Green Monster Games (Curt Schilling)

[tad10]

Originally Posted by Ngruk

and then 38 Studios happened along and we formed a guild here.
* * *
Last night I organized a 25 man raid, never been in anything above 5 man, and we went into Tempest Keep. 14 of the players had never raided before.

I'd suggest you hire a few more people with significant raiding experience over there at 38 to help out with the endgame. Worked out reasonably well for Blizzard.

[Genjiro]

Originally Posted by tad10

I'd suggest you hire a few more people with significant raiding experience over there at 38 to help out with the endgame. Worked out reasonably well for Blizzard.

We had this discussion near the beginning of this thread.

[spronk]

You know your MMO is going to be ballin' when your CEO has tanked Void Reaver. You guys should also go do Gruuls and Magtheridons, easy loot.

Makes me happy that ngruk has so many 70s and is raiding, since thats exactly the kind of game I like to play - alt friendly, casual raiding.

[Ngruk]

Originally Posted by tad10

I'd suggest you hire a few more people with significant raiding experience over there at 38 to help out with the endgame. Worked out reasonably well for Blizzard.

How do you define 'significant' raiding experience and why would having that be valuable for creating end game content? Who on our current staff would meet that 'significant' raiding experience pre-req?

If I remember correctly the WoW "endgame" at launch was a cause of major backlash wasn't it?

Creative thinking, cool idea implementing people are just that, regardless of the amount of time they've spent in Hyjal, ZA or The Plane of Fear. I would argue that knowing how that content works and has worked in the past is a valuable part but by no means is it a priority or a need for people to create that raiding high end content for Copernicus.

It's awesome that the entire design team can reference past work, or past experiences as they are creating and will create this content for our world but some incredibly cool and very unique and different ideas and creations have come from people that have done zero raiding or high end content in WOW or EQ.

The main thing, for me, that people with game development exposure to creating this content bring to the table, if they are good at what they do and into making a great game (and not their game) is allow us to get farther down the road without stepping in the potholes they all stepped in the first time around but also go in directions they couldn't or weren't allowed to the first or second time around the block.

[kcxiv]

Just tell them to make another raid event like The Death Touch even in Inktu'ta. That is my favorite raid zone ever.

[Zehn - Vhex]

It was more that the promised end game wasn't really in and 'raids' themselves were broken with guilds going into the wrong instances and whatnot and the loot rewards were awful.

[kcxiv]

Originally Posted by Ngruk

Last night I was MA and had a blast. One epic screw up when I thunderclapped and broke a sheep, but other than that it was fun as hell. I am dead set on learning how to MT end game content, and that's not something you can just get gear and show up to do. You need to be with folks that get the whole 'learning curve' thing and aren't going to make life hell on people to the point they just won't raid.

Isnt that the truth. I went from a Necro in EQ for 6 years, to a tank in VG. You have to pay 100 percent attention. Its alot different. It took me a bit before i got adjusted to main tanking. Its definately fun and you have to be tons more alert. No more sitting in the back playing xbox while killing mobs.

[Fayvren]

We got to the Reaver before calling it a night, but it was pretty cool to be with a group of people who were experiencing raiding for the first time, and hear them all fired up after we downed the first 6 pull on the 2nd shot. I enjoy that part of MMO's. I'll eventually get the gear I want if I want it bad enough, but the cool social stuff that can happen is fun for me, in a geeky sort of way I guess.

You can have your min/max f bomb dropping DKP minusing raids. I've done that and would rather beat the crap out of the raid leaders than the mobs most times. There is zero fun in that for me. Finding a group of people that are fun as hell to hang with AND can take down high end content has always been the challenge for me.

I can get a group/raid up and organized inside of 30 minutes for pretty much anything on the planet. What I can't do, and probably won't ever do, is know the exact need for every class in every raid spot of a raid. I did that before, not interested, too much work (but I loved doing it when I had time).

More than anything, this is the fun part of MMOs. The excitement of doing something new and accomplishing it for the first time where everyone is kind of a novice.

But it also highlights something that is probably the crux of the problems in "end-game" MMO design. You generally have a whole range of players, skill, time,etc. How do you balance content so more relaxed gamers have things will actually challenge them and actually be achieveable, without the bleeding edge "DKP minus" guys blowing through everything in a fraction of the time, getting bored, then quitting?

One of the frustrations with WOW at least in BC was that new content was almost always too hard for the average casual player. Except for the top raiding guilds it was incredibly hard keeping people motivated to farm, and "peak" their characters for every encounter.

From a business perspective, you can't have the top players getting bored and quitting, yet you also don't want the casual players getting frustrated either. Maybe the solution is that content needs to be delivered much more quickly. New zones and new raids every month or two, rather than having to wait 6-7 months for new things to do. I know I'd stay subscribed if I knew every month I could do something completely new.

[Incognitogamer]

Originally Posted by Fayvren

One of the frustrations with WOW at least in BC was that new content was almost always too hard for the average casual player. Except for the top raiding guilds it was incredibly hard keeping people motivated to farm, and "peak" their characters for every encounter.

From a business perspective, you can't have the top players getting bored and quitting, yet you also don't want the casual players getting frustrated either. Maybe the solution is that content needs to be delivered much more quickly. New zones and new raids every month or two, rather than having to wait 6-7 months for new things to do. I know I'd stay subscribed if I knew every month I could do something completely new.

I think it's mainly because in wow, you're spoon fed content all the way up to and including lvl 70. But as soon as you step foot into the raid game you lose and you wipe and you have lots of repair costs and consumable costs and since you're not soloing you have loots that you can't even use drop and it seems less worth your time to do it. Basically all the way to 70 you get to be a selfish little prick doing things that only benefit you, then all the sudden when you start raiding the individual advancements and individual accomplishments die off or at least drop dramatically and it seems less worthwhile.

[Zehn - Vhex]

The initial barrier to raiding was two-fold. One, Gruul and Magtheridon were pure assbeat in their initial incarnation and they were direct successors to Saphhiron/Kel'Thuzad levels of raiding and not Karazhan Prince raiding.

Secondly, your average guild tried raiding with 3 ret paladins, a handful of frost mages and some BM hunters as DPS with a fury warrior who slapped on a shield to try to tank.

Problem one has been alleviated. Blizzard has promised to make sure each new expansion has a slightly more new-guild-friendly raiding curve. Problem two however has not been addressed and I doubt Blizzard will do anything about. Raid/class composition now matters far more then it did previously.

[random]

Originally Posted by Ngruk

How do you define 'significant' raiding experience and why would having that be valuable for creating end game content? Who on our current staff would meet that 'significant' raiding experience pre-req?

If I remember correctly the WoW "endgame" at launch was a cause of major backlash wasn't it?

Wow has done some good things, but wow shouldn't be your goal take the good discard the bad. The trick is knowing which is which and is why some of the things you've said are a bit concerning.

Originally Posted by Ngruk

Creative thinking, cool idea implementing people are just that, regardless of the amount of time they've spent in Hyjal, ZA or The Plane of Fear. I would argue that knowing how that content works and has worked in the past is a valuable part but by no means is it a priority or a need for people to create that raiding high end content for Copernicus.

You have to know where you've been to get to where you wanna go. All the things you listed are important but to say their experience or lack of knowledge of end game raiding isn't important seems a bit naive? If they were not clearing the content in a reasonable amount of time how do they know how the encounter really worked?

Originally Posted by Ngruk

It's awesome that the entire design team can reference past work, or past experiences as they are creating and will create this content for our world but some incredibly cool and very unique and different ideas and creations have come from people that have done zero raiding or high end content in WOW or EQ.

I don't think anyone will argue a persons talent based on experience but with a lack of experience or someone around with that experience to "guide" them how many mistakes will they make along with all those good ideas?


I'm an admitted fanboi so i'll try your game regardless but some comments here show a lack of long term thinking or internal naivety that you guys know everything you need to know. Getting knowledge from outside sources and the idea of talented people pulling from the experience of a seasoned veteran should not be dismissed so easily. Hell I would even consider buy accounts that are up to par and sitting your guys down in a sunwell guild. Pretty sure they will be shocked at the difference between that and their za runs. This is a pretty cost effective way to get your guys some personal experience. By no means will they be an expert after a few weeks but it might open their eyes a bit.

Sorry to hear about the shoulder, thanks for all you did for the bean on and off the field.

[Digo]

Originally Posted by Ngruk

How do you define 'significant' raiding experience and why would having that be valuable for creating end game content? Who on our current staff would meet that 'significant' raiding experience pre-req?

If I remember correctly the WoW "endgame" at launch was a cause of major backlash wasn't it?

Creative thinking, cool idea implementing people are just that, regardless of the amount of time they've spent in Hyjal, ZA or The Plane of Fear. I would argue that knowing how that content works and has worked in the past is a valuable part but by no means is it a priority or a need for people to create that raiding high end content for Copernicus.

It's awesome that the entire design team can reference past work, or past experiences as they are creating and will create this content for our world but some incredibly cool and very unique and different ideas and creations have come from people that have done zero raiding or high end content in WOW or EQ.

The main thing, for me, that people with game development exposure to creating this content bring to the table, if they are good at what they do and into making a great game (and not their game) is allow us to get farther down the road without stepping in the potholes they all stepped in the first time around but also go in directions they couldn't or weren't allowed to the first or second time around the block.

It's important to have an experienced raider creating your raid content for two reasons: perspective and history. If you were creating a superhero game, and needed to hire system designers, would you hire someone who had never played City of Heroes? No matter how smart someone might be, there are are many lessons that can only be acquired through first-hand experience.

For example, I was trying to explain the problem of raid-stacking to a programmer. He had no idea that raiders will swap people out for every fight to achieve the most optimal composition. He has no idea how raiders think or operate. This guy comes from a heavy RPG background and has never raided before. He is certainly a very experienced designer, but if he were designing raid content, it would be a disaster.

[Genjiro]

Originally Posted by random

You have to know where you've been to get to where you wanna go. All the things you listed are important but to say their experience or lack of knowledge of end game raiding isn't important seems a bit naive? If they were not clearing the content in a reasonable amount of time how do they know how the encounter really worked?

Same thing happened with EQ2 and its poor raiding game, and overall game direction. They had people not only out of touch with raiding and what makes it challenging/fun, but also people out of touch with what their entire playerbase was interested in. This is why Desert of Flames was such a giant mess and nobody wanted to play it, and why tons of raiding guilds left (including mine).

Get people with little raid experience designing raid content, and you get that kind of mess. It wasn't until they actually hired people with a clue about high end content that the game picked back up. But by then, the damage was already done and once you lose those people you rarely if ever get them back. With the dynamic raid content Blizzard has put out, and maybe I'm just overly pessimistic, I can't seeing people topping it as far as quality and interesting design goes, since they actually have people who know a) what people have done in the past and b) how to challenge them in new ways in the future since those guys were also high end raiders. The same old boring ass random_dragon tank and spank encounters won't likely hold those who have raided extensively in WoW, no matter how great Joe Cool is who has no experience and thinks *in his mind* how great it is. That disconnect of fun to designer and fun to gamer has always been a big hurdle, and probably why WoW has been so widely popular because they have identified that better than others.

My only problem with WoW, and it always has been, is the kiddie bullshit. No, not the cartoony graphics, the lack of immersion in the game world. Its a mirror of pop culture, which makes me want to vomit. Paris hilton jokes, Mc hammer dances, all that shit just makes it fail to be an actual fantasy world that I enjoyed reading about growing up --Dragonlance, FR, WoT, the Eddings books etc, I'd like to play in a world that isn't tied in every 10 feet to MTV.

[James]

Originally Posted by Ngruk

If I remember correctly the WoW "endgame" at launch was a cause of major backlash wasn't it?

Well, for different reasons. Launch day raids were mainly extensions of Velious raiding for the most part. Few neat tricks here or there like the Geddon bomb, but for the most part tank this, heal that, DPS the shit down, and watch out for X Area Effect. Trash respawns, loot allotment, trash rewards, all were nearly identical to Velious raiding. Then there was Onyxia, which was probably the single most badass raid encounter ever created in any game ever at that point. Ever. So even at worst you're left with more of the (mostly) successful same, which isn't a bad damn boat to be in -- but then they learned, designed, and implemented bigger and far better raids as time went on.

Release day raid bitching was either about that More of the Same or (mostly) the bugs that were RAMPANT that should never have seen the light of day. Raid lockouts, impossible Ragnaros, little to no raid UI, and basically incomplete/unbalanced classses on the whole that should have been taken care of long before launch day. But for whatever reason they dropped the fattest load of shit on everyone two weeks before launch and let the bugs go live as they didn't patch for THREE GODDAMN MONTHS afterwards. Still bitter? Noooo.

Anyway, Digo put it the best way. You just aren't going to get the same caliber raiding design from a raiding newbie as you are a hardcore raider.

[Cybsled]

Much in the way firms hire former-hackers to develop software protection, MMO developers might do well to hire a former-high end hardcore raider.

The same general thought applies: This guy used to do this for a "living". He knows how they think, what they might try, etc. It could do wonders. Out of the box thinkers, game mechanic exploiters.

Think back to how Verant was aghast at the fact monks were using FD to pull singles. Or burn-tankers in COH were reaping massive AE farming XP by pulling ultra-huge clumps. Or someone exploited LOS to kill some raid boss (take your pick of a MMO). Or some WoW guild stacked classes to make a raid boss ez mode (or just plain killable in the case of Muru I guess!).

What will a player do? What can I do to discourage that, but at the sametime not make the encounter broken? At what point does "complex" degenerate into frustration or tedium?

Important things to keep in mind.

edit: The main problem with early WoW raids, as has been stated, was the lack thereof, poor item design, and some untested encounters.