143381-wildstar-stopped-being-fun-at-max-level-page-2

Page 1, Page 2
== Content ==
			
It's always fun to watch people say x part of game is shit and I don't understand why they like it, by I love y part of game which is better than the rest. In some cases, -totally- warranted (dailies are a spawn of Satan) but when it's just preference of gamestyle, it's incredibly silly.
 
No, endgame is not an afterthought. And it's certainly not "easier to design." On the contrary, it's probably one of the hardest things to balance, because not only do you have to make it challenging to, in this case 5 or 20 players, but you have to make sure 6 classes and 3 roles are balanced well enough to be within range of one another so that one doesn't fall into obscurity. You need to make sure the mechanics are fun, unique, cannot be trivialized, but aren't too difficult. The list goes on for a bit.
 
Honestly, no aspect of game creation is 'easier.' I'm not a programmer, but I appreciate the kind of work they put into the game, whether I severely dislike it (leveling) or love it (raiding.)
 
That said, if endgame is not your cup of tea, don't do endgame. I enjoy raiding and becoming more powerful, and I am severely enjoying doing the raids with 19 friends and challenging myself to get better and just do mechanics. But that isn't for everyone, and that's okay.
 
RE: douchebags in groups. Sad, and I wish it wasn't so, but sadly they are always there. I always recommend joining a guild if you want smooth experiences. I hope you do find more fun folks to run with, though!	
----
			
Pugs will always be pugs. Regardless of the MMO. And I've been verbally abused by a lot of new players in dungeons in the last couple of weeks, even though I've run them all many times, so it's definitely not just a veteran thing. I've also had players try to vote kick me when I was tanking in the past for performing mechanics as intended. It's a specific type of player problem. Which is why pugs will always be hit or miss.
 
Also, please please please say that you are new. This has been a huge problem in my runs lately, with people not admitting they are new until the very end. Yes, some groups might be jerks and kick you, but those groups will probably kick you anyway when you don't execute something properly. You've just saved yourself a bunch of time. The rest of us are way less likely to be jerks if we know you don't have experience, and many will explain fights. There are a lot of players that DO have experience that will wipe your group all day because they refuse to learn mechanics (usually they are the ones yelling at everyone else). I can't know which you are if you don't say something. If I think we can learn and progress on a fight, I'll work on it, but I'm not going to keep going on a dungeon where people are expecting to be carried. 
 
The other issue right now is that I know that I've had to leave dungeons simply because I don't have the money to repair my gear. For my raid geared toons it's about 2 plat a run if it's going poorly, and I've completely run myself out of gold and had to leave a couple of times. So not everyone is intentionally being a jerk.
			
				
	Edited October 16, 2015 by Yleina	
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
The OP has a valid point here. I find it amusing that when I always question why people think "endgame" is the best part of the game I get all sorts of hate and what-not. No, the endgame is honestly there because they need a cheap and easy way to keep you playing in the long term, one that doesn't require as much work for the creators.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
While I am not yet 50, I read this forum every evening and all I see is "got kicked", "people rude" ... If this really is WS, then I will probably not keep playing. In my opinion, Carbine must get to work here - put restrictions on the kick button, don't let premades queue, punish those who kick or swear ... While this game is F2P and everyone can just make account after account, it should not serve as an excuse to not act.
 
Games are supposed to be a hobby and be fun, there is no place for those who harass others.
----
			^Agree. Premades are probably a bunch who are used to play with eachother, usually have a tank and/or healer, and they are possibly on voice comm so they can handle tricky situations better. And you know... they are a premade because they are social people... You have a lot more chance of fun with a premade.	
----
			
It sounds like you don't work well in groups for one thing. You've pretty much stated you prefer to play alone. This is problem number one.
 
The problem is you are trying to do Veteran dungeons. You are a fresh 50 and are still bad. Leveling up and doing solo Shiphands is greatly deceiving in your skill level in WS. Unfortunately, you can't hide behind gear in WS like you can in most mmos. You have to actually be good and you can't be carried. 
 
So just keep trying and you'll get there. Wildstar is HARD. It's not for everyone.	
----
			The OP needs to understand they must complete daunting tasks in order to get access to end game content, just like every other MMO. He can complain all he wants, but what he's complaining about is more of his problem and not the games.	
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I enjoyed the levelling process a lot, and was disappointed that what most people claim is the best part of MMOs was so boring to me.
 
I don't play MMOs much, but I gave Wildstar a shot since it was F2P. I was pleasantly surprised at how responsive the combat felt and how interesting the lore was. The short stories the quest chains told kept me playing. The whole process actually didn't feel like a grind and I enjoyed it the whole way through.
 
I also did the expeditions and dungeons along the way. The expeditions were great as well. Maybe a bit too easy, at least when soloed. The dungeons had just the right amount of difficulty. They were decently challenging, but not to an annoying degree. Avoiding all the crazy telegraph formations was fun. I didn't encounter any trolls in the pug groups. People were nice and would give advice if we were struggling at a boss.
 
I ignored the adventures. I remember them being advertised at being story heavy multiplayer content, and I don't want to do that with strangers. Knowing how MMOs usually go, people would've likely rushed through and hadn't given me time to follow the story. For story based content, I'd much rather do it alone so I can do it at my own pace.
 
Once I hit level 50, I assumed the game would only get better from here. Whenever people talk about MMOs, they always mention how the game starts at max level and all that. The reward screen for level 50 is pretty overwhelming. It lists loads of features, but says nothing about what they are. So, I ended up googling a guide on what to do at max level.
 
The guide recommended that I do the veteran expeditions to get gear. I got gold on all of them, then repeated the shortest one (infestation) so I could get the gear for the harder content. This already felt like the kind of grind I'd dreaded in MMOs, but since the instances were pretty fun and I'd already dedicated so much time to the game. I ended up grinding them for around 8-10 hours to get the optimal gear.
 
So, I had iLevel 60 gear that I'd completely runed and honestly was pretty proud of it after all the time I put into getting it. The next ideal step would've been the veteran adventures, but I really don't want to do them since they can't be soloed.
 
I queued for the first veteran dungeon instead. Right away, I noticed that there was a huge difficulty jump. The first boss already required much better reflexes than anything before. Still, we beat it after a couple of wipes and discussion on strategy. Everyone except one person was new to the instance. I thought we had a good team going, even if we died several times on each boss.
 
We got to the boss with all the running bots in it. We wiped a couple of times again, and people were claiming that I wasn't destroying the bots with the lance attack. I was trying to, and told them so. After one wipe, they suddenly voted me out. After two hours of patiently and politely trying to beat the instance. So after all that time spent, all I got was a 50 gold repair bill. I was pissed, to say the least.
 
Now, I like hard games. Dark Souls is one of my favorite games. The difference between that and Wildstar is that you can keep trying for as long as you want and the only thing that matters is your own skill level. In WS, you have a team that can nullify all your progress and kick you out after two hours of work. Your ability is also determined by how much gear you've grinded by repeating the same instance over and over. This is just busywork, and filler for the game.
 
Trying not to be discouraged, I queued for Veteran Stormtalon three times afterwards. This time, people were much ruder to me when I failed. One guy shouted insults at me. The atmosphere in the veteran dungeons is much more toxic than in the normal dungeons. After all that time I spent getting gear for the dungeons, the only thing I got out of it was being told how much I suck and then votekicked out.
 
All this really made me never want to play the game again. I get why this can be frustrating to old players as well, but I had no way of practising these instances without doing them with other players. Even though I tried my best, I would've had to be a hindrance until I'd learned the bosses. This made me realize that I only enjoy hard single player games, since the only thing that matters is how good you are. In multiplayer games, there's nothing you can do if your teammates aren't good enough.
 
The difficulty really encourages toxicity among players. The votekick system only encourages it, since you can cherry pick your teammates and kick everyone out who isn't up to their standards. Actually, I've never seen the votekicks used for anything other than kicking the least skilled player out.
 
I'm still confused about why people consider this to be the good part of MMOs. It's just grinding the same instances over and over again to get higher numbers on your stat screen. The veteran instances aren't even much different from the regular ones. Protostar's bosses had some new mechanics, at least. Stormtalon was mostly the same, aside from the final boss's telegraphs being obnoxiously much faster. All in all, I spent loads of my time grinding just so I could do the same dungeons again. Honestly, it seems like a lame way of spending my time.
 
Compare this to the levelling, where you constantly travelled to new areas and had a story to follow. I had much more fun doing that. I guess MMOs just aren't for me. I did join a guild in an attempt to be social, but I didn't do anything other than give advice to people who asked questions. I'm not a very social person to begin with. The few times they ran dungeons, I was busy doing instances, so I didn't get a chance to see if the dungeons would've been better that way. After that awful experience, I doubt I'll ever do group content again.
----
			OP, you found out why the game wasn't as popular as it should have been when it ran a subscription model. Very fun game till 50 and then for some reasons things became awry. 	
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
OP, you found out why the game wasn't as popular as it should have been when it ran a subscription model. Very fun game till 50 and then for some reasons things became awry. 
----
			
Hmmm...People are still finding the game too hard? That's all I got from this. I agreed that Medals were the case of a lot of toxicity back in the day(lol). In any case. Kicks are common in every game. I have Max Characters in WoW, Rift, FFXIV and Wildstar and I've been kicked in them all :D(mostly while leveling and learning as a healer. I expect it to happen at some point haha)  But I have also done my share of kicking. :P
 
P.S. installing the game ATM. I'm probably going to get kicked at somepoint lol. I haven't played in a while :lol:
			
				
	Edited October 17, 2015 by Balf	
----
			
Nice write up Reath.  I can understand your frustration.  however just do all you can to be combat ready. Max starting gear,  watch videos and read up on boss strategies. Potions and food. I am sure this has been said before.
 
I will say this wildstar  stands out because it is hard.  Being smashed by an instance is a good thing(the only exception is  overseas players with poor latency).  In todays world of mediocre  mmos wildstars  brand is built on it being tough and I hope it remains that way.
 
Currently endgame is too expensive. However they are reducing repairs for vet dungeons and adventures apparently its on the ptr server so I would be interested to see if anybody knows  much of a reduction it is.  
 
I hope you stick with it, and like many posters have said get into a good guild.	
----
			My personal experience is that people don't get votekicked simply for being bad, but rather for being unprepared. You say that there is no way to practice for a dungeon, but that's not entirely true. If you spend 5-10 minutes watching a youtube guide or reading wiki for the dungeon you are about to queue for (bosses and optionals), you can potentially save yourself and your group a lot of time and frustration. It can mean the difference between spending 30 seconds or 30 minutes on a boss. If people can't be bothered to do that then I think it's perfectly reasonable to kick them.	
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
To be fair their really isnt better out there.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
Main issue isn't that the game is hard at 50 but that it was (and is still kinda is) lacking an entry level classic group PVE at 50 (dungeons or raid) before vet dungeons and raids. In the current wildstar only guilds of experienced players could really stick to the game as there wasn't any real content for new guilds (of inexperienced players) to be built upon.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
Vet Shiphands and Adventures...
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I was talking about classic PVE content. Adventures and shiphands don't prepare you to raids and dungeons and guilds cannot be built around that content. 
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
They certainly prepare you. They are steps along the path of progression, both in terms of complexity and in terms of gear. Just because they aren't called "dungeons" doesn't mean they aren't useful.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I was talking about classic PVE content. Adventures and shiphands don't prepare you to raids and dungeons and guilds cannot be built around that content. 
----
			
Sorry to hear that but you did several things wrong, and this is probably because Wildstar doesn't show well where are the ways that you can take when you hit lvl50.
 
If you like the Story, once you finished the leveling you could follow the story quest, Blighthaven>Defile>Omni-core 1 a Solo-Dungeon with some good gear.	You shouldn't farm/grind the Veteran Expeditions as you did, I can't imagine how tired I would be if I do that :D You could do two or three, then some Dailys Quest, the Solo-Dungeon, etc.	You jumped one step, Veteran Adventures, that would give you 68-70ilvl that it would give you a much proper gear to face Veteran Dungeons. And the people there is much less stressed.	Due the difficult of the game, and keeping in mind that this is a MMORPG....YOU NEED A GUILD! The Veteran Dungeon are NOT ready for PUG without voices communication.	Do Contracts! You can earn 2 gear ilvl68, 2 ilvl80 and 1 ilvl100 easily and quickly, and with different kind of content!	Don't forgot that you have so many things to do, Housing is a big part, Challenges can be really fun, collect Pets, work in your Profession, do PvP, 
Hope you give Wildstar another chance and you can find a proper way to enjoy it!! But definitely queuing for Veteran Dungeon with pugs, without Gear, without voices communication, etc is not the way in Wildstar, and I am glad for this.
			
				
	Edited October 17, 2015 by Celmad	
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
They certainly prepare you. They are steps along the path of progression, both in terms of complexity and in terms of gear. Just because they aren't called "dungeons" doesn't mean they aren't useful.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
Main issue isn't that the game is hard at 50 but that it was (and is still kinda is) lacking an entry level classic group PVE at 50 (dungeons or raid) before vet dungeons and raids. In the current wildstar only guilds of experienced players could really stick to the game as there wasn't any real content for new guilds (of inexperienced players) to be built upon.
 
In games such as wow there had always been entry levels raids for new guilds, then harder raids (either true raids such as sunwell, or different tiers of difficulty for each raids) for experienced ones. You aren't born a raider or not, you become one. If there isn't any content for new players/guilds to become raider, then they won't become raiders and leave the game.
----
			
So, did some dungeoning this morning, and it did highlighted a few things for me. Not sure what it all means, but I'm just reflecting.
 
So I hooked up with a pug that was in around ilvl 70 gear. A little lower maybe, but since I'm in ilvl 106, I figured I could balance things out a bit. They were fully runed, knew out to interrupt, and mostly had a good attitude. It ended up being like the days of old! I explained the fights, and we wiped and wiped, improving a little bit every time. I was able to carry a lot of the fights, but Drokk is tough because of the heal check and the coordination. Our DPS wasn't good enough to just blow up the bots people had to run (as it should be).
 
Now eventually we threw in the towel, and the healer (in full PvP gear) was definitely frustrated, but I think overall the group had a good time. What I told them is "keep practicing and you'll get it". And that's the way it works. The only way to practice is to keep queuing and learning. Eventually you'll get it. And that's cool, just like it was back at launch.
 
Except, maybe you'll get a group that isn't patient for the wipes. Or maybe you'll get a raider geared group that will pull you through and you'll think decent groups you get later arn't any good, just because they need more practice.
 
And that's the real problem. We have this mix of people progression and others farming, and it's made even worse that dungeons typically are not "progression content".
 
I actually really do like yasfan's idea of having a "progression" option so you are grouped with others still learning, but I am skeptical that it would work. But I don't know, and the current rate I do feel like most people are not going to have the patience to handle multiple wipes in dungeons when they can see other lucky people farm them. This will probably be true of even GA soon.
			
				
	Edited October 17, 2015 by SlyJeff	
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
So, did some dungeoning this morning, and it did highlighted a few things for me. Not sure what it all means, but I'm just reflecting.
 
So I hooked up with a pug that was in around ilvl 70 gear. A little lower maybe, but since I'm in ilvl 106, I figured I could balance things out a bit. They were fully runed, knew out to interrupt, and mostly had a good attitude. It ended up being like the days of old! I explained the fights, and we wiped and wiped, improving a little bit every time. I was able to carry a lot of the fights, but Drokk is tough because of the heal check and the coordination. Our DPS wasn't good enough to just blow up the bots people had to run (as it should be).
 
Now eventually we threw in the towel, and the healer (in full PvP gear) was definitely frustrated, but I think overall the group had a good time. What I told them is "keep practicing and you'll get it". And that's the way it works. The only way to practice is to keep queuing and learning. Eventually you'll get it. And that's cool, just like it was back at launch.
 
Except, maybe you'll get a group that isn't patient for the wipes. Or maybe you'll get a raider geared group that will pull you through and you'll think decent groups you get later arn't any good, just because they need more practice.
 
And that's the real problem. We have this mix of people progression and others farming, and it's made even worse that dungeons typically are not "progression content".
 
I actually really do like yasfan's idea of having a "progression" option so you are grouped with others still learning, but I am skeptical that it would work. But I don't know, and the current rate I do feel like most people are not going to have the patience to handle multiple wipes in dungeons when they can see other lucky people farm them. This will probably be true of even GA soon.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
Dps can be carried. Tanks can be given time for threat but a healer cant be helped to increase healing.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
With not standing in the red, and proper use of defensive CD's, lifesteal and regen abilities / items, DPS and Tanks can help healers a whole lot! 
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
Good luck life stealing off bombs for drokk. and the dot on fire bish and the last boss of ssm.
 
Unavoidable damage cant be stopped you HAVE to heal through it.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I don't disagree. But there are items that DPS / Tanks can use even in those situations to help healers (IIRC Protection was pretty much required for certain fights for that reason). And for every other situation there are skills and skillful play that can drastically reduce the loads on healers. 
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
So, did some dungeoning this morning, and it did highlighted a few things for me. Not sure what it all means, but I'm just reflecting.
 
So I hooked up with a pug that was in around ilvl 70 gear. A little lower maybe, but since I'm in ilvl 106, I figured I could balance things out a bit. They were fully runed, knew out to interrupt, and mostly had a good attitude. It ended up being like the days of old! I explained the fights, and we wiped and wiped, improving a little bit every time. I was able to carry a lot of the fights, but Drokk is tough because of the heal check and the coordination. Our DPS wasn't good enough to just blow up the bots people had to run (as it should be).
 
Now eventually we threw in the towel, and the healer (in full PvP gear) was definitely frustrated, but I think overall the group had a good time. What I told them is "keep practicing and you'll get it". And that's the way it works. The only way to practice is to keep queuing and learning. Eventually you'll get it. And that's cool, just like it was back at launch.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
Pots are on a 3 min CD so you get it once,twice max. You could use a absorb fieldtech but $$$. 
 
Reamp for lifesteal $$ Reamp for defense $$.
 
Where i stand is if 4 players have to change Amps and builds to reduce the burden ( that isn't a heavy burden to begin with ) then that 5th player shouldn't be in the instance to begin with. Wasting 4 other peoples time because you chose the path with the biggest rewards over you actually level of content you are geared for deserves a kick. 
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
 
I'm not talking about switching out builds. I'm talking about raid situations where DPS and tanks actively assisting healers is expected (let alone possible). This in Dungeons and Adventures DPS and Tanks have even more leeway to assist healers than in raid situations where it's not just possible but expected. 
 
My only point is that just as DPS can assist Tanks, and Tanks can assist DPS, both can also assist healers in certain situations and in some raid situations are even required to do so. 
 
 
 
Dungeons, let alone Vet's aren't just gear checks. If you don't have the skill and coordination to beat the mechanics then having gear the iLvL of god isn't going to help. 
 
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I'm really glad you had a good time, Jeff, but I have to admit that what you're describing probably qualifies as the single most worrying thing I have yet read coming out of the Veteran Dungeons.
 
Here's a group that went into one of the early Vet Dungeons with fully runed, appropriate iLevel gear, an understanding of the importance of interrupts, a generally good attitude, and a heavily overleveled tank (? Am I right in presuming you were playing the tank?) who has mastered the content.
 
And even with all that going for them--the required gear, someone guiding them who has mastered the content, a willingness to wipe repeatedly while they sort it out--they still couldn't get through it after lots of wipes and had to give it up. They'll have to try again later, only next time the same group won't be assembled because it's a PUG.
 
To me, that story says "overtuned" all over it unless there was really something going wrong with the DPS. Was there?
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I see both of your points here. Certainly Vet Shiphands and Adventures provide some endgame progression and Vet Adventures require some minor amount of teamwork and loose application of Trinity-based play. They are useful if you really know nothing about how to play your character and work as part of a team. But on the other hand, I also agree that the jump in expectations between the Vet Adventures and the Vet Dungeons is a really large one. You go from "don't run away from the healer" to "what do you mean, you didn't read the guide before you came in here?" That's a pretty steep hurdle.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I'm really glad you had a good time, Jeff, but I have to admit that what you're describing probably qualifies as the single most worrying thing I have yet read coming out of the Veteran Dungeons.
 
Here's a group that went into one of the early Vet Dungeons with fully runed, appropriate iLevel gear, an understanding of the importance of interrupts, a generally good attitude, and a heavily overleveled tank (? Am I right in presuming you were playing the tank?) who has mastered the content.
 
And even with all that going for them--the required gear, someone guiding them who has mastered the content, a willingness to wipe repeatedly while they sort it out--they still couldn't get through it after lots of wipes and had to give it up. They'll have to try again later, only next time the same group won't be assembled because it's a PUG.
 
To me, that story says "overtuned" all over it unless there was really something going wrong with the DPS. Was there?
----
			
So here is what I'm doing. It's a jab at helping people enjoy the game more- I'm starting a circle <Tears For Gear> with the express purpose of allowing appropriately geared/rune people try the content in a safe environment where they can wipe, practice, and repeat until they get the bosses down. So when I do pugs like the above, I can invite people to it and we can try again later and get some synergy as people learn to play together.
 
I'm not great at this kind of thing, but I dream big!	
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
Im happy to carry dps through if they bring interrupts so i can go full dps but i'm not going to sit for an hour dying over and over when i know the healer cant do the content because he doesn't meet the gear check
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
Of course- I get it completely. I knew I was taking a loss for the encounter, and I just sucked it up because I was having fun. But I wouldn't expect vet players to go in and try to carry groups and be cool with it.
 
In this case, I'm not sure if the healer's issue was a gear check or skill check. He was in PvP gear, but it wasn't bad gear necessarily. He did whisper me after asking for hints on where to get better PvE gear, so I think he was encouraged rather than discouraged ultimately.
----
			
I'm kind of crazy that way :)
 
I've never done a 7 hour SSM haha!
 
I also pulled a group of inexperienced people through SSM this morning, though the healer was on the ball :)	
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I was actually DPS, which helps more than a tank.
 
And yes, Ufa is correct that you can't carry a healer through Drokk.
 
I don't feel like the content is overtuned- it's dooable. But not all groups are going to be successful at completing the dungeons. I think that is the biggest concern. Can people have fun trying and not finishing, or do they need a guaranteed finish if they show up in appropriate gear? I remember wiping and wiping for more than a week on Stormtalon at launch with both pugs and people in my guild. When we finally got it down, we felt like kings! And I had so much fun trying and making progress each time. That's what progression content is like- what I'm not sure is if the general population can handle it. But I love it.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I don't feel like the content is overtuned- it's dooable. But not all groups are going to be successful at completing the dungeons. I think that is the biggest concern. Can people have fun trying and not finishing, or do they need a guaranteed finish if they show up in appropriate gear? I remember wiping and wiping for more than a week on Stormtalon at launch with both pugs and people in my guild. When we finally got it down, we felt like kings! And I had so much fun trying and making progress each time. That's what progression content is like- what I'm not sure is if the general population can handle it. But I love it.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
Unfortunately though, Jeff, all of what you posted about the run is exactly why I have zero interest in doing endgame in Wildstar. Don't get me wrong, I've done my fair share of endgame in my 17 years as an MMO player (I don't play video games except MMOs), but the more I read and hear about endgame here, the less and less interested I become.
 
Like I said, I've done my fair share of stuff over the years. From the more commonly known LFR, Normal, and Heroic stuff in WoW, to Nightmare in SWTOR, some of the raids in The Secret World, and even old Incarnate Trials in City of Heroes (just to name a few). But the wipe, wipe, wipe, trying and just have fun, try and try again, and the sheer time investment all that requires for endgame in Wildstar is vastly overtuned with a majority of the MMOs I have played. And that's fine if it works for Wildstar and the target audience they want, but at 42 years old with a more than full-time job, four kids, and a ton to do outside of logging into an MMO, I simply do not have that kind of time to devote to an MMO's endgame in 2015.
 
Maybe, maybe 10 or 15 years ago, but that's a thing of the past for me. Which is a shame, because I really enjoy the leveling and other aspects of the game, but if all I want to do is level, level, and level another character . . . well, I have the much more story driven SWTOR and TSW for that.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I think there's a vast gulf of difference between a "guaranteed finish every time" and "more than a week of wiping in a mix of guild and pug runs".
I don't think the former is required. But the average player isn't going to do the latter. Not for an at-level dungeon that they have the gear for. Zero chance of that happening.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
Well, the good thing about WS endgame is that not ALL content is like this. There are expeditions and adventures, which are all far easier and approachable. The only really difficult content before raids are the vet dungeons. Now for whatever reason, adventures aren't run that much, which is a shame. The reason *I* don't run adventures that much is that I find the dungeons much more enjoyable, but what I don't understand is people not finding the dungeons enjoyable because of the wiping, but who are also uninterested in running adventures which do not have all the wiping while learning.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I don't run adventures much because there's only so many soulbound Resold Marauder Anchors one person can get before there's just no reason to have another one.
But I suspect that these days, few people run adventures because the veteran playerbase is well outgeared for them and the new playerbase is never sent to them and has no idea what an "Adventure" is.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
Well, here's the thing. Why do you think that the veteran players who outgear BOTH adventures and dungeons run dungeons, but not adventures? The replayability of the dungeons is MUCH higher. But it's those same mechancis that cause problems for the newer players
 
I fear if you make the dungeons more like adventures, then they'll suffer the same fate. Much as dungeons were in WoW once I started raiding. I just stopped doing them because they weren't much fun any more.
----
			Saying that Dungeon replayability is higher is a bit iffy. Adventures have multiple paths. But they also take much, much longer than dungeons unless your group is wiping a lot in the latter. I think that's the key on why they don't play Adventures (besides the fact that Dungeons give Glory and Adventures don't. Unless something has changed). If you are a veteran who can do it properly most of the time, then of course you are going to replay the fastest, more rewarding content when presented with the question of replaying something. I do that all the time with Shiphands: I've played Infestation and Outpost M-13 at least twenty times more than any other adventure because they go much quicker than the others and give me roughtly the same rewards. I imagine the veteran players follow a similar logic
			
				
	Edited October 17, 2015 by Ildur	
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
There's a point in a zero punctuation video that feels extremely relevant with your particular review.
 
>Zero Punctuation<
 
"Why do you raid?" *To get the best items!* "What do you use the best items for?" *To raid with!*
 
Every mmorpg is a numbers game, to be honest i just adore the housing in the game.
----
			
Fiddlesticks!
 
I've been playing for a year now, roughly half of that at max level. I still haven't done all the dungeons and adventures yet, let alone set foot in a raid. After WoW, I was all raided out, so I've been in no hurry to start again, as I won't mess 19 other people around unless my heart is in it.
 
In the mean time, Housing in particular, PvP, Dailies, Contracts, World Bosses, Exploring, Lore, Crafting, Costumes, etc, etc, etc, have all kept me well engaged. When the dust settles from re-launch, with a now healthy player base, and new content drops starting to flow again, it will be the icing on the cake.
 
Obviously other people's mileage will vary, but I think at the heart of it is whether you actually enjoy MMOs for what they are - an immersive, open-ended journey to be shared will other like-minded people. If you seek instant gratification, with little or no effort, then perhaps an MMO is not for you. There are plenty of genres including FPS, MOBA, RTS that may better suit your play style.	
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
Well, here's the thing. Why do you think that the veteran players who outgear BOTH adventures and dungeons run dungeons, but not adventures? The replayability of the dungeons is MUCH higher. But it's those same mechancis that cause problems for the newer players
 
I fear if you make the dungeons more like adventures, then they'll suffer the same fate. Much as dungeons were in WoW once I started raiding. I just stopped doing them because they weren't much fun any more.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I don't think you can really teach 'better' telegraphs.  I mean can the game possibly get more complex than 'red on ground do not stand'?
 
Basic Boss Comprehension generally boils down to this:
 
Boss is doing a thing, what do?
          - Is boss interruptible?  Interrupt
          - Is boss not interruptable? Get to not-bad
          - Is there a new thing in environment?  Go do a thing there
 
I'm not against teaching people mechanics but I've yet to see any mechanics sufficiently more complex than what Protogames teaches you.  Don't stand in bad, interrupt the boss, deal with adds, do your job.  If it gets more involved than that then I guess more teaching tools would be good?
----
			
unfortunately vote-kicking will be abused, but the vote kick is primarily there to kick people who AFK for too long and are hogging up a spot.
 
if you want to deal with this less, try forming a group yourself instead of using the automatic queue system.  Personally I have yet to deal with vote-kick abusers since a very very very very (very) long time.  It's happened quite rarely for me.  So I would probably say you got unlucky, however I do notice a player quality drop in dungeons lately since F2P, but that is also to be expected.	
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I don't think you quite understood my meaning there. Farming dungeons is more profitable than farming adventures. Farming expeditions is more profitable than farming adventures. Ergo, farming adventures doesn't happen.
 
There are simply more rewarding things you can do with your time that are just as fun no matter whether they're the end of your progression or the beginning of it.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
Every player I know likes dungeons more because they are more *fun*. That was my point.
 
If I'm reading you right, it seems you think that the reason people enjoy dungeons more is because they are more profitable, but in my experience it just isn't true. At least, not from anyone I talk to in game. If you ask them to talk about adventures vs dungeons, 9/10 they'll say that dungeons are more fun.
 
I'm not saying there isn't a problem. What I experienced concerns me, but I think if you took dungeons and made them as easy as adventures, you would very much lose what makes them fun.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
Every player I know likes dungeons more because they are more *fun*. That was my point.
 
If I'm reading you right, it seems you think that the reason people enjoy dungeons more is because they are more profitable, but in my experience it just isn't true. At least, not from anyone I talk to in game. If you ask them to talk about adventures vs dungeons, 9/10 they'll say that dungeons are more fun.
 
I'm not saying there isn't a problem. What I experienced concerns me, but I think if you took dungeons and made them as easy as adventures, you would very much lose what makes them fun.
----
			
I think as Ufa mentioned above, expeditions are the most rewarding content.
 
That is, unless glory is most important to you. But even before F2P (where people are grinding glory for pure rune fragments), you still had loads of geared players running vet dungeons who needed nothing from them, just because they are fun.
 
Anyway, I do think it would be good to incentivize adventures better.
 
Finally, regarding the healer, I'm not convinced gear was the issue, but it may have been. It was either a gear or skill issue with regards to that particular healer. Probably a combination- that is a skilled healer could have overcome the gear, but he probably wasn't at that place.
 
I will note, however, that I do believe that Drokk is one of the toughest fights to do in all of vet dungeons with appropriate gear. It also happens to be one of the most fun fights to do with really good gear, as the fight changes, but not in a way where you are skipping mechanics, but that you are doing them differently.
 
But actually, now that I'm pushed to think about it, one of the things that went wrong with Drokk more than just the healer's gear was that the tank was insisting that the issue was one of DPS not burning down the bombs fast enough (DPS was definitely not an issue). I actually attempted to show the group a safe path to run so you can keep away from the bombs, and about halfway through the path I was showing them, he said "the bombs should be dead by then". I also would have recommended putting slows/stuns on bars, but he was eager to pull.
 
So, upon reflection, there was a little bit of unwillingness to listen (I assume the tank had been through before with geared groups that are able to burn the bombs down fast enough that the runner doesn't have to know a safe path). I can think of other groups that have been more willing to listen to my pathing advice that have done much better. And probably a little was on me, who should have been quicker to tell people to bring slows and stuns. Back in the day, I used to have a special build just for Drokk where I ised T8 Wild Barrage to slow the bombs. It didn't even occur to me to do that because I haven't needed to in such a long time.
			
				
	Edited October 18, 2015 by SlyJeff	
----
			
I also have been playing mmos now for over 10 years. ... The excuse about being over 40 with kids is just an excuse. I remember playing wow.. with over 40 something folks who had kids. I even played with grandmas and grandpas. Its about being in a guild with a raid schedule you can handle. Yes that's what organized players did. We scheduled raids. Yup. And it worked back then and it still works today. IF you can't manage your time.. well that is on you. Thats not on the game. 
And before anyone suggests I Am being mean or disrespectful to a parent.. Like I said I was in guilds with many parents. Heck one of my long time dearest raiding friends she is a high powered executive who runs a huge company.. and has kids. Guess what.. She still raided.	
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I also have been playing mmos now for over 10 years. ... The excuse about being over 40 with kids is just an excuse. I remember playing wow.. with over 40 something folks who had kids. I even played with grandmas and grandpas. Its about being in a guild with a raid schedule you can handle. Yes that's what organized players did. We scheduled raids. Yup. And it worked back then and it still works today. IF you can't manage your time.. well that is on you. Thats not on the game. 
And before anyone suggests I Am being mean or disrespectful to a parent.. Like I said I was in guilds with many parents. Heck one of my long time dearest raiding friends she is a high powered executive who runs a huge company.. and has kids. Guess what.. She still raided.
----
			
I think the point is that being over 40 and having kids is not prohibitive to being able to play on a schedule. Some people's life situations are. But we have more college kids who take a conflicting class struggle with schedule that we do the older folks. We have a wide range of people who raid with us, probably 20-50 in age (ish).
 
Some jobs and careers will make it difficult for some people. Some spouses will. But I don't thing the generalization of "people are getting older, they can't play on a schedule" is correct as a rule. It's true for some, less true for others.	
----
			
I don't get why people get so aggressive about scheduling stuff for mmos.
 
In any group-related hobby/leisure activity, you set aside time to do it.
 
I can totally feel not having time for it - jobs, school etc, but I don't see why the game needs to change just because IRL gets in the way of some people.
 
ruins the whole thing.	
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I think the point is that being over 40 and having kids is not prohibitive to being able to play on a schedule. Some people's life situations are. But we have more college kids who take a conflicting class struggle with schedule that we do the older folks. We have a wide range of people who raid with us, probably 20-50 in age (ish).
 
Some jobs and careers will make it difficult for some people. Some spouses will. But I don't thing the generalization of "people are getting older, they can't play on a schedule" is correct as a rule. It's true for some, less true for others.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I don't get why people get so aggressive about scheduling stuff for mmos.
 
In any group-related hobby/leisure activity, you set aside time to do it.
 
I can totally feel not having time for it - jobs, school etc, but I don't see why the game needs to change just because IRL gets in the way of some people.
 
ruins the whole thing.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
Being over 40? Sure, that's an excuse. I'm 42. But having a more than full-time job? That's not just an excuse. My job constitutes 50+ hours a week, easy. Watch your generalizations, because not all 40+ people are created equal. I know plenty 40+ myself who work less than 40 hours a week and have teenaged children. That's a different set of people entirely.
 
Generalization like that are the same as when folks claim that all those current 20-something MMO players were the "WoW Kiddies" that came along and made the MMO communities so toxic in the first place. 
 
Neither is accurate.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
As I said above, I can rarely schedule events for a game that way. I have real-life schedules to keep. But as I also said it's about personal priorities as well. To me, the physical people in my real life always take precedence over people I meet online, especially in a video game. So, no, it's an extremely rare thing where I will work with a scheduled raid in an MMO, unless it falls on a very odd night where I might know in advance I really have nothing else to do.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
Well if you have other hobbies thats your problem man, there is no need to complain about the game, how can you not see how its not the games fault?
 
If you prefer other hobbies over mmorpgs then well maybe you should consider playing something different.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
 
But in the end, if people want to raid, and Wildstar requires a raid schedule (if it does) because of how tuned they are, and people don't want to commit, then at the end of the day that isn't that player's problem, that's Carbine's problem. 
----
			
In WS, you can certainly find a run through GA of you have a few hours free. DS doesn't really have a tourist mode yet :)
 
But GA didn't either a year ago.	
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
Wait, what MMO has anything resembling raids that don't require setting a time to run them (aka. a schedule)?
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
In WS, you can certainly find a run through GA of you have a few hours free. DS doesn't really have a tourist mode yet :)
 
But GA didn't either a year ago.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I didn't complain about the game at all. I simply stated, amongst other reasons, why I have zero interest in endgame raiding in Wildstar based on my time issues. That's complaining? Well, that's definitely a new definition of that word. But then again gamers like to do that to fit their arguments, anyway.
 
Fortunately, one does not have to touch a single raid in Wildstar to still do things at level 50. Which is good, because had there not been, then like I said there are better story-driven MMOs out there to just keep endlessly leveling new characters in. But, Wildstar does offer non-raid stuff. And considering I could care less in any MMO about having the "best gear available in the game," that also works out just fine. I don't have to raid.
 
And see, the thing is I've consistently played MMOs since 1998. And I have never had to commit to a raid schedule. Sure, the ultra-serious raiders did, but yet I've also been able to see every raid in WoW (up to Heroic difficulty), SWTOR (including several Nightmare modes), and even the The Secret World to name a few. So, to believe one has to commit to a raid schedule is also wrong.
 
But in the end, if people want to raid, and Wildstar requires a raid schedule (if it does) because of how tuned they are, and people don't want to commit, then at the end of the day that isn't that player's problem, that's Carbine's problem. Because those players will, indeed, go play elsewhere. There are a ton of options out there. And considering the writing has been clearly on the wall that Carbine doesn't have much room left with NCSoft, who is never bashful about sunsetting MMOs, Carbine absolutely needs as many players playing, and paying, into the game as humanly possible at this stage. It's either that, or Wildstar players will be posting Save Wildstar the way us former City of Heroes players did for that game.
----
			 I'm gonna be a straight shooter here. The problem is not the vet dungeons the problem is there is not a lvl50 regular variant of them. Apparently carbine wants to try to do this balancing act where there is still hardcore and now casual.. while not implementing the necessary casual dungeon content. you cant expect people to run expeditions and adventures and expect them to understand the more difficult and less forgiving mechanics its just not there for the new players. Carbine is being foolish to think otherwise. Face it there needs to be a proper stepping stone to introduce those type of mechanics to the new players because as it stands right now there isn't any, leveling dungeons don't count since anyone higher level with better gear being downsized will still have better stats than what the dungeon is tuned for and you can't over tune those to compensate that.. it will just make a player who would leave at lvl 50 facing the delima to someone leaving at level 15. When it comes to this you can't have your cake and eat it to.. and this game has already suffered enough indigestion.
			
				
	Edited October 18, 2015 by Rebel Angel	
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
 I'm gonna be a straight shooter here. The problem is not the vet dungeons the problem is there is not a lvl50 regular variant of them.
----
			
I have a feeling that if carbine released all of the normal level dungons with the exact same mechanics, but tuned for ilvl 60 gear and giving rewards on par with adventures, they would be very successful.
 
I don't know how much effort this would be, but I do think it would help people be more prepared for vet dungeons.	
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I don't think you can really teach 'better' telegraphs. I mean can the game possibly get more complex than 'red on ground do not stand'?
 
Basic Boss Comprehension generally boils down to this:
 
Boss is doing a thing, what do?
		 - Is boss interruptible? Interrupt
		 - Is boss not interruptable? Get to not-bad
		 - Is there a new thing in environment? Go do a thing there
 
I'm not against teaching people mechanics but I've yet to see any mechanics sufficiently more complex than what Protogames teaches you. Don't stand in bad, interrupt the boss, deal with adds, do your job. If it gets more involved than that then I guess more teaching tools would be good?
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
Please show me an mmorpg in the late 90s that you can solo end game lol, ive been playing mmmorpgs since everquest 1, wow did not come out with casual raids for the longest time, even coh had harder raids. As I said before this is an issue with you and not the game.
----
			
{| class="blockquote"
I enjoyed the levelling process a lot, and was disappointed that what most people claim is the best part of MMOs was so boring to me.
 
I don't play MMOs much, but I gave Wildstar a shot since it was F2P. I was pleasantly surprised at how responsive the combat felt and how interesting the lore was. The short stories the quest chains told kept me playing. The whole process actually didn't feel like a grind and I enjoyed it the whole way through.
 
I also did the expeditions and dungeons along the way. The expeditions were great as well. Maybe a bit too easy, at least when soloed. The dungeons had just the right amount of difficulty. They were decently challenging, but not to an annoying degree. Avoiding all the crazy telegraph formations was fun. I didn't encounter any trolls in the pug groups. People were nice and would give advice if we were struggling at a boss.
 
I ignored the adventures. I remember them being advertised at being story heavy multiplayer content, and I don't want to do that with strangers. Knowing how MMOs usually go, people would've likely rushed through and hadn't given me time to follow the story. For story based content, I'd much rather do it alone so I can do it at my own pace.
 
Once I hit level 50, I assumed the game would only get better from here. Whenever people talk about MMOs, they always mention how the game starts at max level and all that. The reward screen for level 50 is pretty overwhelming. It lists loads of features, but says nothing about what they are. So, I ended up googling a guide on what to do at max level.
 
The guide recommended that I do the veteran expeditions to get gear. I got gold on all of them, then repeated the shortest one (infestation) so I could get the gear for the harder content. This already felt like the kind of grind I'd dreaded in MMOs, but since the instances were pretty fun and I'd already dedicated so much time to the game. I ended up grinding them for around 8-10 hours to get the optimal gear.
 
So, I had iLevel 60 gear that I'd completely runed and honestly was pretty proud of it after all the time I put into getting it. The next ideal step would've been the veteran adventures, but I really don't want to do them since they can't be soloed.
 
I queued for the first veteran dungeon instead. Right away, I noticed that there was a huge difficulty jump. The first boss already required much better reflexes than anything before. Still, we beat it after a couple of wipes and discussion on strategy. Everyone except one person was new to the instance. I thought we had a good team going, even if we died several times on each boss.
 
We got to the boss with all the running bots in it. We wiped a couple of times again, and people were claiming that I wasn't destroying the bots with the lance attack. I was trying to, and told them so. After one wipe, they suddenly voted me out. After two hours of patiently and politely trying to beat the instance. So after all that time spent, all I got was a 50 gold repair bill. I was pissed, to say the least.
 
Now, I like hard games. Dark Souls is one of my favorite games. The difference between that and Wildstar is that you can keep trying for as long as you want and the only thing that matters is your own skill level. In WS, you have a team that can nullify all your progress and kick you out after two hours of work. Your ability is also determined by how much gear you've grinded by repeating the same instance over and over. This is just busywork, and filler for the game.
 
Trying not to be discouraged, I queued for Veteran Stormtalon three times afterwards. This time, people were much ruder to me when I failed. One guy shouted insults at me. The atmosphere in the veteran dungeons is much more toxic than in the normal dungeons. After all that time I spent getting gear for the dungeons, the only thing I got out of it was being told how much I suck and then votekicked out.
 
All this really made me never want to play the game again. I get why this can be frustrating to old players as well, but I had no way of practising these instances without doing them with other players. Even though I tried my best, I would've had to be a hindrance until I'd learned the bosses. This made me realize that I only enjoy hard single player games, since the only thing that matters is how good you are. In multiplayer games, there's nothing you can do if your teammates aren't good enough.
 
The difficulty really encourages toxicity among players. The votekick system only encourages it, since you can cherry pick your teammates and kick everyone out who isn't up to their standards. Actually, I've never seen the votekicks used for anything other than kicking the least skilled player out.
 
I'm still confused about why people consider this to be the good part of MMOs. It's just grinding the same instances over and over again to get higher numbers on your stat screen. The veteran instances aren't even much different from the regular ones. Protostar's bosses had some new mechanics, at least. Stormtalon was mostly the same, aside from the final boss's telegraphs being obnoxiously much faster. All in all, I spent loads of my time grinding just so I could do the same dungeons again. Honestly, it seems like a lame way of spending my time.
 
Compare this to the levelling, where you constantly travelled to new areas and had a story to follow. I had much more fun doing that. I guess MMOs just aren't for me. I did join a guild in an attempt to be social, but I didn't do anything other than give advice to people who asked questions. I'm not a very social person to begin with. The few times they ran dungeons, I was busy doing instances, so I didn't get a chance to see if the dungeons would've been better that way. After that awful experience, I doubt I'll ever do group content again.
----
			
well written OP but the core of his problem is not too hard PvE content but rather him beeing to lazy to do said content with a premaid group and therefor having a bad experience due to rng getting bad groups.
i have plenty of pugs that were able to do good vet dungeon runs (obv way worse than doing them in 10min with a guild group) and i had plenty of groups were i just left after seeing them doing 7k single target dps while 2k coming from me (tank).
its group content, hard group content if the group lacks exp/gear and its the same in the raids later as well and why i like this game. you can replay the raids later and still be challenged and therefore its different than the other mmos where raiding = boring grind.	
----
			Go play TESO, its a solo MMO.  Fork over the 20 bucks for DLC's and you can play solo for tons of content.	
----