not sure why you guys are comparing video game mechanics to table top role playing games
aggro in those games are determined by one factor alone, the DM
Bingo.
The Trinity, as we know it in MMORPGs works ONLY because there is an artificial and predictable aggro mechanic that allows the tank to consistently keep aggro. If you remove aggro management from a trinity game like WoW, the trinity is gone.
I don't care how tanky you are, if the monster attacks the healer, and you can't stop him...there is no trinity.
Problem is that its not possible to remove "aggro management"
Its like saying ,we removed anger,hate and love from world.
You can if you add in systems to compensate for it (players being able to physical manhandle monsters away from healer if needed or block doors with their shields, etc )
But what kind of system is that.
Sure if monster int is 0 ,its actions are based on its reflexes.
But if its like 1 for example,lets say angry cat who is attacking me,and i give him catfood(detaunt) and he starts to love me.
And then my friend kicks it and cat might run away or attack (cojones roll 1d6 vs int) my friend.
So, did ESO have a successful launch? Yes, yes it did.By Ryan Getchell on April 02, 2014. **On the radar: http://www.cyberpunk.net/ **
not sure why you guys are comparing video game mechanics to table top role playing games
aggro in those games are determined by one factor alone, the DM
Bingo.
The Trinity, as we know it in MMORPGs works ONLY because there is an artificial and predictable aggro mechanic that allows the tank to consistently keep aggro. If you remove aggro management from a trinity game like WoW, the trinity is gone.
I don't care how tanky you are, if the monster attacks the healer, and you can't stop him...there is no trinity.
Problem is that its not possible to remove "aggro management"
Its like saying ,we removed anger,hate and love from world.
Oh that's pretty easy....but you need to be able to do things like collision detection, zones of control and opportunity attacks, etc.
"aggro management" was the early computer games solution to "I don't want to deal with collision detection" or try to understand the spatial relationship between objects in the game world. However it's not difficult for a game to do that IF it wants to....it raises some other types of issues...but it is doable. Just many games choose not to do it because it's not they way it has been done in previous games and it forces a bit more thought and teamwork out of the players which many aren't used to do.
not sure why you guys are comparing video game mechanics to table top role playing games
aggro in those games are determined by one factor alone, the DM
Bingo.
The Trinity, as we know it in MMORPGs works ONLY because there is an artificial and predictable aggro mechanic that allows the tank to consistently keep aggro. If you remove aggro management from a trinity game like WoW, the trinity is gone.
I don't care how tanky you are, if the monster attacks the healer, and you can't stop him...there is no trinity.
Problem is that its not possible to remove "aggro management"
Its like saying ,we removed anger,hate and love from world.
You can if you add in systems to compensate for it (players being able to physical manhandle monsters away from healer if needed or block doors with their shields, etc )
But what kind of system is that.
Sure if monster int is 0 ,its actions are based on its reflexes.
But if its like 1 for example,lets say angry cat who is attacking me,and i give him catfood(detaunt) and he starts to love me.
And then my friend kicks it and cat might run away or attack (cojones roll 1d6 vs int) my friend.
No it' would be the "Madden Football" type of system where as much you might want to get to the quarterback, you can't if there is a blocker physicaly interposing himself between you and your goal.
not sure why you guys are comparing video game mechanics to table top role playing games
aggro in those games are determined by one factor alone, the DM
Bingo.
The Trinity, as we know it in MMORPGs works ONLY because there is an artificial and predictable aggro mechanic that allows the tank to consistently keep aggro. If you remove aggro management from a trinity game like WoW, the trinity is gone.
I don't care how tanky you are, if the monster attacks the healer, and you can't stop him...there is no trinity.
Problem is that its not possible to remove "aggro management"
Its like saying ,we removed anger,hate and love from world.
You can if you add in systems to compensate for it (players being able to physical manhandle monsters away from healer if needed or block doors with their shields, etc )
But what kind of system is that.
Sure if monster int is 0 ,its actions are based on its reflexes.
But if its like 1 for example,lets say angry cat who is attacking me,and i give him catfood(detaunt) and he starts to love me.
And then my friend kicks it and cat might run away or attack (cojones roll 1d6 vs int) my friend.
No it' would be the "Madden Football" type of system where as much you might want to get to the quarterback, you can't if there is a blocker physicaly interposing himself between you and your goal.
Even in maddens football you have anger management ,there they use their eyes and ears and bodylanguage.
See this cat hates me for a reason,it might be the way i look or something that i told him,people does that in sports too.
Theres a reason why its good to "stay calm"
So, did ESO have a successful launch? Yes, yes it did.By Ryan Getchell on April 02, 2014. **On the radar: http://www.cyberpunk.net/ **
aside from the tank not showing up, most of the other problems with the trinity exist because the games have become so easy that you don't need roles. you don't even need a tank in a lot of trinity games anymore until endgame. you never need to CC anything anymore, and you can heal 0-80 in wow with renew. buffs are completely homogenized so there is no buff role anymore, and who needs buffs, the content is too easy to even care about buffs.
the whole thing has been gutted down to stupidity levels. probably why gw2 is so heralded. it plays the same as 1-80 in wow .. just faceroll zerg after faceroll zerg, and it doesn't have much of an endgame, which is the only point where you need real tanking and healing in trinity games. wow could probably just make tanking and healing a secondary thought at endgame for raiding and no one would even notice.
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
Good discussion, though i think a lot is being glossed over in this thread.
The benefit of the trinity isn't in having roles. All RPGs have roles, as do most other games. The thing about the trinity is that it provides easily accessible, and easy to understand roles. Simply put, most people don't like having to figure out how to play their character. They prefer clearly defined and fewer choices. I know some people are going to disagree with this, but it's a well documented fact of human nature. Aka paradox of choice.
To use DotA as an example, one of the great things about that game is that the roles are actually much more flexible than people first realize. However, on the surface, it tells you exactly how (you're supposed) to play your character. By contrast, Guild Wars also has a ton of flexibility, but does a very poor job of telling people how to play their character.
This permeates into combat, where I see a lot of complaints about non-trinity games being 'too chaotic'. The thing is, actual combat IS chaotic. There's nothing neat or organized about a war, a battle, or a skirmish. Even in historical battles, where they tried to organize their groups into neat formations, the second swords started clashing that all fell apart and turned into a massive chaotic mess.
This doesn't mean that there is no strategy, thought, or skill involved. An assumption I see a lot of people make. On the contrary much of the fun comes from creating order out of chaos. From outsmarting the general melee and creating your own advantages. This is something the trinity cannot provide, because it centers around structuring combat in a (very) artificial manner. Combat can never get too crazy, because the dynamic must allow for tanks to tank. For healers to stay alive and heal. And for DPS / CC to end the fights before resources exhaust. Furthermore, they can't make healers too tanky, or the DPS / CC too strong, or else it minimizes the need for a tank.
Essentially, the trinity is nice and easy to understand. And therefor successful. But there are also those of us that enjoy more challenging gameplay. That enjoy complex mechanics, and dynamic problems that require more thought. And that is something that even the best trinity games can't really provide. This isn't to say that all trinity games are easy, but they are deliberately simplified in order to be accessible.
aside from the tank not showing up, most of the other problems with the trinity exist because the games have become so easy that you don't need roles. you don't even need a tank in a lot of trinity games anymore until endgame. you never need to CC anything anymore, and you can heal 0-80 in wow with renew. buffs are completely homogenized so there is no buff role anymore, and who needs buffs, the content is too easy to even care about buffs.
the whole thing has been gutted down to stupidity levels. probably why gw2 is so heralded. it plays the same as 1-80 in wow .. just faceroll zerg after faceroll zerg, and it doesn't have much of an endgame, which is the only point where you need real tanking and healing in trinity games. wow could probably just make tanking and healing a secondary thought at endgame for raiding and no one would even notice.
While I agree that many of these games have become way too easy, what you are suggesting is a gross exaggeration.
Trinity games still require healing (and tanking). Especially at end game. It's mostly the mechanics that have been dumbed down.
Furthermore, 'zerging' has nothing to do with trinity game play. Compare dynamic events in GW2, with public quests in WAR, with FATES in FFXI, or Rifts in RIFT, and you will see that they all can get pretty zergy. Zerging is a biproduct of a game having many players in one space. Nothing more. If you want to truly play MMOs (massively multiplayer), then zerging is something you're going to have to get used to. People will always bunch together when able, regardless of how much the game tries to dissuade them not to.
The reason why GW2 is heralded is for a number of reasons. Mostly, it legitimately solves a lot of the problems with the trinity (even though that's also a reason why a lot of people don't like it). It allows players to create their own roles via class customization, giving players the choice to either try and play into defined roles, or to come up w/ more creative builds. It also gets rid of a lot of annoying things most trinity games have like mob tagging & fighting over loot.
Essentially it's just a very different kind of MMO, and a lot of people wanted that.
Not going to teach you how to play Dungeons and Dragons since you never played it.
But there is simple things like constitution which gives more hp,hp is good for tank its also good against paralyzation etc..
also fighter with 14+ dex can parry and dodge ,not going to explain this either what does it mean.
I really dont know which movies or books you know where peeps presses taunt button,like there is somekind of taunt button.
I assume you understand what it means to make someone angry or calm,you can call it taunting/detaunting from now on .
Rogues great dmg dealers,ok,maybe with dagger +500.
I wonder what DnD you have played since I found rodingo's post to be fairly accurate. There is no tank in the similar sense there is one in MMORPGs. It is recommended to have a front line, but no need for a "tank" in particular. You can make one, but since the Taunt skill is rather weak, and depending on the GM, it is useful only in a very specialized situation.
Generally you can block enemies by moving in their way but if you don't have Combat Reflexes feat and a high Dexterity, you only get one Attack of Opportunity per enemy. That is if your enemies don't have Mobility, Spring Attack or one doesn't simply grapple you when others move past you freely. And you can't always fight in a 1-square-wide corridor.
It doesn't matter if you build your defense from armor or other AC bonuses, HP or other means, the fact remains, D&D had no tank in the similar sense that MMORPGs have it. Then again, your DM might have run a much different game than I did. Perhaps your D&D combat encounters did resemble trinity combat. Mine didn't.
Also, a Rogue is a utility/burst damage character although highly situational. A high level Rogue is a very powerful thing with high damage if you use it right.
Sure you can play with taunt skill if you want to but i prefer to kicking someone in the balls or cut their legs and also i would like to tell my team to stay back ,also charisma ,int or wis or characters race can be a deciding factor who is getting attacked,and my party might know it.sure you can play with your taunt button,theres plenty of things that i can use to hold aggro also theres hold persons ,monsters (cc) which can help me even further.
And there is a tank in this game,its not needed if you play against -500 level monster i think.
not sure why you guys are comparing video game mechanics to table top role playing games
aggro in those games are determined by one factor alone, the DM
Hate to be pedantic and slightly off-topic here, but if you follow the rules to the letter there are some skill/ability checks which could be used to force the enemy to attack you instead of your friend. Bluff for example or Bardic Knowledge (come up with the right insult). There's also the Suggestion and Mass Suggestion spells which could be used exactly how taunting operates in MMORPGs. The rules are pretty vague in such things, although DM can always override those rules.
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been-Wayne Gretzky
The items listed as "the bad" don't apply to trinity because those are the same "bad" issues as appear in a non-trinity setup as well.
1. In non-trinity all players are dps and therefore all are doing the same rotation over and over. Trinity at least gives more variety in gameplay by offering different roles.
2. No tank = no raid is better than Raid = zergfest; besides in a non-trinity game raids will rely on raid leaders to coordinate the tough parts, and you still have the problem of no raid leader = no raid.
3. Encounters are even less dynamic in non-trinity. Players just doing their rotation over and over again. You can't criticize trinity for getting old until you can prove other systems have encounters that never get old. It doesn't exist.
Not only should games have trinity, but they should have (and most older MMO's do) multiple roles required for all difficult encounters. CC and Barding(buffing/de-buffing roles) are two big ones that should be built-in requirements.
The items listed as "the bad" don't apply to trinity because those are the same "bad" issues as appear in a non-trinity setup as well.
1. In non-trinity all players are dps and therefore all are doing the same rotation over and over. Trinity at least gives more variety in gameplay by offering different roles.
2. No tank = no raid is better than Raid = zergfest; besides in a non-trinity game raids will rely on raid leaders to coordinate the tough parts, and you still have the problem of no raid leader = no raid.
3. Encounters are even less dynamic in non-trinity. Players just doing their rotation over and over again. You can't criticize trinity for getting old until you can prove other systems have encounters that never get old. It doesn't exist.
I would submit most FPS or RTS games....or even PnP games demonstrate that to be inaccurate. "Non-Trinity" doesn't mean an absence of specialization or roles (though some games do go that way), it simply means that the specialization and roles are different then the standard "Tank, Healer, DPS" presented within the Trinity.
The items listed as "the bad" don't apply to trinity because those are the same "bad" issues as appear in a non-trinity setup as well.
1. In non-trinity all players are dps and therefore all are doing the same rotation over and over. Trinity at least gives more variety in gameplay by offering different roles.
2. No tank = no raid is better than Raid = zergfest; besides in a non-trinity game raids will rely on raid leaders to coordinate the tough parts, and you still have the problem of no raid leader = no raid.
3. Encounters are even less dynamic in non-trinity. Players just doing their rotation over and over again. You can't criticize trinity for getting old until you can prove other systems have encounters that never get old. It doesn't exist.
Ah but you are assuming that we would just remove the trinity but not replace it with anything.
I am not suggesting we do that, in fact my major point was that a combat system that creates specialized team-roles such as the Trinity, is a must. However, as we have discussed, the Trinity is not perfect. I would like to see another, more dynamic, team-combat-dynamic system that still promotes specialized roles, but avoids the problems many folks have with the Trinity.
There have been a number of ideas in this thread for a system like that. Not fully fleshed out of course, just concepts.
The items listed as "the bad" don't apply to trinity because those are the same "bad" issues as appear in a non-trinity setup as well.
1. In non-trinity all players are dps and therefore all are doing the same rotation over and over. Trinity at least gives more variety in gameplay by offering different roles.
2. No tank = no raid is better than Raid = zergfest; besides in a non-trinity game raids will rely on raid leaders to coordinate the tough parts, and you still have the problem of no raid leader = no raid.
3. Encounters are even less dynamic in non-trinity. Players just doing their rotation over and over again. You can't criticize trinity for getting old until you can prove other systems have encounters that never get old. It doesn't exist.
I would submit most FPS or RTS games....or even PnP games demonstrate that to be inaccurate. "Non-Trinity" doesn't mean an absence of specialization or roles (though some games do go that way), it simply means that the specialization and roles are different then the standard "Tank, Healer, DPS" presented within the Trinity.
Hate to be pedantic and slightly off-topic here, but if you follow the rules to the letter there are some skill/ability checks which could be used to force the enemy to attack you instead of your friend. Bluff for example or Bardic Knowledge (come up with the right insult). There's also the Suggestion and Mass Suggestion spells which could be used exactly how taunting operates in MMORPGs. The rules are pretty vague in such things, although DM can always override those rules.
Thats even better and makes sense,which is the problem because many peeps thinks that "taunt" is a skill somekind of magic which only taunts.
But i still prefer brutal methods if its necessary,i shoot orc-mages wife in front of his eyes for example and most likely he will attack me in few seconds.
So, did ESO have a successful launch? Yes, yes it did.By Ryan Getchell on April 02, 2014. **On the radar: http://www.cyberpunk.net/ **
Thing is without taunts, stuff gets really chaotic real fast. unless your doing evrything with stuns and cc's but then you might asswell scrap your healer asswell because hes scratching his ass until someone occasionally gets hit.
So you have dps classes wich can CC but during fights people will stop CCing at some point or hit wrong targets etc. i see more problems arising then it solves.
Chaos is not a bad thing as far as fight dynamics go. It means unpredictability, less repetitiveness. The best, most memorable fights in trinity MMOs were always those where the trinity broke for some reason, and everyone had to play outside of the familiar route that his role dictated.
I like chaos asswell. it gives my job as a tank purpose. trying to control that chaos. But when games have no threat, when you are unable to control that chaos (as soon as your stun or taunt runs out the mob goes cya and runs off to a healer again) that annoys the crap out of me. stuff like that can be implemented into an encounter. but then it wouldnt be random anymore and yet again scripted. thus repetative.
First of all, My apology for my laziness for doing doing multiple quoting from some of the previous poster (as I agree to certain points of some of the posters made). I'll also like to ask for your patient to at least read all of what I say before you just quote a certain sentence and "sentence me to dead". I'll try to summarize my thought below and not make this into a wall of words.
Is Holy Trinity needed, I would say YES, but do we need to get back to the good old days trinity formation, that is a NO. Basically, those who support trinity is in favor of "group" and those that are not is in favor for "solo" contents. But, can we have them both, i believe so (I'll state it below). It's just that everyone is just voicing their opinion without giving a thought for a solution and insisting everyone listen to them without providing an alternative is not helping to solve the situation.
yes for trinity - in order to be a group play, it is needed. No trinity is just a zerg fest (humanoid A.I. ... maybe in future, but not realistic as of now). Question is, trinity is not good for solo for a certain class, as they can do nothing without a group, which is not an entertainment for them if they can only just sit there and watch the chatbox. Furthermore, not everyone want to group for 24hrs, hence "force trinity" for group and no solo choices is really not very attractive. Previous Trinity system work for group only plus it will stuck you in a one dimension role. You are like forever doing the same thing =_= which is limited. For me, trinity is a system, role is what your played in the group.
Hence, the solution for the situation above is not that hard to fix. Certain game (or certain class but not all) has already implemented it, so I will not said I have the unique thought. Simple fix is just have every class having 2 different stance or role (when u switch to different focus, u can't be that effective in the other focus). I class them into 4 categories of class type (from a group perspective and simple version).
1) healer = main focus is heal as usual, but can switch to dps focus if wanted. (like, in solo time or there is already healer in the group)
2) tank = main focus is tank but melee focus if you want
3) CC = main is CC but dps if u choose
4) DPS = main is dps but with utility with CC if need.
This way, all class is not fix in an one dimensional version for "life" and u can switch to what u need to be in order to better suit your role in your group or ... etc . (i deeply believe this system will have more tank/healer players because it will not hidden your solo or dps if they choose to want it).
The items listed as "the bad" don't apply to trinity because those are the same "bad" issues as appear in a non-trinity setup as well.
1. In non-trinity all players are dps and therefore all are doing the same rotation over and over. Trinity at least gives more variety in gameplay by offering different roles.
2. No tank = no raid is better than Raid = zergfest; besides in a non-trinity game raids will rely on raid leaders to coordinate the tough parts, and you still have the problem of no raid leader = no raid.
3. Encounters are even less dynamic in non-trinity. Players just doing their rotation over and over again. You can't criticize trinity for getting old until you can prove other systems have encounters that never get old. It doesn't exist.
I would submit most FPS or RTS games....or even PnP games demonstrate that to be inaccurate. "Non-Trinity" doesn't mean an absence of specialization or roles (though some games do go that way), it simply means that the specialization and roles are different then the standard "Tank, Healer, DPS" presented within the Trinity.
We are talking about MMORPG games, not FPS or RTS. I differ on your additional comments because most discussions of non-trinity explicitly require that there are no needs for tanks, or healers, per se. I would also like to add that most MMORPG games that have trinity almost always include the need for additional roles of CC, buffs, pullers, etc. so any argument against trinity is essentially an argument against the entire genre of games that have the tank, healer, CC, dps and special roles. The reason the genre is simplified by calling it the trinity is because in all group content you need at minimum one tank, one healer and one dps, but in the same games the more difficult group content will fail without including one CC and one group buffer.
The items listed as "the bad" don't apply to trinity because those are the same "bad" issues as appear in a non-trinity setup as well.
1. In non-trinity all players are dps and therefore all are doing the same rotation over and over. Trinity at least gives more variety in gameplay by offering different roles.
2. No tank = no raid is better than Raid = zergfest; besides in a non-trinity game raids will rely on raid leaders to coordinate the tough parts, and you still have the problem of no raid leader = no raid.
3. Encounters are even less dynamic in non-trinity. Players just doing their rotation over and over again. You can't criticize trinity for getting old until you can prove other systems have encounters that never get old. It doesn't exist.
I would submit most FPS or RTS games....or even PnP games demonstrate that to be inaccurate. "Non-Trinity" doesn't mean an absence of specialization or roles (though some games do go that way), it simply means that the specialization and roles are different then the standard "Tank, Healer, DPS" presented within the Trinity.
We are talking about MMORPG games, not FPS or RTS. I differ on your additional comments because most discussions of non-trinity explicitly require that there are no needs for tanks, or healers, per se. I would also like to add that most MMORPG games that have trinity almost always include the need for additional roles of CC, buffs, pullers, etc. so any argument against trinity is essentially an argument against the entire genre of games that have the tank, healer, CC, dps and special roles. The reason the genre is simplified by calling it the trinity is because in all group content you need at minimum one tank, one healer and one dps, but in the same games the more difficult group content will fail without including one CC and one group buffer.
But I don't think you can really say that the trinity is a defining part of the "genre." It is just a combat dynamic. There are plenty of MMORPGs without the holy trinity that are still very much, MMORPGs.
My point in this thread is that the trinity IS basically a good thing, and its presence is generally better than its complete absence. It brings specialized roles to combat, which makes it an actual team affair and makes it more interesting.
HOWEVER, we need to stop looking at the trinity as something that's black or white...you either have it or you don't and then there is just chaos.
I contend that you can still have specialized roles, but NOT implement them as the traditional "tank and spank" trinity.
We need to stop looking at this as you are either pro-trinity and anti-change, or anti-trinity and pro-chaos.
Why not try to think of a cool new way to implement specialized roles that avoids all the problems of the trinity?
There are good games without trinity and bad games with trinity. We all know and see that every day. We see people comparing games that are so far from the standard 1st/3rd person character slashing/shooting at mobs.
IMHO trinity is not the limiting factor, it adds new layers of difficulty. Yes devs are lazy and they do make tank and spank fights. But when the devs get creative and start to make content that doesn't require tanks, or requires people to do different things, that's when you see any system is good.
I'd say, have a look at Vanguard. The raids started out being pretty much tank and spank with a few tricks that changed from time to time. But as the game progressed and Ikik started to make new raid targets, you saw how the trinity got pushed to the limit. No longer were fights just tank and spank. You had to run out while leaving someone behind, you had to dual tank so when the big finishing move happened the offtank could take over the mob and fight him down to the last few percentage, just in time before the offtank died (thanks Silius for this great fight). You had the keepers for your epic weapon, who dind't follow traditional boring attack, you had to do different things, people had to focus on different jobs. People were forced to do things their role didn't dictate them to do.
Mobs force roles on players and players use skills to fill those roles.
Why do I hate the dps role, well very simple. You want a system where everyone can opt to dps rather than their primary job. If they chose to dps and beat let's say a rogue who can only dps, why bring a rogue if you could have someone who could change on the fly to an offtank or full tank with a change of gear for example.
You want to prevent that from happening, because if that happens the rogue gets envious, he will want to deal more dps, because he is 1D and can't fill another role, then the warrior gets envious because he can only join groups for tanks etc. etc. This will continue until you remove 1D classes or give 1D classes a primary new role and add dps as secondary roll for everyone.
The problems of trinity aren't trinity's fault. The devs got lazy and started thinking in 1D and started making it so you needed trinity, look at WoW. When they realized the problem, they didn't fix it, they made all the tanks the same, all the healers the same. The problem was that now they all had trinity problems, but at least they shared it between more classes. If you would give players either 2 roles, or 2 classes they have to level and play both roles/classes at end game, they could switch between dps and another role all the time. I think EQN is trying to achieve this and that's why they have a chance of succeeding. If they go to GW2 route, I'm afraid of what could happen.
I think trinity is only thing comparable to natural life. No one can be at same time best surgeon, best astronaut, best pilot, .... etc. Specialization is necessary.
The only reason I could hate holy trinity is when I have as dps to wait half hour to hour to enter in some instance. Some classes are by design dps only, nothing to do here. But in general tanking and healing is much harder then just dps-ing and for many less fun.
Over the past few years there has been a lot of controversy over the Holy Trinity of MMORPGs (Tank, Healer, DPS). Some people love it and some people hate it, some find themselves in-between.
Now, I've heard a lot of theories about why the Trinity is amazing, or why it is horrible. As for myself, I've often wondered about what exactly it is about the Trinity that makes it so simultaneously beloved and hated, and if there would be any way to make an alternative to it that works just as well.
To analyze this, let's start off with what attracts people to the Trinity. IMO, the main aspect that makes the Trinity appealing is the fact that players get to have specialized, unique roles in a team that highly differentiates them from their fellow team-mates and gives them a sense of importance. To illustrate why this specialization is good, just consider the following popular multiplayer games:
Team Fortress 2, DOTA 2/LOL, Payday 2, and Battlefield 3
What do all these games have in common? They all allow the players to assume a specialized role in the team. In TF2, Engineers defend the flag, while Scouts rush in and try to slip past defenses to grab the enemy flag. In DOTA2, carries farm up enough gold to dominate late game, while supports try to keep their carries safe and disrupt the other team...etc. etc.
This roles make it feel like you are part of a team because it is not only necessary for your team to work together to succeed, but you also must work together as your roles dictate. They FORCE you to work with the other players in a non-superficial way. Without roles, it can often feel like the team is just independently contributing goal without really working together.
The Trinity offers this kind of specialization to an MMORPG.
Okay now that we looked at what is good about the Trinity...let's talk about what is bad about it.
1. While the Trinity offers specialization, it does so in a very asymmetric fashion. Tanks and healers have a HUGE amount of responsibility to the group, and tanks have a very active and pretty fun role. But DPS players are often just doing the same rotation over and over.
2. In most Trinity games, players are essentially "locked" into one or maybe 2 roles on their character and it takes a SIGNIFICANT time investment to level another character and be able to play another role. This means that if your tank doesn't show up, there's no raid...and this can be very frustrating.
3. The gameplay of Trinity combat hardly ever changes and is not dynamic at all. So every fight, the tank will taunt and take agro, DPS will do their rotation, and the healer will stare at health bars. This is almost EVERY fight in the game, and it can get old fast.
So all of that said...I think it definitely IS possible for MMORPGs to have a more interesting team dynamic without the traditional Trinity, but the key is that specialized roles MUST exist, and they must be necessary. I don't want to go into much more now because this post is already pretty long...so what are your thoughts on this? Do you think the Trinity as it stands now is perfect, or can another system be created that is better? And if so, what would this system be like?
If you want interesting group fights then players need interesting group abilities. Not all players want group fights of course and even those that do might not like how *rigid* a fixed role system like the Trinity is.
Personally i like the idea of tactical group fights but don't like how rigid the trinity is so i'd prefer a system where a class had a set of abilities some of which were only useful in groups e.g. a warrior having a guard ability which they put on another player giving that other player a defense boost if they stay within range of the warrior, or a distraction ability they can use to give a bonus to a rogue's attack.
Ideally (for me) players would select skills and abilities from a big skill tree as they progressed and one branch would have "tank" skills and another would have solo melee skills and players could mix and match according to their preference. This way players that liked group fights could tailor their character to that while solo players could ignore the tank branch of the skill tree completely and make their guy a solo fighter only.
My point in this thread is that the trinity IS basically a good thing, and its presence is generally better than its complete absence. It brings specialized roles to combat, which makes it an actual team affair and makes it more interesting.
HOWEVER, we need to stop looking at the trinity as something that's black or white...you either have it or you don't and then there is just chaos.
I contend that you can still have specialized roles, but NOT implement them as the traditional "tank and spank" trinity.
We need to stop looking at this as you are either pro-trinity and anti-change, or anti-trinity and pro-chaos.
Why not try to think of a cool new way to implement specialized roles that avoids all the problems of the trinity?
Good post. As long as the combat is involving and interactive with each person having their role, whether or not you have trinity should be inconsequential. However, when thinking of other role systems that do not rely on the aggro system being abused, you definitely need to consider fluidity of the game or the game's going to turn into either chaos or turn-based as players need to feel they are in control.
Two aspects worth considering would be making intertwining support and cc via making both of those more about short time buffs and with collision detection blend dps and cc. Ultimately it all starts with a more intelligent aggro mechanism, but that might be kinda off topic. Definitely there are plenty of approaches to find and I have no doubt some of them could prove a lot of fun, if some company wants to take the risk and try things out a bit.
I'm a bit bored so I'll list some quick outlines of possible roles that could work with a revamped aggro and weak/no taunt mechanism:
-support: all heals and buffs are from 3 to 30 seconds. speed buffs, specialized buffs for certain situations, cleansings. low self survivability, but decent aoe, but lowish single target dmg. get's automatically most info from the state of allies. can rez.
-cc: environmental debuffs that affect areas from smallish to the whole vicinity affecting also allies and self, effect of debuffs depend on current environment. decent single target, but lowish aoe dmg, decent/high survivability but no heals. get's most info from opponents. can rez.
-dps: decent survivability, good dmg and dodging (depending on range), single target short time debuffs and attacks of opportunities. get's almost no info from other but current target (including own pt:P, no hp bars or notifications). can't rez.
And that's it. Of course some hybrids could be worked in. The outlines could be divided into classes and there is no mention of itemization (melee/ranged, pets etc) or anything else, but just some rough outlining. However, it was quite fun to think of them:) Not to say they would avoid all the problems of trinity tho, but I guess I would dare say that with correct balance and variation on cc and resistance, it could be made more interactive and fluid. Naturally it could be botched easily too:)
not sure why you guys are comparing video game mechanics to table top role playing games
aggro in those games are determined by one factor alone, the DM
Bingo.
The Trinity, as we know it in MMORPGs works ONLY because there is an artificial and predictable aggro mechanic that allows the tank to consistently keep aggro. If you remove aggro management from a trinity game like WoW, the trinity is gone.
I don't care how tanky you are, if the monster attacks the healer, and you can't stop him...there is no trinity.
Problem is that its not possible to remove "aggro management"
Its like saying ,we removed anger,hate and love from world.
So are you arguing that removing "aggro management" from games is unrealistic because it removes the "emotion" from monsters?
If so...then I have to really disagree with this. Let me preface my argument by saying that I think gameplay ALWAYS trumps "realism," but since you used a realism argument, I am going to use a realism argument back.
Aggro management, as it is implemented in MMORPGs is insanely unrealistic lol. Just imagine this, you are a lightly armored soldier in a real medieval war. You find yourself approached by a hulking knight in full plate, and an archer wearing padded armor.
Now, you KNOW that there is no way you can penetrate the hulking knight's armor, but he is so slow that he will never catch you if you just avoid him. You also know that the archer can easily kill you if you don't take him out fast, but you think you can rush him before he can get a shot off.
So the easy choice here is to go for the archer and then just disengage right? Not in an MMORPG!
In an MMORPG, the hulking knight will stand there bashing his shield and insulting your mother and you will rush right at him, swinging at him in futility, only to be shot in the back. No real soldier that isn't mentally deficient would ever make this decision. They would let the hulking knight stand there spouting insults, kill the archer, and run away.
Problem is that its not possible to remove "aggro management"
Its like saying ,we removed anger,hate and love from world.
So are you arguing that removing "aggro management" from games is unrealistic because it removes the "emotion" from monsters?
If so...then I have to really disagree with this. Let me preface my argument by saying that I think gameplay ALWAYS trumps "realism," but since you used a realism argument, I am going to use a realism argument back.
I don't think you need a realism argument.
It is pretty obvious that games can be designed without realism, and often so. In fact, there is no anger, hate or love in mobs. There is just an aggro counter that follows specific rules. Don't tell me that a simple count that acts on simple numerical damages is realistic.
And what does realism have to do with games? Invoking realism in a game where you cast fireballs to kill rats that drops broad swords is just silly.
Good discussion, though i think a lot is being glossed over in this thread.
The benefit of the trinity isn't in having roles. All RPGs have roles, as do most other games. The thing about the trinity is that it provides easily accessible, and easy to understand roles. Simply put, most people don't like having to figure out how to play their character. They prefer clearly defined and fewer choices. I know some people are going to disagree with this, but it's a well documented fact of human nature. Aka paradox of choice.
To use DotA as an example, one of the great things about that game is that the roles are actually much more flexible than people first realize. However, on the surface, it tells you exactly how (you're supposed) to play your character. By contrast, Guild Wars also has a ton of flexibility, but does a very poor job of telling people how to play their character.
This permeates into combat, where I see a lot of complaints about non-trinity games being 'too chaotic'. The thing is, actual combat IS chaotic. There's nothing neat or organized about a war, a battle, or a skirmish. Even in historical battles, where they tried to organize their groups into neat formations, the second swords started clashing that all fell apart and turned into a massive chaotic mess.
This doesn't mean that there is no strategy, thought, or skill involved. An assumption I see a lot of people make. On the contrary much of the fun comes from creating order out of chaos. From outsmarting the general melee and creating your own advantages. This is something the trinity cannot provide, because it centers around structuring combat in a (very) artificial manner. Combat can never get too crazy, because the dynamic must allow for tanks to tank. For healers to stay alive and heal. And for DPS / CC to end the fights before resources exhaust. Furthermore, they can't make healers too tanky, or the DPS / CC too strong, or else it minimizes the need for a tank.
Essentially, the trinity is nice and easy to understand. And therefor successful. But there are also those of us that enjoy more challenging gameplay. That enjoy complex mechanics, and dynamic problems that require more thought. And that is something that even the best trinity games can't really provide. This isn't to say that all trinity games are easy, but they are deliberately simplified in order to be accessible.
I actually think that the "common knowledge" argument that people want easily accessible, easy to understand roles may not be true. Instead, I think it's most important that roles be clearly differentiated from one another. And oddly enough, I think DOTA 2 is a good example of this.
Consider this...if you ask 5 DOTA 2 players what a "carry" is, you will probably get 5 similar answers that all sounds something like:
"The carry needs to get farm and be 'carried' by his team early game, but then he snowballs out of control and 'carries' his team in the late game."
HOWEVER, if you proceed to question them about the specifics of how a carry plays, you will probably get widely varying answers. For example...
"Should a carry try to gank early game?"
--Yes, you can get a lot of farm from ganking so go for it.
--No, you put yourself at risk by ganking, you should just farm the jungle/lanes and let your supports protect you.
"Should a carry get hand of midas to help late game farm?"
--Yes, with midas you will significantly increase your late game power and it will help you snowball.
--No, midas puts you way behind in the early game and leaves you very vulnerable to ganking.
...
The truth is that any of the answers above are potentially valid, but they all depend on several factors such as the hero you pick, how you choose to play that hero, you team makeup, the enemy team makeup, your and the enemies' strategic choices etc...
So I would hardly call DOTA 2 roles easy to understand and definitely not easily accessible. They ARE however very clearly differentiated from one another. Regardless of how you play your carry, you know you will be trying to get exp and gold way more than a support. But good luck clearly explaining how to play a carry to someone who has never played DOTA 2 before .
On the other hand, it is extremely simple to explain how to play a tank, healer or DPS.
Tank: Make sure all the monsters are hitting you all the time.
Healer: Make sure the bars don't reach the bottom.
Problem is that its not possible to remove "aggro management"
Its like saying ,we removed anger,hate and love from world.
So are you arguing that removing "aggro management" from games is unrealistic because it removes the "emotion" from monsters?
If so...then I have to really disagree with this. Let me preface my argument by saying that I think gameplay ALWAYS trumps "realism," but since you used a realism argument, I am going to use a realism argument back.
I don't think you need a realism argument.
It is pretty obvious that games can be designed without realism, and often so. In fact, there is no anger, hate or love in mobs. There is just an aggro counter that follows specific rules. Don't tell me that a simple count that acts on simple numerical damages is realistic.
And what does realism have to do with games? Invoking realism in a game where you cast fireballs to kill rats that drops broad swords is just silly.
I generally agree, but it's funny because this topic is tricky.
No one is going to have a problem with fireballs and huge demons in a fantasy game. However, people will likely have a problem with characters in a fantasy game that act completely unrealistically, or a magic system that just completely changes its rules at anytime to suit what the author is trying to do.
This is because we expect even fantasy worlds to be internally consistent. What this means is that it's fine to define whatever fantastic rules for your world you want...BUT YOU BETTER STICK TO THOSE RULES.
You can't say that mages draw upon their own life force to cast spells, but then have a mage cast a huge spell 5 pages later with no ill effects.
Likewise, in exception for the established "fantasy" aspect of the world, we expect the world to behave pretty much like ours. Sure there are wizards that can shoot fireballs, but this doesn't mean that the author can kill a character off and just inexplicably bring him back to life in the next paragraph. We expect death to be permanent, because that is how it works in real life...UNLESS of course resurrection is incorporated into the fantasy aspect of the world and explained to the reader in a way that doesn't destroy their suspension of disbelief.
Anyway...my point is that you can't use the fact that a game/book is "fantasy" as a get out of jail free card to explain anything that is "unrealistic" in the world. If you do, the reader will lose interest because it will seem that there are no rules to the world, thus there is no tension and no danger because anything can just randomly happen. A good fantasy author will very carefully design the world to have its own rules and laws of physics, that are adhered to just as rigidly as they are in the real world.
Comments
But what kind of system is that.
Sure if monster int is 0 ,its actions are based on its reflexes.
But if its like 1 for example,lets say angry cat who is attacking me,and i give him catfood(detaunt) and he starts to love me.
And then my friend kicks it and cat might run away or attack (cojones roll 1d6 vs int) my friend.
So, did ESO have a successful launch? Yes, yes it did.By Ryan Getchell on April 02, 2014.
**On the radar: http://www.cyberpunk.net/ **
Oh that's pretty easy....but you need to be able to do things like collision detection, zones of control and opportunity attacks, etc.
"aggro management" was the early computer games solution to "I don't want to deal with collision detection" or try to understand the spatial relationship between objects in the game world. However it's not difficult for a game to do that IF it wants to....it raises some other types of issues...but it is doable. Just many games choose not to do it because it's not they way it has been done in previous games and it forces a bit more thought and teamwork out of the players which many aren't used to do.
No it' would be the "Madden Football" type of system where as much you might want to get to the quarterback, you can't if there is a blocker physicaly interposing himself between you and your goal.
Even in maddens football you have anger management ,there they use their eyes and ears and bodylanguage.
See this cat hates me for a reason,it might be the way i look or something that i told him,people does that in sports too.
Theres a reason why its good to "stay calm"
So, did ESO have a successful launch? Yes, yes it did.By Ryan Getchell on April 02, 2014.
**On the radar: http://www.cyberpunk.net/ **
aside from the tank not showing up, most of the other problems with the trinity exist because the games have become so easy that you don't need roles. you don't even need a tank in a lot of trinity games anymore until endgame. you never need to CC anything anymore, and you can heal 0-80 in wow with renew. buffs are completely homogenized so there is no buff role anymore, and who needs buffs, the content is too easy to even care about buffs.
the whole thing has been gutted down to stupidity levels. probably why gw2 is so heralded. it plays the same as 1-80 in wow .. just faceroll zerg after faceroll zerg, and it doesn't have much of an endgame, which is the only point where you need real tanking and healing in trinity games. wow could probably just make tanking and healing a secondary thought at endgame for raiding and no one would even notice.
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
Good discussion, though i think a lot is being glossed over in this thread.
The benefit of the trinity isn't in having roles. All RPGs have roles, as do most other games. The thing about the trinity is that it provides easily accessible, and easy to understand roles. Simply put, most people don't like having to figure out how to play their character. They prefer clearly defined and fewer choices. I know some people are going to disagree with this, but it's a well documented fact of human nature. Aka paradox of choice.
To use DotA as an example, one of the great things about that game is that the roles are actually much more flexible than people first realize. However, on the surface, it tells you exactly how (you're supposed) to play your character. By contrast, Guild Wars also has a ton of flexibility, but does a very poor job of telling people how to play their character.
This permeates into combat, where I see a lot of complaints about non-trinity games being 'too chaotic'. The thing is, actual combat IS chaotic. There's nothing neat or organized about a war, a battle, or a skirmish. Even in historical battles, where they tried to organize their groups into neat formations, the second swords started clashing that all fell apart and turned into a massive chaotic mess.
This doesn't mean that there is no strategy, thought, or skill involved. An assumption I see a lot of people make. On the contrary much of the fun comes from creating order out of chaos. From outsmarting the general melee and creating your own advantages. This is something the trinity cannot provide, because it centers around structuring combat in a (very) artificial manner. Combat can never get too crazy, because the dynamic must allow for tanks to tank. For healers to stay alive and heal. And for DPS / CC to end the fights before resources exhaust. Furthermore, they can't make healers too tanky, or the DPS / CC too strong, or else it minimizes the need for a tank.
Essentially, the trinity is nice and easy to understand. And therefor successful. But there are also those of us that enjoy more challenging gameplay. That enjoy complex mechanics, and dynamic problems that require more thought. And that is something that even the best trinity games can't really provide. This isn't to say that all trinity games are easy, but they are deliberately simplified in order to be accessible.
While I agree that many of these games have become way too easy, what you are suggesting is a gross exaggeration.
Trinity games still require healing (and tanking). Especially at end game. It's mostly the mechanics that have been dumbed down.
Furthermore, 'zerging' has nothing to do with trinity game play. Compare dynamic events in GW2, with public quests in WAR, with FATES in FFXI, or Rifts in RIFT, and you will see that they all can get pretty zergy. Zerging is a biproduct of a game having many players in one space. Nothing more. If you want to truly play MMOs (massively multiplayer), then zerging is something you're going to have to get used to. People will always bunch together when able, regardless of how much the game tries to dissuade them not to.
The reason why GW2 is heralded is for a number of reasons. Mostly, it legitimately solves a lot of the problems with the trinity (even though that's also a reason why a lot of people don't like it). It allows players to create their own roles via class customization, giving players the choice to either try and play into defined roles, or to come up w/ more creative builds. It also gets rid of a lot of annoying things most trinity games have like mob tagging & fighting over loot.
Essentially it's just a very different kind of MMO, and a lot of people wanted that.
Hate to be pedantic and slightly off-topic here, but if you follow the rules to the letter there are some skill/ability checks which could be used to force the enemy to attack you instead of your friend. Bluff for example or Bardic Knowledge (come up with the right insult). There's also the Suggestion and Mass Suggestion spells which could be used exactly how taunting operates in MMORPGs. The rules are pretty vague in such things, although DM can always override those rules.
I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been -Wayne Gretzky
The items listed as "the bad" don't apply to trinity because those are the same "bad" issues as appear in a non-trinity setup as well.
1. In non-trinity all players are dps and therefore all are doing the same rotation over and over. Trinity at least gives more variety in gameplay by offering different roles.
2. No tank = no raid is better than Raid = zergfest; besides in a non-trinity game raids will rely on raid leaders to coordinate the tough parts, and you still have the problem of no raid leader = no raid.
3. Encounters are even less dynamic in non-trinity. Players just doing their rotation over and over again. You can't criticize trinity for getting old until you can prove other systems have encounters that never get old. It doesn't exist.
Not only should games have trinity, but they should have (and most older MMO's do) multiple roles required for all difficult encounters. CC and Barding(buffing/de-buffing roles) are two big ones that should be built-in requirements.
I would submit most FPS or RTS games....or even PnP games demonstrate that to be inaccurate. "Non-Trinity" doesn't mean an absence of specialization or roles (though some games do go that way), it simply means that the specialization and roles are different then the standard "Tank, Healer, DPS" presented within the Trinity.
Ah but you are assuming that we would just remove the trinity but not replace it with anything.
I am not suggesting we do that, in fact my major point was that a combat system that creates specialized team-roles such as the Trinity, is a must. However, as we have discussed, the Trinity is not perfect. I would like to see another, more dynamic, team-combat-dynamic system that still promotes specialized roles, but avoids the problems many folks have with the Trinity.
There have been a number of ideas in this thread for a system like that. Not fully fleshed out of course, just concepts.
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
Yes, beat me to it, thanks
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Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
Thats even better and makes sense,which is the problem because many peeps thinks that "taunt" is a skill somekind of magic which only taunts.
But i still prefer brutal methods if its necessary,i shoot orc-mages wife in front of his eyes for example and most likely he will attack me in few seconds.
So, did ESO have a successful launch? Yes, yes it did.By Ryan Getchell on April 02, 2014.
**On the radar: http://www.cyberpunk.net/ **
I like chaos asswell. it gives my job as a tank purpose. trying to control that chaos. But when games have no threat, when you are unable to control that chaos (as soon as your stun or taunt runs out the mob goes cya and runs off to a healer again) that annoys the crap out of me. stuff like that can be implemented into an encounter. but then it wouldnt be random anymore and yet again scripted. thus repetative.
First of all, My apology for my laziness for doing doing multiple quoting from some of the previous poster (as I agree to certain points of some of the posters made). I'll also like to ask for your patient to at least read all of what I say before you just quote a certain sentence and "sentence me to dead". I'll try to summarize my thought below and not make this into a wall of words.
Is Holy Trinity needed, I would say YES, but do we need to get back to the good old days trinity formation, that is a NO. Basically, those who support trinity is in favor of "group" and those that are not is in favor for "solo" contents. But, can we have them both, i believe so (I'll state it below). It's just that everyone is just voicing their opinion without giving a thought for a solution and insisting everyone listen to them without providing an alternative is not helping to solve the situation.
yes for trinity - in order to be a group play, it is needed. No trinity is just a zerg fest (humanoid A.I. ... maybe in future, but not realistic as of now). Question is, trinity is not good for solo for a certain class, as they can do nothing without a group, which is not an entertainment for them if they can only just sit there and watch the chatbox. Furthermore, not everyone want to group for 24hrs, hence "force trinity" for group and no solo choices is really not very attractive. Previous Trinity system work for group only plus it will stuck you in a one dimension role. You are like forever doing the same thing =_= which is limited. For me, trinity is a system, role is what your played in the group.
Hence, the solution for the situation above is not that hard to fix. Certain game (or certain class but not all) has already implemented it, so I will not said I have the unique thought. Simple fix is just have every class having 2 different stance or role (when u switch to different focus, u can't be that effective in the other focus). I class them into 4 categories of class type (from a group perspective and simple version).
1) healer = main focus is heal as usual, but can switch to dps focus if wanted. (like, in solo time or there is already healer in the group)
2) tank = main focus is tank but melee focus if you want
3) CC = main is CC but dps if u choose
4) DPS = main is dps but with utility with CC if need.
This way, all class is not fix in an one dimensional version for "life" and u can switch to what u need to be in order to better suit your role in your group or ... etc . (i deeply believe this system will have more tank/healer players because it will not hidden your solo or dps if they choose to want it).
We are talking about MMORPG games, not FPS or RTS. I differ on your additional comments because most discussions of non-trinity explicitly require that there are no needs for tanks, or healers, per se. I would also like to add that most MMORPG games that have trinity almost always include the need for additional roles of CC, buffs, pullers, etc. so any argument against trinity is essentially an argument against the entire genre of games that have the tank, healer, CC, dps and special roles. The reason the genre is simplified by calling it the trinity is because in all group content you need at minimum one tank, one healer and one dps, but in the same games the more difficult group content will fail without including one CC and one group buffer.
But I don't think you can really say that the trinity is a defining part of the "genre." It is just a combat dynamic. There are plenty of MMORPGs without the holy trinity that are still very much, MMORPGs.
My point in this thread is that the trinity IS basically a good thing, and its presence is generally better than its complete absence. It brings specialized roles to combat, which makes it an actual team affair and makes it more interesting.
HOWEVER, we need to stop looking at the trinity as something that's black or white...you either have it or you don't and then there is just chaos.
I contend that you can still have specialized roles, but NOT implement them as the traditional "tank and spank" trinity.
We need to stop looking at this as you are either pro-trinity and anti-change, or anti-trinity and pro-chaos.
Why not try to think of a cool new way to implement specialized roles that avoids all the problems of the trinity?
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
There are good games without trinity and bad games with trinity. We all know and see that every day. We see people comparing games that are so far from the standard 1st/3rd person character slashing/shooting at mobs.
IMHO trinity is not the limiting factor, it adds new layers of difficulty. Yes devs are lazy and they do make tank and spank fights. But when the devs get creative and start to make content that doesn't require tanks, or requires people to do different things, that's when you see any system is good.
I'd say, have a look at Vanguard. The raids started out being pretty much tank and spank with a few tricks that changed from time to time. But as the game progressed and Ikik started to make new raid targets, you saw how the trinity got pushed to the limit. No longer were fights just tank and spank. You had to run out while leaving someone behind, you had to dual tank so when the big finishing move happened the offtank could take over the mob and fight him down to the last few percentage, just in time before the offtank died (thanks Silius for this great fight). You had the keepers for your epic weapon, who dind't follow traditional boring attack, you had to do different things, people had to focus on different jobs. People were forced to do things their role didn't dictate them to do.
Mobs force roles on players and players use skills to fill those roles.
Why do I hate the dps role, well very simple. You want a system where everyone can opt to dps rather than their primary job. If they chose to dps and beat let's say a rogue who can only dps, why bring a rogue if you could have someone who could change on the fly to an offtank or full tank with a change of gear for example.
You want to prevent that from happening, because if that happens the rogue gets envious, he will want to deal more dps, because he is 1D and can't fill another role, then the warrior gets envious because he can only join groups for tanks etc. etc. This will continue until you remove 1D classes or give 1D classes a primary new role and add dps as secondary roll for everyone.
The problems of trinity aren't trinity's fault. The devs got lazy and started thinking in 1D and started making it so you needed trinity, look at WoW. When they realized the problem, they didn't fix it, they made all the tanks the same, all the healers the same. The problem was that now they all had trinity problems, but at least they shared it between more classes. If you would give players either 2 roles, or 2 classes they have to level and play both roles/classes at end game, they could switch between dps and another role all the time. I think EQN is trying to achieve this and that's why they have a chance of succeeding. If they go to GW2 route, I'm afraid of what could happen.
I think trinity is only thing comparable to natural life. No one can be at same time best surgeon, best astronaut, best pilot, .... etc. Specialization is necessary.
The only reason I could hate holy trinity is when I have as dps to wait half hour to hour to enter in some instance. Some classes are by design dps only, nothing to do here. But in general tanking and healing is much harder then just dps-ing and for many less fun.
If you want interesting group fights then players need interesting group abilities. Not all players want group fights of course and even those that do might not like how *rigid* a fixed role system like the Trinity is.
Personally i like the idea of tactical group fights but don't like how rigid the trinity is so i'd prefer a system where a class had a set of abilities some of which were only useful in groups e.g. a warrior having a guard ability which they put on another player giving that other player a defense boost if they stay within range of the warrior, or a distraction ability they can use to give a bonus to a rogue's attack.
Ideally (for me) players would select skills and abilities from a big skill tree as they progressed and one branch would have "tank" skills and another would have solo melee skills and players could mix and match according to their preference. This way players that liked group fights could tailor their character to that while solo players could ignore the tank branch of the skill tree completely and make their guy a solo fighter only.
Good post. As long as the combat is involving and interactive with each person having their role, whether or not you have trinity should be inconsequential. However, when thinking of other role systems that do not rely on the aggro system being abused, you definitely need to consider fluidity of the game or the game's going to turn into either chaos or turn-based as players need to feel they are in control.
Two aspects worth considering would be making intertwining support and cc via making both of those more about short time buffs and with collision detection blend dps and cc. Ultimately it all starts with a more intelligent aggro mechanism, but that might be kinda off topic. Definitely there are plenty of approaches to find and I have no doubt some of them could prove a lot of fun, if some company wants to take the risk and try things out a bit.
I'm a bit bored so I'll list some quick outlines of possible roles that could work with a revamped aggro and weak/no taunt mechanism:
-support: all heals and buffs are from 3 to 30 seconds. speed buffs, specialized buffs for certain situations, cleansings. low self survivability, but decent aoe, but lowish single target dmg. get's automatically most info from the state of allies. can rez.
-cc: environmental debuffs that affect areas from smallish to the whole vicinity affecting also allies and self, effect of debuffs depend on current environment. decent single target, but lowish aoe dmg, decent/high survivability but no heals. get's most info from opponents. can rez.
-dps: decent survivability, good dmg and dodging (depending on range), single target short time debuffs and attacks of opportunities. get's almost no info from other but current target (including own pt:P, no hp bars or notifications). can't rez.
And that's it. Of course some hybrids could be worked in. The outlines could be divided into classes and there is no mention of itemization (melee/ranged, pets etc) or anything else, but just some rough outlining. However, it was quite fun to think of them:) Not to say they would avoid all the problems of trinity tho, but I guess I would dare say that with correct balance and variation on cc and resistance, it could be made more interactive and fluid. Naturally it could be botched easily too:)
So are you arguing that removing "aggro management" from games is unrealistic because it removes the "emotion" from monsters?
If so...then I have to really disagree with this. Let me preface my argument by saying that I think gameplay ALWAYS trumps "realism," but since you used a realism argument, I am going to use a realism argument back.
Aggro management, as it is implemented in MMORPGs is insanely unrealistic lol. Just imagine this, you are a lightly armored soldier in a real medieval war. You find yourself approached by a hulking knight in full plate, and an archer wearing padded armor.
Now, you KNOW that there is no way you can penetrate the hulking knight's armor, but he is so slow that he will never catch you if you just avoid him. You also know that the archer can easily kill you if you don't take him out fast, but you think you can rush him before he can get a shot off.
So the easy choice here is to go for the archer and then just disengage right? Not in an MMORPG!
In an MMORPG, the hulking knight will stand there bashing his shield and insulting your mother and you will rush right at him, swinging at him in futility, only to be shot in the back. No real soldier that isn't mentally deficient would ever make this decision. They would let the hulking knight stand there spouting insults, kill the archer, and run away.
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
I don't think you need a realism argument.
It is pretty obvious that games can be designed without realism, and often so. In fact, there is no anger, hate or love in mobs. There is just an aggro counter that follows specific rules. Don't tell me that a simple count that acts on simple numerical damages is realistic.
And what does realism have to do with games? Invoking realism in a game where you cast fireballs to kill rats that drops broad swords is just silly.
I actually think that the "common knowledge" argument that people want easily accessible, easy to understand roles may not be true. Instead, I think it's most important that roles be clearly differentiated from one another. And oddly enough, I think DOTA 2 is a good example of this.
Consider this...if you ask 5 DOTA 2 players what a "carry" is, you will probably get 5 similar answers that all sounds something like:
"The carry needs to get farm and be 'carried' by his team early game, but then he snowballs out of control and 'carries' his team in the late game."
HOWEVER, if you proceed to question them about the specifics of how a carry plays, you will probably get widely varying answers. For example...
"Should a carry try to gank early game?"
--Yes, you can get a lot of farm from ganking so go for it.
--No, you put yourself at risk by ganking, you should just farm the jungle/lanes and let your supports protect you.
"Should a carry get hand of midas to help late game farm?"
--Yes, with midas you will significantly increase your late game power and it will help you snowball.
--No, midas puts you way behind in the early game and leaves you very vulnerable to ganking.
...
The truth is that any of the answers above are potentially valid, but they all depend on several factors such as the hero you pick, how you choose to play that hero, you team makeup, the enemy team makeup, your and the enemies' strategic choices etc...
So I would hardly call DOTA 2 roles easy to understand and definitely not easily accessible. They ARE however very clearly differentiated from one another. Regardless of how you play your carry, you know you will be trying to get exp and gold way more than a support. But good luck clearly explaining how to play a carry to someone who has never played DOTA 2 before
.
On the other hand, it is extremely simple to explain how to play a tank, healer or DPS.
Tank: Make sure all the monsters are hitting you all the time.
Healer: Make sure the bars don't reach the bottom.
DPS: Kill the main target.
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
I generally agree, but it's funny because this topic is tricky.
No one is going to have a problem with fireballs and huge demons in a fantasy game. However, people will likely have a problem with characters in a fantasy game that act completely unrealistically, or a magic system that just completely changes its rules at anytime to suit what the author is trying to do.
This is because we expect even fantasy worlds to be internally consistent. What this means is that it's fine to define whatever fantastic rules for your world you want...BUT YOU BETTER STICK TO THOSE RULES.
You can't say that mages draw upon their own life force to cast spells, but then have a mage cast a huge spell 5 pages later with no ill effects.
Likewise, in exception for the established "fantasy" aspect of the world, we expect the world to behave pretty much like ours. Sure there are wizards that can shoot fireballs, but this doesn't mean that the author can kill a character off and just inexplicably bring him back to life in the next paragraph. We expect death to be permanent, because that is how it works in real life...UNLESS of course resurrection is incorporated into the fantasy aspect of the world and explained to the reader in a way that doesn't destroy their suspension of disbelief.
Anyway...my point is that you can't use the fact that a game/book is "fantasy" as a get out of jail free card to explain anything that is "unrealistic" in the world. If you do, the reader will lose interest because it will seem that there are no rules to the world, thus there is no tension and no danger because anything can just randomly happen. A good fantasy author will very carefully design the world to have its own rules and laws of physics, that are adhered to just as rigidly as they are in the real world.
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?