General Discussion

I just read this thread and I thought: OMG, thank god I am not alone.

I always thought I am the only one who has the feeling of being alone altough being online. Kinda paradox.

I left over 100 guilds ( in GW alone, lol ) because of the chat problem. There is ALWAYS trouble because I don't use Voice Chat. I get discriminated because of that. Very often guilds don't take me at all.

After so many years of online gaming, I have my own kind of solution: Play only games which allow you to do both, soloing and grouping. Whenever you find someone willing to party with you, do it! If not, solo as long as u find another group.

Example: In Guild Wars (Addons included) you have henchmen/NPC who heal/buff/support you so u can solo. Don't use them if possible. Go to popular places where people meet to find a group ( e.g. eye of the North)

There is no real solution. If you want to  find talkative persons, then use platform like MMORPG.com ^^

We all should form a club or something like that. Players who like to chat.

In general, I have the feeling that problem of anti-social behaviour will deteriorate. The problems of VoiceChat and silence made me register here. Kinda ironic id say.

So....if anyone plays GW or Warhammer Online mail me. I wanna party with u. I would even start a new char just to chat with ya, hehe

Originally posted by MindTrigger

The simple fact is, the game developers have removed almost all the social features from modern mmos.  Things like the auction house system and lack of *useful* social hubs have completely removed the need for anyone to communicate except for the occasional group. Hell, I barely even talk to my own guildies.

This is an ongoing discussion theme here.  So many people are wondering why the hell their gaming experience in mmos feels so dull and lifeless, and I a submit that a large reason for that is the lack of social features and missing or boring non-combat systems.

The other, of course, is stagnant innovation in the genre.  We are going through a period of time where all the game developers think they are going to make the next wow-killer by copying every burned out concept they can from Blizzard.  This is why all the games are fundamentally similar, and dry. 

* crafting / trade sucks - The Auction House concept has made it so you no longer need to build relationships with other players in the game.  No one cares who even makes stuff anymore, because it's all bought on the AH.  In past games I have made very close contacts with great crafters, and I would even do contract hunting for them to make some money.  All of that is pretty much dead now. Crafting itself is so boring and 1 dimensional that most people don't even bother with it.

* instanced player housing sucks - No one really cares about it.  It's outside the game world in it's own zone, so you don't really get visitors.  Most people I know are just using their instanced home for the extra storage space.  Decorating them is a joke, and there aren't many items you can drop in your home.  Most games don't let you craft or sell from your own home anymore.  Any social benefit of player housing is dead due to these shortcomings.

* social hubs suck - they serve no useful purpose.  You can't go there to get entertainer buffs, there is no player made entertainment (like swg had), these games have weak diseases/poisons, so you don't go there for heals.

* soloer as king syndrome - no one really needs to group much anymore, so they don't.  As a result, these games feel like little more than offline single player games with a boring chat room built in.

 

There are plenty of other reasons, but I believe it's the lack of RICH non-combat / social systems that makes the games boring, and has all but ended player interaction.

The auction house is both a blessing and a curse.  Yes it does remove the need for player interaction or real trade instead of just buying items for currency.  On the other hand I don't want the chat channels to turn into rapid fire spam like "WTS uber item X pst".  Giran chat in Lineage 2 is a prime example, having a conversation in that channel is an exercise in futility.

I completely agree with the player housing.  It's nice for storage but the novelty of decorating it wears off quickly.  It has always felt disconnected from the rest of the game.  Guild halls are another story though.  They do help quite a bit with the social aspect of the game.

The social hubs don't work for a few reasons.  The main reason, I think, is because they make too many of them.  They put cities and towns in every area which spreads the population all over hells half acre.  Nobody wants to have to travel anymore to get to a trainer / store / quest giver.  Most people will say travel is a useless time sink, I say its another example of how mmorpg's are being made easier.  As for player made entertainment, the last time i seen that was the costume contests in CoH (I never played SWG).

Everything being solo friendly is another reason.  But not because being in a group means everybody is going to talk it up by default.  The content has to be challenging enough that the group must communicate to survive.  Today tank and spank is the assumed strategy so there's no need to talk even then.  WAR is the perfect example of this, I was in plenty of groups for PQ's and scenarios but they were just mindless kills and zergs so you were able to hear a pin drop in the group channel.

The auction house is both a blessing and a curse.  Yes it does remove the need for player interaction or real trade instead of just buying items for currency.  On the other hand I don't want the chat channels to turn into rapid fire spam like "WTS uber item X pst".  Giran chat in Lineage 2 is a prime example, having a conversation in that channel is an exercise in futility.

I completely agree with the player housing.  It's nice for storage but the novelty of decorating it wears off quickly.  It has always felt disconnected from the rest of the game.  Guild halls are another story though.  They do help quite a bit with the social aspect of the game.

The social hubs don't work for a few reasons.  The main reason, I think, is because they make too many of them.  They put cities and towns in every area which spreads the population all over hells half acre.  Nobody wants to have to travel anymore to get to a trainer / store / quest giver.  Most people will say travel is a useless time sink, I say its another example of how mmorpg's are being made easier.  As for player made entertainment, the last time i seen that was the costume contests in CoH (I never played SWG).

Everything being solo friendly is another reason.  But not because being in a group means everybody is going to talk it up by default.  The content has to be challenging enough that the group must communicate to survive.  Today tank and spank is the assumed strategy so there's no need to talk even then.  WAR is the perfect example of this, I was in plenty of groups for PQ's and scenarios but they were just mindless kills and zergs so you were able to hear a pin drop in the group channel.

Thanks for the reply.  The trade channel does not have to be the only means for people to sell things.  In SWG you would get people barking in public areas, but it wasn't too bad (on Bria anyway).   People's vendors could be seen on the overlay map, and they could be searched on the Bazzaar, sort of like an AH, but you still had to travel to pick items up, or to buy items from private vendors.  This effectively quieted the chat channels for trade.  Even if you don't like those options, there is plenty of room to brainstorm new ideas for trade.  The auction house is just an easy cop-out solution, in my opinion.

The solo / grouping thing to me is just another one of those areas where the potential to make new friends is lost.  I agree about the tank and spank garbage.  I hate to keep bringing SWG into all my posts (actually, no I don't) but since SOE didn't rely on the standard classes pre-CU, groups had to play smart on the tough planets like Dathomir.  The witches would own just about any type of player, so group effort was really important.  There was no class recipe for the right group, just good smart/skilled players.

The reason people used social hubs in SWG was because there was a central purpose behind them.  Entertainers were key to poison/disease healing and wound healing which were *hardcore*.  If you got a disease or you died, a big chunk of your health bar were blacked out until you went and sat with entertainers to heal for a bit.  As a result, conversations happened and friendships were made. What we have today is the death penalty system where you are *sorta* weaker for 10 mins or so.  yawn.  I prefer the social idea SWG had.

The NGE version is even useful because instead of heals, you can get different kinds of buffs from entertainers.  Entertainers were somewhat key to the game, and so the main cantinas were busy, and fun.  Also, if you wanted to craft and you had a crafting droid, you could go sit in the cantinas and grind stuff out while talking with people.

The modern version of social hubs are completely passive and people are expected to just hang out for no reason.  Problem is, they get bored after a few minutes because there is nothing to do or work on there so no one hangs around.

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Originally posted by MindTrigger

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The auction house is both a blessing and a curse.  Yes it does remove the need for player interaction or real trade instead of just buying items for currency.  On the other hand I don't want the chat channels to turn into rapid fire spam like "WTS uber item X pst".  Giran chat in Lineage 2 is a prime example, having a conversation in that channel is an exercise in futility.
I completely agree with the player housing.  It's nice for storage but the novelty of decorating it wears off quickly.  It has always felt disconnected from the rest of the game.  Guild halls are another story though.  They do help quite a bit with the social aspect of the game.
The social hubs don't work for a few reasons.  The main reason, I think, is because they make too many of them.  They put cities and towns in every area which spreads the population all over hells half acre.  Nobody wants to have to travel anymore to get to a trainer / store / quest giver.  Most people will say travel is a useless time sink, I say its another example of how mmorpg's are being made easier.  As for player made entertainment, the last time i seen that was the costume contests in CoH (I never played SWG).
Everything being solo friendly is another reason.  But not because being in a group means everybody is going to talk it up by default.  The content has to be challenging enough that the group must communicate to survive.  Today tank and spank is the assumed strategy so there's no need to talk even then.  WAR is the perfect example of this, I was in plenty of groups for PQ's and scenarios but they were just mindless kills and zergs so you were able to hear a pin drop in the group channel.

---

 
Thanks for the reply.  The trade channel does not have to be the only means for people to sell things.  In SWG you would get people barking in public areas, but it wasn't too bad (on Bria anyway).   People's vendors could be seen on the overlay map, and they could be searched on the Bazzaar, sort of like an AH, but you still had to travel to pick items up, or to buy items from private vendors.  This effectively quieted the chat channels for trade.  Even if you don't like those options, there is plenty of room to brainstorm new ideas for trade.  The auction house is just an easy cop-out solution, in my opinion.
The solo / grouping thing to me is just another one of those areas where the potential to make new friends is lost.  I agree about the tank and spank garbage.  I hate to keep bringing SWG into all my posts (actually, no I don't) but since SOE didn't rely on the standard classes pre-CU, groups had to play smart on the tough planets like Dathomir.  The witches would own just about any type of player, so group effort was really important.  There was no class recipe for the right group, just good smart/skilled players.
The reason people used social hubs in SWG was because there was a central purpose behind them.  Entertainers were key to poison/disease healing and wound healing which were *hardcore*.  If you got a disease or you died, a big chunk of your health bar were blacked out until you went and sat with entertainers to heal for a bit.  As a result, conversations happened and friendships were made. What we have today is the death penalty system where you are *sorta* weaker for 10 mins or so.  yawn.  I prefer the social idea SWG had.
The NGE version is even useful because instead of heals, you can get different kinds of buffs from entertainers.  Entertainers were somewhat key to the game, and so the main cantinas were busy, and fun.  Also, if you wanted to craft and you had a crafting droid, you could go sit in the cantinas and grind stuff out while talking with people.
The modern version of social hubs are completely passive and people are expected to just hang out for no reason.  Problem is, they get bored after a few minutes because there is nothing to do or work on there so no one hangs around.

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I remember how crowded was the general chat in SWG and the first thing we did when landing at a starport was put the spammers on /ignore.

The Bazaar was a nice feature but it lacked the ability to deliver your shopping to either your bank/house/mail.

Visiting empty vendors wasn't fun and so the bazaar lacked the ability to browse through all shops or the planetary map to hide empty vendors.

The cap price on the bazaar was a pain it forced the players to shop on the forum, so more like a second out of game play.

The huge size of the groups (called raids in MMO now) let anyone join them & the lack of levels helped a lot for that. You would stop by a player camp in the wilderness to heal & take the time to chat.

Poisons & diseaase where healed by docs, wounds by docs & meds, mind wounds by entertainers ;) Even as a former master DOC & entertainer I think 10 min downtime was too long for healing, something like 5 min would have been enoough, as for shuttle wait time.

I agree there are no working social hubs anymore.

People talk in WoW all the time.

Mostly about stuff you'd rather not hear.

I think new MMOs are actively trying to discourage chat. WAR and AoC come to mind.

Vent and live voice speak is a plague on MMOGs.

Originally posted by Sovrath

Wel, in Lineage 2 and LOTRO people talk quite a bit.

But they talk with the people who matter, their guild mates!

In L2 everyone talks to everyone else constantly. This is because although it is possible to solo the game isn't very solo friendly. You need to interact with others to get anywhere in the game. This is just the opposite of the WoW generation of games. They are solo friendly to the point that you could play for years and never have to interact with anyone. I believe that soloing should always be available in games but it should be limited in a way that groups are always preferable. The problem is that these newer MMOs have taken solo friendly to such an extreme that everyone treats them as single player games with other people running around. WAR is a good example of this taken to the absolute extreme. Sadly I see more of these games coming in the future so expect more games where nobody interacts with anyone.

Bren