Raid/6-man Timers (A definite problem in this game)

nikosk

nikosk

Dalayan Elder
Having returned from an instanced game after a year and a half and returning to this game.. I've always liked the non-instanced aspects of the Everquest style game. One of the reasons modern RPGs have shifted away from non-instanced raids is that it does not support casual gaming very well. Obviously one of the reasons for the non-instancing is that it's more profitable as you appeal to more people who actually have a life. Instancing is great in that you have competition and you mix all players socially into the gaming environment. Competition can be great fun too as you race to a mob. However, with how non-random spawn timers are on a day-by-day scale, it allows a group of people to monopolize content and block others.

Since coming back to the game, it appears that negative timers on content has been removed. That makes spawn times even less random. In order for more high end guilds to enjoy the game's gear for their characters, the spawn timers should be MORE random, not LESS. This probably should be done for 6-man also. With a few other people, I've monopolized so much 6-man content. It's fun, and it's good for us because we get the gear and tomes we need to drop, but it takes the enjoyment out of the game for others. If the timers were more random, then our ability to monopolize the content would be reduced. This should be done to 6-man and 18-man content. It definitely should be done to 18-man content.

If a particular mob is a 5 day spawn, why not make it 4-6 days instead. Yes, it might spawn more often RANDOMLY so there is a little less control on how often the loot is put into the game. A larger scale on the randomness allows more guilds and characters to enjoy the game's gear because it reduces the ability to monopolize. More people enjoy the game, more people keep playing this game. Do people leave the game because they don't get to obtain loot? Yes, that is definitely a factor in why some people leave the game. They put so much time into their game, yet other people monopolize spawns because they can plan to kill it. They can PLAN to kill it, and they can mark it on a specific day and time of the day on their calendar if they wanted to. That other group of people doesn't get to kill it unless they make sacrifices of their real life. Games are a sacrifice to your life in itself, but that doesn't mean a game shouldn't be less sacrificing, and that is another topic that could be discussed to the fine lines some other time.

Now, I have no doubt in my mind that people have suggested this before. Absolute props to them, because I agree that it is absolutely one of the best things you could do to this game and I totally agree with anyone who suggested this in the past. A more random game, more spontaneous enjoyment, less monopolizing, less dissapointment, more players who stay, more fun. It doesn't take much to make this happen. I would see a change like this being more good for the game than anything.

Please discuss and agree or disagree, but please don't insult people or talk smack. Trolls can post somewhere else less intelligent.
 
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The vast majority of mid/high tier 6man and raid encounters seems to be killed by different guilds/groups almost every spawn so I disagree that there is any issue here.
 
I don't know what 6man content there is that people are actually locking down, maybe you're monopolizing them because there's no real competition these days? Like 4 months ago for example, my group "monopolized" Melek Taus because no one else really gave a shit. Similarly with mobs in Shadowdale until the middle of this year, no one else was really even bothering.

It's pretty easy to track this stuff or see someone is there killing it and get the spawn timer, and no amount of randomizing the spawns is going to compensate for the fact that people with more time to play who track more are going to get the spawns more often when there is actual competition.

Raid content is usually a matter of "who can kill what" but is going to again be subject to the same "he who plays more kills more" no matter what you do. Outside of instancing there is nothing you can do about any of this.
 
I think a timer on new content development would be a greater boon to the success of the game than anything.
 
After the last change to raid encounter spawn timers and their randomness, I'm going to need something specific to go with. A blanket "this is a problem" that I hear after myself working with the numbers specifically to combat this problem before is a bit hard to swallow.

If this is an actual problem, then I'm certainly all ears on the mathematical front, but I'm going to need some convincing because I was involved in the last change to this.
 
What was the problem before? Was the changes to make things more or less random?

I think it's generally a problem that people just deal with. It is not a problem to the people who get to kill the mobs. The issue just lies with player's schedules and the lack of randomness on a day-by-day scale of raid bosses (meaning you can depend on it spawning and dying within a day every time without fail by the guild that kills it) and if your guild's players have a certain schedule that doesn't allow them to raid on weekends for instance, then basically you will never get that mob killed by your guild. It's a player schedule problem.

Changing a game to be more random on a day-by-day scale rather than an hour-by-hour scale is a better solution than asking loads of people to sacrifice their real lives. I guess it would have been changed to be more random if the Devs shared the same perspective and experiences with this issue. It is not an actual problem with the game since mobs die and drop loot like they should. It's a social problem which alteration of the game could reduce. Basically you would have to join "this guild" to get "these loots" and nobody should have to do that if the guild their in now has the ability to kill "this boss mob". Making things more random would not fix the problem 100% it just reduces the ability to monopolize.. so the chances of a different guild killing a monopolized boss mob is increased simply by throwing off a routine that occurs within seperate guild's schedules.

Yes you are right Susvain, the majority of the encounters are spread out between 3 guilds, but there are certain mobs that are only killed by 1 ONLY because their schedules are better. The rest of the mobs don't matter as much because their loot is inferior, therefore this guild does not monopolize those ones. A larger random scale might not even fix this specific mob's monopolization problem, but every boss through all tiers has the potential to have monopolization problems, more so with a minimal randomization of timers.

I suppose it may be silly to post this since it would have been changed long ago if the dev's wanted to reduce a guild's ability to monopolize a mob, but that's what this specific forum is for anyways... suggestions that will either get implemented or will not get implemented.. so I'm just throwing it out there.

If there was a full guild with players that have as much time and motivation to kill bosses as I do, then I probably wouldn't even need to make a post like this.. but other people have real lives so I guess I have to deal with that. I hope we someday get to kill certain bosses.. but that might only happen after holidays mess up their routine, or if lots of people quit the game there.
 
The timers were changed a bit with some spires drama around the end of last year because it was thought that the spawn timers largely favored European time. Unfortunately they will no matter what because there is only a small amount of time from when they finish raiding until guilds in North America start raiding, whereas there is around 12 or more hour period from when North American guilds stop raiding until European raid times begin for mobs to spawn during.

The only thing that can possibly be done is to instance content and this is never met positively by The Guys Who Run Shit.
 
Yea, it is pretty unfortunate with the euro timers thing. It has always been the case in guilds I've been in that you would have to call everyone in your guild at 3 in the morning to kill a monopolized mob to get a flag, etc. (Like when Ethereal had to do this to get Eternal Well because Phoenix Rising had it locked down for several months straight). I do think a MUCH larger random timer range could mostly (mostly...) dampen that issue. The only issue it couldn't solve is 15+ people who have all the time in the world on their hands if that's the only reason they get a mob over others.
 
I'm not aware of any high tier mob that gets killed immediately upon respawning by the same guild over and over except Gloom, and once his script is fixed to prevent a certain guild from exploiting it and using extremely under geared characters to claim and kill, that will probably resolve itself.

And no, an even more random timer would not solve this imaginary problem either since guilds on euro times would still be much more likely to see the mob up before they raid than US guilds. You'd have to weight the chances of spawns such that they are more likely to spawn between like 5-8pm US time or something. But this whole dumb game is designed around the idea of competing for stuff and players that put in extreme numbers of hours being rewarded so I don't see this changing.
 
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nikosk said:
Yes you are right Susvain, the majority of the encounters are spread out between 3 guilds, but there are certain mobs that are only killed by 1 ONLY because their schedules are better. The rest of the mobs don't matter as much because their loot is inferior, therefore this guild does not monopolize those ones. A larger random scale might not even fix this specific mob's monopolization problem, but every boss through all tiers has the potential to have monopolization problems, more so with a minimal randomization of timers.
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And here I misinterpreted this might has been a real issue. Thank you for clearing up that this is in fact just another CW cry thread over being too incompetent for competing on a spawn/ kill a mob that isn't trivial for a piece of loot you want/ game is too hard.

We all know that you are talking about Cmal4.3(6man)/Nylastra'Zara (Raid), we also all know that they aren't dieing the same day they spawn, and that they only die to one single guild because no other guild bothers and/or is capable of killing it yet.

Also the last change of raid spawn times was in fact the direct result of YOUR GUILD (not you, don't think you were playing at that time) bitching over how it is unfair that they were too incompetent to compete with another guild over spawn timers.
 
Never fails, you have to go insulting people with all your negative comments.. learn how to respect other players and their posts. I don't know who your character is failranger, but your post is really shitty.
 
I would love to point out the fact that, Nz sat up for 3 days last time it spawned, and your guild spent 2 days wiping to 4.3 the last time it spawned, THEN you make a post, i don't get it yo.
 
Who doesn't wipe to 4.3 when learning it? Like I told you before, Chaotic Winds can't get sufficient raid force on weekends to do NZ/Custo, which is the only time it is up. Sucks for us. Even if the randomizer was larger it wouldn't spawn when we're able to get a raid force. I don't think CW will ever kill it and the only reason is schedules. Anyhow, gonna stop checking this post.. the trolls on SoD forums try to turn posts into wars and insults, and it totally ruins the feel of the community.

Be nice dood~
 
If your argument is one about the time of day things spawn, then you should know that the last change was designed to make lockdowns of that sort untenable. The time of day the mob would spawn would drift later and later.

If your argument is that if Guild A kills the mob on Monday and you can't attempt the mob in the time period after it respawn and the following Monday Guild A raid, then that's another issue that needs to be considered separately.
 
It is a very simple general question.

If the respawn time can currently be expressed as d days plus or minus h hours,

where d and h vary from mob to mob and d does not have to be an integer.

Then would the game be improved or made worse if the respawn was d plus or minus
5h?

So the mobs respawn on average as they currently do - just into a much bigger window.
 
That would be pretty awful. Having to raid 4 different zones in a night because everything spawns piecemeal would be extremely annoying.

If your guild sees a progression target up and you can't get a raid together before the mob is killed 3 days later, the problem lies with your guild, not the server's spawn timers.
 
Dinadass said:
That would be pretty awful. Having to raid 4 different zones in a night because everything spawns piecemeal would be extremely annoying.

If your guild sees a progression target up and you can't get a raid together before the mob is killed 3 days later, the problem lies with your guild, not the server's spawn timers.
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This, or just wait until the other guild progresses past it and the mobs stays up longer.
 
Spawn timers for quest mobs seriously need to be redone. trying to get a shield of freeport without buying it seems like a dream. 5 day respawn timer on quest mob is just a bad idea, especially if said quest is repeatable and sells for alot of money. People lock down these quests/mobs for a reason.
 
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