Grouping

Sometimes he's the head of the guild, sometimes just a member. He's friendly enough, minds the rules of the guild, and might even go above and beyond from time to time. He's never been anything but friendly to you. Whether you're waiting for a raid, or a special battlefield, or a city assault, he's there offering to come along if possible and cheering you on otherwise.

And as a result, it's a good thing he doesn't know how much you hate his guts.

We all know the guy (or girl) this is about. Whether by dint of horrendous stupidity regarding the game, or just a general attitude issue, you find yourself interacting with a guild member you can't stand. Sometimes even working extensively with them, depending on the game. When has this happened to you? What annoyed you about your fellow member so much? Perhaps most importantly, what did you ultimately do about it? From Star Trek Online to EverQuest, your guild is one of the most important parts of the game -- how do you tolerate an intolerable member?

Star Wars as a franchise is not exactly unfamiliar with the idea of opposing sides, so it's kind of understandable that Star Wars: The Old Republic would eventually talk about the opposing forces in MMO design. No, not Mages versus Warlocks -- freeform or sandbox gameplay versus structured or themepark gameplay. And as BioWare seems to like doing whenever they talk about their game, the answer to these extremes comes down to "neither." Systems Designer Damien Schubert takes the opportunity in the most recent developer blog to talk about trying to place the game in tune with what he considers the most unique defining feature of MMOs -- the community.

Schubert affirms that the game's design goals are to reinforce group play and external interaction not by forcing players to group, but making them want to group. Options such as more community-oriented crafting are explored, as well as letting multiple people take part in the game's dialogue trees. After all, nothing builds interaction like a party member accidentally driving a quest contact into a rage through a poorly-timed interjection. The full entry contains more information on both design goals and their implementation in Star Wars: The Old Republic -- and even a year out, it seems the game itself is already doing quite a bit of community development.

In EVE Online, pilots are encouraged to join player-run corps in order to find a place in the game they can belong and meet like-minded people with similar goals. As the CEO of a small EVE corporation, I've often found the hardest part of running a corp is keeping the members motivated. In a previous article, I gave advice on running a corporation, from details on keeping your assets secure against theft to the different types of operations a corp can go on. Following that, I explored the importance of corporate goals and a few of the things corps routinely work together to achieve. Maintaining motivation is integral to both running corp operations and achieving goals. Demotivated pilots will rarely join in on corp activities and are more likely to leave the corp in search of a better one. This is a particularly big problem in PvP-based organisations like faction warfare corps, pirate squads or territorial alliances.

In this short article, I look at four of my favourite ways a corp can motivate their pilots.

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One of the common statements made among the newer MMO generation is the idea that a game "abolishes the holy trinity." It's the idea that their game has evolved to the point where labels like "tank," healer," and "damage dealer" aren't as relevant when talking about a character. This idea isn't particularly new -- the first big RPG with mass online support to break this trend was probably Diablo 2, which actually predates most of the mass-market MMORPGs available today.

Champions Online definitely takes a step in this direction. In fact, it was a suggestion on the forums and the overwhelming player response against the holy trinity that gave me the idea to write this in the first place. Champions is very solo-friendly, and a character can build to be pretty self-sufficient -- one can build for tanking, damage dealing, and self-healing all in the same package. This lends some pretty big weights to the idea that the holy trinity is a thing of the past.

But Champions Online has a few things in its design that maintain the "Holy Trinity" design concept. Hit the jump, and I'll talk about why, contrary to popular belief, I think that keeping the holy trinity around is a good thing.

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In the first of this two-part guide, I looked at some of the more affordable entry level ships and modules available to dedicated healers in EVE Online. I went on to examine an effective strategy for using medic ships as part of a PvE gang, whether you need some help on a particularly hard mission or you're trying to crack one of EVE's hardest exploration complexes. This week, I look at high-end healing as I explore capital ships and the role of medic ships in both PvP and wormhole operations.

Healing in missions and exploration sites is a largely passive affair, with the healer permanently locked to the main tank. NPCs in these sites never switch targets but the same can't be said for players or the advanced Sleeper AI that roam wormhole systems. Repairing your gang-mates in PvP or a wormhole operation is a completely different affair, made all the more complicated by the fact that the dedicated medic ship is sure to come under fire.

In this article, I look at capital ships and the remote assistance strategies players use in PvP or wormhole operations.

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The first time, okay, it happens. The second time is a bit worse, but again, these things happen to the best of us. Then comes the third death, and the fourth, and you start to wonder if you're actually playing the game or participating in some sort of bizarre computer-controlled death match where the server just wants you to go down in flames time and again. And almost everyone, in the right circumstances, will decide that it's one death too many and leave for greener pastures. In the case of games with a harsh enough death penalty such as EVE Online, even the threat of death can deter people.

We all have guidelines we use for determining when something is a lost cause, be it a group activity with friends or just a quest that doesn't want to play nice. What are yours? Do you have a set number of deaths, or something more game-specific such as losing a certain fraction of experience in Final Fantasy XI? If you're in a group, do you talk about it when you join, do you just quit when the limit is reached, or do you warn people and make excuses?

In this edition of the Mog Log, every question you have ever had will be answered completely accurately. (Disclaimer: these questions must pertain to either Final Fantasy XI or Final Fantasy XIV. And they must have been asked via e-mail or comments. And it must be noted that "I don't know" is an accurate answer to a question. Also, this aside is now longer then the introductory sentence.) Aren't you excited as possible? I know I am.

We'll start off with a question from Dormer:
"Why aren't we getting more information from the beta?"

We're not sure, but we can certainly speculate. The most logical reason is that the testing is closer to an alpha than anything and they're not letting people in that they can't trust implicitly. Square-Enix has a pretty good track record at keeping things quiet when they want to, and they're likely making sure that nothing leaks out from this phase. How much of an NDA further phases of Final Fantasy XIV's testing will have is a mystery. But there's another reason for the possible dearth of information. (Which we've intentionally put behind the cut to inspire you to keep reading.)

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Ah ha! Finally! Freedom from the human reporter, Seraphina! She is going to PAX East, leaving me to my own devices! Now, finally, I can enact the plan I've been waiting so long to do!

...answer one of your e-mails. Muhahahahahahaha!

Ok, ok darlings. I know that perhaps this is not quite the same as world domination or the destruction of Qeynos, but it's special for me, yes? Usually I have to be somewhat pleasant in these weekly scribblings. But, with my oversight gone, I can let you experience the wrath of a true Tier'dal!

...with helpful advice along the way, of course.

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The holy trinity of tank, healer and damage-dealer is present in every MMO, including EVE Online. While most MMOs dedicate these roles to specific classes, ships in EVE can do all three at the same time. When running missions solo, for example, a ship will need to tank incoming damage, repair it and deal damage themselves. Setting up a ship for solo PvE becomes a balancing act between the three roles. Too little tank and you'll find yourself in trouble, but too little damage and you'll take forever to kill NPCs.

As part of a gang, however, remote armour repair and shield transfer modules allow pilots to specialise into a traditional healer role. Rather than having each player repair their own damage, it can be much more effective to have a dedicated medic ship to repair anyone that gets shot at. There are even specialised ships for would-be healers in EVE, from entry-level cruisers to advanced Tech 2 Logistics ships and massive capital ships. Medic ships can be an effective part of any gang, whether you're tackling a tough level 4 or 5 mission or engaging in large-scale gang PvP.

In this first part of a two-part look into dedicated healers in EVE Online, I look at the more affordable ships and modules available and the best strategy for healing in PvE.

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While the structure of the jokingly-named "holy trinity" in MMOs -- tanks, healers, and damage dealers -- isn't universal, it's certainly common enough to be recognizable. Even in games without pre-defined classes, such as Champions Online, have a group structure oriented toward the three roles.

But you can't have classes without a struggle between them, and there's always a discussion in relation to the trinity about which part is the most important. Tanks point to their relative scarcity and the pressure of their job, Healers point to their relative scarcity and the importance of their job, and DPS points to the fact that healers and tanks can't keep their stunts up forever if nobody is killing the target.

So where do you fall in this debate? Which part of the trinity do you think is the most important to a group's success, and which one is the most superfluous? Do you think that (by astonishing coincidence) the role you play most frequently is the most important one, or do you think it's lower on the scale and you play it for other reasons?

So, guess what beta I didn't get an invitation for. You can go consult with the instant replay if you want, I can wait.

I know that everyone is stunned. I certainly was. Of course, I assuaged my sadness by telling myself that I didn't really want to be in their stupid beta anyway, because I bet it smells bad and it sets my computer on fire. That line of reasoning worked real well. I don't honestly think my column got me kicked from the running for a Final Fantasy XIV beta slot, but it's a bit more reassuring than the idea that I just didn't get picked for some other reason. (I'm putting money on Square-Enix not knowing I exist, for the record.)

All things considered, I can live without the beta, even though I'm chomping at the bit to play the game. But I'm not the only person, place, or thing not currently darting about the world of Eorzea. And as long as I'm on a streak of making long-winded predictions, why break with formula? There are three other things that I suspect aren't in the beta either, and I intend to make a guessing game out of seeing how close I am to the truth.

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Mabinogi, aside from having a bit of an alphabet soup name, is not a game known for holding things back until the next content update. If they can think of something neat to add in, they'll happily do so more often than not. So it's not exactly a surprise that with their upcoming Alchemist update, focused around (wait for it) the Alchemist, the game will be adding brand-new "Shadow Missions" as well.

Meant as a cross between regular party quests and dungeons, Shadow Missions are part of a new struggle against the nebulous Shadow Realm and the inhabitants of Erinn, Mabinogi's setting. The approach might feel a bit like the Skirmish system from Lord of the Rings Online, as you pick your mission from a message board in Taillteann depending on which of several types you feel like undertaking.

Once you've chosen a mission, traveling north from town lets you cross over into the Shadow Realm and take part in the battle, either protecting important figures or leading the siege against the dark inhabitants of the area. The official site has a small preview with a list of mission types for what looks to be an interesting addition to Mabinogi's gameplay.

Yes, that looks like a typo in the subject line and it ought to be "a little goes a long way." It isn't. Little itself goes a long way in making a community, as discussed in this recent post by Eric Heimburg. Speaking from his experiences both on Asheron's Call 2 as a producer and Aion as a player, his core contention is that smaller communities decrease anonymity and make politeness far more common for interactions among strangers.

One of the core reasons behind this is the question of reliance. The community of group-based games tends to be stonger than that of games where you can be almost wholly independent, since you rely upon others to work with you. By way of contrast, examine some of the behavior found in World of Warcraft's random dungeon tool, where you find yourself working with people whom you're statistically unlikely to ever see again.

One of the laments about solo-friendly games is the death of community, and while that's not altogether true, Heimburg's post certainly makes a number of compelling points. Well worth examining if you're interested in building a community or just in the ways groups develop.

It happens no matter what you do: you get into a bad group of players, or you and your guild leader (or shell leader, or supergroup leader, or whatever) have a falling-out, or you just tagged something that another person needs. Whatever the reasons, feelings can flare when playing an MMO, and we tend to invest a lot of ourselves in our virtual avatars.

Some people, when confronted with rising tempers, try to get everyone to calm down and even things out. It's not that big of a deal, after all -- it's just a video game, and it's better to make friends than enemies. On the other hand, some people would rather take the chance to hold the moral high ground and lash out where it's appropriate. After all, if you don't tell people what they do wrong, they'll never learn -- and it's just a video game, how could they be so upset when you give them what they have coming?

So which do you generally try to be? When everyone gets touchy, do you try and be the person calming people down, or the one stirring them up? Do you try to convince people to stick with a bad group, or do you let the dead weight know what they're doing wrong and then get the heck out of Dodge?