WoW and the MMORPG model, the Faction Conflict and roleplaying

Community General Discussion
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It’s spoken of from time to time what constitutes a good MMORPG experience and how a game can either move towards that experience or deviate from it. This is one of those discussions.

From my perspective I’d like to see a finer point on it. Specifically what the MMORPG is, what made it great and how deviation from it has hurt the genre overall.

Massively
Multiplayer
Online
Role
Playing
Game

I started with the MMORPG genre way back in 1999 with the release of EverQuest. I’ve also played World of Warcraft for over 14 years. Through all these years I’ve gained a surgical understanding of the genre and what separates it from other genres. What specifically makes it not an RPG or ARPG experience for example. The distinction can be summarized in that the MMORPG is a player-to-player driven experience. This really separates it from developer driven experiences.

So you might ask what’s the difference? Well, developer driven experiences are typically what you see in ARPGs or RPGs. Where the game has a set amount of goals and roles for you to fulfill. You’re the hero to save the universe and your goals are A -> B -> C -> D -> etc. The developer has made this role or set of roles for you to fill and the goals of each are on a predetermined path.

In a player driven experience it’s the opposite. The roles and goals are defined by the player. There are no developer roles such as hero, villain, etc. There’s no large backstory about saving the world. The developers very carefully create a world that is as role-neutral as possible. What does this look like in practice? Have you ever wanted to just be a crafter? A fisherman? A farmer? A carpenter for hire? How about a mercenary who hands out tasks / missions? I consider games like Skyrim and to a lesser extent Fallout to be player driven experiences.

In a player driven experience the goal should be to have as few scripted encounters as possible. Because you want the players to drive the experience. Such a design has no room for NPC questing / dailies / etc. A player driven experience should have no content which taints the significance of any potential player roles. Such as:

  1. Simplified dialogue choices that prevent you from choosing your own path.
  2. One or two set adventures for the player to go on.

This list could be huge but the post already is so I’ll keep it simple.

In a player-to-player driven experience the goal should be much like the player driven experience with the exception being more than one player. This P2P system wouldn’t have conflicting designs like:

  1. Town guards that are immortal which prevent a raiding role playing type.
  2. Simplified professions that prohibit that playstyle.

I feel the major deviation in the MMORPG industry and World of Warcraft in particular over the years has been to make the experience developer driven. That the player shouldn’t have agency in choosing how they want to play the game. As a consequence the popularity and replay value has suffered. Developer driven experiences work for a few hours of entertainment, not years.

This brings me to retail WoW and I think why people just don’t have the same excitement for it anymore. Retail is massively groomed down to a single player role on a single adventure. You are the hero to save the world and that’s that. While the game offers a ton of things to do all of these things are developer driven in concept. Take your “hero” into dungeons to beat a bad guy. Take your “hero” to warfronts to battle the enemy faction. Take your “hero” into raids to beat an even bigger bad guy. Etc, etc. There’s no player agency. Even the dungeon task bar is directing you to do X,Y,Z things in the dungeon to consider it finished.

What all these developer driven experiences amount to is about 2 weeks of real enjoyment. The rest of the time we’re supposed to replay all of this content into infinity to accomplish goals that will only matter for the life of this content. It’s utterly throwaway and most importantly not fun beyond the initial 2 week period.

Trying to cut this short it seems to me that developer driven approaches do not work in the MMORPG genre. You wind up spending an enormous amount of time and energy to create a grand adventure only to have people get tired of it after doing it once or twice. A better design exists and in my mind it would look like:

  1. Massively deflated story arcs. Basically regional stories without the hero apex.
  2. More roles available to the player. Think not just adventurer but farmer, carpenter, vendor, etc. Player quest system would be cool here.
  3. Massively expanded crafting systems. Something players can focus on for months, not weeks.
  4. More ways the player can impact the world.
  5. Actually negative and hostile rep choices.
  6. Faction-breaking trajectory for players to embark on.
  7. Maybe player-driven factions?

Now I do think you need SOME developer driven content. Like achievements and rewards. But not all of those should be developer driven. Think like someone who turns hostile to their own faction. The reward may not be in good boy gear but just knowing they did something different in the game. They changed the game in a way that means something to them.

I’ll stop here. Thoughts?

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WoW will never be a sandbox, it is and has always been a very on rails themepark MMO that always relied on developers to pump out content to keep it going. With that said, I think older versions of the game had more sandbox feel and elements that have been stripped away to make way for the Action RPG WoW is today.

Problem now, actual new content post expansion launch is getting leaner and leaner due to probably lack of creativity, resources and trying to stick to strict time tables for new expansions.

Now, the game is relying on recycled content and systems in order to trick people into just being happy enough to run the same content for 2+ years. This model started with Legion btw.

I don’t see any end to this either unless WoW has a change in leadership and brings or adds back developers that understand what an immersive MMORPG is. Until that happens, just expect more action RPG , lobby style systems with a seasonal approach. This is the only way the current dev team knows how to retain players.

It saddens me that instead of DnD nerds rising to the top to run things with in the WoW team it was the raiders, theory crafters that have the reins now and this is reflected in every aspect of the game now.

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We’re a lobby based arpg now.

Enjoy the sharding, lfg tool, and rushed runs.

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I’d argue this is false. The original game didn’t have a hero perspective on the player. It was more open ended and yes while classes were static in design the world and how you interacted with it was less so. It wasn’t ever perfect on that we agree but comparing it to retail and saying it was always like this is not reality.

Actually they are clearly spending a huge amount of time and energy on the developer-driven content. Just look at the questing system and imagine how much time and energy goes into that. The game didn’t have cutscenes every 5 minutes and didn’t have these huge over the top systems in the past.

So time and energy is being spent in a way that would be better served building a world and things in the world for players to do in a role-neutral way.

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It sounds like it would be fun, but that’s a different game than WoW.

Classic is still very developer driven.

Do quests.
Kill monsters.
Do dungeons.
Do raids.

All of the power gains obtained in instances.

There is a very neat and linear order to work on your character. Every few months a new raid comes with even more gear and progression.

We weren’t called the hero, so that’s different, but we still worked right beside our faction leaders.

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I think you make some good points.

I don’t mind an overarching heroic story BUT I feel like BC through MoP gave me a decent amount of choices on what to do when I logged in. But once WoD hit, my choices got narrower.

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This is a raiding MMORPG which makes it more like Everquest than Star Wars Galaxies. It also has a healthy PvP scene.

Maybe you should play Runescape?

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I didn’t say that my friend. Read what I said. The game had sandbox elements then, but to pretend this game wasn’t a themepark MMO is just silly.

Retail is another animal all together though. I agree with a lot of what you said, but it’s a pipe dream at the end of the day. The only thing that is going to work for players like me and you is a new MMO that embraces what made MMOs fun in the first place.

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I agree with you for once.

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Miracles do happen!

:partying_face:

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I read it. I wouldn’t put so much on it being on rails in the past. Keep in mind a very small number of people did Naxx when it was live.

The Classic experience was far broader and had a lot less of this cinema-driven developer-driven content that retail has. On that we agree.

And I do also agree per the model of player-to-player driven content it left a lot to be desired. There is good in the developer driven content but the real magic is P2P.

Well the thing about this is the developer driven content actually requires more funding. For example I buy my dog a toy and he goes to town on the box the toy came in. Sometimes less is way more. Is that a risky proposition? I don’t think so. We have a huge amount of money spent on one hand and very little spent on the other. If the outcome is the same (less players subscribing) then the developer is better with the latter not the former.

In my mind if you cut all cinemas, cut the story down dramatically and focused on world building instead we would have gotten the missed zones in WoD. We could have had zero garrison and 2 more zones and just a bunch of added stuff in the world and WoD would have been amazing.

Sometimes just mapping out the new content to the old design is all anyone needs to consider to realize the old way was superior.

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I don’t think the current player base that plays WoW would take to a more sandbox game. They are used to being led by the nose by the developers.

I mean look how they have embraced these shallow systems like M+ and World Quests. WoW players are really bad at making their own content, that is why they are attracted to a game like WoW.

The current dev team would never bother upsetting the last bit of player base they have playing the game nowadays. Face it, most traditional MMO that played early on aren’t here anymore and maybe some of them are playing Classic.

Any core changes now would probably result in alienating their ARPG fans at this point.

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I play ARPGs though. I think most people who play WoW do both ARPGs and MMORPGs.

The difference is we play ARPGs for 2-3 weeks tops. When a new league comes out for example. The vast majority of our time is in MMORPGs or should be anyway.

Would certain ARPG gamers be upset if the game became much more sandboxed? No doubt. But how many people are we talking about? Millions or a hundred thousand? I’d say if you can bring back 3 million by sacrificing a few hundred thousand you have no choice. IF your motive is to get as many people playing as possible.

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When did this ever happen?

Not in EverQuest. Not in original WoW. The MMORPG experience has never been as sand box as you are saying it should be. It hasn’t deviated from developer driven quests, etc. They are nearly all “your are the champion, saving the world”.

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I never said it was. I said it was an imperfect system at a time where the meaning of the genre wasn’t defined because it was brand new.

Looking back 20 years now it’s perfectly clear how it changed and why the new direction is negative.

Raiding for instance wasn’t as prevalent then as it is now. It wasn’t even on the radar for a lot of players. Today in retail you’re supposed to do all this stuff because it all links right back to your character power arc.

As I’ve told you numerous times retail is a product that is suited for a percentage of the old MMORPG playerbase. That person who likes to do all of this stuff, have their hands held, etc. The rest of us are turned off by it.

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Raiding was the cornerstone of EverQuest since it launched. The reason why it was not “on the radar” of people is because due to it not being instanced…very few people got to participate. Raiding was incredibly exclusive and hard to participate in despite it being right in everyone’s faces.

If you weren’t an extremely high play time person, you got the raiding scraps.

My point is…how could it deviate from something it was from day 1?

Weird you say retail is for the person that wants their hands held…when your suggestions are typically about holding a person’s hand.

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Classic has shown raiding is massive there now that the playerbase has more knowledge.

Warcraftlogs has more uploads from classic than retail.

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No it wasn’t the cornerstone. You have an opinion about what EQ was. That’s it.

Most players engaged in RPG in the world, exploration and socializing. That’s a fact. Those are the apex activities in an MMORPG. The raid is just a side piece of content for players to do that want more PvE activities.

You’re already starting on a bad premise. Correct that first.

You do realize what a sandbox is right? It’s the antithesis of logging in and having a quest pop up to show you where in the world to go.

I think it’s more the players who have an interest in Classic raiding stuck around. Everyone else probably left for retail or other games once the world thinned out.

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You dismiss my opinion.

Then you give your opinion and state its fact.

:roll_eyes:

My premise is your statement. I am trying to correct it.

Ok. EverQuest was not a Sandbox. MMORPGs did not deviate from a sandbox set up. Because MMORPGs were never primarily sandbox games.

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Did the majority of players in EQ raid or not?

If not, then how are you correct? The cornerstone is the most important part of the experience. That you thought raids were the cornerstone and not the social aspects of the game is hilarious proof you don’t understand what makes an MMORPG an MMORPG.

Stick to your raids.

Wrong.