I just watched a talk from GDC called “The Loner: Why Some People Play MMOs Alone”.
https://youtu.be/b2l2ZxNhCSg
The speaker, Damion Schubert, lists ten types of loners and talks about the needs these players have.
Loner 1: “The new kid in town”
Most players starts this way. Every MMORPG needs other people to interact with throughout the leveling experience. AoC caters to these players by associating leveled content with the node system and encouraging players to commit to a node as it develops. These players may also benefit from systems that help them join a guild or opt into group content without needing to be in a guild. We have already seen hints of this with node sieges and the rolling PvP zones of the caravan system.
Loner 2: “The Daria”
This type of loner may not want to group up, but finds other players good fun anyway. The concentration of players through the node system caters to these players.
Loner 3: “The Sociopath”
These players oppose the social norms of the community for entertainment. AoC caters to these players by allowing open world PvP, and solves for the problems these situations can create by employing the Corruption system. Damion suggests that one way to decrease griefing behavior is to increase feelings of empathy by somehow reminding the griefer that real people are being affected by their behavior. He also says that “some people will never learn and you should not be afraid of expelling them from your environment at the first sign that they prove that they cannot be salvaged.”
Loner 4: “Mr. Lunch at His Desk”
These players have limited time to play and may not be able to use a headset. They need solo content that they can get into quickly.
Loner 5: “The Introvert”
These players enjoy playing by themselves and if they do group up, prefer not to initiate contact. Damion suggests that there are extroverts who like to recruit other players, so developers should provide the tools to allow the extroverts to recruit the introverts, and the introverts will be relieved that they don’t have to be bothered recruiting other players. Introverts will benefit from tools that allow them to reach out to other players passively for things like joining a guild, such that they won’t feel rejected if they don’t succeed.
Loner 6: “The Adrift”
These players used to be part of a group but their social circle collapsed. The job of the developer is to set up the rebound relationship as fast as possible to get the player back to playing the game that they want to. AoC caters to these players by offering two distinct social circles in the forms of guild membership and node citizenry. If a player’s guild collapses or their node is destroyed, they have the other social circle to fall back on.
Loner 7: “The Unworthy”
These players may want to join in on group content, but feel that they are not good enough. Although many of the systems in AoC are yet to be fully revealed, it seems that AoC caters to these players by allowing any player to participate in caravan raids/defense and in node sieges. Node sieges in particular promise to allow players of all levels to participate through their objective based victory conditions.
Loner 8: “The Vacationer”
These players want solo content in the game to escape from real-world responsibilities or even in-game social pressures.
Loner 9: “The Commitment-Phobie”
These players choose to play alone because they think other players are idiots. They may have tried raiding or the like, but it took too long to get started or the experience was bad in some way. They may have been scared off by guild drama or incompatible guilds. Damion describes being in a guild is like being married to about 40 other people, and it only takes one bad guild experience to color a player’s relationship with the whole game. Damion suggests that you can never make guild drama go away, but you can help people find compatible guilds or compatible servers.
Loner 10: “The Garbo”
These players just want to play alone.
Damion notes that being alone is not the same as being lonely. Developers should seek solutions for players feeling lonely, but not for being alone. It seems that AoC will do a good job of catering to many of these players. Two types of loners that may need to be addressed are the Introvert and the Commitment-Phobie.
