Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Comments
When I think about action combat I think about BDO combat which of course is fun but I don't believe it would work in this game.
You’re right, “snooze” IS my opinion, good job!
GW2 combat is mobile but it’s incredibly simple and low skill (no need to aim other than in the general direction or throw down an AOE) along with the fact that you don’t have any sort of action combos. You just rotate through your hot bar like any other tab game. It’s a snooze fest.
And nice try but since I had some pressure to continue playing from a couple friends I played to max level and not only did quite a bit of PvE including fractals and world bosses, but also did plenty of PvP including but not limited to WvWvW. So yeah buster I’ve played the game through and through and am qualified to say it’s boring and the second my friends got their way with “showing me everything the end game had to offer because it would be more fun we promise” I quit because it’s not good combat for an action player. It’s probably fantastic and the best thing since sliced bread if you’re a hardcore tab target player.
I prefer the D&D aspect of rolling a dice to see if I hit or crit vs. the target's defense and to determine how much damage I do. Stats on gear should help me miss less, it shouldn't be if I aimed the mouse in the right direction and successfully predicted whether the target moved in the direction I was aiming at. It will drive a lot of people away from the game.
If Tab Targeting is boring to people, there are other ways to keep the game interesting for them. If Action Combat is too complicated for people, those people just aren't going to play your game. Just as Action Combat is a Risk vs. Reward system, implementing Action Combat is also Risk vs. Reward, and the reward will be much less than a Tab Targeting system would give you in terms of staying power of the game.
All that being said, a hybrid system could work. Action Combat can give you those feel good dopamine hits from perfect aim / perfect timing moments that Tab Target is lacking. And players who absolutely detest Action Combat, can perhaps spec into Tab Target abilities so they aren't pigeon-holed into a system they do not enjoy. It could also keep them around long enough to learn the ins and outs of Action Combat and perhaps change their views on the system.
My stance on Tab Targeting is the system alone is enough to drive me away from playing the game. As I have already done for games like FF14.
Of course it doesn't feel good to be losing. Quit being so sore about it and practice. There will be arenas to practice in but also there will be tons of group content for PvE and PvP so you won't be having all the pressure on just yourself.
Being hit just because the computer says so feels bad. It will drive a lot of people away from the game. Many players actually like a challenge and like doing the work themselves instead of the computer calculating your chance to hit. Nasty disgusting system. Play a tabletop game or Baulders Gate 3 or one of the many Tab Target games on the market.
If Action Combat is too complicated for people, there are other ways to keep the game interesting for them. If tab target is too boring to people, those people just aren't going to play your game. Landing your own skill shots is way more rewarding than the computer saying whether or not you are hit or hit your opponent.
This is finally something I can agree with. Tab is dated and objectively not as exciting. And as you said, players will be allowed to take tab target skills if they want (up to 75% of your hotbar) so the old school players still have their way to play. I just hope the action side is actual action and not just tab target masquerading as action like Guild Wars 2.
I really like your points, they are pretty reasonable, i agree that AC Skills should do more damage than TT skills, but i feel like you need to specify which type of AC skill we are talking about when determining that "more damage" factor as a reward for precise use of a harder to hit skill, and as you stated the size of the hitboxes will play a big role.
AC skills can be separated in the following categories from harder to hit to easier to hit:
Skill Shots: Mostly projectiles and thrusts. The width and the range of the skills are important to measure its precision requirement and should probably be the highest damage output for ranged skills.
Set Location AOE: Mostly instant area damage and DOT area(or both). The Smaller the radius/range the bigger the damage.
Cones,Fans,Squares and etc: Basically Frontal area damages. The Smaller the radius/range the bigger the damage.
AOE around self or Aura: Self explanatory and the simplest one. The Smaller the radius the bigger the damage.
Honorable mentions: Cast time and freedom of mobility during the skill use are huge factors for the damage output of a skill.
Another very important factor for the balance of the damage disparity between AC skills and TT skills is if both can be "avoided" by character stats such as Block/Parry/Evasion. Some games make AC skills ignore those mechanics which is a huge advantage.
Anyway i'm really excited to see how intrepid will deal with those concepts when building their Hybrid combat system and see how the meta will evolve over that as players will have the possibility to choose using up to 75% of their skills AC or TT and 25% of the other.
Aren't we all sinners?
you keep saying GW2 is action, but it's not and doesn't advertise itself as such. It's hybrid and advertises itself as such.
This game has a chance to be the next big thing, or it has a chance to be the next big flop. Action Combat could be what makes it flop. Action Combat is not what's going to make it successful. (This is the part where you just repeat the exact same thing and substitute Tab Targeting - and you're not wrong.) My first impression of this game after seeing the first videos of the combat was that Action Combat is going to make me not like this game. Other than that, I've been wearing rose-colored glasses when looking at Ashes of Creation - I really do believe they can make up for the choice to use Action Combat.
That's just one person's opinion, but seeing what games have been successful in the past and what combat system works the best... It's not Action Combat, so why set yourself up for failure by intentionally reducing your success rate? MMORPG's appeal to me because I can level my character, get gear, do raid content, do dungeon content, do objective-style PvP (not death match), etc. Not because I can point and click my moves. If you want like-minded people to stick around, Action Combat is going to be one of the things that needs to be done very carefully and should have a small impact on combat, not be the basis of the entire combat system. You can say that the world or the player is the most important character in your game, but I'd argue that the combat system is. Whether it's PvE or PvP, the combat is what matters the most. It has to be simple enough for casual/inexperienced gamers to not have a huge barrier of entry, but also complex enough that it keeps players interested. This is why I think hybrid is a valid solution, although I still think tab targeting needs to be the primary focus.
If Action Combat focus is the choice, I'm willing to give it a chance and I hope my opinion on this subject was absolutely wrong. I think at the end of the day we all want this game to succeed and be fun no matter what route it takes to get there.
If hybrid system is the choice, I hope the sum is greater than its parts and it's not a middle ground compromise between the two systems.
This is very true. MMO players don't play for the combat, it's just part of the game that accentuates the others. Players who are playing for the combat would be better suited playing games made for that purpose. Monster Hunter, Dark Souls, God of War, etc.
Of course games like ESO and BDO are fun to play it's true, I don't deny that.
Tab and Hybrid combat just fit really well with the MMO concept. Action combat doesn't fit well with massively multiplayer because Action camera and such is a single-player kind of system, whereas tab and hybrid fit more into a massively multiplayer aspect. Again, I'm not saying Action can't fit into a massively multiplayer system, it's just much harder and has to be designed around it from the ground up.
Games like GW2 and Wildstar are the best examples of MMO combat that found a good middleground, and are/were both very fun to play, with very few negative reviews of their combat.
However, poorly implemented action combat is infinitely worse than poorly implemented tab targeting. If the action combat in alpha is a flop, then they should just switch to tab targeting.
I would agree with this, but I also think - personally- that well implemented tab target is better than any action combat.
I guess you could say that Inlook at action combat returns from how well done it is to be like a bell. It starts off slow, with major improvements hardly making the thing much better. As things improve though, and the combat is generally good, even some small tweaks can make it much better. After a while though, action combat on general hits a point where any improvements to it are barely notice
Contrast this with tab target, that I see as a fairly steady incline in terms of improvement to the system making things better. A bad tab target system is better than a bad action combat system, but as both are improved, the action combat takes over from the tab as it climbs the bell curve.
The part I fully understand many would disagree with me on is that as both systems continue to improve, the action combat system hits the opposite side of that bell and slows down in overall improvements- while the tan target continues on its meandering steady incline upwards.
To me, this is a function of player engagement. A major improvement to combat that has no real player engagement is meaningless unless/until players are heavily engaged. Once players hit "peak engagement", improvements to the system are hardly even noticed, and may even be to the detriment of player enjoyment.
The reason this isn't an issue in tab target is because as tab target systems improve, they become more about decision making and less about reflex. This, in my opinion,gives then a much higher ceiling in terms of realistic possibilities than action combat has.
I'm more than aware that most people will disagree with me on this. The only reason this is my opinion is because I played a game with that tab target system for a very long time. Anyone that hasn't played EQ2 at the top end (specifically from around 2006 - 2010) would have absolutely no reason to believe the above to be true,as I have yet to see a tab target game that even comes close.
That's because the actual MMO is not a battle royal, and instead is a massively multiplayer rpg
I'll have to disagree that there is some forcing function that is preventing action combat from improving, yet allowing tab targeting to improve continuously. In theory, there's nothing that prevents action combat from improving at the same rate as tab targeting. Action combat is definitely harder to implement than tab targeting, so maybe the reason why you believe that is because it's harder to improve on the complexity that is action combat. There is still plentiful of room for action combat to improve if the complexity can be managed, and I would argue that progress towards peak action combat is way further away than peak tab targeting combat currently.
Decision making in action combat can be just as important as it is in action combat. However, this doesn't tend to happen in practice, because it takes studios way more time to implement new action combat skills than tab target skills. This results in a smaller number of decisions. But you could, in theory, have the same tab target skills directly ported to action combat aiming, hence resulting in the same decision making complexity. Action combat would definitively have a higher skill ceiling than tab targeting in this scenario, because you also have to aim on top of choosing from the same number skills. Again, this is not usually true in practice, because studios never have enough time to add the same number of action combat skills as they would if they implemented tab target skills.
Good tab target is more complex than action - significantly more. This is both it's draw, and it's biggest downfall.
You're right that decision making in practice matters more in tab than in action, and also right that this doesn't need to be the case.
You are incorrect about the reason, however.
The reason is that in an action based system, the developers want the players engaged in things like targeting. They decide the level of engagement they want their players to have (is the combat to be fairly casual, of full on intense fighting?), and they design the combat to that end.
Same goes for tab target. They decide on the level of engagement they want, and they develop the system to meet that level of engagement. The thing is, action combat engagement is in targeting and positioning, while tab target engagement is in decision making. Obviously both have an amount of the other (there is positioning and targeting required in most tab target games, and there is some decision making required in most action games), but the bulk of the engagement for each is fairly set.
This is why there is a cap on the returns you get from improvements in action combat. When a player is fully engaged in an action game, there is no real room left to improve the combat. What improvements are made to it are not really noticed by the average player, as they were fully engaged before, and fully engaged after.
Since decision making is a different form of engagement than what is present in action games, further improvements to such systems can still be fully appreciated by players, even when at full engagement in the system.
The BR was used to test mechanics for the MMO. The current combat in the MMO isn't the final version.
Yes but if you look at the battle royal combat it's obviously not mmo combat
People are jumping over buildings and dashing around like crazy, yes they say they were testing the action combat part of the MMO combat, but it's blatantly obvious they also ramped it way up because it was a battle royal
That said, I agree that BDO's combat lacks depth - but you can't blame that entirely on AC. There are far worse systems that are TT which put you to sleep on the keyboard. Unless major innovation happens in TT (in the direction AA went) it will be left behind in the dust.
There are plenty of lessons to learn from games like Monster Hunter, MOBAS, most console games, etc.
In my own experience, I've enjoyed TT in melee combat, where I can swing fists/weapons in the direction of an enemy I'm locked to - and they whiff if I'm not close enough. In this case, TT was more for camera management because (Nintendo's) consoles have (had) less buttons to work with.
I haven't played recent expansions, but I cannot stand WoW TT mages who stand far away and every skill auto targets and you just press buttons in an order.
League of Legends specifically went through a phase where they weeded out many of the "point-and-click" skills (which I equate to TT) that they had implemented early into the game (Veigar's Q, Annie's Q, Taric Stun, etc.) because it is NOT fun for PvP and has a very low skill ceiling. Even today, you hear people complaining about Syndra's R.
Now if mages auto hitting all their spells with TT is the extreme end of TT. Then the extreme end of AC is precision aiming every skill with a reticle. Both are bad for combat.
I'm not saying we should throw out TT, I think it definitely has its place - e.g. LoL put autotarget on Kaisa's Q and it works great and nobody complains about it (although she's about to be hit by nerfs). But the argument that TT is superior to AC as a combat system is just false. There's a reason every fighting game in the world has few auto-target skills.
I keep saying it because people (not just here on this forum, but yes people on this forum as well) continue to refer to GW2 combat as an example of action combat and they’re incorrect. And the camera mode is literally called “Action Cam”. You keep acting like I don’t know all about GW2.
BDO was done well yes, but there are actually many action combat mmo's that have failed miserably, the success ratio is pretty low, and that's where some peoples fear about it comes from.
About the other games like Monster Hunter and such, those are good action combat games yes, but they are not MMO's. They handle at MOST like 10-15 people in one battle. MMO's can reach far more than that, and pure action combat starts to become a hindrance when the number of people rises too much. In the 250v250 battles they are talking about, action combat and an action camera isn't going to pair well with the massive scale, unless they are going for a "I'm in an actual war and can only see the people and abilities immediately around me" kind of D-Day-level of immersion thing.
I haven't seen anyone on here call GW2 action combat, I've only ever seen it called hybrid (because that's what it is)
Also, the action camera is optional, same as the current iteration of AoC's action camera. I only act like it because you keep taking weird stances that aren't accurate towards GW2 and hybrid combat.
Highly disagree with this sentiment from @Dreoh and @Semi. This is a slap in the face to both PvE and PvP players. Whole MMOs have thrived on good combat. I want Ashes to do the same
If combat is just to accentuate other aspects of MMOs. Why is combat so important to so many people?
Why are whole games centered around Raiding or PvP?
This is my personal feedback, shared to help the game thrive in its niche.
You're thinking a little too much inside the box when it comes to action combat. Yes, the decision making in most action combat games is currently targeting and positioning. However, this can be improved upon. In fact, a game like fortnite is a surprising example of this. I'm sure you've heard of that game, so I won't explain the action combat elements, but basically you can place objects, rotate them, etc... to gain an advantage. It's a simple example, but you can use it to construct things of arbitrary complexity, or just use it to gain a small advantage in the middle of a fight. Now, I'm not saying to turn AoC into fortnite. I'm just giving an example where decision making is relevant when developers actually give you tools over instead of only weapons with varying bullet drop.
In theory, you could take everything from a tab targeting game and implement it into action combat. You could even use homing attacks to simulate attacks that always hit in tab targeting. Similarly, you could implement weapon range, and even have the UI tell you if your weapon is in range or not. Then, it's just a matter of perspective between action combat and tab targeting, thus the decision making is the same.
I'm assuming that what you mean by engagement level is not having to think about aiming while tab targeting. If devs give you tools, especially that mitigate aiming, or disrupt it somehow, suddenly focusing strictly on aiming becomes less important. The engagement level of action combat doesn't really affect this.
Note that I did not say combat is unimportant, just that it's absolutely not the focus of MMORPG's.
Games that focus on combat are Fighting Games, FPS's, Action Adventure, etc.
MMORPG's are centered around being a world of many players and player interaction of many kinds. Combat is just a part of that. Any MMO that a person plays that you say they play "because they like it's combat" has a non-MMO combat equivalent that does combat most likely much better. Therefore, combat is not the sole reason they are playing said MMO.
As for your second paragraph, you are making the assumption that combat not being the centerpiece of a game means it is not important. That is absolutely and obviously not true. Combat is definitely important, but it does not have to be great for the MMO to be great.
However, a BAD combat system will absolutely ruin an otherwise great MMO, and THIS is why people are so fretful about AoC's combat.
Finally, you also make the strange assumption that people enjoy raiding for the combat. That plays a part for some people yes, but a much bigger reason people enjoy raiding is because of the social aspect and reward aspects. People enjoy being part of a team and taking on challenges together. Players also enjoy gearing up and getting stronger, and raids are a BIG part of that in MMO's.
As for PVP, you are correct though. Combat is VERY important in the pvp sections of MMO's, though again as I've stated above, it only needs to be decent, not amazing for it to be played. Yes, a good combat will cause PVP to thrive a bit more, but a bad combat will absolutely kill the pvp scene.
I don't disagree with your statement that you could take everything from tab target games and implement them in to action combat, this is a discussion I've had on these forums before.
The thing is, they could also take everything from action combat and add it to tab target - including aiming.
The reason they don't is because player attention and ability is finite, and develoeprs absolutely need to keep this in mind. They ideally want to engage players enough to keep them entertained and busy, but not so much that they are overloaded.
Both action and tab are able to overload players, should developers want to do this.
What this means is that the arguments along these lines are kind of pointless. When both systems can be taken to the point above what is reasonable, there is no place to say "but this one can do more than that".
For every piece of tab target that is bought in to action combat, or action combat that is bought in to tab target, there is a small piece of the other than needs to be left at the door in order to not overload the players - assuming we are talking about two games that both want full engagement in combat.
This last point - games that want full engagement from players - I personally think is why many people kind of look down on tab target. Most people have not played a tab target game that wanted to fully engage the players, yet most action combat games do. As such, people naturally think of tab target as easier or lesser, when really, it was design decisions to not fully engage players.
The reason for this design decision is that most tab target games add in a large component of that engagement via content, whereas most action games simply don't. This means that not only do you need to play one of only a few games to see tab target combat in it's fullest state, but you need to play those few games at the very top end.
I've yet to play or see an action combat game with what I would consider "good" PvE content. This is also why I don't expect Ashes to have very good PvE content at all.
Edit to add; for clarification, the reason I am able to confidently say that top end tab target is better than top end action combat, and also say that both should only ever be implemented to a point where players can reasonably be expected to perform well even though both could go much further, is inherent to the designs of each. Since tab target is all about decisions, a good tab target system offers you actual decisions both in combat (where that limit in engagement is in effect) but also in your build.
Basically, while both are able to fully engage players in combat, it is the fact that tab target allows for deeper character building than action combat that means I consider it to be better at the very top end.
We can haggle on a game by game basis if you like. For Ashes, a game with a number of systems centered around world PvP events. Combat seems pretty important to me.
That is your opinion. As a person who plays mostly MMORPGs, I disagree. There is not a game like Wildstar at all anymore. Single player or otherwise. Games like Wildstar and Tera may seem closely related at a glance, but the PvE and PvP was way different between the two games. There just is not a another game that places quite like these games did. Multiplayer games like monster hunter/darksouls are not the same thing.
I am not making any assumptions here. I have played FFXI, the game that I would estimate has some of the worst combat for most people, and found enjoyment in it. What I am saying is games like Wildstar, Tera, Darkfall 1&2, and Mortal Online 1&2, all draw people in with the combat. What you guys said was "MMO players don't play for combat." I am telling you with some MMOs, I do. I am a MMO player and some games will draw me in or repulse me based on their combat. I hated almost everything about Wildstar except the combat. I would not have given that game a second look if the combat was not what it was.
I guess we are just both assuming things at each other because the main thing I enjoy about raiding is the combat. For me personally what is important in raids is:
(Combat>Difficulty>Being on the bleeding edge>socializing).
The fact that I have been in statics where I only know people by their character names, and barley talked to anyone unless it was to help them learn a mechanic is proof of that.
With raids normally I just want to be in there slaying bosses while they are new and the gear check is real.
In my mind ever boss gets weaker every week as raids progress I hate coming into raid tiers when bosses have been nerfed by raid loot. Again though. It depends on the game.
The PvP scene dies very quickly when the combat is only decent. As PvP evolved over the years the bar for decent has moved further and further. L2 used to be considered decent. Now a lot of PvPers want nothing to do with it. It is hard to go back to that style of PvP. Ashes has a lot of systems linked to PvP so the safest bet for Ashes in my opinion would be to aim for more than just decent.
This is my personal feedback, shared to help the game thrive in its niche.
Fair point - but I think this would only add to the richness of different races and racial bonuses. If the game was designed like this, wouldn't small races also have smaller offensive hitboxes? So it cuts both ways.
In practice though, most attacks have hitboxes that hit a large area cross-sectionally so I haven't seen many AC games where it's been difficult to attack the chicken you were asked to kill for a quest.
First off, no it was not implied, you're just putting words in my mouth. And two, way to just disregard my reply and I guess show that you didn't actually consider any of my points.
No, that is not my opinion. I was not talking in opinions. That is what MMORPGs ARE. You are being highly disingenuous by saying otherwise. I will grant you that Wildstar (may it rest in peace) was very innovative, fun and unique, but it too has some few combat equivalents, like Smite (Not entirely the same, yes, but close enough for this point).
You're also correct, those games are absolutely not the same thing. They are molded around the combat, whereas in MMO's the combat is molded around the Massively Multiplayer.
Everything you've said here is anecdotal. There's a person to fit every scenario, and you fit the scenario of the person who plays for combat I guess. Just because it's how you are doesn't mean it's how everyone is, or even a significant portion of players are.
What I gathered from this paragraph is that you only care about combat. If that's the case, I'll ask you, why do you not just play combat-focused games like I've mentioned previously? They seem more up your alley. Their development is focused entirely on good combat unlike MMO's that split their development between many parts of a game outside of combat.
If you just want to be "In there slaying bosses while they are new and the gear check is real", why aren't you playing Monster Hunter? It's literally exactly what you described. You're side-stepping the obvious fact that you raid instead of playing MH alone because of the social MMO aspect.
Your comment about PUG raids is a whole other separate issue with the current state of MMOs not actually being MMOs anymore and just fake lobby games.
You also just admitted to not being social/interacting with others in a genre mostly about interacting with many people. Why are you raiding with people if you don't care about them. Is it to feel part of a team as you take down a boss together? Because if so that's literally what I said in my quote you responded to.
Other than the "very quickly" part of this, I agree entirely. Average combat games do die out eventually, but all games die out eventually. What we're talking about is if the game is going to be dead on arrival or near so because of the combat.
For everyone else, sorry for this long ass post that you probably won't read or will just skim.
Edit/Tl;Dr: Basically the entire point I'm trying to make is people are drawn to MMORPGs because they are a character fitting into a grander world. A good combat can and will accentuate this fact but it's not the primary reason. A single player game with the exact same combat should and will attract you and the people you are describing just as easily as the MMO version. However the MMO version will also attract people who like all the other aspects of the game. It's for THIS reason that MMO's are centered around interactivity and not combat (though some MMOs emphasize combat more than others).
This is on the verge of getting off topic though, so I will say that I do want Intrepid to strike gold with their combat as much as anyone. I personally believe that a melded Hybrid is the way to go to achieve that instead of some weird Tab Target skills but also Action skills system they seem to have said to be going for.
I want you to know that I have not taken anything personally in this thread between us. I am actually enjoying this conversation. You seem a little frustrated by me, I hope this is not the case. In the spirt of having a good conversation I will continue.
Not trying to put words in your mouth. My interpretation of two people agreeing that "MMO players don't play for the combat, it's just part of the game that accentuates the others." is these two people must not think that combat is very important. I did try to considered your points later in that post when I explained that some MMORPGs that draw me in for their combat but that is not all I am looking for in a game.
We may disagree on what MMORPGs are. I am not trying to be disingenuous. Understand that some people consider diablo 2 to be a MMORPG. I would not fall into that camp. It is a topic that is up for debate.
Smite's combat is close, I love smite. It is only PvP, and lacks a lot of the other aspects I like about MMORPGs.
Just trying to bridge our understand of each others position with a personal account of why I do some of the things I do. The main reason I engaged with you to begin with is to point out that not everyone plays MMOs for the same reason. Also my reasons for playing games very based on the game. Obviously I never played EVE or FFXI for the good combat, but I did play Tera and Wildstar for the good combat.
I have played many combat focused none MMORPGs, but it is not the same. They are not more up my alley. MMOs have a lot more to offer. Just because I like good combat does not mean I don't like: Player driven economy's, player agency, team work, and open worlds. It just means that in the case of Raiding and PvP, I want good combat to be the focus.
I understand your point about MMOs having to split development. I know that if they spend too much time on one aspect of a game it will take away from others, but to me combat is the glue that holds a lot of it together. To me ashes is a game with a lot of systems that need good combat to work. If we were talking about something I do consider extra like voice acting I would agree.
I would also like to point out that with voice acting (Something I hate). It is the reason a lot of people enjoy FFXIV. Some may consider voice acting more important than combat for FFXIV. The raiders of FFXIV would highly disagree, but that shows that the importance of different parts of a game ranges wildly on a per person and per game basis.
I was not taking it as a personal attack. You said: "you also make the strange assumption that people enjoy raiding for the combat". I explained what I personally get out of raiding. I have taken nothing you have said as a personal attack. I use myself as an example because I am the MMORPG player I know best.
You are taking (why I enjoy raiding) and applying it to everything else about MMORPGs. I do enjoy other parts of MMORPGs. Never once did I say I don't like the other parts of MMORPGs.
For Monster hunter specifically? To me it barley qualifies as a RPG. It is coop only. There is no PvP. The whole games aesthetic is gross to me excluding some of the monster designs. The fights are relatively simple. There is no open world, economy, build customization is poor. I did try monster hunter.
Just because I like good combat in MMOs does not mean it is the only thing I like about MMOs.
I specifically said I was in a "Static". Which is a group of people I raided with weekly not a PUG. That group was far from social hour. We were there to prog/clear, and that is about all we did. I don't think anyone was there to socialize. We knew each other by character name alone, and pretty much only grouped up a few hours a week to clear the raid. Did we feel like a team? sure, but we would have gladly kicked anyone from that team if they were not there to take it seriously.
I am saying that every raid group is not a social one. I have also been in the group where everyone pours a big ol beer before we start and its all giggles and pranks. Again, it is another case by case thing.
I am just talking about, I like good combat. I personally feel that good combat is going to be important for Ashes.
This is my personal feedback, shared to help the game thrive in its niche.