A great write up that Blizzard should think about

[Tomana]

What a sad thread, from a sad playerbase.

Sad? Masochism is not a normality for most people.

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Why did Ayn Rand decide to write a MMO manifesto?

It is more a manifest written by Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, actually.

[torterra275]

Um, you do realize that inconvient, harsh MMOs, are only wanted by a VERY SMALL, VERY VOCAL minority? MMOs have changed in the past 5-10 years tremendously to be more "opening" like they should be.

[SamR]

What a sad thread, from a sad playerbase. I can only hope that EQNext follows the article's mindset, and folks who dislike it steer as far clear from it as possible, rather than flocking to it and demanding it be turned into milquetoast mmo variant #73.

I'd love to see a throw back hardcore MMO come out with all the tedious gameplay mechanics described in the OP. Maybe then posters like yourself who hang out on WoW forums just to complain about how casual it is could leave us be and go be all hardcore with other like-minded gamers.

[Grogo]

But really, whether you agree or not...

isnt wow now a MSO game? The S is for single player

[Tomana]

But really, whether you agree or not...

isnt wow now a MSO game? The S is for single player

I missed the part where you can go and solo a heroic boss in current content (heck, even a normal boss )

[Kathandira]

Um, you do realize that inconvient, harsh MMOs, are only wanted by a VERY SMALL, VERY VOCAL minority? MMOs have changed in the past 5-10 years tremendously to be more "opening" like they should be.

Yup, it's great when games like farmville can be played by everyone!

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I missed the part where you can go and solo a heroic boss in current content (heck, even a normal boss )

The majority of activities in the game do not require you to speak a single word to another player. The only things in the game where you even remotely need to speak to another player are Normal/Heroic Raids, and Heroic Scenarios. Other than that, it's primarily single player in terms of social interaction.

Being in a Heroic 5-man or a reg Scenario does not count as social interaction as no one is speaking to each other. Being in the same space as someone does not make you social.

[Pull My Finger]

What a sad thread, from a sad playerbase. I can only hope that EQNext follows the article's mindset, and folks who dislike it steer as far clear from it as possible, rather than flocking to it and demanding it be turned into milquetoast mmo variant #73.

Alas, it's lonely at the top!

Although it is kind of paradoxical - you know, with that basement dweller mindset.

[Grogo]

I missed the part where you can go and solo a heroic boss in current content (heck, even a normal boss )

I give you that part, for that you need a group for current raids/5 mans. Many groups killing the same boss, in the same way and nothing around them changes, they do not affect anything of consequence at all. This what you do, this is how we will direct you to it and spoon it to you in small groups, with a million small groups doing the same thing day after day after day. Let's all be the same, doing the same things. Your whole day is planned for you, neatly...Blizzard is a good mother, she makes sure all her children have conformed nicely into society.

Yes, you can group up, like lemmings. I guess I am tired of being a lemming where what i do doesnt affect any thing. It feels so much like a single player game. That is my opinion, millions play the game though...Mother Generic seems to winning big time. It is all safe and clean now, just let Mother tuck you in and go back to sleep, my shitty opinion was just a bad dream.

[Tomana]

The majority of activities in the game do not require you to speak a single word to another player. The only things in the game where you even remotely need to speak to another player are Normal/Heroic Raids, and Heroic Scenarios. Other than that, it's primarily single player in terms of social interaction.

Being in a Heroic 5-man or a reg Scenario does not count as social interaction as no one is speaking to each other. Being in the same space as someone does not make you social.

You don't have a guild? You can't do stuff with it? Is it forbidden?
Besides, I leveled my first toon in vanilla/early BC without speaking a single word to another player in the world. Sure, you had to communicate in 70 instances, but that's about it.

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I give you that part, for that you need a group for current raids/5 mans. Many groups killing the same boss, in the same way and nothing around them changes, they do not affect anything of consequence at all.

News at 11: it was the same thing in vanilla.

[SodiumChloride]

It's not all bad ...

3. Stop the Hero Crap I think at this point the MMO community is really sick and tired of being spoon fed false praise and constantly told we are HEROES. It’s insulting to our intelligence. EQ Next devs need to focus on the we instead of the me. WoW style quests are a big part of the problem here as they continually force feed players the hero self-esteem mantra. People already get enough bogus self-esteem from parents, teachers and politicians. Telling players they are special breeds self-centered players instead of community-centered players. True heroism is its own reward and a real hero doesn’t require a Flaming Sword of Doom for killing 10 rats.

Ya, it's getting a bit stupid. "Hero" ... right ...

Charge me through the nose for everything from armor repairs and mounts ... feeling like a "hero" already.

4. Let Players Form their Own Memories and Make their Own Stories

With WoW, the story became the focal point. The quest designers and storytellers dictated how players should act. Players were herded into an episodic narrative that has no deviation and only one outcome. Players became puppets that blindly went from golden question mark to golden question mark doing the bidding of the quest designer.
Force feeding players stories and that are not their own and instead driving them into the box of contrived narratives is a recipe for disaster and erodes the cooperative spirit which is the bedrock of creating a good community. This is what Blizzard has been doing for years and they have the worst player community in MMO history to show for it.

Have to agree with this. Player choice is practically non-existence when it comes to the general direction their character takes. You are forced down the path of whatever your faction decides to do - even if it means committing atrocities. You have zero say in things.

They should just set up the background and let players decide which direction they wish to take things.

7. Player Drama and Conflict is Good **

Both Blizzard and SOE, with WoW and EQ2 fell into the philosophical trap that held that eliminating player conflict was a good thing in a virtual world. They foolishly believed that when players disagree and fight over various things like contested spawns and resources, kill stealing, and trains that it was a bad thing and the game needed to have built in anti-exploit/anti-conflict mechanics built in to stop it. This had the unintended consequences of sanitizing the MMO and treating players like prisoners by taking away their freedoms. As this MMO design malpractice continued, suddenly trains stopped as mobs were put on leashes. You could no longer attack a guard or member of your own faction.
How a MMO studio can promote a rich fantasy world full of drama and conflict on one hand but be against it within the ranks of your playerbase on the other hand is mind-boggling. Emergent gameplay is all about letting the players work it out on their own. Freedom should be promoted instead of curtailed. Players should be allowed to police themselves. Instead of banning griefers, turn them into outlaws. Prevent them from entering cities and banking. Put bounties on their heads that law abiding players can claim.
Allowing conflict will require more GMs but it’s worth it. I want to be part of a world where there is drama and intrigue going on with players. After all this is supposed to be a massively multiplayer online role-playing game not a supervised day care center.

This is a double-edged sword. Very dangerous and must be handled with care or it will destroy your game. However it's not without it's benefits.

8. No Easy Travel

Nothing makes a world smaller than providing fast means of travel. This is true for the real world as it is true for virtual worlds. Easy travel trivializes all of the hard work that environment artists and world builders and designers put into all of the zones.
Fast travel should only be made available to players via special classes such as wizard and druids. This has the wonderful side-effect of promoting class worth and class interdependence. Another benefit was that players would congregate around druid rings and wizard portals areas in hopes of getting ports. Travel buffs such as the Spirit of Wolf should only be available from select classes as well. Again this encourages class interdependence.
Absolutely no flying mounts for players either. Insta-portals such as the ones that the original EQ had in the Plane of Knowledge were a disaster and made Norrath into a joke. Mounts should only be available at the highest of levels.

Can't really agree with this one. Travelling in WoW is already painfully slow.

Flying though ...

A Dynamic World with Dynamic NPCs
But a bigger question is WHY NOT? For example, why don’t we have a virtual world where there is true dynamic content instead of the scripted content we have today?
Why can’t we have dynamic content that responds to the actions or inactions of players? Content such as NPCs, structures found in towns and cities and even nature itself should all be dynamic — buildable and destructible. EQ Next should have landscapes that reflect the seasons as well. We have the technology today to pull this off.
Resources should play a big part in a dynamic world. Food and water should be leveraged as a basic commodity subject to supply and demand– you can build an entire fantasy virtual world around that alone! For example, players could engage in hunting and gathering to keep villagers fed and clothed. If players can help the villagers achieve a certain level of prosperity then the villagers can send more recruits to the feudal lord. If the feudal lord has more soldiers, mages resources, they can protect the villagers actually expand the boundaries of the kingdom. Bring in the importance of other resources such as ore and wood and crafted goods. Of course all of this should fluctuate depending on the level of involvement by the players.
If players choose not to help, the town dies and the feudal lord’s kingdom goes into decline. Seeing weakness orcs and bandits rise from the shadows and dungeons and oppress the villagers and chaos runs through the countryside and to the very gates of the kingdom. Who would not want to be involved in a dynamic world where the contribution of every player was not valued and needed?

One final thought on a dynamic virtual world is that the players alone should control the destiny of their worlds. Stop with the fixed plot lines dictated from on high that every player must conform to. The best example of this is in MMOs like WoW where the story of each expansion is predetermined as the big bad boss of the expansion is destined to die about 2 years into the expansion. This is what happened in Wrath of the Lich King and Cataclysm. What if the players can’t or choose not to kill the uber boss? Why does every server have to have the same outcome?
It’s time to stop the on-rails mentality of current MMO design and allow emergent player behavior in a completely dynamic world.

This needs to be done more. WoW's world is static and dead. Nothing ever changes.

At the very least, we should have "dynamic environments", things like a dam opening and closing depending on the time of day, bridges that move ... etc., all would make the world feel so much more alive.

[Grogo]

You don't have a guild? You can't do stuff with it? Is it forbidden?
Besides, I leveled my first toon in vanilla/early BC without speaking a single word to another player in the world. Sure, you had to communicate in 70 instances, but that's about it.

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News at 11: it was the same thing in vanilla.

I rest my case.

Vanilla was different compared to now though. I recall lots of people talking to each other, trying to figure out quests, setting up groups, friendships were made, enemies were made, etiquette was made. Entitlement was very low.

Regardless, a sandbox approach and player driven instead of Company directed is the way to go, for any MMO. Steal the best ideas from both camps.

[mindbomb]

to shit, why not get with a bunch of like minded individuals and go on kickstarter and try and create the game you want?

For the amount of typing done on "wow dying" for years, they could have funded one via transcription services by now.

I bet the SDLC on this product continuously blows Blizz employees away.

[Lochton]

Enforcing 90% of the things OP wrote is the same as Blizzard stabbing themselves and do the bleed out.

[Tomana]

Enforcing 90% of the things OP wrote is the same as Blizzard stabbing themselves and do the bleed out.

Or any other MMO for that matter. It's just that Koreans are unable to produce a non-grindy game, it is beyond their conception of the world. Maybe it will change with EQNext, maybe not.

[Grogo]

Enforcing 90% of the things OP wrote is the same as Blizzard stabbing themselves and do the bleed out.

Has it crossed your mind that doing a variation of those things that make sense in today's market might work or what it might look like?

[Bizerk]

Despite everyone disagreeing with this, please explain the dead realm forums, dead grouping, dead 5mans, removal of group quests, removal of hard, non-zergable world bosses, removal of exclusive 10man raids, removal of world pvp, antisocial lfg/lfd, list can go on forever.

[Tomana]

Has it crossed your mind that doing a variation of those things that make sense in today's market might work or what it might look like?

No, if the renewal will come from a game, it certainly won't be anything like that. The target market is way too small for that to happen.

[Xeraxis]

I rest my case.

Vanilla was different compared to now though. I recall lots of people talking to each other, trying to figure out quests, setting up groups, friendships were made, enemies were made, etiquette was made. Entitlement was very low.

Regardless, a sandbox approach and player driven instead of Company directed is the way to go, for any MMO. Steal the best ideas from both camps.

Entitlement was the reason we have WoW. They decided to give casual players the MMO they wanted.

[Tomana]

Despite everyone disagreeing with this, please explain the dead realm forums, dead grouping, dead 5mans, removal of group quests, removal of hard, non-zergable world bosses, removal of exclusive 10man raids, removal of world pvp, antisocial lfg/lfd, list can go on forever.

- Dead realm forums: why post there + pop concentration on higher servers.
- Dead grouping: mostly function of population. People flock on 5-10 highest servers, then whine about queues. Go figure.
- Dead 5mans: what?
- Dead Group quests? Errr... Thunder isles has some. Or you mean leveling group quests? Well, the problem is that when everyone is max level, finding a group for a low-level group quest is next to impossible.
- Exclusive 10 man raids? Well, 10 man guilds whined about considering a lesser raiding population, so Blizzard made every instance in 10 and 25.
- World PVP died with the introduction of BGs in vanilla. Should be about time to get over it.
- LFD: because spending 1h to get 3 dpsers was sooooo much fun on my realm.

[Lochton]

Has it crossed your mind that doing a variation of those things that make sense in today's market might work or what it might look like?

I have read through your post, and most of it wouldn't give a positive feedback in the end. Only thing I can support is encouraging group ups (more XP when in a group maybe?). No easy travelling is also doable to an extent. Accepting harder work for mounts, and a little higher level needed would be good (like vanilla / TBC).

But the rest, just no. Sorry, but it's become a standard for MMO's for the rest of things. I once did play a korean MMO where you had to find high level players and then ask them to "teach" you a new spell. Some were greedy and demanded gold and others accepted. Wouldn't mind that for special abilities?

But, sadly. Our player base for US and EU wouldn't be accepting it all. There's just so many negative changes for other players experiences. Forcing you to grind to level and only a quest on the rarest moments, doesn't speak of how the current MMO's are build. It's too late about the quests, they are a part of any MMO's foundation.

And no instances, well, is doable but. The idea itself is doable, but it'll also generate problems for the people with a weaker play system/connection, making them lag because they are also generating the outside data. I hope you ment that the instances should be part of the what, that's what I then calculate from.

Can agree with maybe some parts of the conflict and drama, but only to a certain reach. We don't need to over work it, but some steps are needed as some doens't know how to stop a conflict/drama "session". And would also drag a lot more on the GM budget, as I would see it. A lot more. As few GM's already share clusters of servers, if this idea were to go, you would need multiple GM's for just 1 server.

I wouldn't mind a place for players to create their own content within, be it stories or quests, but there's still things that can make this ruin it.