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Looking for Outsiders Opinion (Why is Raiding Hated by Some) ???
zypherant
Member UncommonPosts: 18
Hello all. I'm curious about what some people think. I come from EQ (So maybe right there is my problem) I'm retired now, but anyway, Raiding is what MMORPG is all about in my eyes. Soloing is pretty fun, but gets boring, grping also fun... But Raidng! How kick ass is it to take on a dragon where frigin 72 people come together and either own it or get owned. Why shouldnt there be better items for those who form and kill? What is the problem? All i hear is, only those who are in superior guilds get the best items so its not fair... So Step up and be one of the server best players so you can get in an uber guild and get some descent items. Now, I hear other people say that they like to get far on casual play, or they do not like to be grped they want the same chances by themselves... So I wonder, why do you even need the same kinda gear as those who raid if you are a solo nut anyway?... theres no need. And those PvP lovers, i love PvP also, and I'm still a raid nut... I just really wish I understood the hatred. The best part of a MMORPG is the 8 hour prep to gank some PvE powerhouse. WHAT IS THE ISSUE! man I want to understand.
Comments
Raiding is fun, it's just instanced/zoned raids that are annoying because it takes out the immersion.
I've always dreamed of a epic raid connected to the world where people can just walk in and join or watch epic creatures being killed
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Don't click here...no2
Believe it or not, the demographic of most MMORPG players are older gamers that can only play 3-5 hours a day. A raid that takes 1 hour to prep for, 3 hours to do, and then 30 min to pass out loot, is just too much to ask the majority of the players out there to do. I think grouping is awsome and small raids are fun as well. But I've played DAoC with TOA out and I've done the huge 30-200 man raids. They are laggy, just a big zerg, and not a lot of room for just chit chat, which is also fun in a MMORPG.
I like raiding, but small raids-- that take maybe 2 groups. Two groups or less is not hard to get together. When reading a Fantasy novel, how many people does it take to slay that dragon? That's right, only one. I would feel gimp as hell if I couldn't slay that dragon by myself. I believe raid content should consist of taking over a country, castle, fort...whatever. Not a monster that makes you feel gimpy as hell compared to the awsome fantasy Knights and Wizards in a book.
I am a group gamer. I hate solo and always prefer grouping. It makes time fly and gives you just enough to talk with, but not so many where you get lost in the crowd. I believe this is what a MMO is about.
Because Raids are evil. When my friend was play Everquest, whoever got the loot first get the item. So it would destore guild and friendship, and that just plain evil. However no matter how Dev try they couldnt make raid unevil. Blizzard try but fail at life. Look how ninja looter are hated and how WoW system didnt even stop Ninja Hunter, Ninja Rogue, Ninja Warriors, Ninja Priest, Ninja Druids, Ninja Mages, Ninja Palidins, Ninja Shamans, Ninja Hunters, and umm NINJA HUNERS. But no matter how much blizzard try, Ninja keep on Ninja UBRER LOOT. A classic example is the Retrodruid when she NINJA something and she says why BRing the Hate. This is my life, this where I spend all my time and energy.... on and on what NinJas would say. I can go in to detail how raiding is evil, but I dont have the time right now.
I thought I detected a note of sarcasm in your post but I'll answer with the assumption that you were sincere.
Why is raiding hated by some?
First off, the time requirements involved.
Raids take several hours (at least) to complete from start to finish. This precludes a great number of people from participating in raids on a regular basis. Many, many people simply don't have the time for it.
But it isn't just the time for one individual raid that has to be taken into account here. In order to get into a good raiding guild you would have to commit not just to do an occassional raid but rather to go on raids regularly. Ok, so you join a raiding guild with less strict time requirements. You still have to go on raids on a regualar basis if you ever want to get any items out of it. DKP and/or seniority systems will ensure this. So the guy who has time for the occasional raid (say once a month maybe) is not likely to ever get anything out of it.
So a lot of people are blocked out of it just for the time that individual raids take. And a lot more are prevented from progressing their characters through raiding because of the fact that occasional raiders will never be allowed to loot anything. Just because of the time requirements alone a huge segment of the mmorpg community is locked out of high level gear progression. In games that are all about progression does it really suprise you that this generates a lot of resentment?
Second, many people find raiding to be boring.
I know this has been argued to death. I suppose because it's a subjective thing. Believe it or not there are a heck of a lot of people who really do find raiding to be incredibly boring. Yes, I happen to be one of them. I know that there are people who say that raiding is exciting, challenging, and fun. But what they need to remember is that just because it feels exciting to them it doesn't necessarily mean that it will feel exciting to everyone. What feels challenging to them may not feel challenging to someone else. What is fun for them isn't guarantteed to be fun for everyone.
This wouldn't be a problem except that, once again, these games so far have been all about character progression. When progression is limited to one type of content people feel forced to participate in that content. If they don't they will reach a point at which they can no longer progress their characters. And in a progression game that is death.
So here again, people who have the time for it but simply don't enjoy it become quite upset about this. They either do this thing they don't enjoy (but are paying for) or they can no longer progress their characters.
Third, some people have problems with authority.
This aspect doesn't get talked about as much but it is definately an element to be considered. The typical raiding guild is basically a dictatorship. The guild leader has a lot of power over the members because in a game in which high end progression is dependant on raiding the players are dependant on their raiding guilds. They fear being kicked out. They fear being penalized or having loot withheld for some infraction.
Raid guiild leaders quite often let this power go to their heads and become egotistical twats. But even level headed leaders will have to order people around quite a bit. Some people are naturally submissive types who don't mind playing the role of a subordinate underling. Some people are more individualistic and proud and just can't tolerate the subordinate role in a game that they feel should be complimenting their heroic fantasies.
Ah..geez this post is already getting a bit long. I'll address the gear issue but I'll try to be brief.
Why is the gear imbalance between raiders and non-raiders a problem?
Like I said before, part of the problem is that these are progression games. When you stop progression for all playstyles except one you have to expect people who don't engage in that one playstyle to get angry.
If the game has PvP the gear imbalance will render PvP utterly pointless for non-raiders. Thus completely ruining that aspect of the game for them.
But PvE is also effected by the imbalance. As raid gear becomes better and stronger with each new batch of raid drops added to the game the devs will start balancing new non-raid content for raid gear which means non-raiders become gimped even in non-raid content.
I could probably go on some more but that's enough for now.
Most of the complaints you see against raiding is focused on WoW as an example .
If game A is all pve like EQ then i think apart from some jealous sods most careless if you hold the sword of uberness.But in WoW where your gear is extremely important ,hardcore raiders can go pvp and 1 or 2 shot kill a player.This gross imbalance thus affects the gameplay of others.
In a pve situation i see no reason anyone should complain as long as the company remembers to keep in small group and solo content for those with less time on their hands or just no desire to do long stretch raids.
People solo because if flaming sword of ownage drops, they dont want to have to roll for it.
Basically virtual loot is what drives the MMORPG market.
Look at WoW. From the first minute you logon, you are constantly getting armor/weapon upgrades. Every single gaming session is like Christmas. Here have a rusty shortsword. Here have a leather breastplate. Here have a ringmail pants.
The loot that drops keeps going up as your levels go up.
But once you reach 60 it's like, okay go raid this for 2 hours and you MIGHT get to roll on shoulders of ownage.
Thats what causes the fun in WoW to stop, because it was based on getting equipment upgrades every few hours. Once you hit 60, it might take days/weeks to get an equipment upgrade. Might take you months to farm cash for an epic mount.
Incidentally loot also drove the success of EQ. You know that for every night you join a group in Guk or whatever, you might win something.
Its the winning of loot that keeps you coming back. The social stuff is ancillary to the prestige of winning loot.
Loot = Prestige
You look different, people respect you, because you dont have that respect in RL, so you crave it in a video game.
Basically it comes down to enlarging one's E-peen.
Raiding prevents the E-peen because you feel insignifant, hence people hate raiding.
I've done a fair bit of raiding in EQ and WOW... I loathe it. Infact I'd go as far as to say there is nothing I loathe more than raiding except post-nge SWG.
Why do I hate raiding?
o Time. 1-8 fricking hours of setup for a 15 minute fight. F* THAT.
o Lootz. The ineveitable squabbles over loot or alternately the inane systems put in place to prevent them (DKP anyone?)
o Required Raids. F* that. If I got shit to do, RL first. Raiding guilds seem to assume game time is first priority.
o Politics. I've yet to *EVER* see a raiding guild without a ton of political bullshit involved... they're almost as bad as the "Roleplay" guilds.
o Monotony. The first time is a super rush I gotta agree, nothing quite like taking down that mob that your guild is borderline on being able to kill or the first people on the server or game to knock something off... what a rush man, what a ride... after that it's just repeating the same formula you originally used... over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over for all eternity. Massively boring.
o Guild Mergers. *gags* Enough said, if you've played EQ1 long i'm sure you know what i'm talking about. Strangely enough, guild mergers don't happen much in family and roleplay guilds.
o Level Restrictions. Oh so my real life friends can't be in my guild? Peachy.
o Alt Restrictions. Oh so I can't keep in touch with my guild friends easily. Peachy.
o Stupidity. 72 people getting their asses handed to them because one moron hasn't slept in 3 days and dozes off when he should have been awake. Idiot. Alternately, "Oh shit i wore my disease resist gear instead of poison." which brings me to...
o Suits of Gear. Give me a f*ing break. As if having to have one full set of gear, damn near maxed out to raid isn't bad enough, no i need to maintain 5-6 extra items for each resist type to do it... screw it.
I could go on for days, why bother, I hate raiding. It's prob one of the most annoying aspects of mmo's to date for me.
Shadus
Just wanted to say thats prob the best summary i've ever seen of why raiding sucks. You should mail that thing to the devs of just about every mmo out there.
Shadus
Its not raids themselves that people hate (myself at least), its the total and complete lack of any other worthwhile endgame content that games bring to the table. Not only that, but when developers continue to only put in these ridiculous endgame timesinks, it makes us (me at least) feel that the developers are just taking the easy way out.
Take World of Warcraft for example. With (6?) million+ customers playing the game, all shelling out $15 a month to play, surely they have the means to create limitless content for the game... What do they do instead? Throw in one cheesefest raid dungeon every 3-4 months and wait for the fanbase to complain about nothing to do, then they throw in another. Honestly, for a game with a revenue that big, the reqiurements for creating several various things to do monthly is next to nothing.
Also, again coming down to the casual aspects. Not everyone has the time on any given day to plop down in front of their computer for 6+ hours to participate in a large-scale raid, which unfortunately in many games is the only way to get good equipment. Now I'm not saying that people shouldn't have to work for good gear, but there should also be other ways to compete, for example large quests on a small scale involving 1 person or a small group completing several smaller steps that can be completed over the course of several days, instead of all at once.
The only game I have a character high enough to "raid" in is COH, and there aren't really any "raids" per say. There are end-game "task forces" on the villain side... and a sort-of raid thing on the hero side. And in 2 years or more of COH/COV game play I have not once, ever participated in a raid, and never will.
The reason? Setup time.
To me, the whole idea of spending a long time prepping for the "raid" and making sure everything is perfect, is just not a lot of fun. I'm sure it is for some people, so I certainly don't oppose the idea of raid-style content at the endgame. But don't expect me to participate.
I play games to have fun... usually care-free, relaxed fun. Raids are anything but... They are usually (I know this 2nd hand only but I believe those who have told me the nightmare stories) run by very uptight people who are super-focused on everything going perfectly. I'm just not into the whole uptight, "everything has to be perfect" scene in MMORPGs. As I say, I like to relax when I play a game, and raids are not relaxing. So I don't do them.
Not sure I'd say I "hate" raids... I just have no interest in that form of gameplay.
C
Before MUDS and the Internet, I was enjoying BBS and "rpg" on them.
No matter what, a MMO will always be this extansion rather than something completely new for someone as me. You can't tell me all MMOs are about raiding, they aren't.
I really try to like raiding, but there is nothing to do, I just can't stand it. I can do tradeskills, I can developp my diplomacy and such skills, I can camp something for a LONG time...but nothing will make me accept and bear Raiding. Raiding is in the same boat as PvP. No amount of arguing, of trying, of enforcement will ever change that. I can't bear raiding, in fact I find PvP less offensive than raiding, if I absolutely have to pick the lesser evil between open FFA PvP and Raiding, I will pick ffa PvP as the lesser evil and try to adapt and enjoy the game nonetheless.
Raiding has nothing to do with grouping or with soloing. Raiding is LONG, TENUOUS, UNFAIR (never saw a fair system for loot), YOU ARE A FOLLOWER. I am a hero, not a mere unit. The guild that almost make me enjoy raiding, I was their main chanter and it wasn't enough to uphold my interest. See, even in the uberest group ever you join, you are still an individual-hero and you are allowed a lot of freedom and adaptation to make the group better, you can question the strategy, discuss, try to improve everything. In a raid, you have to STFU, you don't think, you react, you merely do what other ask you to...or worser, you are the superior and you are telling other to stfu and do what you tell them, which is even more horrible.
Asking me to become a member of the Republican fanclub from Canada would be FAR better than asking me to bear a system where raiding grant any edge over the grouping game. Raiding can't be giving any edge inside grouping that a grouper would have appreciate.
Again, if I have to stop 1 thing and only 1, I will stop raiding and bear PvP. Of course, I rather have a good PvE gameplay with no raiding.
I don't hate raiding, I can't stand it myself and as I have said above, I endure many lame stuff like tradeskills or whatever if it make me a better grouper. If raiding make peoples better at grouping, than I have no reason to play that game since I won't endure raiding no matter what. Luckily for me, casuals won't stand stuff they dislike much and they rightly fight the meditating book, the boat, the hell level...I can bear these nasty things myself and I never really fight these even if I agree that they are wrong...yet the casuals can't stand raiding anymore than these other boring stuff enforced on them and eventually it will bring to the conclusion that raiding can't be enforced on players if you want to maximise your game success.
You could say I am an evil powerplayer...but the fact is, despite my powerplayer side, I am extremely helpful and I enjoy online grouping a lot. DREAMING to be #1 is important and raiding deny this dreaming.
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
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Do I ever sleep?
But add to that it's alot of time for possibly no reward for the niji looters that grab and log, shoot even doing dungon crawls in 40's 50's get so old you'd rather hunt green things then do them. But in some games ( wow) the quest rewards at higher level are useless and one must do dungons for exp and possible blue items> But again over and over you even see priests grab "link dead dissappear" on plate
after it happens a few times the desire to go into the dungeons forget it.
Right now faction farming is happening. how many times run here there capture the flag>?
Then u see the last part of the game become totaly loot based, see 60's levels farming in 30s 40 's grinding areas , and then add to the bad behavior in general chat and raid groups, it is alot of trouble for Little to NO reward.
In other games pve spoke to folks for a long time kept them busy, But once again i went 6 levels 40 + normal exping not get a singal even "green item i could use in wow". That is when it is time to take a break from mmorpgs or look at greener pastures
I'm only going to reply to this part, because I think people should know that not all raids are like this. In Dark Age of Camelot, in the Trials of Atlantis expansion, there would be raid leaders that posted on forums and let people know ahead of time in game when they were going to run a raid, so that people can plan for it. You didn't have to be in a guild or anything. It was just first come, first server. There wasn't any DKP or any loot nazis either. At the end of the raid, the loot was lottoed out. Only those that could use the loot could roll on it. So even casual raiders got nice loot if they were lucky and didn't even have to join a guild. DAoC raids took anywhere between 3-6 hours to do, if the raid was organized, which usually was.
So not all raids are bad or jip people out of loot. I think it largely depends on the playerbase the game attracts. WoW raiders were really greedy and the system promoted it. DAoC raiders were mostly mature and casual players, with a smattering of hardcore players. The best gear in the game was crafted, not looted, so the gear that was looted, while good, was not the end all be all of your set. So game mechanics play a role in this as well.
I guess if you're going to raid at all, pick a game that promotes fairness and has a good community. Playing a game like WoW is just asking for it and anyone who reads the forums would know that.
That is a very narrow view and has a lot of assumptions in it. First, you're assuming every game that has raiding in it is driven by loot. DAoC has tons of raiding in it, but it is driven by PvP. There are 50 levels and there is nothing stopping you from wearing level 50 armor at level one, except maybe your bank account. So people typically upgrade their armor every 10 levels or so, do raids for special abilities, and pay a crafter to make them some spellcrafted armor that beats any looted armor in game. Looted armor can be cool, has better graphics, and can help finish your armor template, but by no means do people raid for it. Raiding in DAoC is for gaining special abilities to help you win more battles in PvP.
Secondly, you assume that people respect those with better gear and that those with better gear relish in that respect. Thirdly, you assume these people or all people that play MMOs don't get respect in real life. Well, there are celebrities, doctors, rich people, poor people, etc that play MMOs.
*I think if a raid had 'raid abilities', raiding would possibly be more fulfilling and fun.
I used to live and breath MMOGs, I cant work due to illness, so used to play 12 to 18 hours a day every day. I've played or beta tested 25+ MMOGs since 2000... yet I class myself as a professional n00b
I was hardcore raider in EQ1, #2 guild on server, was a guild MA Warrior.
Quite simply I got burnt out with it. I was fed up spending hours and hours on end just stood around waiting for numbers to log on, or for people to get to the raid zone, or while people figured out what we were supposed to be doing, or people bickering and arguing over stuff, and then having loot ho's (usually weezurds) putting their soloing capabailities ahead of making sure those that needed gear had it, so that we could raid more effectively.
Plus SoE seem to have this anal 'time sinks are fun', 'gaming must be Work' approach to their games, and this is very much reflected in their raids.
I retired from EQ1 in June 04 (by which time we were well past Plane of Time and deep into GoD) and messed about with City of Heroes and several other MMOGS. I couldn't wait to play EQ2 though and was very lucky to get into Beta quite early on.
I decided to forego the raid scene in EQ2 and just explore the game and enjoy myself. Due to this approach and twice taking breaks for various reasons, come EQ2's 1st anniversary my highest toon was nowhere near 60.
The 1st anniversary served as a prompt to get my butt in gear, and a month or so after DoF expansion launch my main, a Necro (there was no way I was gonna play melee again after EQ1!), hit 70 and I joined a raiding guild.
Within a week of starting to raid I was bored, the same old issues that cropped up in EQ1 were cropping up in EQ2, even though raids were designed for less people (A situation I am positive will change as the game progresses... SoE wont be able to help themselves, we WILL one day have 72 people raids in EQ2).
After a couple of months of this I just gave up again. Raiding was fricking boring, I was falling asleep on them, even though I tried to use all of my Necro's 'support' abailities, rather than being just a DPS Queen, to make the raid more interesting and fun.
I wasn't alone in these feelings, many people just stopped logging on to avoid raids, or it was obvious on many raids that people were not paying attention (watching tv at same time etc). Two raid guilds fell apart on me during these short months.
Hardcore raiders make me laugh though. It seem's to me that many of them feel they can't operate within a game unless they have uber items xyz or have title xyz (and yes, I realise full well that I WAS one of these people too, a few years back - but I woke up and saw the light). I laugh when I see morons purposely place themselves afk for hours on end (I guess while they at work/school or asleep), in places that get a lot of traffic, just to show off what they have. I've even had idiots come up to me and show off by flashing uber items in the trade window. Sad, very sad.
My level 70 Necro has 'ok' gear, I can solo quite happily with her, just by playing smart and being canny, I don't need uber item xyz to survive, and I dont need raiding making me negative about the game.
I've just returned to EQ2 again, but there is no way I am even joining a guild let alone go raiding.
There are many valid complaints on this thread and I agree with most of them myself.
I don't "hate" raiding but I rarely do it. Its a headache and it doesn't "fit" into the fantasy genre at all. Its an easy fix for dev's. They can add in smaller amounts of content because it requires more players and time. MMO's should be more GROUP based, not raid. MMO's need more "spirit". More quest with an actual story or point. F*ck kill task and raids. They bring ZERO to the game. Its a Dev's "ace" card, when all else fails, add a raid.
It all comes down to this in most MMORPG's.
Raiding is a "FORCED" activity for the mostpart. That goes against the original idea behind MMO's: open ended gameplay and freedom to choose how to play.
Its forced because devs do not need to worry or focus on building any real open ended options. By stripping away the freedom and open endedness, they make their job's 1000% easier.
WoW's success has nothing to do with the small MMO community. It has to do with the fact that it drew heavily from traditional gamers (PC and Console). Gamers use to playing on restricted, linear gameplay fields. Its an incredible free and opened game to people who do not normally play MMO's. The original EQ, I'm not so sure on, it was a pioneer. They tried it and it worked out at the time.
First you have to find a raid you can fit into.
Then you have to get to that zone.
Then you have to get into the raid.
Then you sit for hours and hours waiting for the raid to start.
Then you have a few minutes of fun, untill some dip stick screws it up and mass argos the dungeon on the raid party.
Then you spend hours on corpse runs and try to get a rezz...
Other then that, raids are fun!
Oh hold on most raiders would never accept that. I wonder why.
Let's see, raiding is an exclsuive playstyle and the ones who do it demand better gear than everyone else. Games like EQ/WoW reward and progress through gear. Of course people are pissed. Its amusing that you say the gear dosn't matter but don't apply that the other way around. If its not so important then err on the side of less conflict. Yet consistently raider demand the option that engenders more conflict. Hmmmm its all so strange .... I just can't imagine why people would start to hate such arrogant, greedy people who try to muscle themselves to the top of a game through politics.
f.ex. a dragon raid.
Guild raid of 40 people go in to kill a dragon. They have a guild keep to maintain and need the dragon's horde to finance it. The dragon's treasure willl pay for the keep's upkeep for 2 months at a time. The horde also has a chance to contain rare crafting materials that will allow the guild crafters to make items with certain attributes for many every one of the 40 people that went on that raid before they run out and have to do another one.
Something like this rewards the WHOLE GROUP instead of just 1 or 2 individuals. Sitting in a raid for 4-8 hours just to watch someone else get an item is completely asinine and horrible for group morale.
Added to that is the ant-like specialization gameplay making it rather borign as well. Its just awful.
Raids are much better as many vs. many. And like Minsc said above they are much better for the game when the reward system in not based on individuals. MMOs claim to be group oriented games and they often force you to group to be rewarded well and then they reward you on an individual basis. Its almost neurotic.
Its like a badly designed database with data granularity problems. Its just plain mismatched.
Edit: To see something along the lines of what I'm talking about you can look at Eve and the system control mechanics. Such a system is resource and pvp based. But it is much less mismatched than silly EQ-style dragon raids. Controling a system takes a good number of people working together and it imparts collecitve advantages, without excluding soloists etc. Its not a perfect system, but it has a better granularity than many others and is much more organic and flexible because of that.