Dungeon Instances

[Jefka]

no having \"one dungeon per team/guild\" entering it is just nasty, for all the community reasons

However somene mentionned the fact that popular dungeons could be overcrowed, and I think this is true : I don\'t want to meet more adventurers around the corners of each gloomy path of the dungeon, I still need monsters to gain xp ; if everybody hunt these monsters, o my god, what\'s left to do in these dungeons

So possible solutions may be ( just react please ) :

- finally, making PS a \"not hunt for xp game\", where you may gain as much xp by being a merchant and making good trades as by being a fighter that kills monsters : if players can have real diverse way of aining xp, they won\'t \"overload\" the dungeons ; till then, all mmorpg I have seen often say : \"we give you maaaany possiblities\" but if you look further, you\'ll see that in the end you HAVE TO fight to progress in the game, because fighting is always more reawarded in xp ; that I think, allowing merchants, mages and so on, teachers etc... to do their job for AS MUCH XP AS the fighters killing monsters would avoid overcrowing and give a much broader gameplay to ps

- or simply put a limit for numbers of players inside, but that sounds crap to me

- or perhaps allow only mixed groups (like mage, fighter, healer and so on) to enter bigger dungeon, so that they have to find a team ; but that also is not \"natural\"


Honnestly as you may have guessed I really suggest the first solution...hopefully you\'ll react to it, especially developpers who are obviously the most involved in the games progress !

[zaphar]

Originally posted by Ravencrowe
URGH!!  The idea seemed like aces to me the way I thought of it, and the way I thought of it you missed the point entirely!

Outdoor areas and dungeons are very different. In an outdoor area (where there are monsters but they\'re spread about and instancing is not necessary at all), let\'s say you form the party. Then you go to the dungeon (thickly populated by monsters, where instancing is not necessary, but in this case is implemented). Your party is on their own. This would work if the rest of the game helped it work that way. For example, if you die in the dungeon and don\'t have a rezzer, maybe you get shot out of the dungeon and have to find your party again, but at no other penalty? The way I see it, if the dungeon is an instance for individuals and individual parties, that just opens up more possibilities for the dungeon\'s design.

When is a dungeon a community? When is a dungeon even a part of a community? When you\'re already in a party, you\'re enjoying the community of it. When you\'re soloing, and see another party, it only adds a community aspect if you want to join them. What are you doing soloing in a dungeon? You\'re either looking for a group there, or you want to fight alone with no one bothering you. The dungeon is instanced; here are YOUR monsters. Enjoy fighting them. Having the dungeon as your own or your party\'s own does not destroy the game\'s community aspect. It might limit it a little bit, but quite frankly I think MMORPGs nowadays sacrifice gameplay to focus too much on community. Besides, that \"destroying the community\" that you mention could be helped by adding good \"looking for group\" systems that cater toward dungeon exploring parties.

\"Good\" alligned players and \"Evil\" alligned players both deserve good gameplay. Plenty of world areas would be nice \"hang out spots\" for both of these people. When they get together, they might eventually decide they want to go to a dungeon. This is where it would get good if such an idea is implemented.

Implemented properly, this could prove to be a good idea.  A BAD idea, however, is a maximum occupancy. Is there ever a maximum occupancy for dungeons in these types of games? This would make groups very disappointed when they get to a dungeon and can\'t even go into it. Think of the possibilities of an idea before you shoot it down, please.

Actually I understood your intention completely. The following are some more of the results of your instanced dungeon. Say you arrive in the game and send out a shout to your regular group. They got here a little early and are in one of the dungeons. You head out to join them. whoops... ummm you can t seem to get in. Their dungeon is one of several instanced dungeons and you get a different instance when you enter.

Now granted there are several ways you could solve this. the party could exit the dungeon they just spent all this time working on so you all can enter together. Or perhaps when you enter the dungeon you recieve a list of all the instances with an offer to join one or creat a new one. However neither of these is really satisfactory no one wants to abandon a half finished dungeon. And if you can enter someone elses dungeon then the whole point of avoiding overcrowding and kill-stealing becomes moot cause anyone can come in. Perhaps you could set up password access to your dungeon? Hmmm..... this is beginning to sound suspicously like quake. log on find a server(or dungeon) and join it (with appropriate password if necessary) Now Quake and Unreal both have community but its not like the community you have in a MMORPG.

Lastly you still have not defined how you determine where a dungeon begins and a normal areas ends I mean the whole thing is one big cave. and some dungeons for me may actually be cities for another. If I am a dark and evil character then the dungeon may be where I built my house and buy my armor and sell my wares? furthermore the Cities may be dungeons for that same dark and evil character. The whole game is one big dungeon you can\'t point to one part and say thats a dungeon.

The way you describe it dungeons would be little RPG\'s inside of the Game and seperate. Heck if you want that get all your buddies to buy a 5 dollar copy of diablo and meet up there.

ps. sorry if I was too harsh in that last bit

[Vengeance]

Yes that is basically my feeling too.  If you want a \"special\" dungeon experience, play NWN or some other private game.  MMORPGs are a fundamentally different kind of interaction model from private worlds, and things like cleared out dungeons are a fact of life.

Also, keep in mind that things which from a player\'s perspective might suck, such as guild wars, or \"ninja dungeon clearing\", or whatever, to me as a game designer don\'t really suck.  :-)  I think all those types of player enforcement issues add to the problem solving requirements of the players and add to the meta-game going on in websites, blacklists, guild alliances, and that sort of thing--all of which I think are very interesting and add to gameplay in the long run.

Just my opinion,

- Venge

[Abemore]

Venge, I respect your opinion, and I remain neutral on the issue, but Zaphar\'s arguments are weak, and I have to challenge them.

That being said, let me break it down for you, Zaphar... you said...

Say you arrive in the game and send out a shout to your regular group. They got here a little early and are in one of the dungeons. You head out to join them. whoops... ummm you can t seem to get in. Their dungeon is one of several instanced dungeons and you get a different instance when you enter.

Reading back from my earlier post, \"WoW also allows one party to \"link\" to another party so they can join them in the same instance of a dungeon.\"  So you can assume group members would also join their group in the same instance, and parties, and guilds could join the rest of their groups as well.  Instancing only separates you in \"special area\'s\" from those you don\'t know.

you go on to say...

...you still have not defined how you determine where a dungeon begins and a normal areas ends I mean the whole thing is one big cave. and some dungeons for me may actually be cities for another.

There need not be a global definition of where a dungeon begins.  It can be subjective.  The developers would decide what area\'s they want instanced.  As I have suggested, Instanced area\'s can be separated from non-instanced area\'s by bird aviary type double doors, or perhaps \"S\" curves.  This way, you don\'t see ugly disappearing players as they transition.  

In the highly unlikely case that some dungeons double as player cities, then I strongly doubt any Dev would suggest instancing such an area.  As Ravencrowe said, dungeons are not community areas.  They are solitary lonely areas.  No Dev in his right mind would instance a community area, because that would undo the community aspect.  This is why non-community oriented dungeons are the only likely candidate for instancing.

Zaphar, you seem to be unable or unwilling to accept the possibility of Instancing as viable alternative for a MMORPG.  Well, Ravencrowe, myself, and the folks at Blizzard would have to disagree with you.

[Ravencrowe]

Abemore.  Let\'s leave and make our own MMORPG.  

I respect the opinion of Zaphar and Vengeance, but you gotta admit that replicating the dungeon for different adventurers opens up gameplay potentials that you just can\'t have when everyone has to share!

Also, this baked my noodle:

If I am a dark and evil character then the dungeon may be where I built my house and buy my armor and sell my wares?

This is where it looks like you missed the point.  When we\'re saying \"dungeon\" we mean a place where we as characters will go to explore treacherous, monster-ridden areas.  A dungeon with houses and merchants is not a \"dungeon\" in that sense.  I have an evil character on Dark Age of Camelot.  He likes to think of Darkness Falls, a dungeon, as his home.  There are demon merchants there.  Where there are merchants, there is an ecomomical activity.  In that sense, the dungeon aspect of Darkness Falls doesn\'t start until you pass the demon merchants.  That\'s where the rest of the world ends and the dungeon begins, that is to say, that\'s where the big arching double-doors would be placed where, upon entry, your party will be taken to its own little part of the dungeon.  Of course, a colossal dungeon (like Darkness Falls) would work better without instancing.  If we\'re talking quaint-sized winding caverns, then instancing would apply there.

My opinion.

[Abemore]

Originally posted by Ravencrowe
Abemore.  Let\'s leave and make our own MMORPG.  

Hey, I\'m neutral