The Daily Grind: How much grouping should be required in a game?

Every game has more than enough solo content in my opinion. The trick is not to force people into group content, but make it a viable and worthwile alternative.
I like to think back to Anarchy Online, where you could level faster in a group. With a good group composition you had tons of buffs availlable to increase the strength of your characters. And the group leveld up when it stayed together long enough. You got more XP from kills and better loot, the longer you played together as a group. That was a lot of fun.
What I like to see is more progression for group players, to encourage group play, like mentoring or any type of currency in game that can be acquired by group play.
A lot of developers tackle aging group content in games by trivializing it and making it solo-able. Why not introduce incentives like mentoring and additional character progression for veteran players to revisit this content and help newer players so that anybody can experience it at is was intended? I think I might be sketching my personal MMO utopia here and it does contradict the modern way of cash shop driven MMO design, but hell, this should be what a _multiplayer_ game is about, shouldn't it?

The majority of posters here will say "It's a MMORPG, you need to group!"
The majority of players (that don't care to post on MMORPG sites) will merrily continue to solo.

Oh dear, here we go again. If unable to think of anything new to write then churn out the old group versus solo chestnut! Oh well, I'll bite.

All MMOs should offer a complete range of options including solo, small group, full group and raid. Not all content needs to be accessible to all playstyles, but the game needs to be sufficiently viable in an enjoyable way to cater for all playstyles throughout the game.

Once a player is forced to adopt a playstyle (even if it is one he enjoys) - for some it's solo, for others it's group, and at endgame it may be a choice of raid or PvP - then he or she will very likely be gone from the game. Players may prefer to do one thing or the other but they don't want to be told that's what they have to do, and of course some players don't enjoy a particular playstyle and therefore it is not an effective option for them anyway.

Maximum choice, maximum playerbase, maximum revenue - that should be every developer's mantra unless they are purely interested in running an indie niche game that really does aim only for one small part of the market.

Non-forced, incentive driven grouping.

Jean-Paul Sartre had it right: hell is other people.

I'm on the side that says core content should always be possible to solo. Group content is fine as an option but forced grouping is anathema.

Nowadays MMOs have been converted into a solo walk from beginning to max level but where it hurts is that most players have been playing solo for so long that they don't know how to play/interact their classes with others in group play.

I"m not against solo play but game developers should encourage players to group by getting more xp and reaching goals faster than playing solo.GW2 is doing it right same with TERA with their BAMs.

While questing I shouldn't have to depend on anyone. In fact I had depending on people while questing. It usually results in a waste of my time and a very awkward chat box.

So..don't make me do group quests to finish this part of the story.

I ditched SWTOR because I couldn't complete a key class quest on my own. I tried and died so many times it was beyond a joke. I like grouping up when I'm in the mood and, more importantly, have the time to do it without having to bail halfway through and let down everyone else. But I want to be able to do this when *I* choose, and certainly not to progress a storyline quest.