DGN: Emergent Behaviors spawned from - Re: [MUD-Dev]SOC:Willcompany sanctioned cheating hurt theMMOcommunity?

[Michael Hartman]

Damien Neil wrote:

> It takes quite a bit of time and effort to organize enough people
> for a large-scale multi-group raid.  Having the raid last a long
> time helps ensure that you don't spend more time getting the group
> together than actually raiding.

Then make more 1 or 2 group raid type encounters. Honestly, the
hellaciousness of raids comes largely from the fact that you have to
deal with so many people. Many of them won't really be your friends
(even if they are guildmates). Every single linkdead, bathroom
break, drink break, etc. impacts everyone. Since there are so many
people, there is really no time to be social at all. There are too
many people involved- it has to be business from the get go.

Also, because they take so long, you cannot waste time on ANYTHING
that is purely fun or frivilous. You can't go look at something that
is interesting. You can't stop for a moment to chat about something
or make a joke. There's no time.  A lot of people are already
pushing the envelope on how long they can play in one stretch just
to go on the raid at all.

> This leads to a vicious cycle where developers make raid rewards
> uber enough to attract players, which forces them to make the
> raids difficult enough to keep the power economy in balance.

I don't think this is part of the cycle, because the raids are the
thing that aren't fun in the first place.

The truth of the matter is, they make the raid rewards uber because
they know how it is almost impossible for most people to go on them.

They make raids to cater to their most hardcore players who are:

  1) Less than 1% of their customers.

  2) About 90% of their forum/feedback population.

So 99% of their customers suffer just because the most hardcore 1%
are the most vocal.

That's bad business.

--
Michael Hartman, J.D. (http://www.thresholdrpg.com)
President & CEO, Threshold Virtual Environments, Inc.
University of Georgia School of Law, 1995-1998
Georgetown University School of Foreign Service, 1990-1994
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