Well any ways forgot to mention some things about not standing in the fire. Raid Bosses are not going anywere for the most part plus with tab targeting you really do not have to have your eyes glued to the boss.
Even with skills shots since raid bosses do not move around or dodge attacks so your eyes do not have to be glued to the target. So no tunnel vision required.
Another thing you could do to not stand in the fire is not to use the first person veiw point of view. but take 3rd person point of view and a little far away and camera angle should be tilted toward the ground a little.
Now the things I mentioned might seem redundant, but probably not so for someone that stands in the fire.
Problem is getting this information to the players that need it.
Instead of a PvE reward system you could in fact have a PvE punishing system were people get less gold for bad performance what do you guys think of that.
There could be a red x in a square with that annoying buzzer sound whenever someone is standing in the fire. This could be a level 1 through 30 thing. Surely that would help people not stand in the fire.
Whether it is rewarding "good" play or punishing "bad" play, my original point still stands. You are trying to a judge a single person's performance in a team-based environment where your performance is affected by what everyone else is doing. Your success in a raid is as part of a team, not as an individual. You could be the best player in the world but if you can't work with your teammates, you will never succeed.
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MeowsedMember, Braver of Worlds, Kickstarter, Alpha One
I think what @consultant is trying to say, basically, is that there are several things new players need to know how to do (avoid fire, manage cooldowns, figure out a decent rotation for DPS, use CC at appropriate times, etc.), and it can help to have them enumerated plainly, or have them laid out one at a time. These things are pretty obvious for veterans, but for brand-new players, they might not even know what it is they're doing wrong in a full dungeon or raid situation.
However, I agree with @Wandering Mist that using individual, overly-specific rewards in EVERY dungeon is a terrible way to teach players about specific mechanics or skills. I'd rather have early-game quests and dungeons focus only on one of these skills at a time, to properly teach newbies without distracting them with all the other trappings of a full dungeon. Then, of course, end-game dungeons can put all the pieces together.
I would specifically like to emphasize that DPS checks should be a regular occurrence, even in low-level dungeons. Games which don't introduce serious DPS checks early in the game, are just asking for people to never look at their skills or rotations. (Has anybody seen Guild Grumps? It's a hilariously extreme example. Ross literally tells everyone to just mash buttons going through early WoW gameplay, and they manage to struggle through a lot of stuff. And when they actually read their skills, days later, it's like night and day how much better the whole experience is.)
Also dungeons shouldn't allow healers to just keep people alive forever, even when they stand in fire. There are many ways to enforce a slightly-punishing, but not frustrating, challenge in low-level dungeons; but if the only "punishment" is that people take a little bit of damage which the healer quickly fixes, that's not good enough to teach people. I don't mind (and I even enjoying) being able to hard-carry a party as healer, even when everyone else is making tons mistakes; but it should be a miserable experience for everyone else as they spend a lot of time dead-on-the-ground or otherwise incapacitated/CCed/debuffed. That's how you get people to care about the fire they're standing in.
(I think this comment was more rambling that usual...)
Rewards for big achievements like 1-shotting a boss or first boss kill - yes, lots of these please.
Rewards for small actions like using skills - no need. Players learning basic things like not standing in fire is a raid working as intended. The learning curve is the risk players accept in order to obtain the big rewards. That equation is important. (Of course, if the example were extreme, like a raid no one could complete, I'd say the game needs to change rather than the players).
I think what @consultant is trying to say, basically, is that there are several things new players need to know how to do (avoid fire, manage cooldowns, figure out a decent rotation for DPS, use CC at appropriate times, etc.), and it can help to have them enumerated plainly, or have them laid out one at a time. These things are pretty obvious for veterans, but for brand-new players, they might not even know what it is they're doing wrong in a full dungeon or raid situation.
I still stand by the idea that the best way for players to learn these things is from other players.
This means the best thing the game can do is to tell players to go out and listen and learn from other players.
There is no shortage of players willing to help and teach.
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Wandering MistModerator, Member, Founder, Kickstarter, Alpha One
I think what @consultant is trying to say, basically, is that there are several things new players need to know how to do (avoid fire, manage cooldowns, figure out a decent rotation for DPS, use CC at appropriate times, etc.), and it can help to have them enumerated plainly, or have them laid out one at a time. These things are pretty obvious for veterans, but for brand-new players, they might not even know what it is they're doing wrong in a full dungeon or raid situation.
However, I agree with @Wandering Mist that using individual, overly-specific rewards in EVERY dungeon is a terrible way to teach players about specific mechanics or skills. I'd rather have early-game quests and dungeons focus only on one of these skills at a time, to properly teach newbies without distracting them with all the other trappings of a full dungeon. Then, of course, end-game dungeons can put all the pieces together.
I would specifically like to emphasize that DPS checks should be a regular occurrence, even in low-level dungeons. Games which don't introduce serious DPS checks early in the game, are just asking for people to never look at their skills or rotations. (Has anybody seen Guild Grumps? It's a hilariously extreme example. Ross literally tells everyone to just mash buttons going through early WoW gameplay, and they manage to struggle through a lot of stuff. And when they actually read their skills, days later, it's like night and day how much better the whole experience is.)
Also dungeons shouldn't allow healers to just keep people alive forever, even when they stand in fire. There are many ways to enforce a slightly-punishing, but not frustrating, challenge in low-level dungeons; but if the only "punishment" is that people take a little bit of damage which the healer quickly fixes, that's not good enough to teach people. I don't mind (and I even enjoying) being able to hard-carry a party as healer, even when everyone else is making tons mistakes; but it should be a miserable experience for everyone else as they spend a lot of time dead-on-the-ground or otherwise incapacitated/CCed/debuffed. That's how you get people to care about the fire they're standing in.
(I think this comment was more rambling that usual...)
All the things you mentioned are things that should be learned during the levelling process in my opinion. By the time you reach level cap you should have a decent idea of what your character can do and be able to do simple rotations without having to think about it too much. If you don't, that is a failing of the game, not the community. If the game never forces you to use CC while levelling up, then of course you will get many people at level cap that don't know how to use those skills. After all, one of the main reasons to have a levelling phase is to teach players how to play. If the game doesn't do that, then it fails.
I've seen this happen in so many mmorpgs where the levelling phase teaches you next to nothing or offer any challenge at all and it creates a massive difficulty spike later on that players struggle to overcome. It would be like if I took a complete non-swimmers and threw them into deep water. Yes, some people might struggle through and improve in such conditions but the vast majority of people will just drown.
When it comes to teaching players to avoid shit, I much prefer CC effects to plain damage. As you say, damage can be ignored or out-healed depending on gear, but CC cannot. If someone stands in a big puddle of black sludge that stuns them, they will instantly be aware of it and seek to avoid it next time. You cannot out-gear CC.
EDIT: Thanks for the awesome recommendation of "Guild Grumps". It's hilarious and definitely hammers home just how important the levelling system is for teaching new players.
Well might be better if it was only to lets say level 40. So it would not be a permament thing.
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mcstackersonMember, Phoenix Initiative, Royalty, Kickstarter, Alpha One
Players should know that taking damage is bad.
It sounds like the problem might be that players are unaware they are taking damage. If the solution is to let them know they are standing in the fire then isn't what should be done, clearly convey to the user that they are burning. Like a lot of games now, have a screen effect or something similar to communicate that they are taking damage and need to move. Maybe have an extra effect if they are killed by the fire so they know what got them.
I know older games didn't always do a good job of showing so I wonder how much that affected people.
Besides that, if you want to teach players how to react to these kind of abilities, give similar abilities to mobs outside of group content.
Those are achievements and honestly I love them. If they go for achievement points or achievement tiers I'd be extra cautious though, things can get out of hand and end up pretty weird like FFXIV or GW2.
"Magic is not a tool, little one. It is a river that unites us in its current."
Comments
Whether it is rewarding "good" play or punishing "bad" play, my original point still stands. You are trying to a judge a single person's performance in a team-based environment where your performance is affected by what everyone else is doing. Your success in a raid is as part of a team, not as an individual. You could be the best player in the world but if you can't work with your teammates, you will never succeed.
However, I agree with @Wandering Mist that using individual, overly-specific rewards in EVERY dungeon is a terrible way to teach players about specific mechanics or skills. I'd rather have early-game quests and dungeons focus only on one of these skills at a time, to properly teach newbies without distracting them with all the other trappings of a full dungeon. Then, of course, end-game dungeons can put all the pieces together.
I would specifically like to emphasize that DPS checks should be a regular occurrence, even in low-level dungeons. Games which don't introduce serious DPS checks early in the game, are just asking for people to never look at their skills or rotations. (Has anybody seen Guild Grumps? It's a hilariously extreme example. Ross literally tells everyone to just mash buttons going through early WoW gameplay, and they manage to struggle through a lot of stuff. And when they actually read their skills, days later, it's like night and day how much better the whole experience is.)
Also dungeons shouldn't allow healers to just keep people alive forever, even when they stand in fire. There are many ways to enforce a slightly-punishing, but not frustrating, challenge in low-level dungeons; but if the only "punishment" is that people take a little bit of damage which the healer quickly fixes, that's not good enough to teach people. I don't mind (and I even enjoying) being able to hard-carry a party as healer, even when everyone else is making tons mistakes; but it should be a miserable experience for everyone else as they spend a lot of time dead-on-the-ground or otherwise incapacitated/CCed/debuffed. That's how you get people to care about the fire they're standing in.
(I think this comment was more rambling that usual...)
Rewards for small actions like using skills - no need. Players learning basic things like not standing in fire is a raid working as intended. The learning curve is the risk players accept in order to obtain the big rewards. That equation is important. (Of course, if the example were extreme, like a raid no one could complete, I'd say the game needs to change rather than the players).
This means the best thing the game can do is to tell players to go out and listen and learn from other players.
There is no shortage of players willing to help and teach.
All the things you mentioned are things that should be learned during the levelling process in my opinion. By the time you reach level cap you should have a decent idea of what your character can do and be able to do simple rotations without having to think about it too much. If you don't, that is a failing of the game, not the community. If the game never forces you to use CC while levelling up, then of course you will get many people at level cap that don't know how to use those skills. After all, one of the main reasons to have a levelling phase is to teach players how to play. If the game doesn't do that, then it fails.
I've seen this happen in so many mmorpgs where the levelling phase teaches you next to nothing or offer any challenge at all and it creates a massive difficulty spike later on that players struggle to overcome. It would be like if I took a complete non-swimmers and threw them into deep water. Yes, some people might struggle through and improve in such conditions but the vast majority of people will just drown.
When it comes to teaching players to avoid shit, I much prefer CC effects to plain damage. As you say, damage can be ignored or out-healed depending on gear, but CC cannot. If someone stands in a big puddle of black sludge that stuns them, they will instantly be aware of it and seek to avoid it next time. You cannot out-gear CC.
EDIT: Thanks for the awesome recommendation of "Guild Grumps". It's hilarious and definitely hammers home just how important the levelling system is for teaching new players.
It sounds like the problem might be that players are unaware they are taking damage. If the solution is to let them know they are standing in the fire then isn't what should be done, clearly convey to the user that they are burning. Like a lot of games now, have a screen effect or something similar to communicate that they are taking damage and need to move. Maybe have an extra effect if they are killed by the fire so they know what got them.
I know older games didn't always do a good job of showing so I wonder how much that affected people.
Besides that, if you want to teach players how to react to these kind of abilities, give similar abilities to mobs outside of group content.
I heard a bird ♫