Sure, but then there are things like utility... do you want 1? or 2? or 4? (Double bard/double chanter is lolsy strong!) Having only a dirge or illy isn't going to do much for aggro control. And, not all healers are able to solo heal... especially if tanks aren't great with cycling temps or if aggro is all over the place or if they're newly leveled or... many things, really... There are a lot of factors that can go into making a group. Don't get me wrong, I run zones with hodge-podge groups, but man sometimes aggro really sucks, and I can't tell you how many times either I or someone else has had to swap to an alt to make it work. So really, the "easy fix" wouldn't really fix much. The hub concept is probably the "best" way to deal with all the variables that can come into play... unless folks want to sit around waiting for a perfectly designed group to be formed (via stringent filters) or deal with groups of a monk, 3 swashes, a necro and a channeler. Also, a hub would allow for folks willing to play alts to say, "hey, I can play any of these roles... what's needed?" Plus, something about this wording-- "have access to large amounts of players"-- just sounds like a hub is what's being leaned towards. It might not be, but that's how I read it. Also, Kander... why'd you have to derail my QQing thread?! *sigh*
there are many issues with that. what you are thinking of is kinda their old style LFG function (anyone remember that? it's a tab on your friends list window!) I remember it, I think I even used it once upon a time near the start of the game. where you can check how many people you have in the group, the roles you want fulfilled, and the level of the group. a massive hub would be the best really similar to BG a main issue that would cause though is that it would empty out many of the server areas due to everyone being in the hub when they want to group, but since they still do that with Bg, I don't see an issue really
So what would be wrong with a similar ui for the queue exactly? A hub - especially a cross-server hub - sounds like one big lagfest to me. And really, is there any difference between adding yourself to a list of people LFG than there is spamming chat channels? I just don't see the problem.
Updating the legacy LFG tool would be better option. I've said it before. People want the discretion it provided when forming groups. Blindly, and mostly randomly, throwing people together is going to almost always result in poor, or unacceptable outcomes. While most people are willing to take a risk, they often want it to be a measured, somewhat managed risk. There are a bare minimum number of qualifiers required when assembling a group and need to be available to a group leader, or membership of a group looking to reinforce or fill open spots (these require no seeking player input and can be inferred). Here are what matters, in the order they generally matter, and should be the order presented to a group leader or group consensus seeking reinforcements: - Level: may or may not matter, but should be clear and plainly visible to the seeking group leader or group consensus for the times that it does matter, which it usually does more than anything with role closely behind, and occasionally trumping it in importance - General role: fighter, healer, damage, support; willingness and ability to take on or fulfill secondary roles is a bit redundant, and depends on particular group composition of a formed group and varies with content attempted, so removing 'secondary' roles and 'ranged' damage qualifiers from a player seeking a group makes sense to me. In other words, simplifying and inferring a narrower range of roles presented makes sense; if secondary roles matter to a particular group with a particular agenda, it is discretionary that requires more information anyway - Class: because duplication is less optimal because of buff/ability stacking restrictions, this more often than not matters, but again, not always, so should be visible, but left as another discretionary determinant for the forming group - Name: some characters have a known reputation, good or bad and sometimes it matters; secondarily, achievement or gearing advancement suitability can be electively checked by lookup against a player profile service: eg eqplayers or u.eq2wire or dragonsarmory or any alternative service; one such alternative service might provide a 'gear score' lookup, based on what they think is important. I think the value of a gear score concept is too debatable and too subject to manipulation that it would be often broken, but some may value it, so thats where it should sit: via an elective lookup service using whatever formula they see fit to calculate said score. Secondary, the group leader or existing group consensus has a task agenda that can be filtered when looking for reinforcements. The first aspect is often level oriented around the following: - Current content; narrow level range, or max level only - LAD content - Non-LAD legacy content; narrow level range, or no upper end if mentoring accepted - BG Pre-Queue as Preformed - Pick Up Raid; narrow level range - Open/Other as specified in comment The task agenda might have a secondary aspect, oriented around the group's objective: - Adventuring (specify between 1 and 3 zones, listed by abbreviated name that can be hovered or clicked on for expanded full name and other relevant info like minimum gating stats designed into the zones in question, and when lockout timers are active for existing group, a completion ratio of bosses remaining vs possible bosses), - Questing (specify main quest and minimum step that group is willing to help others catch up or continue from), - Tradeskilling, not sure if group tradeskilling is still a thing with relevancy, but for purposes of completeness, maybe it should be included For the player seeking a group, they need to specify preferences appropriate and inferred to their level, ranging from 'Prefer', 'Willing', 'Unwilling' (or 'Yes', 'Maybe', 'No'), with an default selection of 'Unwilling' (or 'No'): - Current Content - LAD - Non-LAD Legacy - Non-LAD Legacy as Mentor - BG - Pick Up Raid - Pick Up Raid as Mentor - Other And optionally a preferred objective, defaulted to 'Unwilling', and optionally specifying zones or quests relevant to the following preferred or willing categories: - Adventuring - Questing - Tradeskilling Third, account-wide character play preferences, with the same set of preference range of prefer, willing, or an initial default of unwilling for all characters on the account. Any changes to filters or preferences by group or player seekers should be saved as a per-character default, so any changes carry over to the next time the window is opened, with an option to reset to the interface default. Preferences for each character should be respected regardless of active online or not, so would be be server-side, even if cached locally. Historically, we have relied on a singular leader to do the work of forming a group, with or without input from the group. With the trend of an absence of strong-willed leadership, or prevalence of a lack of initiative, maybe its time to look at ways to incentivize leadership, perhaps by borrowing from EQ1 or other games as models, and provide measurable benefits for acting as a leader moving forward. In Eq1, they offered group experienced based, [scaling] beneficial buffs. A wiki description of leadership AAs can be found here: http://strategywiki.org/wiki/EverQuest/AA_info/Leadership_AA That may not be ideal or translate well here, but should be on the table, even if late in the game.
The amusing thing about mentioning Leadership AAs was that it was determined to be a failure and scrapped I think last year, or the year before. Can't recall which. Too many things they determined should be baseline, and that it was just another thing everyone forced themselves to grind. They are now granted for free on every character. Not saying it's a bad idea, but borrowing an idea from a game where the idea was deemed a failure might not be the best.
Don't disagree with the sentiment on that specific example, merely, noting that perhaps something more concrete (even if entirely superficial, like a 5% leadership tax on coin loot and 5% experience bonus when acting as the leader) needs to be offered to promote and recognize general leadership or initiative, because at present, it is pretty lackluster.
do you lag in the BG hub? cause I don't, and that would basically be the same thing as a cross server dungeon hub. and you are right! what is the difference? yet no one has ever used the LFG function in the game that I just showed you, except maybe way way in the early days of the game. Maybe you should start using it and telling everyone that still plays to start using it.
Are you implying that I should document my lolsy pugging experiences in paint? Because... I hadn't considered this before... but... it could be fun!
This is exactly why I left the game and never purchased the new AoM expansion. During and after AoM testing I first foreseen the number of alarming RED FLAGS approaching... First was the alarming number of people unable to complete any dungeons utilizing the best instance gear. Secondly after reviewing my stat changes were not impressive. Third the new prestige AA abilities and stat boosting didn't impress me after reviewing ACT and was actually disgusted at the copy past prestige abilities for each class. Fourth on my list was the actual instance armor utilizing the same basic logic as last expansion to carry stats and gems with no focus on procs or any other effects. Also the number of currency items needed to upgrade using gems was a ridicules time sink. Fifth was the charms and jewelry utilizing the same proc effects with increase Rank +1 with STA increase . Six thing I noticed was the Battlegrounds gear requiring a final Dreadnought armor, weapon, or Jewelry piece prior to moving into new AoM beginner tier equipment. Meaning new Battlegrounds player starting this expansion unlike any other expansion would be required to spend tokens on Last Expansion items prior to moving into current AoM expansion equipment pieces. Seventh was the already low server populations... even with the influx of returning players to play the new expansion I was already having my worries based upon server populations and my experiences with instance groups on AoM TEST server utilizing the best instance armor. Eighth was the solution of using Cross Server grouping as if Dungeon Finder wasn't already a clue as to how terrible an idea Cross Server grouping would actually become I was shocked to see that this would be the BE-ALL highly anticipated delayed solution we would all be waiting for to save our servers from lack of grouping and restore balance to this hemorrhaging loss of new and veteran players. Ninth was the lack of respect you displayed by leaving the most sought out, anticipated, difficult, rare, trophy to kill, trophy item to wear, magical and special NPC's to kill "The Avatars". You simply left them with scripts and levels from Tears of Veeshan expansion. What a disgraceful and near unforgiving act of respect I have seen in all my years of playing this game. It's time to leave the game folks... SoE said it itself. They are going to take months to finish their new Database and then they will be able to implement Cross Server grouping as their BE-ALL solution for the lack of players on all these dead servers. It's a shame to see this great and thriving of life game be treated this way. May SoE make tons of money off the rest of the players using Server Transfer Tokens and continue the process of building EverQuest Next. Farewell to all forever, I have no plans on ever returning back to this game again.
The existing lfg tool was fairly well designed and it would have been great if everyone put in the effort to use it. Unfortunately, it has two fundamental flaws. It is a complicated GUI competing with an intuitive immersive interface in "/3 LFG", and most of the choices don't matter. The entire dialog box is intrusive when it does not need to be. The lfg tool could parse the lfg channel for "LFG (?<note>.*)" or "LF[1-5]?M (?<note>.*)" and automatically add you to its active pool, and drop you from the active pool when you get a group or your group fills (not counting mercs). The channel remains the primary form of communication, but the tool is available to help out. The second flaw is the illusion of choice. You can't try to impose a false sense of group makeup based on different games. The choices need to be player driven and cooperative, so just list name, level, class and "note". Usually note is a zone name. The players will take care of the rest.
the thing wrong with the LFG function in the game is it requires more effort. Nearly all people will look for the most efficient way of completing a task. And saying you are lfg in the general channel and waiting for someone to send you a tell is easier than digging through the tabs in the LFG function thing It's just the way it is. so once again a hub would be the most effective way. it allows a physical place to be to know you are LFG
An automated system for forming groups would have to know that some zones only need HP of X, resists of Y, 1 tank, 1 healer and then 4 others. But other zones require more HP, more resists and 2 healers 1 chanter and then 3 dps. Other zones require 1 of each arch type to complete… and so on. So the system would have to be tailored by a person for each zone. So a central hub would be a much more efficient system.
tbh I wouldn't trust Soe's thing about formula. during beta I was told that most of the zones were meant to require 2 healers, I did just about all of them with 1 healer.
Best of luck to you, whatever game you move on to, but quite frankly -- & as much as I'm personally neutral-to-negative about Altar Of Malice -- I'm having more fun in EQ2 than I ever did before. So, despite your long, well-written doom-&-gloom, I think I'll stay right here until there's no more "here" in which to stay. My thinking on this crystallized yesterday when I did my first AoM heroic, & had a riotous good time.
I'm liking this xpac too...yes it has some challenges and limitations here and there...yes it needs some tweeks...and yes....I'm on a dying server....but I'm still enjoying this game and so far liking this xpac better than the ones released over the last few years. I always laugh when others say time to move on...or I quit....blah blah blah...people come and people go all the time in EVERYTHING....gaming is no exception.....if I decide to leave this game I don't think everyone else should leave too.
Meh, I don't know, I think there are folks who need to step away/take a break/get a reality check. If you're not having fun, by all means, don't play. In a few weeks/months/years, you might be refreshed and come back and say, "holy-moly! This game is Lols!" I know I did... Maybe not. Idk! I also totes advocate logging out when you feel yourself getting angry. It helps! Personally, I get tired of playing with jaded folks... So, I dont! This game is lols! Thank goodness heroic content is hilariously fun; well, the potential is there, at least.
