149154-compartmentalizing-raids

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Hello everyone, I haven't made a lot of posts on the forums and I've been around since August. This thread is mainly to address a lot of the criticisms of the end-game content I've seen on the forums; as well as posting a few ideas to make this content more accessible without compromising the difficulty of said content, which seems to be liked by the majority of the player-base.  :)
 
I've seen a lot of commentary on these forums suggesting that the problems with retaining players on Wildstar comes down to the accessibility/difficulty/frequency of end-game PvE content, among other things. (PvP *cough* but that is for another thread.) I think some of these criticisms (like the former attunement process) were completely fair. However, I've seen a lot of commentary since the release of F2P that players are still leaving even though they supposedly fixed the problems (attunement being streamlined, some difficulties being slightly refined, bugs being fixed) and yet we are finding that people are slowly dropping off again. Which I totally believe is happening as there was a huge population surge in September/October and that seems to have died off again. A lot of this was people quitting before level 50, but a lot of it is people getting to 50 and then quitting after getting bored, either because they don't have the time to commit to raiding schedules, or they have completed raid content and are too bored to continue waiting for the next raid tier. 
 
Speaking from my personal experience I really like the game, even though I wasn't sold on it at first and am glad I gave it a try. I like the difficulty of the content (from my experience with Veteran Dungeons) which reminds me a lot of playing WoW back in TBC which I loved but find since I have grown up since then I really don't have time to really bother aggressively pursing attunement to get in these super-long raids which I really would like to do but doubt I can find any rosters to really take part in with my schedule which can be a bit haphazard. 
 
The problem I feel with the endgame PvE content right now doesn't come down to difficulty as much as it does the amount of time required to do said content. As someone who used to play WoW I have really watched in fairly aghast horror as the game has been progressively dumbed down, at the same time I have also taken on real world responsibilities and commitments which means that I no longer have as much time to learn and progress through long raids with hard content like I used to, and quite frankly I feel a lot of people from the bygone days of WoW raiding feel the same.
 
Now, for all the criticism I have given to WoW I do have to say one development in their raid development philosophy since TBC I think could be applied to this game to increase the amount of people that could actively pursue endgame content, without compromising or trivializing the content such as LFR did. That is compartmentalizing the extremely large and long raids in this game into smaller instanced raids. This is something that WoW implemented in Pandaria (might have been Cataclysm but I didn't play at all during that expansion), which basically through the LFR finder allowed players to raid small parts of an otherwise larger raid (say the first 3-4 bosses of a 12 boss raid). I feel this system would really benefit Wildstar for a few reasons.
 
1) It gives people with less time on their hands more ability to experience content - This is the biggest benefit of this kind of design change as it allows people who maybe only have 1 or 2 hours a week to give towards raiding the ability to at least experience some content. Most guilds currently usually require a minimum of 4-5 hours a week to commit to raiding which I really simply no longer have the time to do. This would keep more players logging on instead of leaving the game after they get tired of running dailies or veteran dungeons.
 
2) It allows you to keep the feeling of meaningful progression - Another benefit of this system while requiring less time is it can acknowledge progression through a raid. That means if you complete the first section of an instance you unlock the second. When the raid resets and your guild decides it doesn't have time for long raiding in a week you can continue to do progression by focusing on queuing up for the second part of the raid and skipping the first part which allows you to continue working towards progression even on a tight schedule.
 
3) It doesn't have to compromise difficulty of existing content - A lot of commentators have suggested that the difficulty of WildStar is still too much and that it should be dumbed down. I disagree strongly here as I figure the difficulty is to a large extend what continues to differentiate this game from other MMOs, removing the difficulty will make WildStar pointless. With this system content does become more accessible not through easing up time it takes to learn and clear content, but by rewarding previous MEANINGFUL progression, with time savings rather than constantly having to re-raid entire sections every week while working through a raid.
 
4) It would help with releasing content more frequently - Perhaps one of the biggest benefits would be for people who have already cleared a lot of content. With a compartmentalized system Carbine could release future raids in parts on a more frequent basis rather than everyone having to wait months for a totally complete raid. Especially with the more limited resources Carbine has it would allow progression to continue more consistently while also still giving the feeling of being a large raid when it is complete, which I feel is still psychologically important to a lot of raiders.
 
Anyways... that is my suggestion. What do you guys think?  ^_^
 
 	
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			I believe this has been suggested in many iterations in the past in similar threads.  
			
				
	Edited January 22, 2016 by MedicMelawen	
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I agree with this.
 
I think loot lockouts (at least for GA, and then DS when the new raid comes out) would go a long way toward achieving this as well.	
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			the difficulty of wildstar raids is not compatible with lfr in its current form.  you can not roll your face across the keyboard and win, which will be too difficult for most of the people who would use this feature.  i do think a loot lock out is the best way to open things up more, and this may help eliminate the suggestion of queuing for a boss or wing.  a group finder tool for raids would be good too, think group advertising,  but a queue system for these raids would not work well in my opinion, without nerfing content into the ground.  there are a lot of pug ga groups that run these days.  GA can be cleared in about 2 hours with a good group, and pugs clear regularly.  do not assume that you need a lot of time dedicated, in order to get in and start raiding.  but be warned, you dip a toe in the water and you will get pulled right in.  the raids are that good.  lfr or not.	
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 GA can be cleared in about 2 hours with a good group, and pugs clear regularly.
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A 2 hour clear requires a significant portion of the raid to be in near BiS DS gear. It's awesome if you can get in one of the raids, but it's by no means a sure thing. Most pugs aren't completing GA in a night, and those that do are usually more than 3 hours. And I've seen a lot of 6/6 groups wipe on ohmna repeatedly.
 
That being said, I do realize that GA is pretty accessible these days- I just think we should be realistic about things like a 2 hour clear :)
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I've done a 1.5 hour clear :)
 
On our side of things we have a huge number of pugs, which is why you have such a varying degree of success. You have some pugs that just want to get x-89 down. You have some that span multiple nights (this is probably the most typical). You have others gunning for a full clear. You have some guild runs + pugs that will clear in under 2 hours.
 
And you have ChemBoy's "I'm starting a GA, if you don't suck join on me now" that filled in 60 seconds and cleared in ~2 hours. Don't know how we pulled that one off, but I'm glad I got in :D
 
The variety is nice, and you can plug in where you will. But the sub 2 hour clears are still not the norm :)	
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I've done a 1.5 hour clear :)
 
On our side of things we have a huge number of pugs, which is why you have such a varying degree of success. You have some pugs that just want to get x-89 down. You have some that span multiple nights (this is probably the most typical). You have others gunning for a full clear. You have some guild runs + pugs that will clear in under 2 hours.
 
And you have ChemBoy's "I'm starting a GA, if you don't suck join on me now" that filled in 60 seconds and cleared in ~2 hours. Don't know how we pulled that one off, but I'm glad I got in :D
 
The variety is nice, and you can plug in where you will. But the sub 2 hour clears are still not the norm :)
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