My observations from the other side...

I'm not talking about the afterlife.

A bit of history: I've been with DCUO since its beta days, an on and off legendary subscriber with toons on both platforms - though predominantly PC. I have only ever played on the villain side, and when taking the plunge on DCUO again with the PS4 launch, I figured, new console, new experience, let's go hero. So I rolled a new healer under the guidance of Wonder Woman and set out to save the world, instead of destroying it Its been over a month, and I have my fellah geared up to CR 99 and at around 110 SP, and I took the long road to get there (feat collection, storyline completion, instance dawdling and so on), and here are my observations.

First and foremost, the USPS hero community is huge. Even when I log on to my villains to do their daily vaults, you see just a few lonely calls in LFG instead of a stream of chatter. Last time I played on PS was around the time the Braniac finale launched, and last winter I was on PC until just after the fire/ ice revamp (which was terribly unimpressive for Ice, and why I shelved the game - that's another issue entirely). All that aside, I don't remember the villain population ever being so... well... decimated and anemic on either platform. I don't know what the ratios are, but they feel like 10:1 easily. Which brings me to my next few anecdotal experiences on the community itself.

Larger isn't always better, and there are 'bad' players on both sides, equally. There is a misconception perpetuated on the villain side that all the leet players exist there in some sacred microcosm of skill, but I'd chalk it down to basic mathematics. More players = more people who are good and bad at pushing buttons and knowing roles. In any event, I like the larger population, even if it can be headbanging at times, if only because you are never wanting or left for groups. Now having been away during the Origin Crisis launch, and suddenly returning to the game, you can see how gravely that foray into appeasing the hardcore (which strangely, I consider myself one of as a theorycrafter and min/ maxer, fast-reflexes guy but I stay away from the egotism and elitism that can come with that knowledge) with 'difficult' content. I've been through Dox and Nexus enough now to get almost full ToT (for tank of couse, lol) and in enough pick-up groups to see the absolute worst behavior in players that has existed in any MMORPG that I've every played. Next to Eve of course, but c'mon everyone knows what that community is like. People are so kick-happy, so extreme in their judgements that its like playing with a bunch of angry children.

Now as this wasn't my first rodeo, I made sure I was in half-Prideful, half-Raven drop gear, Trigon's prison weapon and face and fully modded before I even subjected myself to the gauntlet of T5 raiding. And for that, I have made it through largely ignored by the trolls. I even healed my first solo Dox today (and can do Nexus without even trying), but that was a responsibility thrust upon me as the group suddenly shifted direction, and I knew that if I declined or announced my hesitations, I would quickly go from "good healer" to "liability". Of course there is still plenty of criticism and a dearth of praise - use a soda, do this, do that!" - while no appreciation for the fact that the entire raid is being healed by a CR99 who needs to clip and combo constantly to keep the team alive. That's how communication currently works these days: you only hear someone speak up when things aren't perfect (in their minds, not necessarily in reality).

That's the saddest part about coming back to DCUO after a break, the community is broken. There is little to no sense of responsibility, fair play, and most importantly, fun. Dox is not fun. Its challenging, yes: avoiding constant one-shots keeps you on your toes. But its certainly not fun. (I actually enjoy Nexus, but that's another story.) And the negative behavior, the escalating CR calls, and shorter and shorter fuses are a direct result of people being forced - yes, it is a requirement to do Dox if you want to stay competitive, be desirable to groups - to hop on this nightmare merry-go-round.

I have a thick skin too, but I worry about those that don't. The ones who will hit this wall of content and player abuse and simply leave. Never to come back. I can only guess how many players have already done so. Remember, for every raised voice here on the forums, there are ten or more who just silently leave without raising any objection.

I really love this game. Its the one I keep coming back to. My hope for 2014 is that the community begins to heal, begins to stop being so insular and angry and works on becoming a little more accepting of each other's mistakes.

Sincerely,
- Hex

P.S. If anyone from Wolfpack reads this, you guys were great to pug with the other night. Polite, respectful, and we all got the job done (Prime feats). All players could learn something from you guys.

Nice read.

I believe the t5 raids made the community the way it is now,which is divided beyond repair for the immediate future. After all the nerfs and apparently easy (by reading comments on test server) next dlc, the devs are 'fixing' the problem between the cans and can nots.

The problem too, is that the poor behavior becomes a self-perpetuating thing. Even the more level-headed people, like myself, can succumb to it when the environment is so toxic. In a Gates run the other day, I had to stop myself from acting like a total you-know-what simply because people were making mistakes and likely one or two were new - the tank included. That's a learning instance, really, and coaching is needed, not harsh reprimands. Yes, leagues are a good way to escape this sort of negativity, but I don't believe that they are necessarily the best or only solution. For then you're just escaping the behavior, not really correcting it on a community level. We all just need to start being more understanding of each other. LoTRO actually has one of the nicest communities around, they even survived some pretty shady gear and mechanic changes. I don't know how, but they did.

Anyone who looks at this thread and thinks it's not worth it or it's just a wall of text, please be patient. Some very valid points in here and it's hard to find anything to disagree with. It's true, the community is far more broken than the game itself, far harder and deadly than Nexus and Paradox combined. We don't all have to hold hands together and sing along, but mistreating someone for the colour of their gear (see what I did there?) is just ridiculous. And there's worse things happening. A healer that refuses to solo heal, gets a kick. It doesn't matter if the person CAN solo heal, but just refuses to, the kick is swift. Same goes for DPS not burning fast enough or controllers who debuff too much.

The same people being jerks are the same ones that are going to be here crying away when the servers shut down because all the mistreated newbies left the game without being given a proper chance. A friend of mine in game was cr 91 and can't solo heal nexus and got the boot from a random pug group. I was invited in to solo heal it and and made the group re-invite them with the promise that I would solo heal for them and my friend would sit in dps stance doing whatever damage they could. Sure enough, we beat the raid in like 30 minutes with no wipes and my friend got 4 pieces of gear they needed

People need to stop with their made up rules of what a raid should have or else they'll hurt the game long term by excluding others now. Way too many people don't have the perseverance to continue playing after being mistreated and kicked so often without being given a chance to get better and gain experience. The community needs to get better and more helpful to grow to make sure the game lives on.

I think you posted in a thread I started, about the new setup in raids, the 3-3-1-1, solo healer, 3 trollers. People just start looking at videos and thinking anyone can pull that thing off and the entire community suffers. It doesn't matter if they have tried it before and it didn't work, they will keep going for it and ruining the game for all those involved.

Yep, that was me. I will probably never solo anything in a pug group again after being spoiled by running as a solo healer with my league. Imagine, people not standing in stuff, actually taking soders, being self reliant, and basically playing smart? Lol. I just did the nex pug to help my friend experience the raid, but will never pug solo again for reasons that you stated. People get an idea and run with it expecting miracles, not realizing mechanics and understanding them are key for everyone to understand in order for someone to pull off a solo heal effort in top tier raids.

DCUO seems caught in a loop with dogmatic demands in group content, the increasing need not just for a team of the right number but also of composition and of the right experience and who all know what the others want to do is an idea stretched to breaking point as the difficulty and reward escalate. It is an inevitable breeding ground for frustration. I fear that by persisting with the same philosophy for all content the game is fragmenting the community unnecessarily, a greater focus on solo or duo's is needed at higher levels or else content that drives players into needing to split up and meet again in terms of objectives, a need to detach from the explicit requirement of support roles and overburdened lynch pins (who invariably get kicked as they take disproportionate blame for the team).

F2p saved the game and killed the community all at the same time.

As the distance between levelling and top tier content grows its only going to get worse.

I've lost count of the number of times I've heard "we don't need a tank for this, I can solo heal, I can solo troll" for everything less than T5 raids. In the highest, hardest raids it will always be, whatever it takes to finish it, at least a first but for the rest of the content all the old principles now get torn up.

Of course you don't need to have a balanced group when half the group is massively overpowered for the content but the message that is being pumped out to the up and coming players by the high end community is our own fault. There are players out there who have a warped understanding because we have delivered it to them.

The above coupled with the must-finish-this-run-at-least-10-milliseconds-faster attitude means that lower tiered players when they come into contact with higher tiered will get a really skewed view of the content, quite often its also a blink and you'll miss it one too.

People are entitled to play that way though, play the game, your way, it says on the tin. I just wish the ones who do and then complain about newer players could acknowledge their own part in the problem.

@OP
I would love for the community to heal but.... I'm pessimistic and don't see it happening. Maybe if there were a way to cauterize the wound but you'd need to be a bit of a villain to make that happen...

Unfortunately the concerns you've brought up are not isolated to DCUO, they may well have been exacerbated by T5 - they occur in some form or another no matter what online game you play, and the larger the playerbase, the more likely you are to encounter these issues - I was having group issues and hostility all the way back when EverQuest first started.

As you correctly pointed out, the playerbase particularly on the PlayStation side is enormous - it is a numbers game, the number of "bad" players far outweigh the "good" - and as valid as the points may be, I didn't read any resolutions, fixes or suggestions you've made.

There has been no system created, and I do not think that one can be created, that is infallible against player abuses - I do pug from time to time, but thankfully we as players can bypass these issues by seeking out and playing with like minded players, through friends lists and leagues.

You're completely right about a new player's introduction to content. Even in lower tier raids I'm guilty of blitzing through in my T5 gear for feats; to my defense, I don't go in DPS stance though and I actually heal the team. I understand your pessimism, changing human nature and I agree that the pie-in-the-sky fantasy of eliminating aggression and mistreatment from these games is an impossibility. But minimizing the instances of abuse should be the goal of every reasonable person on these boards and in the game. If you're angry and feeling frustrated, it is most certainly the wrong time to play a social game: unless you plan on PVPing That's the perfect outlet for misplaced frustrations. PVE instancing, which requires cooperation and - ideally polite - communication is most certainly the wrong arena for that. I do think it is well within the realm of possibility to create a community that polices itself better than we are now (read: Lord of the Flies, aka not at all). Heck, some sort of MVP tool to identify the players that are actually helpful could do some good. Such a tool would certainly have to be more refined than the one FFXIV uses, but it would be a start.

I'm not quite ready to throw in the towel on DCUO, or its players, just yet. Hopefully, the new DLC balances things out a bit. We just have to wait and see.

Oh, these problems are endemic to MMORPGs, for sure. But anecdotal speaking, they seem worse in DCUO. I think many people would and have agreed that something has gone sour lately in DCUO. As I said before, I think that Leagues are an escape (and one that I turn to myself), but are by no means a fix. There are communities that are far less toxic than DCUO, I think we (the developers too) should look toward those for insights.

This is a lot of my own view of things too, but the only ones that are going to change this are people like you who go out of your way to assemble groups with lower CR people to help them learn how to play through the content. Be positive and have fun. Others will find it contagious.

OP has said a mouth/heartful right here with this thread. i've said the same on many occasions but paraphrased but you put it all out there for players to see. Devs can only do so much and trying to please everyone is certainly a difficult feat. Harder content in and of itself is wonderful but the community its presented to is terrible. i wonder if the devs would simply make every new "instanced" gameplay with a hard and a novice instance would this solve things? they did this with FOS and a few alerts but seemed to have abandoned that idea. the easier instances could drop less gear like they did before but at least everyone would get to enjoy every part of the game.

good post fellow gamer, good post.

too hard to read... ;x

I 100% agree that the mentality of the best of the best should stick together, that only the highest gear player is trustworthy, that only your brothers and sisters in arms should be assisted exists in many games and isn't just DCUO.

I also agree that it was exacerbated by the OC DLC and hasn't fully recovered yet. Although I have faith it will be after T6 is released.

I think the biggest solution to this is for the skilled players to take a pick up player through content. Be positive to them even if they don't communicate back. Help them gear up for a night. Just answering peoples questions in the Watchtower/Hall of Doom shout channel can go a long way.

If people do positive things for others then those people are more likely to do positive things for other people they meet in game. It's one big positive ponzi pyramid.

The players themselves are in the best position to do something about the community. We're there every day and we can take action right away to help fight against some of the attitudes that can be harmful in the long run. There are things the devs can do, but I still feel the players can do the most good.

The problem arises when people have the attitude of, "I don't work for SOE, they should fix it!" or "It's not my problem, let someone else worry about it."

I would like to start off by saying that this thread was a excellent read. My compliments to the Chef/OP. I would also like to say that all the response's so far has been overwhelmingly positive which has brought new vigor to my superhero exploits. At this point I really didn't think their were any kind players In DCUO community up until now.

I played DCUO when it first came out for about 2 months. In the last 3 years I've come and gone 3 or 4 times always as a legendary member because of my love/loyalty for DC comics . One of the main reason's for leaving so often was because of the community and its poor attitude.

My first online exp was playing WoW, which was a very satisfying. The community was always helpful and ready to give a hand. When chatting in game there was always someone that would answer. From day 1 of DCUO the community was off. I would have to /shout for half hour until someone finally replied and that would usually be with some kind of sarcastic remark or S T F U.

I wish it would change but sadly this is one thing the dev's cant fix with an update.

Today was a good day in DCUO. I took an hour of my time to help strangers in duos and with their mentor feats (the ones you are locked out of without grouping). Tried and failed with the spastic Medic feat (I know just need lots of burn and juggling but it just wasn't in the cards). Finally, I ended it with a Dox run with some competent, only moderately geared folk (which is good enough really) and we downed the Tyrant with some laughs and fond farewells. Still think that raid is a train-wreck, but with the right company even a dive barn can feel like The Ritz.

So pay it forward fellow players. You will be rewarded. (Perhaps quite literally like I was with the ever elusive 88 handblasters! )