In the WoW: Wrath of the Lich King expansion players were treated to a lot of two group content. This was due in part to how popular Karazhan proved to be. Similarly, I’ve found that the developers of EverQuest II have created a two group instance, the Ward of Elements. It is also quite popular with the players, myself included. At Dragon*Con the question was posed to Brenlo as to if more such content would make a future appearance and he said yes, he expected so. That leads me to ask the question, “What is the big deal with two group content?” Why is it all the rage? What are the benefits to having it around?
When it comes to MMOs and games in general these days I think it is fair to say that casual is king. Everyone likes the idea of being able to have some fun in a short period of time. This attitude was previously unheard of in the MMO market given the progressive nature of games but that is certainly changing. It is far easier to find two groups to jump into a raid zone than it is four. It is also far easier to set up and deal with less players. The overhead is far lower and this allows far more opportunities for small guilds and PUG raids. For developers that means more people get to see content and they have a better return on investment. There is a lot of positive aspects here.
On the other side of things you are now pushed into a balance situation. Obviously, four group raids should offer superior rewards to the two group ones due to the difficulty of orchestrating them. That can lead to a sticky situation, though. Are two group raids part of a progression or just a different path? In my eyes the latter is superior. Forcing guilds that have designs on full size raids to first progress through half sized is unwise. It leads to fracturing a guild and forcing two groups to work towards the same goal. There is always a first and second string and it just leads to some ill will in a lot of cases. Though it takes more resources I think the path to raiding greatness should start at full size and end there too.
I view two group encounters as hyped up group content. This should be a totally separate path for guilds like mine that are microcore and have no intention of ever returning to the true full size raid scene. It also allows content for casual players beyond a single group without forcing them into a more stressful and frustrating situation. At the same time, this can help slow the rising urge to reduce the difficulty of full raid content. It might work out for the best but I’m certain you’ll still have that “wasted content” argument pop up.
I’m interested to see where developers go with half sized raids in the future. As a former hardcore MMO player turned casual I love the smaller sized raids because we can get them done without waiting on a lot of people. We can get started quickly, progress through and call it a night. It is something that I and a lot of other players appreciate and we’re always hoping for more content. I just hope the trend doesn’t turn into the norm. I wasn’t thrilled when full size raiding went from eight groups or so to four. Lets hope four doesn’t become two.
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I agree, casual is king for the vast majority of MMO players. It’s up to the niche (although I hate using that word) titles to attract the more “hardcore” of players.
The trick is now to still having a challenging yet fun experience for those players (like myself) who can only play for an hour or so at a time, while still having the large scale time sucking experiences that others want. I think things like the smaller raid groups in WoW, and the skirmishes in LotRO have done alot for these types of players.
Well the games use each other metrics and innovations to guide their developments and have done since beta so it’s no surprise to see one game following the other.
In WoW 10 mans are simply much higher calibre than 25s. A 10 man was me, 5-6 excellent players who are mates and 3-4 filler players. A 25 man was me, 5-6 excellent players who are mates and 18-19 filler players. I think most WoW raiders have the same experience unless you play hardcore with a guild that’s full of excellent players (which I did do from time to time).
So no surprise really that people in the middle bracket of raiding achievement are keen on small raids. Big raids only benefit you if you’re playing at such a high level that everyone you raid with is excellent or if you’re so utterly bad that you need to sneak into someone’s raid as filler and hope to get lucky with loot rolls before they realise just how bad you are and blacklist you for ever.
I agree, casual is king these days. As much as I get on my soap box about the “good ol’ days” though, I think that providing the 12-man options is only a good thing. It’s all about accessibility, in my opinion. It’s great if you can get together with 25-40 other people together to do something, and a lot more epic feeling too, but it’s much more difficult for the majority of players to arrange that, I think.
An issue that goes along with the scaled down nature of raiding though, is the paradox of difficulty and the balance you mentioned.
When compared with their console counterparts, I don’t think raiding in MMOs is challenging in the actual encounter, so much as managing the people to tackle each encounter. In WoW especially, fights typically come down to “here’s your role and the 3-4 things you need to watch out for,” with healers being the exception. The more people having to be responsible for themselves and others, the better chance there is of failure. So, in this way, 25 mans are definitely more difficult.
However, the input of each player in a 10 man is much more important than in a 25-man. If one person messes up in a 25, you have more people to take up the slack. In that way, 10 mans become more difficult.
So which is the more accessible/difficult path? I would think 10-mans, still. Simply because getting 10 people in one place at one time is easier than 25. Yet, when it comes to guilds where people know and trust the competency of one another, I can’t help but feel that 25-man is better. Maybe the answer lies in creating better tools (like WoW’s new LFG tool) for people to get together, determine competency, and arrange these things.
Raiding is so much about management and individual responsibility, it masks the fact that bosses, which some are more complex than others, aren’t really what decides how hard an encounter is.
I’m probably talking myself into a corner and stating what the rest of the world already knows. I have a habit of doing that. When it comes to raiding though, my noobness tells me it’s never hard so much as it can be frustrating.
There definitely is greater reward for 25mans than for 10mans. In WoW, at least on my server, 10mans aren’t really a part of progression. You can track it, but for recruitment purposes most, if not all, applicants will look at your 25man success.
As someone who has led pick-up raids, 25man pugs can be soul-crushing and heartbreaking. It is much easier to get a majority of guildmates for a 10man and fill in one or two pug spots and be successful. In 25man, I’d be lucky to get 10 guildmates which means I have to fill 15 spots from random people from the server that I don’t know. Like Chris said, trying to manage 15 or so people that are not from your guild can be very hard to do.
I think 10mans definitely have a place in end game for people that really just want to play casually and/or don’t want to get into a raiding guild.