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PVE rewards should be tuned to encourage players to do things with a significant chance of failure
Quizzical
Member LegendaryPosts: 25,355
If you've done much PVE combat in an MMORPG lately, what percentage of your battles do you win? 98%? 99%? More? High 90s is typical of most players in most games.
And that's a problem. If you're winning 99% of your battles, you're probably not having to focus on exactly what you're doing every single time to barely eke out a victory. You're probably winning most of your battles by a huge margin, such that if mobs had double the health or hit twice as hard, you'd usually still win. You're probably going through the motions of fighting most mobs the same way, even if it's not optimal for a lot of them, simply because the difference in effectiveness doesn't matter. You're probably not even paying that much attention to what you're doing most of the time.
And why do you do this? It certainly isn't because there aren't challenges available; go try to fight mobs 10 levels higher and you probably won't still win 99% of the time. Depending on the game, you might not still win 10% of the time. If you're winning 99% or so of your battles, it's because you're picking easy battles that you can win 99% of the time, rather than harder battles where you'd lose a lot more.
So again, why do you do this? Do you Is it because you like things to be so easy that you don't really have to pay attention? Maybe you do like that, but even if you'd like something more challenging, you probably pick easy battles anyway.
Whether or not you've explicitly thought about it, the reason you pick easy battles is probably because that's what games encourage you to do. They give you bigger rewards for picking easy battles than harder ones, so you level faster that way. If you seek harder battles where you die half of the time, not only do you level much slower, but depending on the game, you might barely make any progress at all.
Why do games scale their rewards this way? I doubt that most game designers do it intentionally. I'm not sure what response you'd get if you asked a game designer why he built his game to discourage players from trying anything remotely challenging, but I doubt that very many would have a ready answer that indicates that he's thought about it before while agreeing with the premise of your question. Some might even dispute the premise of the question, even though simply from counting the number of times that players kill all of the mobs in a battle versus the other way around, it's pretty much indisputable that PVE in nearly all MMORPGs encourages players to pick easy battles where victory is nearly automatic. In fact, the only game I can think of off hand that doesn't is Puzzle Pirates, though there might be some others that I haven't played.
So perhaps the better question is, how do games scale their rewards to so strongly push players to do content where they'll nearly always win? Let's explain the situation by example. Suppose that you can fight against mobs that are level 30, level 35, or level 40. If you fight the level 30 mobs, you get x reward if you win, and win 99% of the time. If you fight the level 35 mobs, you get 2x reward if you win, and you win 80% of the time. If you fight the level 40 mobs, you get 4x reward if you win, and you win 20% of the time. Which do you fight?
Here, I've skewed the rewards a good bit. While games commonly give greater rewards for fighting higher level mobs, they don't often double the rewards for fighting mobs five levels higher unless you're comparing it to mobs far below your level. So this setup actually encourages you to take on greater challenges than most games would.
A naive answer is, if you fight level 30 mobs, you get .99x reward per battle on average. For comparison, you get 1.6x on average for level 35 mobs, or 0.8x on average for level 40 mobs. So you fight level 35 mobs, right?
Well, no. We're missing some important factors. For starters, if you're fighting harder mobs, the battles tend to take longer. And it's not necessarily just longer in battle, either. If you're in good shape when a trivial battle ends, you can move on to the next very quickly. If you're nearly dead, you probably have to sit out of combat for a bit to recharge health and perhaps mana. If that battle against level 35 mobs takes twice as long as a battle against level 30 mobs, as measured from the time you start one battle to the time you start the next in order to include the time spent recharging between battles, then the level 30 mobs get you rewards 24% faster than level 35 mobs. Most likely, fighting those level 40 mobs takes much longer yet.
And this is before we consider death penalty. You might scoff that recent games tend to give much lighter death penalties than early MMORPGs did. And if you're winning 99% of your battles, then the death penalty in recent games is pretty trivial. But it's not if you're only winning 50% of your battles. Even if you don't lose experience, items, or gold upon death, you still lose the time that it takes to get back to where you were. If that's enough time to fight a few battles, then that death costs you a few battles worth of loot as compared to what you'd have gotten if you won all of your battles. Fighting those level 40 mobs and spending most of your time running back might mean that you only level 10% as fast as if you fought the trivial level 30 mobs--and remember, this is even if we're assuming that the only penalty for dying is that you instantly respawn somewhere else.
So the end result is that by picking trivial battles where you win 99% of the time, you level a lot faster than if you picked harder battles where you only won 80% of the time. That's why most players in PVE spend most of their time on battles that are trivial--and boring. I say that ought to be changed. Players should level the fastest in PVE by choosing battles where they may win 80% or 90% of the time, but certainly not 99%. A player who is winning 99% of his battles should be able to pick stronger mobs to fight and level faster against stronger targets.
But even if you agree with that statement in its entirety, it still doesn't answer the question of how to make it so. One obvious answer is to give greater loot for fighting stronger mobs. But this can readily create problems of its own, especially if your loot is based purely on the level of a player and the level of the mobs he fights. Players already pick out the relatively easier mobs of a given level to farm; this could greatly strengthen the incentives to do so.
Fortunately, that problem is easy enough to avoid: make loot depend not just on levels, but on how much the mobs in question get killed. I don't mean diminishing returns for a single player; rather, rescale loot based on how much particular mobs get killed globally, totaled across all instances and servers for an entire game, as compared to other mobs of the same level. If players figure out which mobs are the relatively easier ones of a given level and farm them extensively, the system would automatically scale loot for those mobs down and for the harder mobs of the same level up. It gets more statistically complicated, but you'd also need to compare with nearby levels, just so that, say, level 35 mobs didn't end up giving better loot than level 36 mobs.
Still, attempts at addressing this sort of problem are hardly new to MMORPGs. Games with instanced PVP have had to grapple with how to encourage players to continue to compete even when defeat looks likely. After all, in PVP, you don't win 99% of the time; there, if one side wins, then the other loses.
Comments
Exploits.
If hard mobs give a lot of XP, people would team up and camp them for 20 hours and reach LvL-cap. Then they would cry that leveling up in the most efficient manner was a grind and that there was no content in the game.
I would like to see all the different difficulty mobbs, from pink bunnies to elder dragons, together in the same maps.
As a player I would then have to avoid mobs who were clearly stronger than me, and I could chose to fight whatever monsters I felt up to fighting.
whilst i can see your trying to sort a problem, What i am not getting is why your trying to sort the problem??
Loot and/or Gold is often the last/near last reason people kill mobs, most time its because mission dictates it, So messing about with various formulae's to dictate strength of mob is pointless.
Just have more dynamic mobs, Get rid of the same old "collect 10 pelts" / "kill 10 Raptors" and make the missions more engaging.
Heck things like 'hold the hill' - Where rewards are based on the + levels above your own level which you dictate, so soemthing like base of 100% for equal level and then 10% extra reward per extra level, but then also -10% reward for each lesser level- So instead of mobs being stood in EXACTLY the same spot 24/7/365 they only spawn on the mission/quest holder arriving at spot.
Most loot that worth keeping is only given from mission with RARE drops which should be as it is.
Heck even easier is to remove levels all together and have (like EvE) specific sized mobs (small/medium/large) that require you to be certain level / ability to take on.
This post is all my opinion, but I welcome debate on anything i have put, however, personal slander / name calling belongs in game
where of course you're welcome to call me names im often found lounging about in EvE online.
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I get what you are saying here. This is an area where EQ1 had the best system.
Green cons gave next to nothing exps, blue = challenge, yellow = 50% chance of death, red = corpse run.
Then factor in Mana, adds, and Fizzles. Even if you were winning and a couple of fizzles used all your mana, you had to run.
I'm no game developer but sometimes you get something so right (like eq1 did) that you just need to keep it.
Just as a side note, I'm very tired at the moment due to late nights working on a new thesis. So I might just completely ramble with this or even miss the point completely. I apologize if this is the case.
On topic, but with regards to crafting. There was a game that was absolutely brutal in terms of crafting, and it didn't have a cash shop or anything to make their be a higher chance of success or of saving an item.
Back in FFXIV 1.0 (not the case with A Realm Reborn) you had a chance of breaking an item and it's material when crafting. The first craft was easy, but with each craft up to four or five it got harder. Heck, I think it was like a 1% chance of success when you got to those levels. When you failed, the item was broke (and all progress made) and all the material was gone.
People spent hundreds of millions just for a 1% chance at success. With higher tier materia costing millions as well (in addition to some items being expansive). Though there were titles, items and of course the most powerful items in the game from having these kinds of melds.
Not to mention them being worth hundreds of millions if they were some how a success (and with you being the envy of the entire servers). Such huge gil sinks, such huge risks and very little chance at reward. Oh, and that was just one item. Next let's try the gloves, or the chest, or the helmet, or the boots... It's kind've insane, but there were some that have four melded sets of everything, and maybe even a couple five melds.
Though one thing about that, is that they were the most coveted items and people just oozed with jealousy whenever they inspected said owners of these items.
While not pertaining to mobs and success chance of battles, it does show a risk / reward system in place that is quite possibly the most extreme case of any video game. To put things in perspective, most people barely had 250,000 gil on hand at a time unless they were crafters. Level 49 items that were exceptional items were like 30,000-50,000 gil at the market ward.
I think most games just don't follow this path anymore. A Realm Reborn kind've spikes in difficulty at around level 15, with it wiping 95% of the people on their first couple tries. Then teams are needed from thereon with story quests. But as a whole, feel games are willing to do even this. But I think you've thought this through quite a bit. Would be interesting to see it in practice and what modifications would have to be set in place. If it would even be accepted into the mold, as many tend to judge things the first five minutes of attempting it while then proceeding to think they know all about it because they've played a MMO before.
Therefore, before we can really fix anything about this genre, I'd surmise that we'd need to open many eyes. We assume too much, we think we know everything. We would even assert things as facts and say to a person who has a max level in a particular game that we know better than them about the game they have more experience than us in. Simply because we've been playing MMOs for 10+ years and we can "tell" how everything is with minimal exposure or just reading about it. Any max level that says differently is a fanboy, because hey, they spent the time to get to max level. That we've played a dozen MMOs before, and therefore we've played them all so long as they fit a certain criteria in the first couple of levels of game play.
But no, I believe that we truly need some humility on our plate soon if we are collectively going to take this genre to the next level and not just have it turn into an even bigger "milking" genre. When we stop going to a thread with a title we don't agree with just to bash something we know little to nothing about, we may start to form a better community. One of understanding, and more importantly, one that accepts change more openly and even embraces iteration without calling it a clone of something else.
With this the industry may actually be more willing to take risks and to do different things. If they feel more comfortable or safe to do so, and if we are less ignorant as a whole. If we treat each MMORPG as a game and not just as a tag that says "MMO" followed by, "oh, I know ALL about that already".
Now this is very much hopeful thinking that is highly likely to be impossible. To attempt such would be to try and curtail the very basis of human nature. Though at the same time, I believe -- one person, one post, one thread and even one site at a time -- that a more mature thought process could be formed. The minds can be opened and expanded upon. Perhaps all of these changes will do well on their own what with the new console crowd being introduced to more and more MMORPGs with the coming Playstation 4 system. It just may be that new blood is needed for us to see the folly of our ways. Maybe we're just over thinking a lot of things and this genre is inherently here just to exist with people outgrowing it and new players coming in.
For what we are taught in higher education is to have open minds, to be able to be persuaded by hard facts, ample reasoning and unshakable logic. But also to be steadfast in your beliefs, as rhetoric could just as easily condemn a fact to obscurity. But always make sure the fact is such, and being steadfast in an opinion is the first step of being closed minded.
I don't have all the answers; I don't have any answers. Though I think that's a good first step. I believe hard thinkers who prepare for that day by writing articles like this will be pivotal in seeing us through. Especially when they publish their works to the scrutiny of others to both assert their research and learn just as much as they hope to convey.
Trying to balance raw difficulty is silly and flawed.
____________
Players should be forced to balance their resources, and with good use of resources be able to take out more whatever for their rewards.
Even the simplest rules of revives having limited uses. Ammo/healing/health being based on your base stats and your inventory, rather than some passive regeneration you don't need to invest in.
It just requires the developers to massively change their dungeon design to something that is a bit more open with multiple paths AND designed on the assumption that only the "perfect group" of players will get a 100% clear. whereas a normal group would get somewhere between 40% to 60%(IE taking out 3 of the 5 bosses).
Practice doesn't make perfect, practice makes permanent.
"At one point technology meant making tech that could get to the moon, now it means making tech that could get you a taxi."
I agree however ,how do you balance challenge with group size?You can't make every fight a 24 man fight and you can't make it only tough for a solo player,knowing a group would walk through it.I also think the reward can only be in form of xp but that has flaws in it as well.I don't like encouraging speed leveling,like that is the only reason you play a game.
As for loot,if you make loot too good,then it might kill crafting.So where do you draw the line and how much effort are you willing to put into the systems to make them all as important as the other?
So yes i like PVE rewards based on challenge but what kind of reward?I think perhaps weapon skill is the way to go.So if for example you start out with a 0 skill,you might not have any penalties for up to 2 levels but you need a 3 level gap to gain any weapon skill .So if all you care about is speed leveling,you can go ahead and kill stuff quick but sooner or later your lack of skill will hurt you.
Example if you get to level 10 and not gained any skill with your weapon,you would have a 50% penalty to hit on top of the dmg/def equations.SO you need to mix in tough fights to build up your skills.This would do many things,encourage grouping and encourage tough fights.Next problem is how does this weigh into linear questing ,where the parameters are already set,i definitely would not go for any scaling design.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Do you have proof of that statement?
I just defeated the bulleye encounter in Marvel Heroes. That took me 2 tries. So the win rate is 50% .. way lower than 90.
When i am farming D3 MP9, i probably die to 1 in 4-5 elite/champ groups. So each feels like a good, but beatable challenge. That does not count the times i "strategically retreat". So that is what .. 80% win?
Now i am just one data point. If you claim is true, certainly atypical. But i don't see you have any data to back up your claim.
He said MMORPG.
You really have quite the struggle going on with this shit, lol
"Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb
Those games are close enough. When i play wow, or STO, .. i hit a button .. i go into an instance. When i play D3 and MH .. same thing.
In fact, you get to fight in public zones in MH ... which is much more public pve fighting than WOW.
"Close enough"? LMAO. Nice argument there, bud.
Try to stay on topic and keep it relevant; it works wonders when you're trying to have a discussion (as opposed to constantly trying to derail things while at the same time quenching some sort of odd thirst for attention on an internet forum).
"Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb
It is you who questions my examples .. which shows at least for one data point (me), the win rate is way less than 90+%.
So again, i question the OP .. does he has any evidence to back up his claim that it is typical to win high 90s of the battles? And anecdotal evidence don't establish it for "most players".
Diablo 3 is listed as a MMORPG on this very site.
Somebody, somewhere has better skills as you have, more experience as you have, is smarter than you, has more friends as you do and can stay online longer. Just pray he's not out to get you.
Agreed.
I haven't seen any concrete evidence in this thread to confirm that players are "winning" to such a high degree, my issue lies with the fact that a MOBA is not an MMORPG even if some of them are similar in certain respects. I will acknowledge that there are titles that were originally MMORPGs, that no longer can be classified as such. These games have deviated so far from the foundation of what an MMORPG is that they are no longer a part of the genre. They've evolved into something else entirely.
The other problem that has presented itself is the overuse of the term MMORPG. We have way too many studios trying to pass off multiplayer games as MMORPGs in an attempt to cash in on the potential of such games. It's confusing to gamers and it dilutes the entire point of having genres. For example, I love disaster movies and zombie movies, so World War Z was a film I had a pretty good hunch that I would find entertaining. Went and saw in Ultra AVX and walked away thoroughly satisfied and then some (note: I never read the book). This is the advantage of having well defined genres; it narrows the search to find just what it is that you find "fun".
"Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb
Yeah, I'm not even going there
That's a whole other doggy bag of poop.
"Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb
The genre is a huge part of this analysis. Games without long-term progression tend not to push players to avoid a challenge. Without long-term progression, they tend not to push players to do play in any particular way at all. It's not a fluke that the one MMORPG that I could think of that didn't push players to avoid a challenge is also the one that doesn't have any long-term progression.
But to address the issue you raised: does the Bulleye encounter consist purely of a single battle against Bulleye? Or does it have a bunch of trash mobs that you have to clear to get there? If you won 20 trivial battles against trash mobs, died on Bulleye, restarted, won 20 more trivial battles against trash mobs, and then beat Bulleye, then you won 98% of your battles.
If most encounters in Marvel Heroes consist of fighting just the boss and you don't have to wade through trash mobs or fight lots of trash mobs to level up in order to do the boss encounters, then that's unusual for MMORPGs.
I completely agree, I cant remember the last time I died in an mmo before level 30. Most games I don't die much at all outside of instances and pvp and when it does happen it was precisely because I pulled one of the 2 mobs in a given zone that was meant for a group, but I was solo.
This all kinda speaks to the removal of elite mobs from game worlds ... and even farther looking, the failure to adopt system like vanguard and to a lesser extent aion where there are a large variety of difficulty levels of mobs.
Neither is a perfect solution as many 4 dots can be soloed by some classes in VG .. but it's still adds some interest and variety to the game. killing 2 dots is very different from killing 3 dots.
theres BAMs in Tera too .. but imo they don't really offer much of a challenge for a duo. as soon as you add a tank to the mix they are a pushover.
I was actually fairly disappointed when I heard W* was going to have dynamic events that will scale .. hopefully they prove me wrong, but I find it hard to see how anyone will get a system like that right.
To me the worlds first need to be more open and less linear. there need to be areas that are designed for groups, duos, and even small zergs .. then scale the loot only to be lower if you "over contribute" ...
LFD tools are great for cramming people into content, but quality > quantity.
I am, usually on the sandbox .. more "hardcore" side of things, but I also do just want to have fun. So lighten up already
I'm talking purely about PVE in this thread. MOBAs are PVP by their very nature, are they not?
I'm not arguing for grinding as opposed to questing. If most rewards come from quests and higher level quests are scaled to give much larger rewards than lower level quests, and you're prevented from making progress on quests when in a larger than intended group, then players would again be encouraged to try harder content.
And are players always forced to take some particular quest? If doing quests that are more challenging at your level were encouraged, players could skip some lower level quests along the way and constantly do more challenging content.
I explicitly addressed the first piece in my original post.
This thread isn't about solo versus group content. While I largely had soloing in mind while writing the post, the same argument works just as well for group content, or for that matter, raid content.
Lots of games color code mobs to give some idea of the mob's level relative to your own. But that has nothing to do with this post. The problem is that game mechanics then encourage players to stick to the easy mobs.