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Is Raiding Dead?

VrdictVrdict Member Posts: 10

Knowing all the major MMO's and what they offer, I was searching for a possibly unknown, perhaps Korean, MMO that offered end game raiding. I couldn't find much of anything, in fact most searches turned up posts by MMO players shouting their distaste for raiding in general. EQ Next seems to be my only hope on the horizon.

Having been introduced to MMO's through the raid-centric Everquest, I'm completely saddened by the core of what I loved most about MMO's being phased out in favor of barbie doll housing crap and dumbed down PvP. To me, if I wanted to build a house I'd play the Sims where it expands on that aspect in much more detail. Likewise, if I wanted to PvP I'd play one of any number of FPS, rather than being completely focused on the PvP aspect of MMO's - I've been there, done that, but the majority of pure PvP'ers I've been around in MMO's are mainly fueled by this ego trip that they can wipe the floor with other players due to advantages in gear progression. So to reiterate, 2 functions of MMO's that have been rising in popularity are both available, and in better form, in other genres.

For raiding this isn't true, there is nothing even remotely similar to it in any other game genre. Yet it's been a downward trend since EQ, which is still the king of raiding. EQ2 would fall right behind it in 2nd, where the vast majority of active players are only there for raiding. WoW and RIFT both have raids, but neither offer the same atmosphere, intensity, require the same level of skill, and because of these reasons don't have the same sense of accomplishment that you'll find in EQ. Vanguard it's an afterthought, I actually formed a hardcore raiding guild for Vanguard on it's release only to be completely disappointed by the lack of raiding, and lack of loot on existing raid mobs, so much so that the entire guild moved on to WoW.

So here we are, 14 years after Everquests release, and EQ is still on top of the food chain for hardcore raiding? Majority of MMORPG's coming out either don't offer raiding or offer it as a compensation prize in the form of 10 mans and other junk? The only possible savior being EQ Next which won't be out for years and I'm simply assuming it will have proper raids based on it's pedigree and nothing more?

It's a sad time to be a hardcore raider and seeing the genre you loved for so long is nearly extinguished.

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Comments

  • DJJazzyDJJazzy Member UncommonPosts: 2,053

    plenty of raid games out there, hardly dead

  • VrdictVrdict Member Posts: 10
    Originally posted by DJJazzy

    plenty of raid games out there, hardly dead

    Then by all means please list them, I'm definitely interested in any I haven't looked into already. Seems to be a pattern of many MMO's to start calling 10 mans 'raiding' to sell the term, where it's really just double group play with added hassle of standing in the blue circle phase 1 and avoiding the red circles phase 2 - not my definition of raiding by any means. Which this rules out games like TERA, Lineage 2, AoC, among others.

  • L0C0ManL0C0Man Member UncommonPosts: 1,065
    Originally posted by Vrdict
    Originally posted by DJJazzy

    plenty of raid games out there, hardly dead

    Then by all means please list them, I'm definitely interested in any I haven't looked into already. Seems to be a pattern of many MMO's to start calling 10 mans 'raiding' to sell the term, where it's really just double group play with added hassle of standing in the blue circle phase 1 and avoiding the red circles phase 2 - not my definition of raiding by any means. Which this rules out games like TERA, Lineage 2, AoC, among others.

    Depends on your definition of raiding then. According to a thread sometime ago, IIRC most people just consider raiding any content that needs 2 or more full groups to complete, so based on that definition, there are still plenty of raiding games and lots more coming out.

    If you mean raiding as content that needs 40+ people and it's extremely difficult and that can take lots of hours or even days to complete (both in preparation by getting pots, reagents and the like, and in actually raiding), then I'd say yep, it is dying because the old school raiders tend to have less continuous free time to raid than they used to as they have more responsabilities, and the newer generation doesn't seem to have the patiente to do the equivalent of herding cats.

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  • nariusseldonnariusseldon Member EpicPosts: 27,775

    Raiding dead?

    More people got into raid (statistics was out a while back on mmo-champion.com) in WOW because of the LFR feature.

    Now the really hard core type raiding is being phase out.

    Blizzard has stated that raids like Sunwell is only done by <2% of the players. That obviously is not enough demand to support a huge resource investment.

    I suppose the best option for really hard core raiders is to do hard mode .. i.e. "share" the raid experience with more assessible versions.

    Personally, i have done hard core raiding before (precisely hard mode back in WOTLK) and that is too much work and commitment. Won't do it again.

  • nariusseldonnariusseldon Member EpicPosts: 27,775
    Originally posted by Vrdict
    Originally posted by DJJazzy

    plenty of raid games out there, hardly dead

    Then by all means please list them, I'm definitely interested in any I haven't looked into already. Seems to be a pattern of many MMO's to start calling 10 mans 'raiding' to sell the term, where it's really just double group play with added hassle of standing in the blue circle phase 1 and avoiding the red circles phase 2 - not my definition of raiding by any means. Which this rules out games like TERA, Lineage 2, AoC, among others.

    What is YOUR definition? Without a precise definition, there is no point in listing any games.

  • KiyonoriKiyonori Member UncommonPosts: 70

    I never played Everquest, how was the raiding in that game compared to all the raids we have avaliable in current-gen(or next-gen up from everquest) mmos?

     

    Raiding as I've always known it, was something you did with 10+ people, usually in a linear instanced cave or dungeon where you whittle down huge life bars, follow a set rotation that maximized your role and hope that the pinata--I mean boss at the end drops a specific item so you can repeat the same thing in the cave next door.

     

    I've never liked raiding as the atmosphere is always so tense, you always gotta be topping charts and not making mistakes then you have people who steal the drops or is real chummy with the raid leader and gets first dibs, I could go on.

     

    Anyways I'm rambling, as to the title of this thread I can't help but feel confused as most mmo's these days resort to raids/dungeons to fill in conent for the "end-game". I'm not sure what constitutes as "hardcore raiding" but plenty of people structure their real life schedules around raids so if that isn't hardcore raiding I don't know what is.

  • nariusseldonnariusseldon Member EpicPosts: 27,775
    Originally posted by Kiyonori

    I've never liked raiding as the atmosphere is always so tense, you always gotta be topping charts and not making mistakes then you have people who steal the drops or is real chummy with the raid leader and gets first dibs, I could go on.

    LFR solves some of the complaints here.

    - no more stealing drops. You just roll for it.

    - performance can be an issue. However, usually people don't get kicked unless they are AFK or are doing dps way below average. No need to top anything.

  • ZippyZippy Member, Newbie CommonPosts: 1,412

    There are only 3 supported progression raiding MMOs presently EQ2, Rift and WoW.  One might add TOR to the list but I do not see any serious raiding guilds playing it.  One could also add EQ1 to this list but it doe snot havemuch of a playerbase left.

    There are only two  real raiding games in development that I know of EQNext and ESO and one has tow onder about both of their commitments to raiding.  Will ESO have seriosu progression raiding?  Will SOE seriosuly develop EQNext? 

    With EQ2 and WoW turning 8 this later this year  Rift looks like the only serious raiding game for the future.  Rift under Hartsman's guidance is essentialy the sequel to EQ2 and its first and foremost a raiding game.  Its raiding is very good and somewhat difficult but one has to wonder what direction it will go.  Raiding is the core and focus  of Rift endgame but I will not be surprised if they end up going the wow easy mode route with the next expansion.  I guess the problem is if they make raids to hard like HK people complain but if they make them to easy like the beginning of ID hardcore guilds become upset.  In todays MMO world where players have no patience and will leave a game anytime they become bored it is hard to make raiding to difficult.  Which is my guess why we bhave seen the hurdles or ability to gear up for rift raiding become so easy and also why we thgey are changing PvP gear to be useable in raids by adding hit'/focus.

  • VrdictVrdict Member Posts: 10
    Originally posted by Zippy

    There are only 3 supported progression raiding MMOs presently EQ2, Rift and WoW.  One might add TOR to the list but I do not see any serious raiding guilds playing it.  One could also add EQ1 to this list but it doe snot havemuch of a playerbase left.

    There are only two  real raiding games in development that I know of EQNext and ESO and one has tow onder about both of their commitments to raiding.  Will ESO have seriosu progression raiding?  Will SOE seriosuly develop EQNext? 

    With EQ2 and WoW turning 8 this later this year  Rift looks like the only serious raiding game for the future.  Rift under Hartsman's guidance is essentialy the sequel to EQ2 and its first and foremost a raiding game.  Its raiding is very good and somewhat difficult but one has to wonder what direction it will go.  Raiding is the core and focus  of Rift endgame but I will not be surprised if they end up going the wow easy mode route with the next expansion.  I guess the problem is if they make raids to hard like HK people complain but if they make them to easy like the beginning of ID hardcore guilds become upset.  In todays MMO world where players have no patience and will leave a game anytime they become bored it is hard to make raiding to difficult.  Which is my guess why we bhave seen the hurdles or ability to gear up for rift raiding become so easy and also why we thgey are changing PvP gear to be useable in raids by adding hit'/focus.

    Thank you. I'll have to check out ESO, I haven't researched it extensively since I assumed it wasn't going to have raiding.

    I completely agree with the rest of your post. RIFT I didn't like much of the game, left and ended up coming back just for the raiding. It didn't take long to get 11/11 HK which was disappointing but when they nerfed aky and then ID was a cakewalk, I didn't like the direction that was going and decided to move to Diablo 3 (what a joke) while looking for something else.

    I still raid in EQ but until expansions hit it's basically 1 or 2 nights raiding a week and most are raiding for their alts. I considered going back to EQ2 since it's been several expansions since I've played, but the population is only marginally better than EQ.

    EQ is still great, but it's almost like a members only club now days where everyone has pretty much known each other for many years. I mean you know you've been raiding with the same group of people too long when you know the names of their kids friends.

  • QuizzicalQuizzical Member LegendaryPosts: 25,347

    A large fraction of AAA MMORPGs have a raid-centric endgame.  That's why there are the anti-raiding rants.  People look forward to a game, only to find out that it's yet another game that will try to shove you into raiding if you want good loot at the end.

    Your argument isn't really that there aren't many raiding games, but rather, that there aren't many raiding games that you like.  That's a very different issue.  To claim that that means raiding is dead isn't much stronger of a case than someone coming in claiming solo gameplay at lower levels is dead because he hasn't found a game with solo gameplay at lower levels that he likes.

  • IsaneIsane Member UncommonPosts: 2,630
    Originally posted by Vrdict

    It's a sad time to be a hardcore raider and seeing the genre you loved for so long is nearly extinguished.

    Raiding has always been a poor excuse for a lack of end game design and has no place in MMOs. What will truly revitalise the genre is a bit of longevity and challenging design. Where NPC elements have decent AI and are challenging.

    Raiding is a bit of a dead end and whilst I like the idea of Boss Mobs, hundrreds of heroes are needed for a Battle not , to kill sentient NPCs.

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  • maplestonemaplestone Member UncommonPosts: 3,099
    Originally posted by Vrdict

    It's a sad time to be a hardcore raider and seeing the genre you loved for so long is nearly extinguished.

    I'm pretty ignorant when it comes to raiding, but I am curious to better understand what you are looking for.  What aspects of the raiding playstyle you enjoy?   Is it the number of people?   The complexity of the fights?   The time commitment?   Something else entirely?

  • VassagoMaelVassagoMael Member Posts: 555

    I don't play it, but I would just say ask the 10 million people who play WoW.

    Free to play = content updates for the cash shop. Buy to play = content updates for the cash shop.
    Subscription = Actual content updates!

  • ZylaxxZylaxx Member Posts: 2,574

    Probably not but I really wish it would die.  I think it is the single greatest failure that was evr fostered on the MMO community.  Organized "set player" Instanced Raiding is stupid and horrible game decision.  Now fighting random, spur of the moment, community envolved mega bosses are fine.

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  • UsulDaNeriakUsulDaNeriak Member Posts: 640

    i feel your pain. for me these 16 men raids are way too small to call them raids. i remember EQ raids where we had 6 full groups just for offtanking. i remember a 130 men raid (actually 2 raids), where i leaded a special necromancer squad of 6 necs. our main job was, to summon corpses at the dungeon entrance, in order to bring all the dead players back to fight again for the next phase of the fight. in the 1st phase this damn boss wiped over 100 people as usual.

    while we were summoning and the clers rezzing, a special squad of about 10-20 rangers kept the boss busy with kiting until the raid is ready to fight again. their only job was to run and die, but survive long enough that we got the time needed.

    the only thing which comes close to this are fleetfights in EVE. but this is PvP.

    played: Everquest I (6 years), EVE (3 years)
    months: EQII, Vanguard, Siedler Online, SWTOR, Guild Wars 2
    weeks: WoW, Shaiya, Darkfall, Florensia, Entropia, Aion, Lotro, Fallen Earth, Uncharted Waters
    days: DDO, RoM, FFXIV, STO, Atlantica, PotBS, Maestia, WAR, AoC, Gods&Heroes, Cultures, RIFT, Forsaken World, Allodds

  • JimmydeanJimmydean Member UncommonPosts: 1,290

    People always equate WoW raiding with Everquest raiding. The two are/were very different. 

    In WoW, there is 1 dungeon that has the best loot in it at one time.  So you are doing the same bosses, every night, until the next patch comes out 8 months later. Of course people are going to get bored of that, and end up hating "raiding". 

    This isn't how EQ works though. In EQ, there were always multiple raid targets.  Didn't want to do Plane of Water that night? Go do Plane of Fire, Plane of Earth, Plane of Air, you get the point. There was always plenty of variety in the raids in EQ. 

    To say raiding is dead because people are sick of World of Warcrafts raiding isn't saying much.  Even Rift appears to have fallen into the "1 end tier raid at a time" rut.  I have faith that EQ Next or TESO will get it right, as EQ 1 did. I have a lot of hope for FFXIV 2.0 as well, because FFXI raiding was varied like EQs was.

  • stevebmbsqdstevebmbsqd Member Posts: 448
    Originally posted by Zylaxx

    Probably not but I really wish it would die.  I think it is the single greatest failure that was evr fostered on the MMO community.  Organized "set player" Instanced Raiding is stupid and horrible game decision.  Now fighting random, spur of the moment, community envolved mega bosses are fine.

    Which is nothing more than giant DPS spam fests that last until the boss goes down and involve little to no coordinated tactics.......... Yeah...loads of fun. I have a feeling the OP is looking for just the opposite.

  • NanulakNanulak Member UncommonPosts: 372
    Under the current game mechanics, raiding is going in the direction to the trinity.  As the letter goes out of style, the former will follow.  And since the trinity based model promotes the exclusion of content for many players they look for a model better suited for their game play.
     
    In my opinion raiding will only survive in open world boss fight scenarios where everyone can participate.  OR, the game mechanics change and the trinity model gets replaced by a more robust system that allows everyone to participate without having to rely on one particular class/build/armor set.
     
    Raiding can be fun, but not under the trinity system unless you are one of the 2% who meet the raid requirements.

    Nanulak

  • JimmydeanJimmydean Member UncommonPosts: 1,290
    Originally posted by grogstorm
     
     
    Raiding can be fun, but not under the trinity system unless you are one of the 2% who meet the raid requirements.

    Lol raid requirements? You mean being able to listen and not being terrible at the game you are playing. I suppose those are some pretty harsh requirements that not many people are able to reach. But it's ok, GW2 is for you!  You can be as terrible as you want, and the 100 other people there spamming the giant boss will help you get your loot.

  • UsulDaNeriakUsulDaNeriak Member Posts: 640
    Originally posted by Jimmydean

    This isn't how EQ works though. In EQ, there were always multiple raid targets.  Didn't want to do Plane of Water that night? Go do Plane of Fire, Plane of Earth, Plane of Air, you get the point. There was always plenty of variety in the raids in EQ. 

    To say raiding is dead because people are sick of World of Warcrafts raiding isn't saying much.  Even Rift appears to have fallen into the "1 end tier raid at a time" rut.  I have faith that EQ Next or TESO will get it right, as EQ 1 did. I have a lot of hope for FFXIV 2.0 as well, because FFXI raiding was varied like EQs was.

    I played EQ for 6 years. My guild was rather small and needed alliances with other guilds for the bigger bosses. So we usually raided just 1-2 days a week. There are still some bosses i never saw. just 1 instanced raid? thats unacceptable!

    But i understand the devs. If the figures show, that just 2% of the players are able or willing to play that content. I am sure in EQ it was way more than 2%. 

    I hope the open world bosses in GW2 and TSW are zerg-immune and wipe them all. I love to listen to the criebabies on the forums ;)

    played: Everquest I (6 years), EVE (3 years)
    months: EQII, Vanguard, Siedler Online, SWTOR, Guild Wars 2
    weeks: WoW, Shaiya, Darkfall, Florensia, Entropia, Aion, Lotro, Fallen Earth, Uncharted Waters
    days: DDO, RoM, FFXIV, STO, Atlantica, PotBS, Maestia, WAR, AoC, Gods&Heroes, Cultures, RIFT, Forsaken World, Allodds

  • UsulDaNeriakUsulDaNeriak Member Posts: 640
    Originally posted by grogstorm
    Under the current game mechanics, raiding is going in the direction to the trinity.  As the letter goes out of style, the former will follow.  

    you guess the trinity is dead?

    Sorry dude, this is just a wet dream of some GW2-fanbois. ;)

    and why big raids without a trinity should not work? they even become more tactical and versatile.

    played: Everquest I (6 years), EVE (3 years)
    months: EQII, Vanguard, Siedler Online, SWTOR, Guild Wars 2
    weeks: WoW, Shaiya, Darkfall, Florensia, Entropia, Aion, Lotro, Fallen Earth, Uncharted Waters
    days: DDO, RoM, FFXIV, STO, Atlantica, PotBS, Maestia, WAR, AoC, Gods&Heroes, Cultures, RIFT, Forsaken World, Allodds

  • DibdabsDibdabs Member RarePosts: 3,203

    As long as there are players who delight in riding the Hamster Wheel Of Monotony day after day after day after day... raiding will remain the laziest way for game designers to provide what passes for game content at level cap.  Sadly.

  • VigilianceVigiliance Member UncommonPosts: 213

    I don't think that raiding is "dead" per say but it is over done. That horse has been beaten into a coma over the last ten to twenty years.  In simplier terms there is just a community that is sick and tired of it. If they weren't they would probably be playing one of the MMO's on the market right now that provide this activity as their only real end game content available. 

  • spizzspizz Member UncommonPosts: 1,971

    I remember the time when the word "raiding" was actually used in pvp. Raiding the other faction for example i.e. city or bases.

  • UsulDaNeriakUsulDaNeriak Member Posts: 640
    Originally posted by Dibdabs

    As long as there are players who delight in riding the Hamster Wheel Of Monotony day after day after day after day... raiding will remain the laziest way for game designers to provide what passes for game content at level cap.  Sadly.

    raiding and hamster-wheel aka item based progression/treadmill are 2 different things. raiding just means content, which needs more than a group (i say much more!). of course you could implement raid dungeons in a game without the typical endgame item-progression like GW2. you just get the same cosmetic type of rewards like in the group-dungeons. i also read, that they have very tough open world bosses, which need more than a few guys to kill. we have to check, how versatile these bosses in the high-end DEs are and if they are zerg immune or not.

    i guess, most people argueing against raids, are just against the item treadmill but not against multi-group content.

    and btw, if raid content would be the laziest way for the devs, they would offer tons of raids. but as shown above, most modern theme-parks nowadays have just a few or even just 1.

    played: Everquest I (6 years), EVE (3 years)
    months: EQII, Vanguard, Siedler Online, SWTOR, Guild Wars 2
    weeks: WoW, Shaiya, Darkfall, Florensia, Entropia, Aion, Lotro, Fallen Earth, Uncharted Waters
    days: DDO, RoM, FFXIV, STO, Atlantica, PotBS, Maestia, WAR, AoC, Gods&Heroes, Cultures, RIFT, Forsaken World, Allodds

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