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What, exactly, is wrong with instanced dungeons?
rikilii
Member UncommonPosts: 1,084
I can think of several reasons why instanced dungeons are a good thing, but few, if any, why they are bad.
Someone care to explain?
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im to lazy too use grammar or punctuation good
Comments
I'm trying really hard to find reasons why instanced dungeons are bad, but I can't really find any.
Having a place you can go do with a small group of buddies, without being bothered by a bunch of other people, is rather nice.
That's what I think, but members of these forums seem to have an irrational hatred for them.
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im to lazy too use grammar or punctuation good
Makes me feel like im playing a single player game, theirs no one else around doing anything interesting.
Instances more often than not have a single path/objective, I prefer an open zone in which I can decide where I want to go, how im going to get there, and what im going to do. Instances have a pre set goal and path.
Its not that instances are bad like they're glitchy or anything, but it prevents you from being able to interact with other players as you would be able to in a non-instanced area/game. Its nice for me personally to run around a zone, perhaps see someone who needs help clearing a particular camp for a quest, and deciding id like to help the guy.
If you don't like to interact with others, instances are right up your alley, but for the rest of us we prefer an open zone.
He said dungeons not zones
instanced dungeons are fun if you like diablo2, but if you want to ambush someone and pk the crap outa em or claim a dungeon for your own and pretend your the lord of the dungeon you can't exactly do that now can ya, i think instancing is okay for something likc a city as in WAR but too much of it feels like a guild wars, a cop out if your paying 15 bucks a month its just a way for them to save on server bandwidth, it can be fun i guess i just kinda prefer an mmorpg thats a fully open world, same with player housing, i'd only like it if it were non-instanced, can't roleplay with it, use it as a way to ambush someone if nobody else can see or interact with it, what can I say I like ambushing.
--- Razimus
because other people shouldnt need to be avoided in an MMO. Other players should make the game, not just be there when you bank and check your mail.
I like instanced dungeons because you don't have to compete with other groups for the mob you have to kill or other quest items you need that a mob drops. Plus it kinda kills immersion if your have to wait for a group to kill the mob and wait again for it to respawn.
He said dungeons not zones
My mistake,
but the same idea can be applied to dungeons as well, I would also add to it that its so much easier to get a group inside a dungeon that isn't instanced, and again, the freedom of setting goals for you and/or your group within the dungeon.
Kills immersion.
Defeats purpose of a MASSIVELY multiplayer online rpg. Any feature that negates the massive part of an mmorpg is a strike against the game for me.
I recall Vanguard had some open dungeon stuff, which wasn't really fun, as stated above, People would just stand in line to kill X mob. Personally that is not my idea of a good way to spend my online hours.
But then again I can see why open dungeons would be 'fun' in a PvP ganking game.
I think the only way that non instanced dungeons wont kill immersion is if they are really big and the main mobs respawn in random locations and chests do as well. But to do some PvP in there would be fun or to kill of a group that was killing this mob and you take it from them.
What kills immersion is getting a mission to infiltrate a fortress and kill a boss. Upon arriving to the location you see the place is camped to the brim with a line of people waiting for the boss. THAT is the bane of massively multiplayer games.
Then to add salt in the wound, you got idiots hopping around like kangaroos and other idtios spamming the dance emote while they scream random #$%^. JUST THINKING ABOUT IT MAKES ME SO FRIGGIN MAD!!!
I would rather take my team of 6 people, enter an instanced dungeon, and face a challenging guantlet of enemies before reaching a potential hard eopic battle with a boss. That is what I call immersive gaming. Not waitin in line for an easy kill on an easy 8 man boss that 50 other people will help you with.
This baffles me...because it is soooo immersive to be going out to kill the Big Bad Dragon and you tell your friend..."hey we are killin the BBD"....."Hey so are we!"....."Yea my other friends group just killed him 5min ago for the 2nd time today"......but how is he here in front of us if he has already been killed today? twice....
Instanced dungeons take away from the MASSIVELY part of MMO and it really brings the game into easymode.
~~
Darkfall Releases on: February 25th, 2009
Darkfall Recap of everything that has happened the last 3 months: http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/213296
"The monsters are tough. I was looking for a challenge, but these things are just too damn smart." -DF Beta Tester
"If people were dismissing it, then they wouldn't be talking about it. The well-meaning gamers root for efforts that try to raise the bar. So who's left? It's so easy being a skeptic." -Tasos
What kills immersion is getting a mission to infiltrate a fortress and kill a boss. Upon arriving to the location you see the place is camped to the brim with a line of people waiting for the boss. THAT is the bane of massively multiplayer games.
Then to add salt in the wound, you got idiots hopping around like kangaroos and other idtios spamming the dance emote while they scream random #$%^. JUST THINKING ABOUT IT MAKES ME SO FRIGGIN MAD!!!
I would rather take my team of 6 people, enter an instanced dungeon, and face a challenging guantlet of enemies before reaching a potential hard eopic battle with a boss. That is what I call immersive gaming. Not waitin in line for an easy kill on an easy 8 man boss that 50 other people will help you with.
Yup that is frustrating...but thats what happens on PVE servers. Which is why a lot of people are begging for PVP games because it makes the experience 10000x more realistic, challenging, and satisfying when you accomplish something. Anyone can read up on how to kill a raid boss, take some guys in there and punch the same buttons over and over....but trust me that same group will have a lot more fun and will be more satisfied with their time spent if they felt challenege and had to be aware of third party influences
~~
Darkfall Releases on: February 25th, 2009
Darkfall Recap of everything that has happened the last 3 months: http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/213296
"The monsters are tough. I was looking for a challenge, but these things are just too damn smart." -DF Beta Tester
"If people were dismissing it, then they wouldn't be talking about it. The well-meaning gamers root for efforts that try to raise the bar. So who's left? It's so easy being a skeptic." -Tasos
I enjoy both kinds tbh,The thing that is very important with open dungeons is the community.
In Vanguard when I played I found it great,If we were in dungeon and heading to the boss if a group came from behind us they would simply ask to give them a whisper when we were done,not like in some game's I can mention were people would then try to beat you to the kill.
Instanced dungeons I also find good fun if you have a group of friends,I have seen myself messing around in a dungeon for hours and no not always just to get uber loot but also just because we were having a great laugh.
If someone had came up to me in 1980 when I was on my Atari 2600 and said we will be playing games with thousands of people at the same time.I guess my response would have been,"but I only have 2 joysticks"
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/235780/page/8
Well, a few gigantic un instanced dungeons work fine but there are lotsa of bad things with open dungeons, ever got killed cause the last survivor of another group drags 20 mobs right into your boss fight? Ever waited in line for a boss only to have some snot faced guy steal it just as it appears?
I remeber in Eq2 on the PvP server I use to play, high levels camps out the dungeons and kill everyone entering. So you could wait until you are so high so the dungeon will be too easy or get ganked with your whole group for hours. Not fun, yes I played on a PvP server for the rush but dungeons were just useless there since you could either gank noobs, get ganked or farm for stuff way under your level.
An open dungeon will have to have several exits, be really huge with several possible ways and lots of bosses. High pop rating is a must too and no stupid placeholders. Smaller dungeons are better instanced.
Instanced dungeons dont belong to a MMO, a game with thousands of players at the same time. Instanced dungeons handle 5 or 6 people at the same time (at max).
Maybe instanced dungeons offer the same content for all gamers (because everyone gets its own instance) and maybe they can offer more atmosphere, but a game with instanced dungeons is no MMO.
Clearing a dungeon with 2 or more groups at the same time does not make it easier? Certainly when waiting groups are bored waiting and take on the respawn or adds.
Um, no....that's what happens when you instance. The way to avoid the immersion breaker of multiple people killing same boss in the same time frame is to not instance it, and make spawn times long.
What kills immersion is getting a mission to infiltrate a fortress and kill a boss. Upon arriving to the location you see the place is camped to the brim with a line of people waiting for the boss. THAT is the bane of massively multiplayer games.
Then to add salt in the wound, you got idiots hopping around like kangaroos and other idtios spamming the dance emote while they scream random #$%^. JUST THINKING ABOUT IT MAKES ME SO FRIGGIN MAD!!!
I would rather take my team of 6 people, enter an instanced dungeon, and face a challenging guantlet of enemies before reaching a potential hard eopic battle with a boss. That is what I call immersive gaming. Not waitin in line for an easy kill on an easy 8 man boss that 50 other people will help you with.
What kills immersion is the fact that stupid people actually enjoy quests where you "infiltrate a fortress and kill a boss". Conventional quests are retarded. It has nothing to do with instancing or lack there of, it has to do with people like you gobbling up this retarded non-immersive bullshit left and right.
It is not immersive to have multiple instances of the same place in the world. You have no idea what the hell you're talking about. You're confusing "immersion" with "bullshit."
Instanced dungeons shatters the community into pieces.
Every player with a guild is playing with his guild and noone else. Players tend to live/play in autarcy.
If you dont have a guild or if your guild is stuck in dungeon X for Y reasons (bad attendance, not geared enough, etc...) you cannot go into other dungeons, just for the fun of exploring it, while other guilds beat the mobs.
With instanced dungeons, Devs tend to create gimmick fights. Which is fun, as long as you havent found the gimmick, then it quickly becomes very repetitive and boring. But, since you're spoiling yourself (or your guild or your raid leader or your guildmate is spoiling you, you cannot prevent that), the gimmick do not have to be discovered, unless you're living in a world-first guild.
It defeats the purpose of a massively multiplayer game. A mmorpg with instanced dungeons is more like a gamespy chat with few servers. The chat is the mmorpg's world, servers are the instanced dungeons. Once you enter the dungeon you're playing a multiplayer game, not a massively multiplayer game.
Well.. I don't like waiting. I never considered waitng in RL as having fun and I don't like waiting in game. When arriving at a boss and there's like 2 groups waiting allready and long respawn time, you know you won't be going anywhere else the first few hours.
I recall playing Vanguard. There was this spider cave. A large spider on it's back, fog near the entrace. And then I entered to see at least 20 peeps inside. WOW, thats scary. No mob, no danger, no framerate. From time to time there was respawn and it was killed instantly. For me this kills immersion and having fun.
You seem to forget that sharing of raid boss strategies didn't start until WoW. There was a specific event that started the entire trend. Early in WoW's life, Blizzard banned a top guild for pulling a raid boss to a zone line. This was common practice in MMO raiding in EQ, and the raid dungeon was designed by an ex-EQ developer. Everyone assumed this was OK, since creative pulling tactics were commonplace before WoW. Without warning, Blizzard banned the guild, and said all raid mobs were meant to be killed where they spawned. There was a huge uproar on the forums, and in retaliation, the guild started releasing raid strategies. Raid progression was trivialized and sped up. There are quotes from Blizzard devs from back then that the entire practice of sharing raid strats was completely unexpected, and changed how they designed encounters. This is part of the reason why WoW is so gear dependant today.
If a game has challenging raid encounters with non-obvious strategies for winning, and killing the bosses actually mean something in the game, guilds wont share the strats. EQ achieved this by not instancing dungeons and giving bosses long spawn times. I'm sure there are plenty better ways...just giving an example that worked in the past. I have a great memory of following another guild as they cleared a dungeon on the way to a raid mob invisible on my enchanter so I could watch and report to the GM on how they killed the boss. The info I gathered helped us finally kill the boss.
I totally agree that people are looking to pvp for a real challenge in MMO's again, but pvp is not the only way.
Yep sorry, I misquoted.
The whole point of MMORPG's is shared experiences and recognition by peers of one's own accomplishments. Therefore, when you have some instanced event, the rest of the MMORPG community on your server does not see your heroics not do you see theirs. In other words, your actions might as well have been played out offline in a single player RPG.
What instancing does is keep folks from stepping on one another's toes or arguing over camp spots. However, the gain does not make up for the loss in immersion and overall fun.
I have played plenty of both, instanced and non-instanced dungeons, in 9 years of MMORPG gaming, and some of my non-instanced experiences, I have remembered for years. All of my instanced dungeon experiences are forgotten the next day.