General Discussion

So my whole point of view is Soloing is needed for games however Grouping should be more rewarding than Soloing simply because it takes time and effort to get a group going where as a soloer can just jump in game and get going right away.

Right now in MMOs grouping isn't even rewarding sure you can do it for sh!ts and giggles but in reality you are punished for grouping up with others even in a duo. Here is a little story from WoW to back up my claim ...

So my cousin and I (Paladin and Warlock) decided we wanted to do a dungeon, tackle some tougher mobs get away from questing and maybe get some loot. we were both level 25 and decide to hit up razorfen kraul. My wife(Shaman) who usually plays with us wanted to finish up some quests she had gotten so she didnt join us (she is also 25).

so we get to Razorfen and notice a lot of the mobs are 26s and 27s ... pull one to test out how it goes and we kill it, sure it took a bit of time but we did it without too much trouble. We got 236 xp for it, we keep killing and we get about the same exp for each one anywhere from 206 to 236xp.

in my downtime, and there was a good amount of it i watched my wife play she would kill a solo mob level 26-27s and get 216 xp for them. I was just stupified at what i was seeing ....

she was able to get 20 less xp than my cousin and I, while being able to kill them faster and take on many more at the same time. in fact in the time it would take us to kill one. she would be able to kill 2-3 ... so in essence she was nearly getting double or triple the xp we were in the dungeon FIGHTING ELITES. And not only that she got done with her "kill X amount of mobs" she got 3000 xp for the turn in.

but at least we got to kill a boss that dropped a blue item ... that neither of us could use, and that bound on pick up so we couldnt even sell it.

now i know what your saying "bring some more dps" but if we had invited another DPSer/healer we probably would have gotten 100+ xp per kill and probably still kill slower than my wife solo.

this is the problem I have with the genre right now, to be that in utter nonsense, were tackling tougher content and she gets rewarded for not grouping and staying away from dungeons. And i doubt you soloers out there will see an issue with this.

Elite mobs were designed for groups, not 2 players barely able to kill 1 mob, no wonder you werent getting any XP, try some non-elites maybe? or get more ppl in your group and pick up the pace.

Wow is like the easiest to level game there is. it is dumbfounding that its not easy enough for some people.

Originally posted by Ravanos

So my whole point of view is Soloing is needed for games however Grouping should be more rewarding than Soloing simply because it takes time and effort to get a group going where as a soloer can just jump in game and get going right away.

Right now in MMOs grouping isn't even rewarding sure you can do it for sh!ts and giggles but in reality you are punished for grouping up with others even in a duo. Here is a little story from WoW to back up my claim ...

So my cousin and I (Paladin and Warlock) decided we wanted to do a dungeon, tackle some tougher mobs get away from questing and maybe get some loot. we were both level 25 and decide to hit up razorfen kraul. My wife(Shaman) who usually plays with us wanted to finish up some quests she had gotten so she didnt join us (she is also 25).

so we get to Razorfen and notice a lot of the mobs are 26s and 27s ... pull one to test out how it goes and we kill it, sure it took a bit of time but we did it without too much trouble. We got 236 xp for it, we keep killing and we get about the same exp for each one anywhere from 206 to 236xp.

in my downtime, and there was a good amount of it i watched my wife play she would kill a solo mob level 26-27s and get 216 xp for them. I was just stupified at what i was seeing ....

she was able to get 20 less xp than my cousin and I, while being able to kill them faster and take on many more at the same time. in fact in the time it would take us to kill one. she would be able to kill 2-3 ... so in essence she was nearly getting double or triple the xp we were in the dungeon FIGHTING ELITES. And not only that she got done with her "kill X amount of mobs" she got 3000 xp for the turn in.

but at least we got to kill a boss that dropped a blue item ... that neither of us could use, and that bound on pick up so we couldnt even sell it.

now i know what your saying "bring some more dps" but if we had invited another DPSer/healer we probably would have gotten 100+ xp per kill and probably still kill slower than my wife solo.

this is the problem I have with the genre right now, to be that in utter nonsense, were tackling tougher content and she gets rewarded for not grouping and staying away from dungeons. And i doubt you soloers out there will see an issue with this.

You mad just cause she somehow built her character into a mob killer instead of a pvper? or maybe you just suck at building characters or grouping? I mean come on. Anybody should look at this and see someone who just sucks in general at the game they're playing.

Yes grouping should be more rewarding because you can already take on harder monsters and get the better loot earlier, and its actually easier when you group up with someone to kill monsters . Let's look at some of the basics of grouping and soloing:

Grouping-

Get more loot, but its split between the group

Kill Harder Monsters

Kill Monsters Faster

Soloing-

Get all the loot

Kill monsters slower unless your character is somehow nerfed or you don't intend to PVP, but its still faster if you group up

You can't take on Boss Monsters since one person can't get the job done which is also saying that you can only take on lower level monsters than groups

So what you're saying is utter nonsense because you're saying that WoW is so bad it can't follow basic rules. I can't believe someone sucks at a game so ridiculously easy.

Because of all the time it takes to set up and maintain a group, including bio breaks and what not, I think grouping needs to give you at LEAST twice the xp as solo play, or else you might as well solo.

Good old Razorfen.  The last time I played Razorfen it highlighted why I somethimes abhor grouping.

No lie, I get a random request to help some folks to help do Razerfen and i agree to help them.  No problem.  Even though I did not have the proper flight points and took like 15 minutes to get there, I was the second one there.  2 hours later, all the folks show up and we go in.

Of course, we have an over geared Paly who simply charges in; like all blues makes him God and then when he dies it is our fault and that we are noobs.  He leaves (good riddance).  30 minutes later we get a replacement.  Things go much better, and it is starting to be fun.

Then all of a sudden, half way in, our healer needs to leave because it took so long to get the group together that he now has to go to work.  I say we should try without the healer, being WoW at Lvl 25-28 is NOT hard, but 3 others are so stuck on the group model that we sit another 45 minutes till we get a healer. We finally knuckel down and clear the place and finish the quests in about an hour.

Total elapsed time: about 6 hours.  What did I get for 6 hours of play?  One wimpy green, about 4 bubbles of XP, and some junk items barely worth 1 gold. If I had solo'ed for that time I would have gained a level at the very least.  The sad part was 2/3 of the time was wasted on simply getting the group going. 

Group play can be fun, and I know that NOT EVERY group is plagued with the BS I cited above.  Yet, the above experiences have been the norm for me-- whether it be PUGs or with guildies.  I find that the "pregroup" set up combined with rude play or drama is making soloing the only fun and viable option.   It seems that if you are not part of a good guild you can forget a rewarding group experience 75% of the time.  And getting into a good guild is another very frustrating and dificult endeavor worthy of a post in its own right.

That's why I support games that emphasize solo as well as small group and raid play.

Originally posted by heremypet

Elite mobs were designed for groups, not 2 players barely able to kill 1 mob, no wonder you werent getting any XP, try some non-elites maybe? or get more ppl in your group and pick up the pace.

Wow is like the easiest to level game there is. it is dumbfounding that its not easy enough for some people.

way to miss the point of the post ... seriously next time read the thing. here i will explain it in less words for the incredibly stupid.

Duo fights Elite mobs ... duo gets 236 xp per kill for while it takes a while to kill
if duo were to invite 1-2 others to speed up process they would get even less xp
soloer fights normal mobs ... soloer gets 206 xp per kill and is able to kill 2-3 solo oriented mobs compared to the duo killing 1 elite. thus netting nearly 2 - 3 times the xp
Soloer also has quests to turn in thus netting them 2000-3000 xp more for quest turn ins.

so thus this proves that Grouping is actually punished in these games instead of rewarded.

@ Bonemane you know I was going to formulate a comeback to your post ... however after attempting to decipher your jibberish about PVP characters and what not (even though i didnt mention PVP anywhere in my post). I decided I had lost enough brain cells trying to figure out what you're trying to say and just leave you with this .....

W-T-F?!?!

Originally posted by Ravanos

Originally posted by heremypet

Elite mobs were designed for groups, not 2 players barely able to kill 1 mob, no wonder you werent getting any XP, try some non-elites maybe? or get more ppl in your group and pick up the pace.

Wow is like the easiest to level game there is. it is dumbfounding that its not easy enough for some people.

 

way to miss the point of the post ... seriously next time read the thing. here i will explain it in less words for the incredibly stupid.

Duo fights Elite mobs ... duo gets 236 xp per kill for while it takes a while to kill
if duo were to invite 1-2 others to speed up process they would get even less xp
soloer fights normal mobs ... soloer gets 206 xp per kill and is able to kill 2-3 solo oriented mobs compared to the duo killing 1 elite. thus netting nearly 2 - 3 times the xp
Soloer also has quests to turn in thus netting them 2000-3000 xp more for quest turn ins.

so thus this proves that Grouping is actually punished in these games instead of rewarded.

@ Bonemane you know I was going to formulate a comeback to your post ... however after attempting to decipher your jibberish about PVP characters and what not (even though i didnt mention PVP anywhere in my post). I decided I had lost enough brain cells trying to figure out what you're trying to say and just leave you with this .....

W-T-F?!?!

 

 Wow good you mentioned the basics (A) The duo will get blue drops and better loot, the Soloer on the other will not and in time the better geared players in this case the duo will be able to kill things both faster and that are harder. the Solo'er will just always be Meh. Your talking WoW here, leveling is fucking easy, exp means nothing.(unless of course your trying to be the first lvl 80 on your server)  items, and gear on the other hand mean everything. Sorry your arguement at least for WoW is weak, major fail, try again.

Edit: PS I know i shouldn't go here but to save your poor brain cells the jist i got from Bonemanes post was that your Duo sucks. <shrug> wasn't very hard for me to figure out.

Wow this thread is full of so much scrub i could clean a slaughterhouse with it.