Making Social Connections in Neverwinter

putzboy78

Nice video and a good discussion topic. Do MMOs do enough to connect players in game. We have some generic search criteria's to find guilds like languages used or time zones. But what about helping people connect through other interests and shared experiences. How about veterans? How about hobbies? etc etc

It seems like helping people form connections in games, helps in binding them to games. So why don't companies help orchestrate these connections. I'm not sure what a system would like that would look like. Would you have an option to setup a profile (similar to a dating profile on a dating website) where it helps match people up and you can swipe left or right on people you are interested in meeting? Just seems like depending on chance encounters in dungeons or pe chat is not a good system to build friendships through games.


https://youtube.com/watch?v=OtElX7DW_GI

plasticbat

Social connections have been available since the game started. Good and/or bad existed. Real couples in real life created because they met in the game. Of course, they do all these in 'private' after the connection is established. Of course, when something does not go well, there is drama.

fademist

nice troll ...

greywynd

Who is trolling?

putzboy78

plasticbat said:

Social connections have been available since the game started. Good and/or bad existed. Real couples in real life created because they met in the game. Of course, they do all these in 'private' after the connection is established. Of course, when something does not go well, there is drama.

I agree, but wouldn't the community benefit from better means of connecting with people than PE zone chat, chance encounters in zone chat, or just being lucky enough to be in a guild that matches your play style

wamlgon

It seems like helping people form connections in games, helps in binding them to games.

This is true, how many games has most people played when it was well past the time they even wanted to play them? They continue to do so because of the connections made in the game, their friends in game, good example, before I came to NW I was playing a game where I was pretty much maxed, had done all content and raids, there was literally not much I could do to make myself better nor was there anything new or different to do, but I sloughed on playing for years, waiting on a once a year expansion that was beat and mastered within a month. Was I doing it for me or the bonds I had made in the game?

fademist

wamlgon#8772 said:

It seems like helping people form connections in games, helps in binding them to games.



This is true, how many games has most people played when it was well past the time they even wanted to play them? They continue to do so because of the connections made in the game, their friends in game, good example, before I came to NW I was playing a game where I was pretty much maxed, had done all content and raids, there was literally not much I could do to make myself better nor was there anything new or different to do, but I sloughed on playing for years, waiting on a once a year expansion that was beat and mastered within a month. Was I doing it for me or the bonds I had made in the game?

or maybe u liked that u solo all

sandukutupu

I have told people before, I block spammers, gold sellers, doom prophets, and that one annoying guy. However I don't play a "social game" to be anti-social. Thus the first of every month, I clear my ignore list and give everyone amnesty. But no matter how many times I do this, that one annoying guy shows up on the first or second day, and is right back on my list.

A few of my friends here came with me from Guild Wars, others I met working on the Foundry. I created the Foundry Authors on Facebook as a group... Today, I can only count the Foundry authors on one hand that still play this game. The group of 88 members still exist as "UGC Authors" and they seek out other games that offer user generated content.

I help new players often in the game and they friend me. I help people who have language barriers in chat. I am still opposed to the heavy chat restrictions forced upon new players in the game. If someone in the game needs something and I have it, more often than not, I will just give it to them. I don't just hand out gold to the "gold plz" beggers, I ask them why they need gold? Then I tell them or show them how to make it for themselves. Sometimes they think the gold is the thing you need to buy items, then I tell them how to make AD instead.

Often I have made friends with other guilds. No not the alliance but just chatting with them on Facebook or Discord. There are many guilds who make their Discord chat public and you can get to know them better. I have told people seeking guilds to search the Find Guild tab for those websites. I know of many guilds that are full of cool players and I keep in touch with them. Why don't I join their guilds? I have all of my characters in guilds already.

I see a lot of people in chat everyday I recognized as "Second Lifers", unlike the role-players, the "Second Lifers" use Neverwinter as a 3D chat room. So I call them a "community group" I hang with, while waiting on timers, shopping, or just banking. It is not hard to make a lot of friends in Neverwinter or any other MMO. It is hard to get them to stay here or even show up when wanted. I do have some phone numbers but I am no longer allowed to call some of them after 11 pm. There are some people who cannot appreciate, that I need help in the game at 3 am, and they need to wake up and log in to assist me... now! Come on it's not like they need to get dressed up or even bathe.

plasticbat

putzboy78 said:

plasticbat said:

Social connections have been available since the game started. Good and/or bad existed. Real couples in real life created because they met in the game. Of course, they do all these in 'private' after the connection is established. Of course, when something does not go well, there is drama.

I agree, but wouldn't the community benefit from better means of connecting with people than PE zone chat, chance encounters in zone chat, or just being lucky enough to be in a guild that matches your play style

I know many still stays in the game not because of the game but to maintain the existing social connection.

The existing "successful" social connection is NOT in PE zone chat.
For those who already has certain connection, often, not bother to turn on PE zone chat at all.

People created many different channels for different goals. Those are the existing tools in the game for social connection.

gradii

I can think of one suggestion which would be positive. a Party Finder feature. high quality MMOs like WoW (before Activision) and FFXIV (after the shut down and remake) have it and it is effective and a real time and effort saver for forming teams.

FORCING teams on people for more content would be a really, REALLY idiotic mistake. Games should not force people to team most of the time, forcing people simply results in the competition which does not force people winning easily.

plasticbat

gradii said:

I can think of one suggestion which would be positive. a Party Finder feature. high quality MMOs like WoW (before Activision) and FFXIV (after the shut down and remake) have it and it is effective and a real time and effort saver for forming teams.

FORCING teams on people for more content would be a really, REALLY idiotic mistake. Games should not force people to team most of the time, forcing people simply results in the competition which does not force people winning easily.

I don't think you understood what this thread is about. It more or less has nothing to do with playing the game but connecting people in personal level.

putzboy78

i think it is something that all MMOs should be focusing on more, helping people find/identify like minded people within it. And what could that look like, a profile system so you can swipe left or right to try and find people you are interested in socializing with? Maybe you do a quiz or something and then each person has a % match over their head so as you run around you can see if someone has some similar interests worth exploring? An ability to have an secondary system of "clubs" in games outside of the guild structure to connect through?

Everything should be optional of course, some people don't play MMOs to socialize with (I still have no idea why since RPGs are far better games) and that desire should be respected.

the challenge i see currently is similar to what @sandukutupu mentioned. Where people were connecting outside of the game through facebook or other social media environments. These environments of course require access to multiple platforms, but it also moves the connections outside of game and therefore breaks the dependence on the game. That of course can and should happen, but the game shouldn't be forcing that to happen.

putzboy78

and it should be easier to link these sub-communities together

wintersmoke

putzboy78 said:

and it should be easier to link these sub-communities together

One problem that would need to be overcome would be the medium used to connect them. Many guilds have Facebook pages for their members. Discord is also well populated. I have even seen personal Instagram & Snapchat profiles linked in character bios. But these multiple outside connections don't necessarily work well together. In the end, the only thing we all have in common, is the Game. it might be easier if we were talking about a phone game tho...

sandukutupu

I believe they desired the Arc launcher to do a lot of what you are discussing. But I don't use it. I use the forums and other media, the Arc launcher breaks the game, it runs in the background doing nothing but consuming memory. You can offer connections with the game but it still up to the players on how often they connect to this game... ok my husband just started making fun of me by singing "Eight Days a Week". This game (and others) still suffer from latency and adding more tools isn't going to help.

Much of this is left to the player. Champions "official" wiki is player hosted and only edited by invite. That might sound a bit elitist but many wikis suffer bots posting advertisements. Both STO and NW have to deal with the adware of Cursed (Gamepedia) wikis. My point here is; many other game companies hosts their wikis on their own server. I met a lot more people editing the wiki who were playing the game. Here no one seems to care to edit the wiki or take part in sharing what they learn. This is not the fault of the company but the player's lack of interest. Instead I hear how nice it would be to have a game manual. That is what a game wiki is all about. The cool thing I love about Guild Wars, you go to help and it took you directly to the official wiki hosted on their server. Also to this day, I can type /wiki (subject) and get the information as well.

I am not in favor of them adding more to Arc or the client to make it work like Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn. Players have a History tab, use it. I peek at interesting characters all the time and find no history on there. No links to external social media. The wiki for Neverwinter is not that great, use it, make it better. There is only one guy on the wiki running the whole show, do you really expect him to make an entire manual and play the game too?

Have fun!

putzboy78

i agree that the arc launcher was meant to do bridge some of that gap but it of course suffered by being outside of the game and being in direct competition with other out of game options... also yes it was buggy and a resource issue.

I also think the "history" on the character sheet can help but it suffers from being subject to inspection and doesn't actually serve as a tool to help find like minded people. I can't search for players with X in their history. Which makes its use as a connection tool facing the similar issue of requiring chance encounters in game.

Many guilds do have contacts points like facebook outside of the game, but that still suffers the same issue of not helping people with an interest in Neverwinter hone in on better matches by combining interest.

What if you even had a rudimentary profile in game and as you road along you could see visual representation that you shared interest with that other person. Ex. % match or 4.5 stars out of 5. Then you would at least know to scan their history to see what you had in common.

The point being that none of the existing tools work to associate people with similar interests other than neverwinter. Where maybe vets would like to party together so they can talk about doing basic training in lackland while they fight spiders in game. Cryptic leaves finding those connections up to the players and I think it would serve game companies better to help make those associations in game. Remember, we are all running the same 5 dungeons daily, the only thing that makes them interesting is who we run them with.

wintersmoke

putzboy78 said:

i agree that the arc launcher was meant to do bridge some of that gap but it of course suffered by being outside of the game and being in direct competition with other out of game options... also yes it was buggy and a resource issue.

I also think the "history" on the character sheet can help but it suffers from being subject to inspection and doesn't actually serve as a tool to help find like minded people. I can't search for players with X in their history. Which makes its use as a connection tool facing the similar issue of requiring chance encounters in game.

Many guilds do have contacts points like facebook outside of the game, but that still suffers the same issue of not helping people with an interest in Neverwinter hone in on better matches by combining interest.

What if you even had a rudimentary profile in game and as you road along you could see visual representation that you shared interest with that other person. Ex. % match or 4.5 stars out of 5. Then you would at least know to scan their history to see what you had in common.

The point being that none of the existing tools work to associate people with similar interests other than neverwinter. Where maybe vets would like to party together so they can talk about doing basic training in lackland while they fight spiders in game. Cryptic leaves finding those connections up to the players and I think it would serve game companies better to help make those associations in game. Remember, we are all running the same 5 dungeons daily, the only thing that makes them interesting is who we run them with.

Venn diagrams!

Sorry. I'll see myself out.

gradii

plasticbat said:

gradii said:

I can think of one suggestion which would be positive. a Party Finder feature. high quality MMOs like WoW (before Activision) and FFXIV (after the shut down and remake) have it and it is effective and a real time and effort saver for forming teams.

FORCING teams on people for more content would be a really, REALLY idiotic mistake. Games should not force people to team most of the time, forcing people simply results in the competition which does not force people winning easily.

I don't think you understood what this thread is about. It more or less has nothing to do with playing the game but connecting people in personal level.

That is not the games job nor something the game itself can do. that is something only the community as players are capable of.

putzboy78

gradii said:

plasticbat said:

gradii said:

I can think of one suggestion which would be positive. a Party Finder feature. high quality MMOs like WoW (before Activision) and FFXIV (after the shut down and remake) have it and it is effective and a real time and effort saver for forming teams.

FORCING teams on people for more content would be a really, REALLY idiotic mistake. Games should not force people to team most of the time, forcing people simply results in the competition which does not force people winning easily.

I don't think you understood what this thread is about. It more or less has nothing to do with playing the game but connecting people in personal level.

That is not the games job nor something the game itself can do. that is something only the community as players are capable of.

lol, who defines what the games job is. The games job is maximize profit.

A bar's job is to sell alcohol. Why then does it have karaoke night and trivia nights? Why do they host line dancing classes? They know that helping people connect into the social atmosphere of the bar will increase activity within the bar and consumption. It connects them to the bar by more than alcohol but through the people that ALSO share an interest in alcohol.

Similarly it would be beneficial for game companies (not just cryptic but any MMO) to invest in providing tools to increase social ties within the game. Game companies shouldn't do it because they want to, they should do it because they can profit from it.

gradii

Becuase a game can be designed in any way you want but it can't force players to play the way originally intended. proof of that is all over the place in this game, ever tried a lower level dungeon random pug?

greywynd

All the time. It's good for some rAD and maybe some guild recruits.

gradii

greywynd said:

All the time. It's good for some rAD and maybe some guild recruits.

Then you've noticed how people tend to rush to the end leaving newbies in the dust and one shotting bosses. NOT intended.

A Party Finder feature would be the closest thing the game can do for social connections, its a tool for bringing people together, when people form parties with it they can make new friends as well.

NO feature (except maybe player commendations as implemented in FFXIV) is going to go farther than that and force people to make connections, not one which wont severely harm the game.

greywynd

You think rushing to the end is bad now you should have been here before M16 hit.

gradii

greywynd said:

You think rushing to the end is bad now you should have been here before M16 hit.

I was, but it was close to launch so dont remember clearly. It's still bad, and needs to be fixed is the thing. no one should be able to kill a boss in less than 8 seconds.

kharkov58

Killing the boss quickly is not the problem. Rewarding them for it is the problem. Just shift the rewards to content that is a challenge for them.

gradii

kharkov58 said:

Killing the boss quickly is not the problem. Rewarding them for it is the problem. Just shift the rewards to content that is a challenge for them.

The problem has nothing to do with rewards, the problem has to do with ruining the new player experience which is should be far higher on the dev priority list due to a game thriving on new players and NOT people who have been in endgame for years and are bored salty vets.

I say this as a 5+ years vet of several other games, and I say this there, vets are NOT to be listened to if they ask for stupid stuff like removal of scaling or not to make a good scaling system.

If you removed things like AD rewards from older dungeons, new player would wait in queue for HOURS, even on tanks and healers becuase nobody who was not leveling would ever do them. the rewards which are there are appropriate and required. changing them would be stupid.

What needs to change is a GOOD scaling system must be implemented. dont argue against that, you're going to make a laughingstock of yourself trying.

greywynd

gradii said:

I was, but it was close to launch so dont remember clearly. It's still bad, and needs to be fixed is the thing. no one should be able to kill a boss in less than 8 seconds.

Movement at M16 was nerfed hard and there are only a few options to increase that speed.

Before M16 we had Vigor insignias, Darks added to Movement, etc. There were times my fighter would run ahead, just normal running mind you, and GWFs had to sprint to try to keep up with him.

gradii

greywynd said:

gradii said:

I was, but it was close to launch so dont remember clearly. It's still bad, and needs to be fixed is the thing. no one should be able to kill a boss in less than 8 seconds.

Movement at M16 was nerfed hard and there are only a few options to increase that speed.

Before M16 we had Vigor insignias, Darks added to Movement, etc. There were times my fighter would run ahead, just normal running mind you, and GWFs had to sprint to try to keep up with him.

Theres a big issue with movement speed buffs, and that is if one person can move faster than another, the slower one WILL always get left behind as people buttrush ahead, most NWO content is not designed well and lends itself to encouraging that.

sandukutupu

Back on the topic at hand, I agree with what @gradii stated. Games are just a set of rules and guidelines to be used to have fun. If a group can play outside the guidelines and instructions set down, how is the game going to tell players to make friends?

It has been my experience the typical PvPer has no "friends" in that arena. Sure we are good friends outside and agree to meet up for gaming, but all that goes away when you start an epic PvP battle. Later on Facebook we are back to discuss other things. I have +5000 friends in a group on Facebook who hook up for PvP weekends in Guild Wars. But Guild Wars has no mail system, they are not planning on adding one ever. They told us, in 2012, the game is done, no more content will be added, since they released the carp sequel. This Facebook group was the effort of 5000 players who didn't care about the absent mail system, they just desire to play the very best PvP available.

There are times you can go into chat in PE, and find some real toxic conversations, and other times where you swear Cryptic had a priest perform and exorcism. People are going to find friends on their own and it really isn't the responsibility of the software or the developer to match them up. If my goal was to force or coerce people into making friends, that could be done with friending achievements. Such as; "Make 100 friends this week and earn 25,000 AD" and other such absurdity. I like most of Galactic Underwear's videos, but people don't need a game to tell them who their friends are.

gradii

Games can be designed to encourage people to be friends, FFXIV does this very well with the positive only Player Commendations system and like NWO it has bonus rewards for first timers in every dungeon and raid instance.

putzboy78

forcing people to be friends no. I would never be for compulsion. Creating systems that enable a person looking for a friend to find them I am all for.

So a good function would be the ability to remove yourself from looking for friends