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Inbuilt Skill Rating System vs Inspection

Is it better for the game to decide how skilled a player is, rather than the player base creating their own hierarchy system, where the boundaries between acceptable and unacceptable will shift according to group owner ?

I am all for self improvement. I am against players picking only the perfect for their group when perfection is not required. It is also their argument that some people cant be bothered to put in any level of effort and want to be carried by everyone else to get a reward.

So I was thinking of an autonomous rating system that anyone can see like a leader board. This lets Intrepid clarify what level of performance is acceptable to complete content and what needs improvement. Basically, Intrepid defines the standard required and noone else.

Comments

  • "autonomous rating system"? What is this? Can you eat it?

    And please define what you mean by "performance", because I can't grasp what you're trying to say... Unless the way you completed dungeon X impacts how likely you are to complete dungeon V despite the fact that they may need completely different mechanics + the fact that you might have never done dungeon V before.

  • ArchivedUserArchivedUser Guest
    edited August 2017
    By performance I mean a players ability or inability to deploy their skill set against adversaries.

    So how would an gear inspection system allow you to garner how well a player can combat game mechanics ?
    How does an inspection system declare how many times a player has completed a dungeon ?

    A personal performance ranking system will define how a player reacts to its environment....rather than define simply a potential that may or may not represent performance reality.

    There will be veteran players that cant be bothered to reach a basic level of competency. There will be new players whose ability far exceeds their experience. Looking at someones build cant tell you that. Looking at how they have historically performed (with their build) can.

    A bad craftsmen blames their tools ;)
  • Gating content leads to p2win accusations. So don't expect a gearscore, raid parser, inspect character function, or any of the other various "options" thrown out by those in the community who believe that they should be able to determine who can or can't handle content. All these discussions play off a false assumption that there is going to be linear content that people are going to be able to pigeonhole into their preconceived notions from playing other MMOs that are themeparks and not a "themebox."
  • ArchivedUserArchivedUser Guest
    edited August 2017
    @UnknownSystemError
    Personally I agree. But I am playing devils advocate here and trying to see the other side of the coin too. I am trying to see if such a stance that you and I and many others share is flawed. There is after all, many in the community with a completely opposite view. The point on this thread was to hopefully encourage a mature debate. Rather than have two parts of a community that have diametrically opposed views staying in their respective corners and smouldering. We all need to try and fix this source of hate. A community game would be all the better for it if we could.

    The devil of course is in the detail. Trying to isolate what aspects of this are fundamentally required to improve group gameplay (collaboration), and what is a blatant bigotry system. Is it simply a case of any system that encourages exclusion rather than inclusion should be dropped? And if so what aspects of a rating system does not condone exclusion ? Is the concept of a 'standard', a fundamentally negative or positive thing ?

    I posted this because although I recognise only allowing the user defined perfect player within the group, is an exclusion system. Is the concept of someone deliberately dragging the whole team down not also a problem ? Should the deliberately useless be excluded if they prevent the group from functioning as a group by not performing their class skills for instance ? Is someone in a group who wont collaborate really a community member to which we espouse ?

    This does of course high light the problem that not all community members play well as a team. Some even play well in large groups but not small groups. Although they can contribute just as much to the community individually or in their own way.
  • There already exists a system of accessing someones "performance".

    It's the character levels vs mob level. Simple.

    If you meet the minimum character level that IS has set themselves there is no reason to add extra layers of requirements imposed by players.
  • ArchivedUserArchivedUser Guest
    edited August 2017
    So the level system is enough ? Anyone at max level should be able and entitled to play any content anywhere at anytime with anyone. That seems perfect on the surface, yet character level says nothing about the level of each skill...only an overall level. It doesnt even say if you are a proficient cleric, fighter, rogue, mage, bard, summoner, ranger. It normally just means you have gained X amount of XP

    Lets for arguments sake talk about a project that needs to be done at work. It requires various tradesmen with their own skillset. Each of those workers would have been employed, once proven they were capable of doing their job to a set standard and may well have a trial period. Their boss would have a standard of quality for the work produced, that would require skill in the respected field that was of a minimum standard. The worker may well be sacked if he/she cant produce acceptable work.

    I would never attempt to be called a chemist, physicist, biologist etc....because I am not skilled enough to be identified as such.
  • And as soon as I start getting paid to play, then I will start hitting the "bosses" gradeable metrics. Let's instead use the example of trying to move house and inviting 7 friends over to help you. There might be one or two who just wander around packing up the light stuff and going through your sock drawer, and there will be those couple of friends you have that are beefy and do the heavy lifting. You (unless you're a dick) are not going to throw a tantrum at the two friends who are packing up your light stuff, but will just be happy you are getting moved for free without having to pay professional movers. And unless you are the aforementioned dick, buy pizza for everyone after.
  • ArchivedUserArchivedUser Guest
    edited August 2017
    Good angle @UnknownSystemError
    And yes there will be the dick moaning at all of those 'friends' not doing the things the way he/she wanted... regardless :tongue:
    In fact there may well be drama and one friend told to bugger off before they get their lights punched out.

    We see this in game when someone decides to be a jackass. Specifically doing the opposite of what was expected. Some do it as an attempt at group humour, some do it because they love to upset people and watch the world burn. Granted no rating system would protect you from a skilled person who cant be bothered to use their skill.
  • At least they have addressed the whole switching sides mid-battle issue. 4 different "group states" will stop friendly fire and trying to rp traitors. Don't have the quote handy, but remember it being friends list, current group, guild, and alliance will all be unattackable. Kicking someone from group and trying to kill them would only work if they were from a competing guild and probably has a timer on it before they will become attackable. Why you would be grouped with someone with no connection to your "faction" I don't know, but would imagine it to be rare. Since there is no server-wide random groupfinder planned, no fast travel port to instance, and many of the other mechanics that link you to random people that cause many of these problems, it is going to make your "rep" all the more important. People who act like jackasses will find themselves in smaller and smaller circles of people willing to group with them. Just like life.
  • ArchivedUserArchivedUser Guest
    edited August 2017
    Yes the friend ally grouping system is an excellent start.

    But my main point was..what would you do about the friend that put your socks and knickers down the toilet, your tools in the panty drawer, your food in the shed and the garden tools in the fridge ....that was now in the shed with no plug socket ? (Not because they were malicious but simply didnt know any better)

    Even your friends are expected to do certain things in a certain way to achieve the task in hand.
  • I understand you are trying to say and I agree a boss will have a standard level of service they expect their staff to perform at and even have trial periods.

    So my argument for that would be, why can't players also be offered trial periods? Invite them and see how they play, if they're not good enough to you explain it to them and kick them if you're really unhappy with it.

    I think it's fair to give everyone a chance if they already meet the level requirement. Just because content could be easier with a specific set up doesn't make it a requirment.
  • I get what you mean, I have had people over the years who were obviously trying to wipe the group, were looking for a carry without having made it clear during the group formation process, and other "anti-social" behavior. People like to have fun, but if your "fun" ends up cockblocking everyone from the objective, expect to be kicked and replaced, and people to remember. This is why I fell on the side of account ignore vs character ignore. I have seen people enrage and harass voip, and other mechanics just because they were excluded from groups for anti-social behavior. It will be up to the individual guild and group leaders to reign in their troublemakers, or kick them to the curb. There seems to be a wide range of playerbase, and if someone is looking for a hardcore theorycrafting guild I am sure they will find it. The one I ultimately decide on is going to be able to run content, but without the incessant whining that "hardcore epeen" guilds tend to foster.
  • ArchivedUserArchivedUser Guest
    edited August 2017
    Fanzhon said:
    I understand you are trying to say and I agree a boss will have a standard level of service they expect their staff to perform at and even have trial periods.

    So my argument for that would be, why can't players also be offered trial periods? Invite them and see how they play, if they're not good enough to you explain it to them and kick them if you're really unhappy with it.

    I think it's fair to give everyone a chance if they already meet the level requirement. Just because content could be easier with a specific set up doesn't make it a requirment.
    Yes, that is my stance and for the same reasons. Judge a person on their ability to perform a task, not how you think they 'might or might not' perform. Which means you have to give everyone a chance by default. I have seen many players, try many builds, in many unconventional ways...yet still be effective. Many even then change the 'meta' as a consequence. They are in effect the true game pioneers. God how I hate that word meta. lol.

    Your angle is also what they do that counts, not what they look like. You are still going to judge them on their effectiveness to complete the task and perform their role. You will still have a 'standard' you expect of others.
  • Your angle is also what they do that counts, not what they look like. You are still going to judge them on their effectiveness to complete the task and perform their role. You will still have a 'standard' you expect of others.
    I think I can now see why you would want a measurable score for deciding what counts as the standard. It gives justification and gives a fair reasoning.

    Personally, I think I think it would be best if this was left vague and up to players to individually decide on a case by case basis for what they can expect from a party.

    I'm sure this opinion is in a minority as most people seem to be in favour of DPS meters, gear scores and equipment inspection. I just feel like these tools more likely to breed elitist attitudes and gatekeeping.
  • Fanzhon said:

    I understand you are trying to say and I agree a boss will have a standard level of service they expect their staff to perform at and even have trial periods.

    So my argument for that would be, why can't players also be offered trial periods? Invite them and see how they play, if they're not good enough to you explain it to them and kick them if you're really unhappy with it.

    I think it's fair to give everyone a chance if they already meet the level requirement. Just because content could be easier with a specific set up doesn't make it a requirment.
    Yes, that is my stance and for the same reasons. Judge a person on their ability to perform a task, not how you think they 'might or might not' perform. Which means you have to give everyone a chance by default. I have seen many players, try many builds, in many unconventional ways...yet still be effective. Many even then change the 'meta' as a consequence. They are in effect the true game pioneers. God how I hate that word meta. lol.

    Your angle is also what they do that counts, not what they look like. You are still going to judge them on their effectiveness to complete the task and perform their role. You will still have a 'standard' you expect of others.

    I am one of those unconventional guys... mostly because I hate the meta/fotm mindset and try to break it whenever I can. Anyone can follow it takes skill to lead
  • Fanzhon said:
    I'm sure this opinion is in a minority as most people seem to be in favour of DPS meters, gear scores and equipment inspection. I just feel like these tools more likely to breed elitist attitudes and gatekeeping.
    Nope, I'm 100% with you. I don't want inspections, no records or ranks. Hell, if we could not show lvls, that just be dandy for me. 
  • I've made this argument before, but I'll make it again.

    There was a time before damage meters, raid parsers, etc existed. In these times, people worked together. LFG wasn't a deal, so you really had to scout around to find dungeon & raid groups. You had to know your team, you had to learn the fights, and you got an idea, over time spent with these people, how well or how poorly someone managed their jobs.

    I've run dungeons & raids with some very poor players who were dear friends, and we've overcome the content. I've run dungeons & raids with some "super-uber-l337" players who couldn't pull their own weight -- especially not the weight of their mouths, running off about their super-uber-l337ness.

    Having meters and parsers and whatnots are "easy" methods of accomplishing tasks, and they do not require that one know their teammates. Hey, we didn't beat the rage timer? Pull up the parser, figure out who had the lowest damage, & replace them. There isn't, any longer, a strong sense of helping folk grow their characters, and their characters' abilities.

    One of the hopes/dreams that has been given resurgence with Ashes is a return to the more community-based dungeons & raids, where we won't rely on some internal or external guide that tells us how "prepared" a character is. I mean, let's say I have a mage who does whammo! dps ... but then I decide to roll a rogue. So, my mage has been through all the dungeons & raids, but my rogue's still new. If we rely on ANY form of gating that shows us a characters' preparedness, rather than knowing each other, how the other plays, so on and so forth, then what, we're gonna say "Nope, sorry, you've never been in here, don't wanna waste my time with you"?

    That's what the bulk of us (admittedly) older players do not wish to see happen. People tout all kinds of alternatives to ye olde dps meter, but in the end, it will all come down to a simple conversation:

    RL: "Hey, man, ok, so we're considering you for XYZ raid, but we really need to know what your self-reporting score for blah-blah is."

    Alternative 1:
    PC: "Um, no?"

    RL: "Alright, sorry, next?"

    Alternative 2:
    PC: "It's 123435"
    RL option 1: "Great, you're in!"
    RL option 2: "Sorry, next?"

    If you can tell me how any kind of damage meter or parser or self-reporter whatever can avoid this, I'd love to hear it.

    I'm not opposed to this because I think it's bad to want to use numbers to try to improve your performance. I'm opposed to this, or anything similar, because you know and I know that, in the end, the above scenario will be what occurs, and the ideology behind knowing and actually giving a damn about other players will be lost. 
  • Isende said:
    I've made this argument before, but I'll make it again.

    There was a time before damage meters, raid parsers, etc existed. In these times, people worked together. LFG wasn't a deal, so you really had to scout around to find dungeon & raid groups. You had to know your team, you had to learn the fights, and you got an idea, over time spent with these people, how well or how poorly someone managed their jobs.

    I've run dungeons & raids with some very poor players who were dear friends, and we've overcome the content. I've run dungeons & raids with some "super-uber-l337" players who couldn't pull their own weight -- especially not the weight of their mouths, running off about their super-uber-l337ness.

    Having meters and parsers and whatnots are "easy" methods of accomplishing tasks, and they do not require that one know their teammates. Hey, we didn't beat the rage timer? Pull up the parser, figure out who had the lowest damage, & replace them. There isn't, any longer, a strong sense of helping folk grow their characters, and their characters' abilities.

    One of the hopes/dreams that has been given resurgence with Ashes is a return to the more community-based dungeons & raids, where we won't rely on some internal or external guide that tells us how "prepared" a character is. I mean, let's say I have a mage who does whammo! dps ... but then I decide to roll a rogue. So, my mage has been through all the dungeons & raids, but my rogue's still new. If we rely on ANY form of gating that shows us a characters' preparedness, rather than knowing each other, how the other plays, so on and so forth, then what, we're gonna say "Nope, sorry, you've never been in here, don't wanna waste my time with you"?

    That's what the bulk of us (admittedly) older players do not wish to see happen. People tout all kinds of alternatives to ye olde dps meter, but in the end, it will all come down to a simple conversation:

    RL: "Hey, man, ok, so we're considering you for XYZ raid, but we really need to know what your self-reporting score for blah-blah is."

    Alternative 1:
    PC: "Um, no?"

    RL: "Alright, sorry, next?"

    Alternative 2:
    PC: "It's 123435"
    RL option 1: "Great, you're in!"
    RL option 2: "Sorry, next?"

    If you can tell me how any kind of damage meter or parser or self-reporter whatever can avoid this, I'd love to hear it.

    I'm not opposed to this because I think it's bad to want to use numbers to try to improve your performance. I'm opposed to this, or anything similar, because you know and I know that, in the end, the above scenario will be what occurs, and the ideology behind knowing and actually giving a damn about other players will be lost. 

    This is the way I feel
  • Thanks everyone. I understand and respect everyone's thoughts on this, because they are all valid. I have been through and experienced the same as you and have the same fears.

    All such things are exclusion devices, no reasonable person can argue with that. In an MMO we need to get back to being fully inclusive, as that is what a community means at the end of the day.That inclusion extends to everyone, the strangers and not just our friends.

    My point with this thread was to determine if exclusion is never acceptable for any reason, or allowable in certain circumstances. Why have ignore and block if exclusion isnt permitted ? Clearly there is behaviour that is unacceptable. Is a basic level of skill one of them in regard to teamplay. Not being perfect should not be a valid reason. So where do you draw the line if there is one.
  • I might be wrong but i think the conversation is moving off the point. The undesired behavior is people pre-judging players by looking at their character and forming assumptions of it's performance based off community perceptions. People need to be able to build character how they want. If a person wants to do group content, they should be judged off there performance and not how they built there character. It shouldn't take a popular streamer or youtuber to make a build acceptable.

    Groups are free to invite or not invite whoever they want, I just hope they aren't basing bad presumptions. 
  • What I was discussing is a metric in game that is generated form skill competency. A metric that realistically describes a players ability to perform their class role. Such a metric tells players if they need practice and the groups.... which players are and are not ready to group yet.

    Character level normally has nothing to do with skill and everything to do with how much XP you have amassed. So is literally irrelevant as a 'skill' level.

    So this is to give 'relevant' information and thus prevent bad assumptions.
  • ArchivedUserArchivedUser Guest
    edited August 2017
    Oh, sorry for my misunderstanding but i disagree with such a feature. I feel like making that number accurate is almost impossible. It would promote elitist behavior in the community just to protect pug groups from noobs. Also, with the way pvp is set up in this game, you should probably know the people are going to the dungeon with. I'd be more worried about taking in a spy then dragging along a noob.
  • There are at least 4 qualifiers mentioned so far that won't allow people in your groups to "gank" you once in a dungeon. Friends list, current group, guild, and alliance (2 or more guilds that have enacted this option), are not able to attack each other. Since there is no groupfinder or fast travel, groups will be almost always formed from people in your immediate zoi. And yes, anyone who doesn't fall under one of those umbrellas is most likely not going to be hanging out in the area.
  • There will always be content that will be just out of reach for a given player, if there's to be any sense of character and skill progression. Beyond that, it's ultimately up to players to decide who they party with, and no system (or lack of) will change that.

    While elitists can be a problem, so can a number of other types of players. There are players who constantly bring down the groups they join, there are trolls, and there are people who will perceive any level of performance standards as elitism. But there can often be good reasons to be selective—such as limited playing time, meeting goals that require speed and efficiency, not being able to give the game full attention, or not being in the mood for a drawn out run. Nobody has the right to tell someone how they should form their parties, or enjoy the game.

    That being said, in more recent MMOs, it has been getting easier to measure or ballpark performance. Not just because many people have come to rely on it, but also because people tend to set more rigid or unrealistic requirements without it.

    I personally think it would be great if MMOs had built-in combat breakdowns (or what is more widely known as a combat parse, although there wouldn't be any parsing involved if it was built-in) and dungeoneering profiles. People could pull up a given player's profile and see how many times they've completed a dungeon, what achievements they've completed for it, and how many times they've killed each boss, including what the player has personally showcased as their best parse for the encounter. Depth of measurement would allow people to be as selective as they want/need to be, instead of the usual shallow gearscore discrimination.
  • ArchivedUserArchivedUser Guest
    edited August 2017

    So a good point was raised about how you could implement a standard in a fair way. I was thinking about this last night and had a light bulb moment.

    To group up for themepark dungeons:

    1. You cannot change your skillbar once grouped.

    2. All skills on your skillbar must be at max level.

    The idea here is that solo play and ad hoc team play will be used to level up your skills. What skills you choose is upto your own playstyle. All it requires is that you are a master of that playstyle and fully competent to deploy the skills involved with it.

    Group play itself is not about being competent with your skills. Its about coordinating your skills with other players in a complementary way. No one can train for this. There is no meter that says their group is going to gel and work well together. It 100% relies on experience with a group of other players that get more and more intimate with each others abilities over time. It 100% relies on a persons abilities to watch each others backs and understand each others weaknesses and plug them.

    This isolates mechanical skill from social skill. It makes mechanical skill compulsory, but social skill something that develops as part of group play.

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