I facepalm every time I see somebody in another MMO say something like "people don't want to group up very often, so the game should force them to do so". Yes, I love it when games force me to do things I don't want to do. Let's not make grouping desirable or fun or accessible so that players want to group up more, that's just crazy talk. *sigh*
Well we do have a portion of the player base that has such an aversion to the Star/Team Leader position that they literally have been seen standing in a circle at contacts/trainers for teams/tf's/trials spamming LFT for over an hour and then complaining that the server is dead and they can't find teams.
The only reason I mention this is because I'm expecting at least one of them to come in here and claim Bill is wrong.
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It always amused and annoyed me in equal parts when just after BAF/Lambda came in, I'd see 20 or so people stood around DJ Zero in PD spamming /b with 'Any trials forming?' 'ne trails' (don't get me started on gibberish spelling) and so forth.|
Originally Posted by Forbin_Project
Well we do have a portion of the player base that has such an aversion to the Star/Team Leader position that they literally have been seen standing in a circle at contacts/trainers for teams/tf's/trials spamming LFT for over an hour and then complaining that the server is dead and they can't find teams.
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If I was actually looking for a trial, I'd usually mutter something in /b then start forming a league, but it does remind that Forbin has it right in that you can never underestimate just how allergic a lot of people are to any sort of responsibility for a team.
Warning:
The above post may contain Cynicism, sarcasm and/or pessimism. If you object to the quantities contained, then tough.
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Is it any wonder with the vehement bile about the latest trial in some other threads (and apparently on some server global channels)? I am sure they are typically afraid of having 20 people mad at them for leading a failed trial.|
Originally Posted by Canine
It always amused and annoyed me in equal parts when just after BAF/Lambda came in, I'd see 20 or so people stood around DJ Zero in PD spamming /b with 'Any trials forming?' 'ne trails' (don't get me started on gibberish spelling) and so forth.
If I was actually looking for a trial, I'd usually mutter something in /b then start forming a league, but it does remind that Forbin has it right in that you can never underestimate just how allergic a lot of people are to any sort of responsibility for a team. |
MMO gamers are some the most fickle, hyperbole filled gamers I have seen in my 30+ years of gaming.
There are people that play this game with an emotional and intellectual makeup that forces them to blame everything about a team, good or bad, on the leader, or at least everyone else besides themselves...just like real life.
Too many of the MMO players I see treat the pixels on the creen like real life and therefore bring all the same emotion baggage with them on a team.
Personally, I and the people I play the game with laugh all the time at team wipes and failed attempts at things. Personally, I cannot understand why anyone would get worked up emotionally on a constant basis about pixels. I understand having a bad day or something making the game frustrating when anything would.
I have seen in more than one global channel a player decried as a bad leader simply because a Trial failed. Fear drives people and many fear the idea of being ostracized.
Just a morning rant brought to you by Caribou Coffee, brewed to perfection by my lovely wife.
"The side that is unhappy is not the side that the game was intended to make happy, or promised to make happy, or focused on making happy. The side that is unhappy is the side that is unhappy. That's all." - Arcanaville
"Surprised your guys' arteries haven't clogged with all that hatred yet." - Xzero45
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Originally Posted by MajorPrankster
Is it any wonder with the vehement bile about the latest trial in some other threads (and apparently on some server global channels)? I am sure they are typically afraid of having 20 people mad at them for leading a failed trial.
MMO gamers are some the most fickle, hyperbole filled gamers I have seen in my 30+ years of gaming. There are people that play this game with an emotional and intellectual makeup that forces them to blame everything about a team, good or bad, on the leader, or at least everyone else besides themselves...just like real life. Too many of the MMO players I see treat the pixels on the creen like real life and therefore bring all the same emotion baggage with them on a team. Personally, I and the people I play the game with laugh all the time at team wipes and failed attempts at things. Personally, I cannot understand why anyone would get worked up emotionally on a constant basis about pixels. I understand having a bad day or something making the game frustrating when anything would. I have seen in more than one global channel a player decried as a bad leader simply because a Trial failed. Fear drives people and many fear the idea of being ostracized. Just a morning rant brought to you by Caribou Coffee, brewed to perfection by my lovely wife. |
I respectfully disagree. While what you describe does indeed happen, the type of behaviour I'm talking about has nothing to do with the actual content or it's success or failure. What I'm referring to has been prevalent for 8 years and has been seen for everything from radio missions to incarnate trials, old fashioned sewer runs, to trick or treating.
The real issue is they think recruiting, selecting the mission, setting the difficulty level is a chore that they avoid at all costs. We've all watched teams dissolve when the leader leaves and the sheep play "Hot Potato" with the star and quit to send LFT spam rather than accept leadership and recruit one more person or continue playing.
Whoops! I should have made a note I was adding an edit to this post. Seems I corrected what I wanted to say while MajorPrankster was responding and it didn't trugger the last edited message. Sorry about that Major. I meant to word my original post with this "While what you describe does indeed happen," but I was thinking faster than I typed and had to go back and add it. It does change the tone of my post to what I intended.
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Very true, I have seen this as well!|
Originally Posted by Forbin_Project
I respectfully disagree. The type of behaviour I'm talking about has nothing to do with the actual content. It's been prevalent for 8 years and has been seen for everything from radio missions to incarnate trials, old fashioned sewer runs, to trick or treating.
The real issue is they think recruiting, selecting the mission, setting the difficulty level is a chore that they avoid at all costs. We've all watched teams dissolve when the leader leaves and the sheep play "Hot Potato" with the star and quit to send LFT spam rather than accept leadership and recruit one more person or continue playing. |
I still think a portion of it has to do with the fear of being ostracized for being perceived as a 'bad leader'.
The 'chores' of being a leader are compounded for some, I think, because of the emotional involvement of being a leader.
This, IMO, has a lot to do with the social aspect of MMOs and life in general.
For MMOs, except for things like iTrails and TFs, I have always played with a group of RL friends. When some stop playing, I recruit more.
Getting RL people to play in the first place is more challenging than getting a PUG going...This leads to my POV being very different on PUGs, I think. I will PUG for a lot of things, but my day-to-day, bread-and butter playing is either solo or with RL friends in voice chat.
However if I want to run a TF or something on a character, for a badge or whatever, I will shout out in a global channel and away we go.
The more cynical part of me also has to say, I think some of the people wanting others to lead don't even want to 'play' the game. I have a friend that subscribed for a while like that. He was only ever around to talk in voice chat. He now has several 50's, all from just following us and hitting a few powers now and then. For some, MMO is just a graphical chat room. IMO, those are the most emotionally frightened of the star, coupled with a lack of knowing much about the game in general.
"The side that is unhappy is not the side that the game was intended to make happy, or promised to make happy, or focused on making happy. The side that is unhappy is the side that is unhappy. That's all." - Arcanaville
"Surprised your guys' arteries haven't clogged with all that hatred yet." - Xzero45
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I respectfully disagree with your disagreement. The last thing I want is the responsibility of everyones happiness. I can count on one hand how many times |
Originally Posted by Forbin_Project
I respectfully disagree. While what you describe does indeed happen, the type of behaviour I'm talking about has nothing to do with the actual content or it's success or failure. What I'm referring to has been prevalent for 8 years and has been seen for everything from radio missions to incarnate trials, old fashioned sewer runs, to trick or treating.
The real issue is they think recruiting, selecting the mission, setting the difficulty level is a chore that they avoid at all costs. We've all watched teams dissolve when the leader leaves and the sheep play "Hot Potato" with the star and quit to send LFT spam rather than accept leadership and recruit one more person or continue playing. |
I have seen someone extolling the virtues of a team leader on the boards, and even if I found myself with double the digits, I wouldn't have enough for the amount of times I have seen posts lambasting inept leadership.
My leadership days ended when my friends list went grey 5 years ago. Leading pugs has no appeal to me at all.
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I respect that, but you wouldn't fall into the player category I'm referring to. You don't seem the type to wait for other people to take the initiative and simply follow along mashing buttons. Nor do you seem the type to complain because no one is leading you around by the hand, when you are perfectly capable of doing it for yourself.|
Originally Posted by SinisterDirge
I respectfully disagree with your disagreement. The last thing I want is the responsibility of everyones happiness. I can count on one hand how many times
I have seen someone extolling the virtues of a team leader on the boards, and even if I found myself with double the digits, I wouldn't have enough for the amount of times I have seen posts lambasting inept leadership. My leadership days ended when my friends list went grey 5 years ago. Leading pugs has no appeal to me at all. |
I'm talking about a very specific and sometimes vocal group. It may not be a large group, but (generic) you always know where to find them, so it seems like there is more of them than there actually is.
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Unfortunately, these types of people infest MMO's. I wish they would drop the game.
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Originally Posted by Forbin_Project
I respect that, but you wouldn't fall into the player category I'm referring to. You don't seem the type to wait for other people to take the initiative and simply follow along mashing buttons. Nor do you seem the type to complain because no one is leading you around by the hand, when you are perfectly capable of doing it for yourself.
I'm talking about a very specific and sometimes vocal group. It may not be a large group, but (generic) you always know where to find them, so it seems like there is more of them than there actually is. |
Count me as one of the people "allergic" to leadership roles and forming groups. With that said I appreciate how good I have it in COH that I can do plenty solo, I have the LFG system to use and I can watch the channels and if something forms I have an interest in I can jump on it with little fuss.
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I wouldn't go that far. I wouldn't mind if they'd stop complaining tho. It's perfectly alright to not want to to be the leader, but standing in one spot spamming LFT doesn't mean the server is dead or should be merged. They can be soloing while they are looking for teams.|
Originally Posted by dbuter
Unfortunately, these types of people infest MMO's. I wish they would drop the game.
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It's like watching water boil. If you stare at it, it seems to take forever, but if you keep busy it's boiling in the blink of an eye.
I don't prefer to lead things. I'll do it, but I'd much rather someone else do it. And the reason is alluded to above - I don't wish to be responsible for the other players' happiness. I'm not afraid of that responsibility, but I find it draining, and I'm much more relaxed if I don't have that to worry about.
I'll say that the above is mostly true from an iTrial perspective, where instructions given and attention paid both to trial ques and what players are doing are often important to success. I'm still not eager to form teams for less complex content, because it's still more stressful to me than "just" participating, but not nearly so much so.
On the topic of the OP, I am completely spoiled by CoH's teaming, and have regularly been off-put by the way it works in almost every MMO I've seen since CoH came out.
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I respectfully disagree with your disagreement disagreement. I've got nothin', I just wanted to say that.|
Originally Posted by SinisterDirge
I respectfully disagree with your disagreement. The last thing I want is the responsibility of everyones happiness. I can count on one hand how many times
I have seen someone extolling the virtues of a team leader on the boards, and even if I found myself with double the digits, I wouldn't have enough for the amount of times I have seen posts lambasting inept leadership. My leadership days ended when my friends list went grey 5 years ago. Leading pugs has no appeal to me at all. |
Oh, here we go. Actually, I do see threads complimenting good leadership. Maybe not by name, but then, threads lambasting inept leadership don't name names either. Most of them are indirect compliments--threads about a task force that went well, or in which some team achieved some kind of success.
Most teams, including PuGs, are mediocre and don't merit a thread one way or another.
We've been saving Paragon City for eight and a half years. It's time to do it one more time.
(If you love this game as much as I do, please read that post.)
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Agreed, I will never understand that subset at all. If there isn't a trial forming within 5 mins of me looking, I am doing something else. I don't have much time to play the game, so standing around watching folks preen is a sure fire way to burn me out.|
Originally Posted by Forbin_Project
I'm talking about a very specific and sometimes vocal group. It may not be a large group, but (generic) you always know where to find them, so it seems like there is more of them than there actually is.
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Originally Posted by UberGuy
I don't prefer to lead things. I'll do it, but I'd much rather someone else do it. And the reason is alluded to above - I don't wish to be responsible for the other players' happiness. I'm not afraid of that responsibility, but I find it draining, and I'm much more relaxed if I don't have that to worry about.
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Originally Posted by TonyV
I respectfully disagree with your disagreement disagreement. I've got nothin', I just wanted to say that.
Oh, here we go. Actually, I do see threads complimenting good leadership. Maybe not by name, but then, threads lambasting inept leadership don't name names either. Most of them are indirect compliments--threads about a task force that went well, or in which some team achieved some kind of success. Most teams, including PuGs, are mediocre and don't merit a thread one way or another. |
What's ironic about about allowing 8 person teams is that it actually narrows the search criteria down and probably ends up meaning you form as fast or faster than a team with a hard-cap of 4 (and the game balanced around that). Part of the reason CoX teaming works so well is that it the cost of picking up a "wrong" member is generally low. In other games, if one member is bad at his or her role, the whole team is in serious trouble. The fact that other games force you into very canned roles contributes as well.
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That's why I dont' lead trials or mothership raids. I have no problem with having the star on SG nights (I usually do) or if the mood strikes me, forming PuG's for TF/SF's, radio/paper teams, or tip teams. All of those are pretty straight forward. Click mission, enter, fight, next. Even easier on TF's where it's just a linear run from beginning to end. Even when not leading, I try to be conversational.|
Originally Posted by UberGuy
I don't prefer to lead things. I'll do it, but I'd much rather someone else do it. And the reason is alluded to above - I don't wish to be responsible for the other players' happiness. I'm not afraid of that responsibility, but I find it draining, and I'm much more relaxed if I don't have that to worry about.
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Trials and raid things, on the other hand, are way to stressful and draining to me to make leading them any fun for me, and I don't need any higher blood pressure than I generally have.
I'm just thankful that there's a few really good trial leaders on my home server, and always extol their capabilities to those who ask. I truly salute a good trial leader, whether we succeed or fail, which in the end is a team effort.
"I play characters. I have to have a very strong visual appearance, backstory, name, etc. to get involved with a character, otherwise I simply won't play it very long. I'm not an RPer by any stretch of the imagination, but character concept is very important for me."- Back Alley Brawler
I couldn't agree more.
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That is why I allow a second or third Tanker on a team. |
Originally Posted by Oedipus_Tex
What's ironic about about allowing 8 person teams is that it actually narrows the search criteria down and probably ends up meaning you form as fast or faster than a team with a hard-cap of 4 (and the game balanced around that).
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For me I have been a leader since I was elected to run for class president in the sixth grade.
Every time this topic comes up about people and leadership I feel the same way. Some people are just not "leaders". While most people are in fact "capable" of leading, true "leaders" just step up and lead no prompting needed.
I will never "not" lead where leadership is needed as many have seen me on my 40 50's leading MAG farms to death since the release of I23, but I don't "have" to lead to have good fun.
Leaders are born but "leadership can be learned by anyone.
The development team and this community deserved better than this from NC Soft. Best wishes on your search.
I love both roles. Leading or taking orders, there's a time for both. If anyone plays on Virtue and likes lighthearted RP/mission teams (real super heroes don't stand around in a club all day ), and if you're ever having problems finding teams with awesome people, add me to your global and I'll hook you up with some action. 
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Honestly, it's the same here. If you're willing to start your own teams, you'll have a team in minutes. If not, you can wait hours.
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Originally Posted by Memphis_Bill
though eight years of surviving as an MMO should indicate that.
I was watching a dev update on an upcoming release for another MMO. They were talking about their team-building tool. The quote that got me going "er... wha?" "This should cut down the time it takes to form a team from around an hour to minutes!" In some ways their tool is like our LFG tool, but still - even on a slow night on one of the lower pop COH servers, I don't think it's taken more than 15 minutes to get a team together (for something that requires a nearly full team, like some of the TFs.) I cannot *imagine* struggling through for an hour.... and their teams are limited to *four* people. One of those "No wonder I keep coming back" items. |
The City of Heroes Community is a special one and I will always look fondly on my times arguing, discussing and playing with you all. Thanks and thanks to the developers for a special experience.
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I rarely form my own teams (though I have no issue with doing so if I wanted to) and have literally never waited for more than 20-30 mintes, let alone "hours", on any server that I have a presence on. (Every formerly-NA server.) Hyperbole isn't good to utilize as an argument.
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Originally Posted by EvilGeko
Honestly, it's the same here. If you're willing to start your own teams, you'll have a team in minutes. If not, you can wait hours.
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Originally Posted by Dispari
I don't know why Dink thinks she's not as sexy as Jay was. In 5 posts she's already upstaged his entire career.
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I used to lead all the time, but lately I've been reluctant, yet I can't explain why.
...having said that, I think I led the league that unlocked Hybrid 2nd on Freedom as soon as issue 23 launched this past week - those of you playing on Freedom the minute the servers came up might remember FlintEastwood running several Magisterium trials in a row.
My new Youtube Channel with CoH info
You might know me as FlintEastwood now on Freedom
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Great point.
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Originally Posted by Oedipus_Tex
What's ironic about about allowing 8 person teams is that it actually narrows the search criteria down and probably ends up meaning you form as fast or faster than a team with a hard-cap of 4 (and the game balanced around that). Part of the reason CoX teaming works so well is that it the cost of picking up a "wrong" member is generally low. In other games, if one member is bad at his or her role, the whole team is in serious trouble. The fact that other games force you into very canned roles contributes as well.
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I tend to lead when I am playing...unless I have had a rough day at work...then all I wanna do is be the one to take directions etc.
I just co-led a Mag trial about an hour ago...basically other person formed it and I gave out all the instructions. I tend to be a very blunt and to the point "leader;" Partially because I have a goal in mind and also because I find that simple & direct works better. If a trial fails (Which Mag didn't).. I do not blame myself whatsoever. The strategies to success are simple, but require multiple people to pay attention and follow simple directions...if people can't do that...not my fault.
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Originally Posted by Paladiamors
I love you, I Burnt the Toast!
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though eight years of surviving as an MMO should indicate that.
I was watching a dev update on an upcoming release for another MMO. They were talking about their team-building tool. The quote that got me going "er... wha?"
"This should cut down the time it takes to form a team from around an hour to minutes!"
In some ways their tool is like our LFG tool, but still - even on a slow night on one of the lower pop COH servers, I don't think it's taken more than 15 minutes to get a team together (for something that requires a nearly full team, like some of the TFs.) I cannot *imagine* struggling through for an hour.... and their teams are limited to *four* people.
One of those "No wonder I keep coming back" items.