Tuesday 10 March 2015

MMO Design: Vet Party Building

[Part of my MMO Design folder.]

While playing Vindictus I decided to join a party raid titled "Pls Join" for a boss I've never done. While waiting for the party to fill up I asked what tactics were needed and only got replies of "This is my first run too!" and "Lolz I dunno! xD". Still, the team filled up and we set off. As per usual for all raids I've participated in (other than Lakoria) the first move was setting up a campfire to buff up. During this down time I asked again and got different people telling me they also didn't know what to do. That's cool, we can learn together I thought.

Battle begins, we're not doing too badly until the boss nukes us with a special skill. The party leader then gets pissed and says "You do know how to fight this right?". Um. What? 6 out of 8 of your team just said they didn't. Weren't you listening? He then says "Sorry all, I'm restarting" and ends the raid right there. A few minutes later I see his new party waiting for members entitled "Please know what to do".

Without getting into the "play the way you want to play" argument, wouldn't the easiest method to fix this simply be a check box for "Veteran" when viewing the party list? One you have to "tick" first before joining the party, and the only people who can click the tick box are those who on their last attempt of that same raid/mission were successful (otherwise the option is greyed out so you can't just bluff the box)? This way people who failed it or haven't tried it can't join "Know what to do parties" and at the same time Vets who get tired of waiting for the "vet party" to fill up can opt to knowingly join a potentially less experienced team.

Do you think this will cause more problems that it will solve or is it something you would like to see?

2 comments:

  1. Just sounds like a party leader who himself doesn't know what to do and is hoping to hide behind or get carried by party members who do.

    I doubt designers would actually want to make it easier for players who do know how to do a fight to find and only okay with each other, you end up with a catch 22 situation where the new ones don't have an avenue to learn from the vets because the easy lazy way out is to always tick the check box.

    Taking the easy lazy way out of not communicating, not teaching, assuming every player knows how, -should- result in a train wreck.

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    1. Ironic you say train wreck because that very boss we were fighting was a living train (Bark Mk1). :P

      Newbies not having access to vets isn't such a bad thing either as it would force them to possibly think for themselves? I mean, how did the first vets work something out right?

      Also, can't be lazy if vet team fails in this example as it would disable your box ticking ability until you win that particular thing again. ;)

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