Forums » General Pantheon Discussion

Raid Size

    • 66 posts
    February 26, 2016 11:50 PM PST

    i'm wondering what everyone's opinion is on raid size. i know WoW has gone with 20- 25 man raids. I for one am partial to EQ where you could take as many as 72 players into a raid. altho i think nowadays that raid force would be a bit hard to put together, i would at least want that option to be there if there are guilds that can field that many. i have been i guilds that did content with 50+ players and other guilds that did the same content with 30 - 40 well disciplined players.  i guess what i'm saying, is i dont want to see raids limited to X number and not being able to do the raid unless you have exactly X amount of players and no more no less. i would like to see content be able to get beaten with less or zerg. i think its what made EQ raiding great. If you hadnt raided before and were max level, you could join a raiding guild (flags permiting), and just start raiding, without "taking" someon elses "spot".

     

    if this topic has been discussed already, i appologize :D

    • 1434 posts
    February 27, 2016 3:12 AM PST

    No less than 30. Ideally though, I think it should vary. I just don't like the idea of everything being standardized. I'm tired of having to bring an exact number of people to do things, or only an exact class composition. Creating all content to be defeated by an exact number of people is too gamey to me. What of the sense of wonder and danger that really powerful dragons, demi-gods and even dieties can pose. Are they just supposed to be lumped into another 24 man raid? I think not. I liked not knowing whether a mob was even capable of being killed. Designing everything for an exact number of players is something that should be abolished in the MMO.

    I think, beyond just the proper raid build and strategy dynamics, there should also be the social dynamics of trying to coordinate and manage a large number of players in a concerted effort. Of the hundreds of raids I've attended across dozens of MMOs, the big ones are the most memorable.

    • 1468 posts
    February 27, 2016 4:15 AM PST

    I've been on raids with the full 72 man limit filled (especially when we were back flagging in PoP) and I've been in smaller 30 - 40 man raids. Overall I didn't mind either. It was certainly easier for the guild to put together a raid force with a smaller force and this is something that non-hardcore raiding guilds sometimes struggle with. But I'd be happy with either. I certainly don't want to see raids smaller than 30 as Dullahan says though.

    • 308 posts
    February 27, 2016 5:28 AM PST

    I dont really care to see raids of anything less than 6 groups, but i would also like the ability to bring more players even if its in "Spectator Mode" where they are unable to influence the raid but can see the chats and get any flags that come with the raids sucess.

     

    a Spectator group slot for the raid could also allow for us semi casual guilds to have alternates in the raid incase of players going linkdead or needing to leave for RL issues.

    • 1468 posts
    February 27, 2016 5:37 AM PST

    Gawd said:

    I dont really care to see raids of anything less than 6 groups, but i would also like the ability to bring more players even if its in "Spectator Mode" where they are unable to influence the raid but can see the chats and get any flags that come with the raids sucess.

    a Spectator group slot for the raid could also allow for us semi casual guilds to have alternates in the raid incase of players going linkdead or needing to leave for RL issues.

    Not sure I like the idea of people outside the raid getting flags. That would make it way too easy to progress in raid tiers. Beat the encounter once and you can basically get an unlimited number of people flagged.

    No I think flagging should be restricted to those who actually took part in the raid as a whole. Plus the other advantage of that is it gives everyone raid experience. If you can get a flag without taking part in raids you don't learn how to play your class in a raid situation.

    • 409 posts
    February 27, 2016 5:45 AM PST

    I personally feel it's much more tight knit when you have around 30-40ish people.. you actually get to know the people you're playing with.

    The main issue I have is raid "freeloading". Where they basically come along to a raid and afk/do hardly anything. I remember on a few raids where there was this one shaman who just would not buff anyone at all unless an officer asked him too. Stuff like that anoys me in big raids. I remember in the 72 man raids I was assigned "noob catcher" duties.. a informer who told the officers whom was slacking during raids. So when you think about it.. if it gets to that level of needing someone keep an eye on people.. then you kinda know the raid size is too big.

    • 1468 posts
    February 27, 2016 5:54 AM PST

    Nimryl said:

    I personally feel it's much more tight knit when you have around 30-40ish people.. you actually get to know the people you're playing with.

    The main issue I have is raid "freeloading". Where they basically come along to a raid and afk/do hardly anything. I remember on a few raids where there was this one shaman who just would not buff anyone at all unless an officer asked him too. Stuff like that anoys me in big raids. I remember in the 72 man raids I was assigned "noob catcher" duties.. a informer who told the officers whom was slacking during raids. So when you think about it.. if it gets to that level of needing someone keep an eye on people.. then you kinda know the raid size is too big.

    Good points. There certainly were people who used to slack off in bigger raids but my guild treated it more like a joke than anything else "oh so and so is slacking off again better ask someone else" but then at the time we were not a hardcore raiding guild we only raided 3 - 4 times a week. I can see how hardcore raiding guilds could see slacking off as a bad thing though.

    Not really sure how you can combat that apart from making the raid encounter target people who are not putting the effort in. If all the people who were slacking off died it would soon become pretty apparent who was pulling their weight or not.

    • 511 posts
    February 27, 2016 8:28 AM PST

    There is a topic here -  where group size (and raid size) are discussed. The two are so closely tied together you really can't have one without the other (love and marriage, love and marriage, THUMP). I would like it tuned to the number of groups and not necessarily a set # of people. I would like to see a system kind of like WoW's where you have smaller raids (2-3 groups so 12-16 on low end and 18-24 on high end) that give lesser loot (can look at my expansion tier list here) where it would be a T1 Raid. However unlike wow it would not lock a full raid of 6-8 groups (36-48 on low end and 48-64 on high end) and they would be doing mainly T2 and T3 raids.

    One of my big faults with wow was that 10 people working together (while this is great) is no were as complex as getting 20+ people working together and thus the rewards should be greater (and mobs harder) to kill. I understand they have that tier system now where 10 to what 25? people can join a raid and it will scale the mob to the raids abilities but still whether you have 10 people or 24 people the loot is the same quality..

    • 338 posts
    February 27, 2016 8:48 AM PST

    I'd like 6 man groups and raids to be 8 groups for a total of 48 players on raids.

     

     

    Kiz~

    • 2130 posts
    February 27, 2016 8:51 AM PST

    Why 48? Honest question.

    • 366 posts
    February 27, 2016 9:26 AM PST

    I'm good with anything over 2 groups. I am even fine with if there is variable raid sizes within the game.

    Big raid = epic feel

    Small raid = more your individual performance matters.


    This post was edited by Zarriya at February 27, 2016 9:29 AM PST
    • 2138 posts
    February 27, 2016 1:05 PM PST

    I felt the original 72 character Max was- good if you could get it, impressive if recounting it to people IRL (72 strangers? in one place? on line?), but when it was deemed "necessary" it was almost unwieldy. the 48 player was about right, But I think 4-6 groups of 6 would constitute a "raid" or if a group of 8- 4-5?  

    • 1778 posts
    February 27, 2016 1:32 PM PST

    I favor smaller sized raids. Where it feels more like an extended family not an army. Ive participated in smaller raids and felt my efforts had greater inpact and in my opinion achieved a greater sense of comraderie. I have also participated in large raids where things feel less satisfying due to being a cog in the machine. Which equals me feeling I had less impact and less comraderie. While I am also cautious of too large a group bypassing the intended challenge through raw numbers (tactics like Zerging or worse Zombieing).

    I would however agree that not having a hard number requirement is best. So something like 24 players is the average, but 30 less skilled/geared players could also make it work. And yet 18 highly skilled/geared players could still get it done. As for a max? I really wouldnt want to see a raid size much bigger than 30 honestly. Maybe 36?

     

    Lastly, we and the devs need to keep in mind that this will be a niche game. And not everyone wants to raid. So depending on how many servers there are, and how many players per server, and how many of those players want to raid......... Could make it a problem particularly the higher the required raid size becomes. In short Its easier to find 20 people than it is 60. Not talking about organizing, thats a different topic. Im talking about finding a niche group in a niche game. Though I could be wrong. I dont think Pantheon will be hurting too much for an overall population. It will be niche but there will still be plenty of people, but acording to the statistics, raiding represents a very small portion of MMO gamers.

    • 383 posts
    February 27, 2016 2:36 PM PST

    I hope there's no limits and we can take as few or as many as we want just as it should be. 

    • 409 posts
    February 27, 2016 2:56 PM PST

    Niien said: I hope there's no limits and we can take as few or as many as we want just as it should be.

    You sure about that?

    • 2419 posts
    February 27, 2016 2:59 PM PST

    Niien said:

    I hope there's no limits and we can take as few or as many as we want just as it should be. 

    Think about that from the developers point of view for a moment.  They are trying to create content that is interesting and challenging.  How could content be made challenging if players could bring any number of players?  You might say "make it dynamic, responding to the number of players present".  Ok...what I choose to bring just myself?  Should the raid content adjust to just me?  No, there would have to be some minimum number of players.  And if you're going to have a minimum, is stands to reason then there should be a maximum.

    Only by limiting the maximum number of participants can the content be balanced properly.  Unbalanced content will quickly ruin a game.

    • 2130 posts
    February 27, 2016 3:05 PM PST

    Niien said:

    I hope there's no limits and we can take as few or as many as we want just as it should be. 

    Impractical. Also "should" is an objective statement. Careful there.


    This post was edited by Liav at February 27, 2016 3:05 PM PST
    • 308 posts
    February 27, 2016 3:19 PM PST

    Cromulent said:

    Gawd said:

    I dont really care to see raids of anything less than 6 groups, but i would also like the ability to bring more players even if its in "Spectator Mode" where they are unable to influence the raid but can see the chats and get any flags that come with the raids sucess.

    a Spectator group slot for the raid could also allow for us semi casual guilds to have alternates in the raid incase of players going linkdead or needing to leave for RL issues.

    Not sure I like the idea of people outside the raid getting flags. That would make it way too easy to progress in raid tiers. Beat the encounter once and you can basically get an unlimited number of people flagged.

    No I think flagging should be restricted to those who actually took part in the raid as a whole. Plus the other advantage of that is it gives everyone raid experience. If you can get a flag without taking part in raids you don't learn how to play your class in a raid situation.

     

    I am not really married to the idea of the flagging either, i just kinda casually tacked it on at the end. the main reasoning i had for the spectator group is so that players who are not normally in the raid or new to the guild can see how the guild operates in raid situations, being in the raid chat, and seeing how the group responds to orders. all this without having to impact the raid force by having players not accustomed to the way the force works together dragging the group down with thier learning curve. another reason is also being able to sub in the players that have to leave without waiting for someone to come from elsewhere, or trying to finish a raid geared for 36 with 35.

    • 89 posts
    February 27, 2016 7:50 PM PST

    I liked how WoW did raids in vanilla.  40mans for the big ticket items with your guild, and 20mans for powerful specialty items with your static late-night group.

    • 308 posts
    February 27, 2016 8:39 PM PST

    sdcord said:

    I liked how WoW did raids in vanilla.  40mans for the big ticket items with your guild, and 20mans for powerful specialty items with your static late-night group.

     

    While that is all fun and everything i dont really think i would like to see multiple tiers of raiding with differing rewards between them, that just pushes group content and crafted stuff down further. and end up with "no you cant join the 40 man raids because you need to do the 12 man then the 24 man raids to get geared up first".

     

    and while i am not agianst needing to get geared for raiding, I do not want to be level 50 and then need to grind gear all the time to get into the raids atmosphere i like.

     

    unless you are talking about things like bracers, shoulderpads, jewelry coming from the lower raids, then breastplates, legguards, helms, boots and weapons coming from the raids. but i feel like that type of thing could also be done with extremely difficult single group content, then have the big ticket items come from raids.

    • 1714 posts
    February 27, 2016 10:35 PM PST

    Content should be done by the number of people who can do the content. Differentiating encounters between solo vs group vs raid is a great way to ruin immersion and prevent the players from having a real world they can go out and interact with as they see fit. 

    • 1468 posts
    February 28, 2016 7:02 AM PST

    Gawd said:

    Cromulent said:

    Gawd said:

    I dont really care to see raids of anything less than 6 groups, but i would also like the ability to bring more players even if its in "Spectator Mode" where they are unable to influence the raid but can see the chats and get any flags that come with the raids sucess.

    a Spectator group slot for the raid could also allow for us semi casual guilds to have alternates in the raid incase of players going linkdead or needing to leave for RL issues.

    Not sure I like the idea of people outside the raid getting flags. That would make it way too easy to progress in raid tiers. Beat the encounter once and you can basically get an unlimited number of people flagged.

    No I think flagging should be restricted to those who actually took part in the raid as a whole. Plus the other advantage of that is it gives everyone raid experience. If you can get a flag without taking part in raids you don't learn how to play your class in a raid situation.

    I am not really married to the idea of the flagging either, i just kinda casually tacked it on at the end. the main reasoning i had for the spectator group is so that players who are not normally in the raid or new to the guild can see how the guild operates in raid situations, being in the raid chat, and seeing how the group responds to orders. all this without having to impact the raid force by having players not accustomed to the way the force works together dragging the group down with thier learning curve. another reason is also being able to sub in the players that have to leave without waiting for someone to come from elsewhere, or trying to finish a raid geared for 36 with 35.

    Oh OK. That sounds like a reasonable idea. You mean like training sessions for raids so people can learn without impacting the raid and then when they are ready they can take part in the raid? Yeah that could work.

    Maybe there should be some things that players can't learn that way so that it keeps them on their feet when they do actually join the raid and don't just slack off all the time. At least that way it would keep the raid fun for them so they don't know everything about the encounter but they do learn how their guild handles giving orders and how they handle class based issues in a given raid (class specific chat channels for instance).

    I don't think there should be an easy way to learn raid encounters though. I remember my first ever EQ raid and I was terrified on it that I would do something wrong and wipe the raid force so I was literally sitting on the edge of my seat for the whole raid being super observant. I think that kind of "on the job" training is essential to get a working raid force together so that everyone knows their place in the raid force. But learning how a guild handles internal matters should be OK otherwise the guild would have to run their own training sessions at the start in order to make sure that everyone knows what they are doing.

    • 318 posts
    January 6, 2017 10:06 AM PST

    Sign me up for the larger raids.

    Small raids (24 man), the participation of every person in the raid is crucial. One ungeared/unskilled player can bring the whole raid down.

    Larger raids (48+ man), the success is more based on the raid leadership and not as heavily on the individual players. You have much more flexibility in the raid class makeup, and you can get away with bringing several undergeared guildies if you want to.

    Neither small or large is necessarily better than the other, they just present two different kinds of challenges. 

    There are tons of MMO's already out there with 24 man or less raiding. I'd love to see Pantheon bring back the "massive" in MMORPG when it comes to raiding.


    This post was edited by Wellspring at January 6, 2017 10:08 AM PST
    • 1860 posts
    January 6, 2017 10:54 AM PST

    When the 72 player max was added to EQ I was never a fan...and it wasn't really the max (except in splitting the exp 72 ways which didn't matter at all).  We would still form 2 raid windows that worked together if we had more players online who wanted to raid if we could.  We wouldn't leave people out because EQ instated a silly raid window with a maximum later in its development.  I find it interesting that I didn't notice anyone mention this.  72 people was not the limit if you actually raided in EQ's prime.  That came later.

    Having to tell another guild member that they can't join a raid because of a pre-set limit is not fun for anyone involved.

    One of the main reasons most raiders I talked to, once WoW released, had for NOT switching from EQ to WoW was the small 40 person raid groups.  That mindset has somewhat changed in this day and age but I think the reason is more about people never having experienced such large encounters.  Not because they aren't fun.  Most people don't know what they are missing.

    Also, I lose the feeling of an encounter being an "epic" battle if there are not a lot of people.  It makes it feel like you overcame a larger obstacle if you have a lot of people working together.  5 or 6 groups just doesn't lend the same feeling of accomplishment for me.  Sure it is still fun to kill smaller minibosses or whatever with 5 groups but that feeling of an "epic" acomplishment is lost.

    One more point.  Creating content intended for a larger quantity of players allows for more mid range raid content.  If the most difficult raid encounter is scaled for 24 people, you can only have miniboss encounters scaled for 12-18 people and below that is single group encounters (assuming all gear is equal).  That doesn't allow for much variation.  Content designed for larger raid sizes might have 6 or 7 levels of difficulty progression based on the number of people required (not just the gear required).  Did that make sense?  I'm unsure if I explained it well.  More variation is good.


    This post was edited by philo at January 6, 2017 11:12 AM PST
    • 2130 posts
    January 6, 2017 11:10 AM PST

    Any more than 24 players is just zerging. You have to dumb down your encounter mechanics to alleviate personal responsibility at raid sizes larger than that.

    Massive raids just allow for deadweight players to not stifle progress as much as they would in smaller quantities. An alternative way to look at it is that larger raid sizes accomodate worse players on average compared to smaller raid sizes.