Mob tagging LOL

[Shuji V2]

There's no question that when spawning or quest objectives are not handled properly on our side, the tap system can create negative and anti-social experiences, wherein seeing players of your own faction nearby becomes a nuisance. We very much want to limit and rectify those situations. The most helpful thing you can do in that regard during beta is to bring to our attention specific quests or areas in which you felt competition for spawns was overly detrimental to your experience. We have a number of ways of fixing those problems, ranging from simply adding additional spawns, to dynamic spawn thresholds that ramp up density as player density increases, to making specific targets open tap.

The main reason we don't embrace a fully open-tap world is that we feel that those mechanics are asocial. To be fair, that is certainly better than antisocial - no question there, and antisocial experiences usually reflect spawning and mechanics that we need to adjust. However, while a world in which everyone runs around damaging things a few times (or however much is needed to qualify for credit) may be one in which you don't feel bad about other players being around, at some point it also makes those players nearly indistinguishable from NPCs or bots with decent AI. You don't need to talk, or ask if someone has room in their group or would like to join yours. You just attack a few times, and then move on.

On the other hand, mob tagging rules inherently reward and encourage social gameplay. Even in solo areas like daily quest hubs in Mists, we'd commonly see transient pickup groups form for the sake of efficiency, and stick together through that hub or maybe even another ("hey, anyone up for Klaxxi after this?"). But once again, it's incumbent upon us to make sure that we avoid situations where that is outweighed by negatives like competing for underspawned quest targets or objects.

Philosophically, for a while now, we've made sure that any time multiple players are sent to kill a single specific target that has a respawn timer (be it named quest boss, world boss, or an event like the Battlefield: Barrens commanders in patch 5.3), the mob is open to credit for all. We're certainly open to extending that treatment where it makes sense, and where it serves to improve the overall experience. But I wouldn't expect a wholesale overhaul of our tap mechanics in the near future.

Especially the underlined and bold part made me laugh so hard XD This has to be the biggest pile of shit I've ever read.

I honestly don't get Blizzard any more. Having tap limits supposedly encourages social gameplay? What? How? How does that even go compared to LFG and LFR which is basically the anti-social environment they don't seem to like and want to avoid by tap limits. How is it any different? Look, I personally don't mind having restrictions like these but they need to make sense. Their arguments for keeping the restrictions are even more questionable because that's exactly what LFG and LFR is. You wouldn't have known the difference if the people you queue up with were random bots programmed to say hi at the beginning and bye at the end.

I wish Blizzard would be inherent with this and just opt for an open tap to keep the game consistent and anti-social as it is. Besides that, there is virtually no reason to group as is. So the only purpose a limited tap serves is to grief players or to create unnecessary downtime.

[Deleted]

I honestly don't get Blizzard any more. Having tap limits supposedly encourages social gameplay?

Well, they think that it encourages people to form groups. While in reality, all it does is to encourage spamming macros to get the tap first.

[Byucknah The Red]

Well, they think that it encourages people to form groups. While in reality, all it does is to encourage spamming macros to get the tap first.

Yep, take the PvP rare elites. If you tag one, people expect you to invite them or you are an asshole. If they tag it first its basically "Bugger off" even though they could easily invite you and you BOTH get credit. The majority of the player base are assholes and how Blizzard does not see this is beyond me.

[Highlord Hanibuhl]

(...)the mob is open to credit for all. (...)

Which is great for the asshole-players that come with internet-anonimity...

[Primernova]

Open tap is the best solution.

This is the evolution of tap rules in MMOs:

EQ1: I'm 99% sure, killing blow owned the loot and XP if ungrouped. Other players could also heal the mob you were trying to kill, for super griefing.
AO: Highest damage on the mob had XP/Loot rights. Interesting mechanic but top geared players wielded too much power like this.
WoW: Tap to claim. Not bad, but it created grey mobs that were ignored on death and resented. A pretty spartan way to do it imo.
Current gen MMOs: Open tap, everyone kill and everyone gets some benefit. It's fine, and it's not what causes the weird antisocial behavior all MMOs have anymore, but that's for another discussion.

[Deleted]

Yep, take the PvP rare elites. If you tag one, people expect you to invite them or you are an asshole. If they tag it first its basically "Bugger off" even though they could easily invite you and you BOTH get credit. The majority of the player base are assholes and how Blizzard does not see this is beyond me.

Yeah, exactly. That was always...funny. Several people stand on a spawn point and spam AoE - and if YOU managed to tap it, they suddenly started begging for an invite. Ridiculous.

[Byucknah The Red]

It is not down to Blizzard to instil basic social skills to the player base, if that is in your make up then a tag system within a video game is not going to change that. However on the open tag system I think it is a bad move because then you will have the same thing you get on Timeless Isle where someone will get a tag and then sit on their ass while others get the kill for them.

I would MUCH prefer that over a system where someone, who can, tags and does not care about others. People who round up entire areas with AoE, people who tag a long respawn monster and refuse to group just out of spite, ect. I would much rather have lazy people leaching off work over assholes who make your experience more frustrating.

[Isheria]

Mob tagging may not encourage social gameplay like blizzard wants to believe but open tagging doesn't either. If anything open tagging promotes leeching off of other players since you don't care the slightest about them and you all care about is getting credit for minimum amount of effort, example: DoT a mob and let the other guy kill it since you'll get credit anyway.

[Condemner]

Kind of expected this. Also I think if it worked like on timeless isle rares then mobs could get more health by peeps just tagging and moving on, giving the player who was already on that mob a pain in the ass cause of the extra health it gets.

[reemi]

I honestly don't get Blizzard any more. Having tap limits supposedly encourages social gameplay?

Yes, I've made friends because of that before, when grouping with people farming in Tyr Hand like me...

My god, the old good time!

Please don't make WoW a game like GW2 where everyone single play and never care of anyone.

Open tag is okay for rares and unique quest mobs.

[Zephre]

Yep, take the PvP rare elites. If you tag one, people expect you to invite them or you are an asshole. If they tag it first its basically "Bugger off" even though they could easily invite you and you BOTH get credit. The majority of the player base are assholes and how Blizzard does not see this is beyond me.

Experienced this myself. I suppose Blizzard are just stupid beyond all comprehension.

[Deleted]

I would MUCH prefer that over a system where someone, who can, tags and does not care about others.

I agree. Even if some people do leech kills now, it's still SO MUCH better than the One-Tap system. In my opinion, this was easily one of the best changes ever, and I'd never want to return to how it was before.

[Deleted]

(...)the mob is open to credit for all. (...)

Which is great for the asshole-players that come with internet-anonimity...

see, I dont get this.

Whenever things like this are mentioned in wow, people assume the majority of players will be arsehole and act like twats...


But when I've encountered these systems in other games, I dont see the bad behaviour at all.

Is there somethign about the wow community in particular that makes people assume its players will act badly and selfishly more than in other mmos?

[Byucknah The Red]

see, I dont get this.

Whenever things like this are mentioned in wow, people assume the majority of players will be arsehole and act like twats...


But when I've encountered these systems in other games, I dont see the bad behaviour at all.

Is there somethign about the wow community in particular that makes people assume its players will act badly and selfishly more than in other mmos?

Experience and seeing it first hand? Don't get me wrong, there ARE nice people out there and for some players they never really have a bad experience. Factually though, the community is very VERY bad, "toxic" of course being the word used. The unfortunately vast majority of players don't care... about anything or anyone except themselves and what personally benefits them. If you have not run across these kind of players, good on you and I hope you continue to have good luck in that department. Unfortunately, the vast majority are assholes and its very hard to disprove it when evidence is literally EVERYWHERE. MMO-C Forums, WoW Forums, Reddits, in game, ect. Its really REALLY hard to miss just how bad the community is.

[Thelxi]

Technically it does reward and encourage "social" gameplay, but yeah it is a load of shit. Who knows what their real reasoning is.

GW2 is one of the most socially pleasant environments I've seen without this kind of encouragement and rewarding lol.

[cityguy193]

It is not down to Blizzard to instil basic social skills to the player base, if that is in your make up then a tag system within a video game is not going to change that. However on the open tag system I think it is a bad move because then you will have the same thing you get on Timeless Isle where someone will get a tag and then sit on their ass while others get the kill for them.

How is that different from if you were alone? Imagine if that guy never existed, would the outcome of you fighting the mob change? Do you personally feel people wait around for you, personally you, to grace them with your presence so they can start killing your personal mobs. Are you that self centered? In reality, other players can only help you killing your mob that takes 3 seconds to kill, whether its 1 hit or 50.

In reality the waiting around for you to kill only really applies to certain rares and celestials. I know as meele I cant get close to certain rares without dying a horrible death, so the best I can do it spam my low damage ranged skill while I wait for others. Thats a design flaw. Theres plenty of work arounds too. There can be partial tagging of normal mobs, where quest credit is given if you do <30% of the mobs HP and/or if you engaged the mob or stayed in combat for X amount of time with mob.

[Zechs-cenarius]

It is not down to Blizzard to instil basic social skills to the player base, if that is in your make up then a tag system within a video game is not going to change that. However on the open tag system I think it is a bad move because then you will have the same thing you get on Timeless Isle where someone will get a tag and then sit on their ass while others get the kill for them.

For your examples:

First one where it is not open tag, the asshole can use that as a system to grief other players and make players less inclined to continue if it happens on a consistent basis.

Second one where it is open tag, yes you get a terrible player that doesn't do anything but the other person that wants the tag gets it and moves on from the kill.

Which do you think will keep players going?

This is exactly why mob tagging just needs to go away. Its an archaic system that really no longer has a place in a MMO, especially one as big as WoW. Blizzard and their ridiculous canned answer of "On the other hand, mob tagging rules inherently reward and encourage social gameplay" is so far off base it makes me wonder how can a community manager feel comfortable enough to say something so blatantly stupid.

PS: Remember the rage that was happening on Galleon and Sha? Notice it went away when it went open tap?

[Rivellana]

Honestly, I laughed to myself at the blue post as well.

Players don't group up so that more of them can get the tag. Most of the time they just stand there silently and then spam abilities to try to steal the tag first. If you ask to join or send a group invite to the person, you MIGHT get to join their group, but I've tried to join groups with people before who were killing a named quest mob (that wasn't open tag) and had them decline the group, tag it, kill it and run off just to be jerks.

I do like that they might be able to put in a dynamic spawning system for regular mobs, I think that could solve the problem for regular mobs. For named quest mobs though they should just make sure that they are all open tag.

[Ghostile]

Would you rather fight for mobs or have the whole player base just attacking every mob once or twice?

That would encourage people to play oh so much, imagine a quest zone with a quest "Kill 10 shibbledibbles"
So, instead going for single lonely shibbledibble on the side, you rush the big pack, which few other people have already pulled and might get a hit in for each before they explode of the amount of damage thrown at them.
Yay, that's good gameplay.

[NightZero88]

Would you rather fight for mobs or have the whole player base just attacking every mob once or twice?

Have the whole player base just attacking every mob once or twice. It works out just fine in GW2. Because of the open tag in GW2 when I'm running through an area and see a player fighting a mob I'll toss out some damage on it as I pass by which gets me credit but it also helps that player out. And I know a ton of people do this. Open tagging is leaps and bounds better than fighting for a mob, especially during a new release were you have tons of players in a small area all trying to move forward.