Developers Corner

What I would like is a few classes such a necro that are naturally antisocial to be a class designated as solo. There could be more as well but these classes wouldn't offer much to a group. In fact if they grouped they would provide the group with a experience penalty to the point it wouldn't be worth it. Then you would have your grouping classes who get a penalty for solo and get a lot better xp in a group. Actually these classes that are labeled group classes would have a hard time killing monsters solo that a necro would kill with ease.

The group classes would have a benefit of being able to raid, killing dungeon bosses etc. The solo classes would have benefits of being really strong, taking down monsters the group classes couldn't solo. But they would be limited to solo play and although tough enough to kill most dungeon trash monsters, they couldn't take the bosses down and would have a hard time with pack of monsters. Now the solo classes would have some dungeons tuned to them and would offer nice rewards and other content as well tuned for them.

I would expect most players would have one of each and that would be okay. I think this would be a unique game and could work. In PvP it would get really interesting. The group classes would be able to fight against a single solo class but one on one they would die a horrible death. The soloers would be like a small raid boss that the groupers would have to take down. Only one solo class could be in a battleground at a time waiting for a group to que up. The soloist "raid boss" in PvP would have strategies and henchman he could deploy as well depending what instance he chose to be a boss in would determine his dungeon/castle etc. This would offer the soloist a unique challenge as well as the groupers as in pvp they would both be doing what they like best .. soloing and grouping.
 

(Group Class) What would be more fun than fighting a real live raid boss? (Solo Class) What would be more fun than trying to wipe a large group of players by yourself?

I'd consider it doable.  but with a different bare bone mechanic.

I wouldn't go for it being class based but rather it being a reward to some extent or another.

____basic format that I would go for with the above modification_____

Zombies and other undead have somehow appeared.

While as a human you gain experiance normally.  Earn skills from crafting(mainly repair, maintance, restoration, and adjustments), weaponry, survival, and body like skills(let the average person learn parkor to amazing levels I guess).  Go through NPC storylines.  a cold war RvR story(different factions with different takes on the world, the RvR rarely if ever being real PvP, but rather competing over resources and story like mechanics).

However when you die you obviously become a zombie or some other kind of undead and get a character select screen that gives you the options of playing characters based on how well you did.  If you weren't alive for very long you become a reletivly normal zombie; enhanced senses and chosing between a few other enhanced things.   While if you were alive for a very long time, took a lot of risks, and gained a bunch of levels without dieing you could choose to become a lich queen/vampire/undead drake or whatever else.

While as an undead player you're going to be gaining score based on how much damage you do.  And then your human form gets some reward or another based on that.  when the players kill the player they mostly just get whatever towns back and the player themselves back to human. 

_______

Call it monster play if you want but LOTR wasn't the first to do so wouldn't be remotely surprising if there were/are a few muds that do the same.   There's a KR game that has people playing an RTS game and other players playing the enemy faction against them as individual people.

EDIT:

I guess I'm aiming for the whole players being mini-raid boses aspect instead of having different game mechanics for soloers/groupers.

If it was tacked on top of what I'd currently expect to play, hell no. But if it had a well tailored game surrounding it, with it making sense in terms of gameplay and setting why this was happening, sure, why  not?

Basically, what Paulscott said.

Originally posted by paulscott

I'd consider it doable.  but with a different bare bone mechanic.

I wouldn't go for it being class based but rather it being a reward to some extent or another.

____basic format that I would go for with the above modification_____

Zombies and other undead have somehow appeared.

While as a human you gain experiance normally.  Earn skills from crafting(mainly repair, maintance, restoration, and adjustments), weaponry, survival, and body like skills(let the average person learn parkor to amazing levels I guess).  Go through NPC storylines.  a cold war RvR story(different factions with different takes on the world, the RvR rarely if ever being real PvP, but rather competing over resources and story like mechanics).

 

However when you die you obviously become a zombie or some other kind of undead and get a character select screen that gives you the options of playing characters based on how well you did.  If you weren't alive for very long you become a reletivly normal zombie; enhanced senses and chosing between a few other enhanced things.   While if you were alive for a very long time, took a lot of risks, and gained a bunch of levels without dieing you could choose to become a lich queen/vampire/undead drake or whatever else.

 

While as an undead player you're going to be gaining score based on how much damage you do.  And then your human form gets some reward or another based on that.  when the players kill the player they mostly just get whatever towns back and the player themselves back to human. 

_______

Call it monster play if you want but LOTR wasn't the first to do so wouldn't be remotely surprising if there were/are a few muds that do the same.   There's a KR game that has people playing an RTS game and other players playing the enemy faction against them as individual people.

 

EDIT:

I guess I'm aiming for the whole players being mini-raid boses aspect instead of having different game mechanics for soloers/groupers.

I am starting to feel the same after thinking more about it. Thanks for adding further to the idea!

Originally posted by qombi

What I would like is a few classes such a necro that are naturally antisocial to be a class designated as solo. There could be more as well but these classes wouldn't offer much to a group. In fact if they grouped they would provide the group with a experience penalty to the point it wouldn't be worth it. Then you would have your grouping classes who get a penalty for solo and get a lot better xp in a group. Actually these classes that are labeled group classes would have a hard time killing monsters solo that a necro would kill with ease.

Funny you should mention a necromancer as an antisocial and very poor grouping class, because that's exactly what said class is in EQ2.

I can see a possible trend arising from this:

At the game's release, the individuals who don't know anyone to play with will decide to have a solo class. They will level it up to maximum and reap the benefits of a high-income / high-level main character, and then create a grouping alt. This way they have a 'PvE farming character' which can be used to twink their grouping alts, making them more desirable for grouping in general (so they get into more teams). Even if you disallow sharing of wealth between chars on the same account or even the creation of alts at all, there will be a lot of people who will buy and support two accounts.

Also, those who choose grouping classes but cannot find groups will either suffer through the poor soloability of their chosen class or will start a new character that can solo.

So yet again, soloing is still the initial primary goal for new players.

From what I see, this will only eliminate the frequent forum question: "which class is easiest to solo to cap?" That's great if the question bothers you... but as for affecting gameplay in a major way, players already weed through which classes are needed / viable for raids and grouping and which are the best for solo grinding.

I just don't see a significant difference...

Anyway, I said "yes", I would play that game. Not because I think it will solve anything, but because I'd like to see if my prediction came true. I'm such an asshole.

Besides, I don't like the idea of a 'social game' encouraging antisocial behavior in such a way. MMORPGs are social games blah blah blah, blah. Blah blah.

Blah.

I'm getting too preachy about this topic. I already have a post or two somewhere in these forums on teamwork incentives. I think my posts tend to be overlooked for some reason... either I'm a horribly dull typist and not worth the effort to read or I've gained enough notoriety as a troll to be ignored by everyone.

Oh well, I consider either of the above an accomplishment.

I don't ignore your posts because I think you're trolling. I ignore them to watch the dejected tears slide silently down your face.

Originally posted by methulah

I don't ignore your posts because I think you're trolling. I ignore them to watch the dejected tears slide silently down your face.

Hey it's all fair! I threw it out there asking for it. I am a big boy I can handle critiscm. 

To be honest I voted no. But i have good reason. The reason is simply because I believe too many games nowadays are class and level based.. i think we need to get away from that and go "sandbox" type.

In a sandbox type of game i dont see soloing being a problem because the game wouldnt be the same as level/ class based. People could explore.. map a region, sell the maps... do whatever they want... sure some things they would probably WANT to group for so they dont get killed over and over, such as a dragon scripted to attack your player made (yes.. from scratch, hacking down wood and building) city becuase it was too close to the dragons lair.

There are tons of ways to make the game balanced solo vs group. But in my opinion classes really need to be done away with and skill trees need to be ushered in.