grouping-incentives
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Wings Over Atreia: Solo vs. group
OK, now get your collective minds all out of the gutter! There we go. Of course, the title speaks to gaming styles and preferences in Aion. Lately, I've had the topic of grouping crop up in different discussions, from the trend of decreasing group sizes (Star Wars Galaxies had groups of 20, then Lineage II had groups of nine, followed by other games with a maximum group size of six) to questioning the need to group at all. To group, or not to group: Is that really the question? I touched on this topic a bit a few weeks ago, but an adventure this past week brought my attention back to it; I discovered that you no longer need a full group for one of the more frustrating quests in the game (once you factor in trying to get a group when the rift is up and not have it camped on the other side by the enemy!). Instead, you can complete the quest with just two or three Daevas, a feat unheard of previously due to the difficult dungeon in enemy territory. Granted, we completed our quest, which would have been impossible otherwise given the circumstances. But on a broader scale, what's with the trend of phasing out group content in MMOs and catering to the solo crowd? This phenomenon puzzles me. When a game is an MMO (read "massively multiplayer"), why discourage grouping by making almost all content accessible to the solo crowd -- especially in Aion (where learning good group dynamics can be crucial in large scale warfare)? In a time when social skills seem to be struggling to survive, why open yet another opportunity for people to avoid interaction? Type /Invite and join me past the cut to examine this phenomenon and weigh in with your preferred gaming style in our comments.
Wings Over Atreia: Altaholics anonymous
OK, now I've done it... my status as an oddity at Massively is exposed for all the world to see. I confess -- I do not like to play alts. Whew. There, I said it. That wasn't so hard. And being unique is not such a bad thing, right? In gaming, and in Aion especially, I definitely feel out of place for this philosophy. After all, Aion not only encourages but rewards you for playing alts; what other game gives you an impressive armor set and weapon only after you reach mid-level on numerous characters? And even for those who eschew playing alts, there are times when you are forced to do so (like I was). Pathetic available inventory space? Make a mule. Miss lower-level solo instances because they were introduced after you were too high of a level? Make a noob. But these are only a couple of examples involving mechanics. What makes people create so many alts that they need spreadsheets just to know who has what and is where? Head past the cut to delve into the pros and cons of managing multiple characters in Atreia.
Persistent issues and Final Fantasy XIV
There are certain recurring complaints heard about Final Fantasy XIV's beta, especially with players freely able to share their experiences. The fact that guildleves are on a 48-hour timer and the lack of easy and efficient mana regeneration are two of the more persistent ones, and a recent interview with Hiromichi Tanaka at Gamescom address just those complaints among others. But it's not all roses and sunshine -- if you're one of the testers hoping for the guildleve timer to be reduced, you're flat out of luck. Tanaka makes it clear that several of these issues are part of the intended design -- guildleves, for instance, are doable solo or in groups, but they aren't meant to just be burned through solo each time they're up. As a result, the team is looking into how to give better incentives to group up and share guildleves. MP regeneration is meant to be difficult, and spells are supposed to be a choice of using up limited resources. There are several interesting answers in the interview, but not every Final Fantasy XIV player will be happy with the content of those answers
