Two populations playing the same game

There's no way to make challenging group content for raiders that doesnt either exclude the group only players, or require additional developer time put specifically into it. Personally i have always liked the idea of hardmode missions. You could make it 12 or 18 man and have it drop like 1-2 pieces of Raid gear off the same loot table that the 54 man version of the raid has, as well as 1-2 rk3 spell runes. It could also reward a small amount of raid currency as well. Give it a 5day lockout like raids so its not something thats just a spammable way to get all your gear/spells quickly. But like i said this requires additional developer time put into it to balance it so that the ratio of difficulty:reward is appropriate.

I have never been upset at all when powerful raid gear simply allows a roflstomping of group content. That's what powerful gear is for. That's what gaining power in any manner is for. It's fun being powerful.

Neither have I ever been upset that content thus trivialized didn't then provide further upgrades. To expect such would be silly.

Raid for things. Get to flex on stuff. Pass loot to those that haven't raided for the things. It's nice.

A good attitude. Thank you.

The problem comes when some in the roflstomping gear expect content either to be tuned around them and their gear or feel they should be the arbiters of what is balanced in the group game.

Based on what data? I still see plenty of casuals and competitive players out there. Yes, there are farmers. Yes, there are boxers. Yes, there is krono.

...and?

and it's economics. Plenty of casual I fail to see, they are vastly outnumbered by the boxes/krono teams now. Which is affecting their sales, once their sales dies, they move on. And sales are affected, krono down 20k in 2 month, hasn't raised in 4 month. Still selling round 50k, or (cause they do try hard) 60k.

I wish more had this attitude.

You are basing your entire argument about the population demographics on Krono prices. I won't argue that some interesting statistics can be derived from following the server economy, but it is just a single variable extrapolation. Your argument needs more data. That kind of data is only available to DBG, sadly.

Most of the people owning those zones on TLP servers come from the top end raid guilds on LIVE servers. Same can be said for FV. Lots of people have a toon in the raid guilds on FV.

If they went to TLP servers to avoid them, they are damn silly. Those players will go to every new TLP rather you like it or not. Get used to it.

It's all about the Benjamins

Both populations can co-exist just fine. Thrive together? Perhaps a bit subjective.

I used to raid, but have not actively raided in probably going on almost 2 years. I am still in a raid guild however. How does that work? I really don't know. No one has said you need to leave since their rules don't require raiding to stay tagged. I have felt no reason to leave as a result.

The blow back from that is the near zero demand on the part of the guild to have me participate in group activities with them. I consider myself a decent player, but well played group geared player versus well played and RAID GEARED players, well there is no contest. Plus a bit of the quid per quo factor. Its debatable if I hold up my end of the deal very well, if at all.

So now I box and mostly play an expansion or two behind. Its challenging and fun, but my guild is mostly for a guild hall, buffs, rot loot and occasionally someone to talk to. Any aspiration that I am "part of the team" is pure fantasy. I am in that "other population". No one is an outright jerk or says "you need to leave, you non-raider, you" but its very clear that I am 100% on my own. Which also might be a part of the challenge that makes it interesting.

The next step past there if I get bored is to maybe try TLP or raise up a different box set. I have kinda gotten used to the freedom of not being obligated to be somewhere in game at a specific time, even though compared to my peers I am giving up gobs of power by passing on raiding.

All of us do not consider how we play as THE way. Many of us realize that different people play different ways. Unfortunately there are many that want to destroy those not in their Tribe. People thinking that, the way they play, is THE way..is the problem actually. Society in the US recently has taken on this THE way attitude towards many things, such as politics for example, so this attitude is not surprising though disappointing.

It seems that too many people in the world today, are not tolerant of other people being different or thinking different than them. It seems that many people attack those that choose to do things differently than them instead of embracing difference. Life would be boring if we all liked the same things, looked the same way, and played games the same way.

Game Staff are people too! Devs that realize that people want different things in game, and try to satisfy that fact, are generally successful. Forcing people to do things a certain way, whether a player or Game Staff, will ultimately lead to failure IMO.

it would be so easy to please everyone

1) tier one zone = easy and no locked zones.

2) tier 2 zones to be harder than tier one.

3) tier 3 zones to be much harder than tier 2 .

that would not be "so easy", and it would not please everyone

Wait. Isn't it already this?
Since when is pleasing everyone a thing? Today, well, TBH pleasing absolutely no one is completely valid.

One important tip to take into consideration is the need to ask what is expected from you when you are interested in joining a guild. If the answer is anything other than to see your smiling face at least once every couple of days, then chances are there is some competition involved. I had a guild kick me from the roster because I didn't have good enough gear for their liking--no warning. It's their guild, and they can do that, but it did leave a bad taste in my mouth especially because that expectation wasn't ever communicated to me. In other words, the whole competitive thing is not my thing and kind of pushes me away from those people because my values are completely different than theirs.

If you are a casual player, just keep in mind what I said above. People on a guild may act nice, but if they are competitive enough and want everyone to raid, then you best play quite a bit and always research gear, spells, new ways of doing things, etc. For me, at that point and with those kind of expectations, it's no longer a game nor is it fun.

One thing to satisfy players from all context is not cause group geared players to be locked out of T2 and T3 due to the difficulty of content.

Now, in those T2 and T3 zones there can be side instances for progression or ability to request events that are tuned to challenged the raid geared players that offer tuned rewards such as augmentations, clickable items, achievements, heroic stats, AA's, Quests or additional gear.

Raiders don't usually need better group gear for their mains, but better augmentations or abilities still are useful when the raid gear is upgraded to the newest raid content.

Another reason not to try and design difficulty levels to the high end raid geared players is they will finish all content in a month. I think DBG realized time sinks are the only way to keep the very high tier players busy at all.

The top raid guilds do beta master as much as possible the raids and group content so they can plow through it as soon as possible and get it all done. And that is part of the fun for them being the first to finish content. That takes a lot of work and dedication to achieve but for them it is worth it. Being the first to finish raid content is a big deal just watch the threads of congratulations when an new expansion comes out as they finish it. I am not dissing or insulting that way of play. Some play to win at EQ and I get that. I am very competitive in first person shooters so I get it. But all that skill and dedication to win firsts in raids etc makes for very highly skilled players who burn through group content no matter how hard it is made. And that is why they can't be included in group content balance IF DBG wants to hold on to the players who aren't so hard core.

P.S.
I am always amazed and impressed at the skill of the top raid guilds and their players and their ability to coordinate a large number of folks to achieve all their raid wins. Just because I champion the more casual group side of the game does not mean I want to diminish the most highly skilled players in the game. . I just feel we need to hold on to the more casual folks as well as the hard core to keep the game going.

I think the big deal is finding something to keep you busy. The "hardcore" are always asking for challenging content because they get bored blowing through everything so quick. The "casual" want things to be achievable for them, otherwise they also run out of things to do.

I think AA were the original invention to address this very issue, but as time got on, they became necessary. I don't recall many folks having their AA maxed in Luclin, but that was long ago and I was a lot more casual then.

The solution would be still achieving something even after you are at the end. Most people do alts because of this, but repetition can get old and people lose interest. I can honestly say, I hate when I am grinding a group on my toon who is max AA and max XP and am feeding it to my fellowship vitality because that's all that's left, but I gotta max out my evolving items or help some guildmates with theirs.

GMM was an awesome addition. I miss the days where this happened throughout the year. By the time you were getting finished or bored with what was, what's next shows up. And if you didn't finish, you actually fell behind a bit and had even more to catch up on.

Most people hated the staggered release. I loved the content aspect. Hated the re-gearing aspect. But if it wasn't so cookie cutter one expansion every year, perhaps we would see more content overall, just not as much at once.

Either way, this is what I think, and they don't pay me to think.

TBL was the opposite of this with Stratos being one of the hardest zones and everything afterward being locked by awkward missions.

Now they are going to tell you about the way around things in progression which was nothing like any past expansion and unknown by the average player till the info finally filtered down out of the main raid guilds.

Never mind that the two main sites just listed the regular progression path which some found far too hard. Which brings us to the point, if it was possible to get around some of the progression why did that progression have to be a road block? Why couldn't it just have been tuned to allow most people to complete it?

I guess for those who did beta and knew all the ways around standard progression it was a bonus. On the funny side many of those probably were high end players who did all the progression anyway.

Now don't get me wrong I don't blame high end raid geared players for playing competitively and being good at playing the game. I just think the devs get tied up in knots trying to please these folks and the more casual players in regards to group content. Even high end raiders knew some things were over tuned for the group players.

The group game cannot be tuned to keep high end raiders busy. They will steamroll through it then concentrate on their raids. Best thing you can do is give them some high value time sink heavy item to work towards each expansion.

In a perfect world each type of player would have a whole expansion dedicated to the high end or more casual play styles. The real situation is less then ideal and trying to keep everyone happy is needed to keep the game going.