand how this system still works. What motivation can people find to do the same thing a 200th time, when they were screwed 199 times by a simple dice roll ?

How do people thought, back in the days of FFXI, that getting the Empress Hairpin was "challenging" when you could OS the NM that could drop it ?

And more importantly, why do they consider people who claim "challenge over random" to be "gimme gimme players" ?

My ideas certainly have flaws, but at least you could feel proud when the game rewards you.

[SkyeWindbinder]

Honestly, I don't understand how this system still works. What motivation can people find to do the same thing a 200th time, when they were screwed 199 times by a simple dice roll ?

Your exaggeration is noted. But the thing of it is, time and repitition are part of what makes an MMO. You may get lucky on the first roll. Then again you may not. On the other hand, you'll probably have to run the dungeon again in order to get yet another piece or loot you're looking for. To tell you the truth, if the content is fun and you have a few friends willing to run it either for their pieces of loot or to help you get your own, it's really not as bad as you're painting it out to be. If it was, it would have failed a long time ago instead of being featured in MMOs multiple times.

How do people thought, back in the days of FFXI, that getting the Empress Hairpin was "challenging" when you could OS the NM that could drop it ?

I've never played FFXI, so I have no idea what you're talking about. But I do know this: Making content challenging is only part of what makes an MMO worthwhile. Dungeons exist also as an alternative for gaining rewards that boost your character. A Dev's job is to make the content and the reward enticing enough so that a player is willing to repeat said content for said reward.

And more importantly, why do they consider people who claim "challenge over random" to be "gimme gimme players" ?

I don't know, but I do know that random is needed in these kinds of runs just as much as challenge.

My ideas certainly have flaws, but at least you could feel proud when the game rewards you.

Well, I'm frankly speaking for myself, but when my wand dropped for my WHM in one of my primal fights, I felt pretty proud myself.

[Reynhart]

Your exaggeration is noted. But the thing of it is, time and repitition are part of what makes an MMO. You may get lucky on the first roll. Then again you may not.

Some people on my LS have done Ifrit more than 500 times to get all the seven weapons. It's not exaggerated to say they were screwed more than 200 times.

On the other hand, you'll probably have to run the dungeon again in order to get yet another piece or loot you're looking for. To tell you the truth, if the content is fun and you have a few friends willing to run it either for their pieces of loot or to help you get your own, it's really not as bad as you're painting it out to be. If it was, it would have failed a long time ago instead of being featured in MMOs multiple times.

Doing the dungeon for another loot or to help a friend is totally different. If you have 5 or 10 items items in a dungeon, of course you would have te repeat it. Like I said in one post, if only one item is guaranteed on each run, even for a full PT, it'd be fairer.

Making content challenging is only part of what makes an MMO worthwhile. Dungeons exist also as an alternative for gaining rewards that boost your character. A Dev's job is to make the content and the reward enticing enough so that a player is willing to repeat said content for said reward.

Dungeons are "challenging content". You shouldn't offer good reward in an "unchallenging content", and winning a dice roll is not challenging.

A Dev's job is to make the content and the reward enticing enough so that a player is willing to repeat said content for said reward.

No, the content and reward should be enticing enough so that a player is willing to do it.

I don't know, but I do know that random is needed in these kinds of runs just as much as challenge.

A little random is good. How a content rewards you can be random, not If a content should reward you. (Dark Matter is not a reward for killing a primal )

Well, I'm frankly speaking for myself, but when my wand dropped for my WHM in one of my primal fights, I felt pretty proud myself.

Since you probably killed that primal numerous times (For that you should be proud) before dropping it, there's nothing special from this win that could make you more proud of yourself.

[SkyeWindbinder]

Some people on my LS have done Ifrit more than 500 times to get all the seven weapons. It's not exaggerated to say they were screwed more than 200 times.

It's also quite plausible to say that they simply weren't lucky enough to get what they wanted those "200" times they played. (200 seems like an exaggeration to me as well, but I'll allow it, since I wasn't really there when your LS members were playing.) Anyway, it's the luck of the draw. Some people have it, some have less than others.

Doing the dungeon for another loot or to help a friend is totally different. If you have 5 or 10 items items in a dungeon, of course you would have to repeat it. Like I said in one post, if only one item is guaranteed on each run, even for a full PT, it'd be fairer.

What is fair is a matter or perspective. Some people may not feel it's fair that they are not guaranteed high tier gear EVERY time they run a dungeon once. Some people may feel it's not fair that they actually have to group up with others to get access to said gear. Some people may think it's not fair they don't get a cookie every time they step into a dungeon. lol But the way the system is set up now, it all but guarantees 100% that people will continue to revisit dungeons if they want quality tier rare items. Setting it up that way helps keep players busy while playing the game at highest level. Granted, it may not be the most graceful or "fair" way to elongate a player's business with content in a game, but it works.

Dungeons are "challenging content". You shouldn't offer good reward in an "unchallenging content", and winning a dice roll is not challenging.

However, the dungeon itself is challenging enough to balance with the reward you are trying to receive. Unfortunately, the content is not the only obstacle that stands between you and your desired gear. (shrug) What are ya gonna do? Well, besides run it again. lol It can be a bitter pill to swallow, but you have to understand something. Just making content challenging is not what keeps an mmo running. Indeed, it's not really the most important aspect of keeping an mmo running. What keeps an mmo running is time, more specifically time the players invest into the game. Adding the luck factor to drops all but totally ensures the player will be back to spend more time in that dungeon. It's a system that works. And quite well, I may add.

No, the content and reward should be enticing enough so that a player is willing to do it.


A little random is good. How a content rewards you can be random, not If a content should reward you. (Dark Matter is not a reward for killing a primal )

You say that, after I said:

A Dev's job is to make the content and the reward enticing enough so that a player is willing to repeat said content for said reward.

What say we meet somewhere in the middle on this? (I am not beyond compromise :P) The content should be enticing enough so that the player is willing to do it repeatedly. The reward is part of the enticement. Do you want it? Do ya? Oh, you want better rewards for just running the dungeon than totems? Fine. Well how about a small piece of green gear? Suppose you were getting that instead of totems? Of course, that wouldn't satisfy a lot of people who may feel they deserve at least one piece of blue gear or primal weapon for running. So the complaining would continue, lol. You can please all the people some of the time... yadda yadda. The thing of it is, you are not really going to be satisfied until you get that one epic item you're looking for. You're still going to repeat the content. So, what would be the point? You're asking for a trophy at least for participating. But the truth of it is, not everyone can get a reward just for being there. The luck factor, man. It can be a witch. But it keeps players returning for more, and makes getting the item all the more satisfying.

Since you probably killed that primal numerous times (For that you should be proud) before dropping it, there's nothing special from this win that could make you more proud of yourself.

Okay, we'll meet in the middle again. I was proud because, through repeating the process, I got good at the fight enough so that I could do it blindfolded. I was proud that I totally kicked the butt of the primal that stood before me minutes ago, and was good enough at the fight so I was an indispensable healer AND DD to my team. And I was proud I stuck it out all those times I did it until I got my stuff instead of giving up out of frustration and getting nothing for my troubles. The primal weapon I got was not just a testament of my skill, it was a testament of my patience as well.