112248-carbine-haventand-they-still-dont-teachedcontributed-players-to-form-value-and-respect-groups-big-mistake

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When I played Aion, each new zone/area had an elite zone with mobs, that required a group of players to clear it. A lot of quests and lore went through this elite zones with a lot of exp. Also this zones had mini-bosses and bosses with good loot. And players had to cooperate with each others to form a group. Press "enter" and type in chat that you are looking for group or forming it. On 15 level game already told players: "Find another players, form a group to play with and clear that zone for good exp and loot, so you will be able to proceed with your progression".
 
What we have in wildstar? Adventures and dungeons can be skipped, quests with elite mobs can be skipped. Even if you go in dungeon and adventure, you just press one button and system forms you a group, you don't even care who are these people, you don't even remember their nicknames, you can leave if something doesn't satisfies you and let the system find you another group with just one click. You don't make any effort to form a group so it is of little value for you.
 
And when players reach silver dungeons, LFG system fails, and they are required to form static/const groups, or just find another players to clear those dungeons. But they weren't teached, motivated for forming groups all the path to level 50, wtf? "How comes, all the way to level 50 I played solo and used lfg tool and now it doesn't work?!"
 
You think knowledge that game is about raids will teach players to value and respect group/raid? No, it won't. Game MUST teach players to value and respect group-play from the beginning.
 
So in the end in game we have static/const groups/raids that came from other games or were formed of players that already know about value/respect of group-play. Mostly solo/lfg players left wildstar. It's mmo and not single-player game.
 
 
 	
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Chua not fully agree.
Carbine not responsible for teaching Humans to be social. Is expected behavior of Human in MMORPG.
Chua think if Human cannot be social in game by making groups, should not play said game.	
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			I agree with Chua   :)	
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I'm with Olivar on this one.
 
Carbine shouldn't have to hold your hand with dungeons.
 
Also, dungeons and elites that can't be skipped? I'd be pissed if I couldn't skip them.
 
Entire guilds have been/are formed solely because a guy wants to group up and go kill world bosses. Guilds thrive that way. 
 
I don't see what point you're trying to make here.	
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I agree with the chua (as much as it pains me to agree with a chua). It isn't a company or a game's responsibility to teach people to be social or to have the ability to seek social situations. I've met many of my game friends through world bosses and group quests or dungeons, even from the plain ol' LFG dungeon queue when I queue solo, I've met players who I stay in the group with and we go for more and sometimes we become friends, sometimes we don't. The game GIVES us the opportunity to meet other players. It's up to us to take the opportunity. Random dungeon queues? Random BG queues? Heck, you can even visit random player houses. It's not up to them to teach us. It's up to us.
 
Edit: If you go through your entire game experience up to max lvl not making any friends to play with, to help or to be helped by, that is definitely not the game's fault. It's true, some people don't want to go through the extra effort of, y'know, speaking to random people or seeking out others to play with, and that's fine, that's their/your choice. Some people like to play Solo and don't want to have to find a group, and that's just fine too! All the game needs to do is provide the opportunity, and they have.	
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Chua not fully agree.
Carbine not responsible for teaching Humans to be social. Is expected behavior of Human in MMORPG.
Chua think if Human cannot be social in game by making groups, should not play said game.
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			The way people treat each other in a game is a far broader issue than any one game. Want to find people who play like you do? Work at it, cultivate relationships, communicate, and be ready for it to take some time. Don't expect the game to do it for you.	
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Carbine shouldn't have to hold your hand with dungeons.
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You missed one thing. The game already teaches players not to be social. As I already described it.
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You missed one thing. The game already teaches players not to be social. As I already described it.
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If the game had a flourishing population and a steady stream of new players then i would be all for having Zone Quest Lines and Region Quest Lines (Perhaps even World Quest Lines) that involved group activity. But when i lvled to 50 3 weeks ago, such an implementation would have made my leveling experience a lot worse. I do however agree that this game completly lack elite zones where you have a bunch of optional quests that encourages people to group up.
 
I've only found 2 so far... one in Southern Grimvault and one in Blighthaven.	
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Human not understand game then.
Game clearly states on big quests to bring group of friends or help...
Not games fault if Human cannot make friends
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			I don't care about other players. They can go to hell as far as I'm concerned. I only cooperate with other players if they can offer something back or if I can exploit them. I don't have the time to be social here, no more than the absolutely selfishly necessary. This is a hardcore game and you should play it like that.	
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ebp... You lost that battle at the very moment you have Dungeon Finders on a MMO...
 
The same ppl that claims "it's player responsability" are probably the same ones that will cry out loud if DF were deactivated.
 
There is a new "fauna" of "group players" created by DF that, certainly, are simply deadweight in coordinated teams and Carbine already implicitely accepted their responsability when they "listened to feedback" and reworked the entire bronze/silver/gold reward system (specially on adventures) to discourage certain behaviours but...
 
...DF used on other MMOs have already created a custommer profile you have to satisfy if you want to increase your subs, those players that want to have Gear needed for group activities so their Solo gameplay is much easier (on top of the ones traditionally needing to wear status symbols to showoff).
 
This custommer profile, in time, will find him/herself unable to progress in content that requires coordination so, naturally, will demand a nerf in overall game difficulty.
 
As usual, how the content is shaped will be controlled by the proportion of each of this mutually exclusive profiles Carbine wants to retain as Subs...
 
...Let's see how long "Hardcore... Hardcore!!!" motto lasts on this game.
 
EDIT: A good example is the poster above me... That have read somewhere what "hardcore" means and have, ofc, no clue on what he will find soon ahead :).	
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Carbine not responsible for teaching Humans to be social. Is expected behavior of Human in MMORPG.
Chua think if Human cannot be social in game by making groups, should not play said game.
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Human not understand game then.
Game clearly states on big quests to bring group of friends or help...
Not games fault if Human cannot make friends
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OLIIIIIII!!!!!!! missed you m8, how was the vacation, did lots of sience?
 
OT: Soooo in Aeon, you had zones that you had to clear with a group. IN WS you have dungeons that have to be cleared in a group. Both the zone and dungeons are needed for progression. So the ONLY difference is the lvl required to start running these zones/dungeons in groups.
 
I also kinda agree with Oli, the reason i play MMO's is because of the social aspect that naturally comes with these games. You really shouldn't have to be told that  you should group up in an MMO to increase your fun :P
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I don't care about other players. They can go to hell as far as I'm concerned. I only cooperate with other players if they can offer something back or if I can exploit them. I don't have the time to be social here, no more than the absolutely selfishly necessary. This is a hardcore game and you should play it like that.
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Noone cares about others, while everything is ok for themselves. But low population may change vector of the game content development.
 
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I don't care about low population.
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If a person is not willing to participate in the multiplayer aspect of an MMO than perhaps this isn't the genre for them to play.
 
Wildstar in it's functionality as multiplayer is pretty self explanatory, there is a guild system, LFD, battlegrounds, a couple group quests per zone, high level 5man quests, raiding, arenas and warplots. If a person cannot learn to use these tools then complains about the fact the game sucks, then it's their problem.
 
Just because the game doesn't force you into playing with others whilst levelling does not mean that it doesn't have any multiplayer. Personally I hate games that force you into playing with a group (think the low level dungeons in FF ARR, you have to complete them to continue the main storyline... eeeeughhhh) and Wildstars options suited me fine.	
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May be you care about game become f2p with easy content?
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I 10000% agree with OP.
 
I HAVE leveled up completely with my other half, and we were constantly hindered by quests that did not group update or dungeons that wasted our time. 
The quests that didn't group update were a serious pain, although it might be considered petty, but it was just weird that if we were both hitting a mob we wouldn't get a quest update.
 
 
Dungeons need to give something more for the leveling player and incentives for the mentoring player. Perhaps special skin weapons? or dyes?
And for open world I would love to see some actual useful loot from raid bosses instead of green implants :/	
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May be you care about game become f2p with easy content?
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If you look at his recent posts in other threads, I think boni has gone full troll-mode.
Best not bother with him.  -_-
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If a person is not willing to participate in the multiplayer aspect of an MMO than perhaps this isn't the genre for them to play.
 
Wildstar in it's functionality as multiplayer is pretty self explanatory, there is a guild system, LFD, battlegrounds, a couple group quests per zone, high level 5man quests, raiding, arenas and warplots. If a person cannot learn to use these tools then complains about the fact the game sucks, then it's their problem.
 
Just because the game doesn't force you into playing with others whilst levelling does not mean that it doesn't have any multiplayer. Personally I hate games that force you into playing with a group (think the low level dungeons in FF ARR, you have to complete them to continue the main storyline... eeeeughhhh) and Wildstars options suited me fine.
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ebp... You lost that battle at the very moment you have Dungeon Finders on a MMO...
 
The same ppl that claims "it's player responsability" are probably the same ones that will cry out loud if DF were deactivated.
 
There is a new "fauna" of "group players" created by DF that, certainly, are simply deadweight in coordinated teams and Carbine already implicitely accepted their responsability when they "listened to feedback" and reworked the entire bronze/silver/gold reward system (specially on adventures) to discourage certain behaviours but...
 
...DF used on other MMOs have already created a custommer profile you have to satisfy if you want to increase your subs, those players that want to have Gear needed for group activities so their Solo gameplay is much easier (on top of the ones traditionally needing to wear status symbols to showoff).
 
This custommer profile, in time, will find him/herself unable to progress in content that requires coordination so, naturally, will demand a nerf in overall game difficulty.
 
As usual, how the content is shaped will be controlled by the proportion of each of this mutually exclusive profiles Carbine wants to retain as Subs...
 
...Let's see how long "Hardcore... Hardcore!!!" motto lasts on this game.
 
EDIT: A good example is the poster above me... That have read somewhere what "hardcore" means and have, ofc, no clue on what he will find soon ahead :).
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When I played Aion, each new zone/area had an elite zone with mobs, that required a group of players to clear it. A lot of quests and lore went through this elite zones with a lot of exp. Also this zones had mini-bosses and bosses with good loot. And players had to cooperate with each others to form a group. Press "enter" and type in chat that you are looking for group or forming it. On 15 level game already told players: "Find another players, form a group to play with and clear that zone for good exp and loot, so you will be able to proceed with your progression".
 
What we have in wildstar? Adventures and dungeons can be skipped, quests with elite mobs can be skipped. Even if you go in dungeon and adventure, you just press one button and system forms you a group, you don't even care who are these people, you don't even remember their nicknames, you can leave if something doesn't satisfies you and let the system find you another group with just one click. You don't make any effort to form a group so it is of little value for you.
 
And when players reach silver dungeons, LFG system fails, and they are required to form static/const groups, or just find another players to clear those dungeons. But they weren't teached, motivated for forming groups all the path to level 50, wtf? "How comes, all the way to level 50 I played solo and used lfg tool and now it doesn't work?!"
 
You think knowledge that game is about raids will teach players to value and respect group/raid? No, it won't. Game MUST teach players to value and respect group-play from the beginning.
 
So in the end in game we have static/const groups/raids that came from other games or were formed of players that already know about value/respect of group-play. Mostly solo/lfg players left wildstar. It's mmo and not single-player game.
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Chua not fully agree.
Carbine not responsible for teaching Humans to be social. Is expected behavior of Human in MMORPG.
Chua think if Human cannot be social in game by making groups, should not play said game.
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Chua not fully agree.
Carbine not responsible for teaching Humans to be social. Is expected behavior of Human in MMORPG.
Chua think if Human cannot be social in game by making groups, should not play said game.
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Again, I already described. You don't need any group, till you reach 50 lvl. For some people it takes one month to get to level 50, without any group help. And suddenly happens big boom for such players, when they are forced to gather groups to proceed in progression.
 
Of course, you are already social, you know about such things as gathering groups or asking for help. It's not even a problem for players that come to play this game in already-formed group.
 
The problem is in players that came to play game alone, that played solo in other games. And wildstar all the way to level 50 tells to these solo-players:"It's ok buddy, no need to find group, you can reach everyting solo."
And these players spent a lot of time in single-player mode and sometimes using lfg tool. And on level cap all the gameplay for them is changed upside down.
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Dude your basically asking carbine to gate important content behind required group-play....which is a big no-no when it comes to world bosses/adventures/dungeons. You would *cupcake* more people off than you pleased.
 
Your right when you say this is an mmo not a single-player game, but most of the content in wildstar/swtor/eso etc etc is SOLO content with the option to group up if you wish
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No. Wildstar is about group/raid play with elements of solo/pvp content. You see, even you don't understand it, cause from the beginning game treated to you in such manner.
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I 10000% agree with OP.
 
I HAVE leveled up completely with my other half, and we were constantly hindered by quests that did not group update or dungeons that wasted our time. 
The quests that didn't group update were a serious pain, although it might be considered petty, but it was just weird that if we were both hitting a mob we wouldn't get a quest update.
 
 
Dungeons need to give something more for the leveling player and incentives for the mentoring player. Perhaps special skin weapons? or dyes?
And for open world I would love to see some actual useful loot from raid bosses instead of green implants :/
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Yes, and everyone knew (at least I hope so) when they bought the game that this is an MMO and you are required to form a group to raid. Cause you know... well... surprise, but you cannot raid alone! But there are people who for whatever reasons like to explore and quest alone (a lot of people in fact), and why should they be forced to group all the time? I liked to level my first char alone, I had my own pace to explore the areas and quest-stories (in fact I don't really like to group for story-parts, because everyone is rushing and/or we are talking on TS and you easily miss the story), and I'm now in a guild and do almost everything grouped. It's like you want to make something a problem which isn't.
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Again, I already described. You don't need any group, till you reach 50 lvl. For some people it takes one month to get to level 50, without any group help. And suddenly happens big boom for such players, when they are forced to gather groups to proceed in progression.
 
Of course, you are already social, you know about such things as gathering groups or asking for help. It's not even a problem for players that come to play this game in already-formed group.
 
The problem is in players that came to play game alone, that played solo in other games. And wildstar all the way to level 50 tells to these solo-players:"It's ok buddy, no need to find group, you can reach everyting solo."
And these players spent a lot of time in single-player mode and sometimes using lfg tool. And on level cap all the gameplay for them is changed upside down.
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And my main point is, that game is not providing any motivation for players to form groups, while they are climbing up to end-game, where they WILL HAVE TO form this groups, be social, etc. Doesn't matter how it will be implemented, by forcing players to do all group quests/dungeons, without ability to move to new zone, or just implement it in parallel form with a lot of exp and phat lootz, so players have big will to finish this group content.
 
I repeat again, the point is not in HOW it will be implemented, but in LACK of such implementation.
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And my main point is, that game is not providing any motivation for players to form groups, while they are climbing up to end-game, where they WILL HAVE TO form this groups, be social, etc. Doesn't matter how it will be implemented, by forcing players to do all group quests/dungeons, without ability to move to new zone, or just implement it in parallel form with a lot of exp and phat lootz, so players have big will to finish this group content.
 
I repeat again, the point is not in HOW it will be implemented, but in LACK of such implementation.
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A prime example is the attunement stage where you have to go into a room and decode some panels, there are mobs with spotlights and my absolutely dedicated to healing partner, well it's just not fun for her to dps. Understandably that's an issue with her not being flexible enough to dps, but then again why should she if it's an MMO? WE should be allowed to do everything together but that missions does not allow it.
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Nope, they're not responsible, this is true. But: Knowing about the tendencies of human behavior (favoring the path of least resistance, being jerks as soon as anonymity/lack of accountability comes into play, etc.) still means it's a smart move for a game dev to design a game's system to counteract these tendencies.
 
And I don't think Wildstar is a shining example of such design.
 
It's humans' responsibility to not steal cars.
But you would still advise car designers to design locks into their cars' doors.
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			Welcome to the modern MMO, void of community or soul. Players want to be instantly teleported everywhere without needing to talk to anyone. These same players are trying to get their Silvers done in LFG. This is the playerbase they're now catering to. RIP.	
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You can't reach anything solo.  Every zone has 2+, 3+ 5+ quests, 5 man rare spawns, 20 man event bosses, world events that always take more people.  That LFG is putting you in groups where you are playing with people.  Hell, I've been doing some events with people of the other faction (we're like that on Evindra) just to help them out.  There's a lot of group content, not to mention that you essentially have to never use your chat to make friends to maintain your bubble.  And that's not mentioning PVP.
 
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With LFG is very hard to proceed on dungeon attunement step.
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OP:  It seems to me that you're assuming for most people in this game, this is their first MMO.  This is not the case.  Most people here have played other MMOs, and have no delusions that they can tackle end game content solo.
 
I'm one of the solo players you talk about, and I never once assumed that I could solo the end game content here.  I hate PUGs with a passion, as they are 90% fail, and a complete waste of my time.  So I skipped the group content while leveling (except grouping with my wife or RL friends for the 2+ & 3+ quests).  Simple fact is, I have very little faith in random people I've just met, so I avoid them.
 
Now that we've reached 50, we are checking out active guilds looking for one that will be a good fit for us, because we knew from the start that to get into the raiding scene would require more than just the 5 of us.  We're not in any hurry, and we won't just jump into the first guild that we see.
 
Bottom line, I think your premise that players don't know what they're getting into just because they're not forced to group up from day 1 is flawed.  It may be the case for a small number, but the majority are fully aware of what end-game content in an MMO is.	
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Nope, they're not responsible, this is true. But: Knowing about the tendencies of human behavior (favoring the path of least resistance, being jerks as soon as anonymity/lack of accountability comes into play, etc.) still means it's a smart move for a game dev to design a game's system to counteract these tendencies.
 
And I don't think Wildstar is a shining example of such design.
 
It's humans' responsibility to not steal cars.
But you would still advise car designers to design locks into their cars' doors.
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2+, 3+ some classes can do it solo, but yes, 5+ will require to group up, for ~1 minute of group play. Not to mention, that you can just run to spot with elite mob, wait for other solo players, without grouping up start killing at and others will join. Can easy skip, not much loss. I heard about bosses, that they give a lost of xp, but they have big resp cooldown. Events are public, just come and solo-play. Very low motivation.
With LFG is very hard to proceed on dungeon attunement step.
 
Already said, you have to group up to proceed in PVE progression, dungeon -> raids. Attunement will be nerfed -> still need to group up to proceed in raids. Of course it's your choice not to do dungeons/raids and step away from pve progression. But there are a lot of people that want to proceed in pve progression but they weren't prepared for it. "How comes, all the way to level 50 I played solo and used lfg tool and now it doesn't work?!"
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I 10000% agree with OP.
 
I HAVE leveled up completely with my other half, and we were constantly hindered by quests that did not group update or dungeons that wasted our time. 
The quests that didn't group update were a serious pain, although it might be considered petty, but it was just weird that if we were both hitting a mob we wouldn't get a quest update.
 
 
Dungeons need to give something more for the leveling player and incentives for the mentoring player. Perhaps special skin weapons? or dyes?
And for open world I would love to see some actual useful loot from raid bosses instead of green implants :/
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			Group Finder is a valuable tool.  How people use it, is entirely on them individually.	
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			doublepost	
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Looking over the wreckage of the past few months, I honestly have to say Wildstar gets a failing grade in gamer psychology 101. 'Solo your way to 50? Drama over LFG/medal abuse? Bypass itemization RNG by crafting? Whoudathunkit?'
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I don't disagree completely, on top of some mistakes, Carbine was naive regarding a few things. And today's MMO playerbase is a lot different than 5 or 10 years ago. Developers need to stop developing MMOs in their underground bunkers.
 
 
It's a community-wrecker. Worst thing that could happen to MMOs. IMHO of course, you use it all you want. Enjoy.
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Already said, you have to group up to proceed in PVE progression, dungeon -> raids. Attunement will be nerfed -> still need to group up to proceed in raids. Of course it's your choice not to do dungeons/raids and step away from pve progression. But there are a lot of people that want to proceed in pve progression but they weren't prepared for it. "How comes, all the way to level 50 I played solo and used lfg tool and now it doesn't work?!"
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Already said, you have to group up to proceed in PVE progression, dungeon -> raids. Attunement will be nerfed -> still need to group up to proceed in raids. Of course it's your choice not to do dungeons/raids and step away from pve progression. But there are a lot of people that want to proceed in pve progression but they weren't prepared for it. "How comes, all the way to level 50 I played solo and used lfg tool and now it doesn't work?!"
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It's a community-wrecker. Worst thing that could happen to MMOs. IMHO of course, you use it all you want. Enjoy.
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Olivar
Members
LocationChua Leader
Posted Yesterday, 11:59 PM
Chua not fully agree.
Carbine not responsible for teaching Humans to be social. Is expected behavior of Human in MMORPG.
Chua think if Human cannot be social in game by making groups, should not play said game.
 
I don't often agree with Olivar, but when the scruffy little varmit is right, he's right.
 
If it wasn't for some sort of LFG function I doubt I'd find anyone to group up with in this game, given that I play at very odd hours.	
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You're imagining that somehow if the game forced everyone to join a raiding guild to progress to 50, we'd all try it and love it. Sounds a lot like a PvPer thinking that if only people who don't PvP could be forced to, they'd realize how fun it is.
 
In both cases, it's simply wrong. Not everyone wants to play the same way you do, and the solution isn't to force them to do it.
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After slogging thru that hash of a post..I realize I'm probably someone you think should not be here.
 
I have maybe 1 day a week where I can invest more than 2 hours to content. I'm on-call for most of the jobs I do.
 
I have been dropped from guilds all over cyberspace and snubbed for PUGs before it became an acronym, because my time is limited.
 
I'm here because I like to blow stuff up and enjoy the storytelling..solo, usually. And I will quit the moment I'm not enjoying a quick session of whack-an-exile or am told I have to do something someone else considers "fun" because I don't understand what "fun" really is.
 
Is that wrong and would you tell me to leave? **cupcake** you.	
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 "How comes, all the way to level 50 I played solo and used lfg tool and now it doesn't work?!"
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Public companies like NCSoft operate with public money, and that means they are not legally allowed to keep spending investor money on products that don't perform. They don't have the luxury that EVE does, for example, of deciding "Hey, this is the kind of game we want to make, and so players can either play it our way or leave.
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You act like somehow, before there was a group finder tool there wasn't a zone channel filled with LFG spam. And yet, nobody ever called the chat system a community-wrecker.
 
The group finder is the same thing without the spamming, so I'm inclined to disagree.
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			Isn't much Carbine can do if you weren't raised to play well with others.	
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But "paying plat or money to win" works well in any game.
People just are too slack to try finding any way to pass the raid attunement.
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While I agree with most of what you're saying, I had stop here and say 'WTF?'  Just because NCSoft is an incorporated company does not mean it can't legally make stupid decisions.
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While I agree with most of what you're saying, I had stop here and say 'WTF?'  Just because NCSoft is an incorporated company does not mean it can't legally make stupid decisions.
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Once cross-server LFD came in, that wasn't an option anymore.  Since groups were like kleenex, you were one and done.  And it didn't matter if those people hated you.  You'd never see them again.  You might not see someone from that server again for a while.  Asshattery rose since you could get away with it.
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After slogging thru that hash of a post..I realize I'm probably someone you think should not be here.
 
I have maybe 1 day a week where I can invest more than 2 hours to content. I'm on-call for most of the jobs I do.
 
I have been dropped from guilds all over cyberspace and snubbed for PUGs before it became an acronym, because my time is limited.
 
I'm here because I like to blow stuff up and enjoy the storytelling..solo, usually. And I will quit the moment I'm not enjoying a quick session of whack-an-exile or am told I have to do something someone else considers "fun" because I don't understand what "fun" really is.
 
Is that wrong and would you tell me to leave? **cupcake** you.
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It only isn't an option because developers allow it to persist, just like asshattery in PvP. They have lots of options on the table for letting people know what they're getting into and who they're getting into it with. Some of those involve penalties for undesired behaviors, like deserter debuffs. Others involve tracking of relevant parameters to let players make informed decisions about their teammates. 
 
Generally, games choose instead to be the way eBay would be if there was no feedback rating for buyers or sellers.
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			Teach????? This aint school man >.>	
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I think this might help ease things out, the grind is making us ugly.
 
 
 
Pretty simple, though some of us are that way because of our situations in RL already.	
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Generally, games choose instead to be the way eBay would be if there was no feedback rating for buyers or sellers.
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Absolutly not, and more power to you. The problem comes when other players who have those same tendancies demand that the game be changed for them when it was clearly never aimed at them in the first place. That's when I feel people just need to GTFO and stop ruining the game.
 
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The concept of "forcing" anyone to do ANYTHING implies that you have the power to compel cooperation. No game company ever has that power over players, and particularly not when there's a sub fee involved. The only reason Vanilla WoW got away with having stuff in their game that nearly everyone hated (attunements, for example) is that players didn't have any other better options for MMOs, only worse ones.  That's not true now. It's a buyer's market in MMOs, not a seller's market, and an MMO that wants to be profitable has zero power to force players to do anything.
 
Players want LFD/LFG. I know I sure do.  If they don't get it, they will move to a game that has it, and your game loses.  (Ask SWTOR.)  Players want content to be accessible. If it's not, they will move to game where the content is accessible, and your game loses.  Most players want the option to not group up if they don't feel like grouping up; if you force them to group when they don't want to, they will move to a game that lets them play the way they want to play.  And your game LOSES.  
 
When I hear "Oh, if they make the content difficult, players will have to improve their skills!" I think -- "Have to"?  There is no "have to."  Same thing for "If they don't include an LFG/LFD, players will have to build real communities for group content!"  Have to?  They never have to, not today. There are dozens of MMOs out there. The door is just a couple of mouse clicks away and that player is gone, and his sub money with him.
 
 
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Actually, developers are very aware of how these things work.  Social reputation worked because it was relatively hard to doctor, your word was only as good as your own reputation.  Things balanced out.  Actual in-game systems with in-game consequences have two major concerns they have to address:  does this work to solve the problem we have and is it going to cause another problem?
 
Having in-game kicking by vote solves a problem, as an example, but it's also used by majority 3 man groups in Wildstar's queues to boot people before they have a chance to roll on loot.  That's a good Wildstar example of something necessary working against the players at times; if we step into WoW I could go on about how all of their improvements have proven to be double edged swords.
 
Again, I'm not knocking the idea.  Obviously, it's popular because the old FFXI method of spamming genchat in a leveling zone town for healers and tanks doesn't work as well.  But a whole host of issues comes with these things, and not all of them have proven to be net-beneficial to the playerbase.
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I agree that developers are very aware of the problem. But they are also very reluctant to implement solutions, in part because players--particularly organized groups of players--are quick to find and exploit holes in game design. Your example of 3-man groups in WS queues is a good example of that. 
 
But that's not an argument against a LFG tool. It's an argument FOR a mechanism to ensure that people who contributed to a kill get a chance at the loot from that kill that is in-line with their contribution to the kill--whether that contribution was doing damage, taking damage, holding aggro, healing, rezzing, buffing, debuffing, or crowd controls. 
 
The idea that this wouldn't be central to the core design of how loot drops in the first place is a little remarkable--and frankly, a perfect counter-example of how a problem can be long-standing across several games, and have an obvious solution, yet still have the fixes in place be rudimentary at best. 
 
If you make a sword and it has two edges, the solution is to improve the design of the sword rather than act like sword-making is just too hard to expect it to be done well.
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The idea that this wouldn't be central to the core design of how loot drops in the first place is a little remarkable--and frankly, a perfect counter-example of how a problem can be long-standing across several games, and have an obvious solution, yet still have the fixes in place be rudimentary at best. 
 
If you make a sword and it has two edges, the solution is to improve the design of the sword rather than act like sword-making is just too hard to expect it to be done well.
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I suspect the issue is, that to get a really functional LFD/LFG queue system and interface going from the ground up, you have to design with that as one of your objectives for your game. For example, I love the idea that "If you helped make the kill, you get to roll on the loot even if you got kicked by a scummy premade," but I see that as hard to implement on a split-server design because once you've been kicked you're back on your home server and not the instance server.  
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How about new people in LFG? How about people unfairly blacklisted because of cliques and guild drama? There's a reason Blizzard extended out to cross-server LFD, I'm fairly certain it wasn't because a self-policed LFG chat was a rousing success.
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			How did a post with such a terrible title get 4 frigging pages!?	
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How did a post with such a terrible title get 4 frigging pages!?
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How did a post with such a terrible title get 4 frigging pages!?
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I did my first dungeon in FF XIV last night, and I was introduced to their reputation system: At the end of the run, you get to award a commendation to one of your teammates on the run and I got to choose between the two randoms we picked up in the duty finder. I believe said commendations can then be turned in for rewards, or somesuch. Certainly I can imagine where such a system could be abused but the concept is solid: Positive reinforcement for good behavior.
 
Wildstar is all about positive reinforcement for elite skills. It doesn't seem to care much about good behavior. And that's a problem.
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The character's contribution can still be tracked in the instance server even if they're no longer in it, and even if there's absolutely no way to send the loot to the character's server if they win the roll (which would be the worst case scenario, the preferred solution being to send the loot after them), the other players can still be kept from receiving it in their place it the character who wins the roll is no longer in the server.
 
If you want to stop the exploit, you have to remove the benefit the exploiter gets for doing it. That is essential to minimizing the impact of exploits.
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Wow I'm late to this party.
 
I can see both sides of this argument.  I am a firm believer that many MMOs today, including Wildstar, do not do enough to prepare players for the group content that they know is coming at endgame.  As others have pointed out, if given the choice, players will quite often choose the easier, less social way of doing things.  They'll solo to max level, they'll use dungeon finders instead of talking to people, and so on.
 
Sadly, I don't think that Wildstar can really get away with pushing groups much harder than it does, because too many players expect this sort of game now.  They've been "trained" by dozens of MMOs that were all about soloing until you hit the cap, or that devalued groups to the point that even supporting guilds in the game was questionable.  There's an awful lot of people who play MMOs like single player games, because the games let them do it and because that's what they're used to.  Take that away, and those folks don't all of a sudden start grouping - they just quit playing.
 
However, I also believe that some responsibility lies with the player as well.  The group content is there, and it is compelling, and it is well built.  If you do the normal mode adventures and dungeons, you *will* learn the skills needed for the vet modes and for raiding.  Players know what they're in for at level 50 - the Wildstar devs have been very explicit about just how they've built their game.  So to an extent, any player that chooses to solo their way up and then gets frustrated because they can't hack it in the vet modes has only themselves to blame.
 
Ideally I'd love to see more things that pushed players to go through normal mode group content on the way up.  But I don't think we can blame the game for players that aren't prepared to group at max level - at least not completely.  Part of the fault lies with those players as well.	
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However, I also believe that some responsibility lies with the player as well.  [...] Part of the fault lies with those players as well.
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WoW implemented the system you're talking about.  Individualized loot.  After clearing a raid, every single player individually rolls on their own gear which is always useful for them.  This was a direct response to what we've been talking about happening in Wildstar, the result of extending anonymity and disposability to what was originally intended to be a highly social game.  And this was, of course, a response to people saying they didn't want to have to walk to instances and put together groups in the LFG channel because it was so hard.
 
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I'm leery of that kind of commendation system, because I think it doesn't hold up well when I ask "Is there a easy and obvious way that an organized group of people willing to screw everyone around them to get what they want could take advantage of this?".
 
I think the answer to that is yes. That kind of system is a popularity contest. It's a nice idea in principle, and kudos to you for offering up the gold star fairly. if everyone did that, MMOs wouldn't be the quagmire that they are.
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Take that away, and those folks don't all of a sudden start grouping - they just quit playing.
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Uh, I _didn't_ talk about individualized loot. It's completely unrelated to what I talked about. I'm actually quite puzzled about how you got from what I said to what you responded to at length and in great detail.
 
What I said was that the odds of winning the loot roll should be determined by the individual's contribution to the kill, and that contribution included not only damage done but also damage received, aggro held, heals, rezzes, buffs, debuffs, and crowd control.
 
 
The goal, as I noted in another post, is to ensure that people cannot take a useful participant in the risks and shun them when it's time for the reward. It doesn't have anything to do with whether you think the loot is good or not or whether you think LFGs are hard or not. You can always pass on it if you don't want it, but you have the right to a shot at it if you helped bring the beast down.
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"Responsibility"? What responsibility? The only responsibility a player has to Carbine is to make sure his credit card number isn't expired when it's time to charge the sub fee and to obey the TOS.
 
"Fault"? What fault? It's not a fault for players to want to play the game in the way they enjoy.  It's their money.  
 
This "blame the customer" mentality is the number one reason businesses of all kinds fail.
 
Honestly, where do people get the idea that it's up to the players to rise to Carbine's expectations? That's completely bass-ackwards from reality and I just don't understand where this line of thinking comes from.  
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Any attitude that reeks of coercion on the part of the devs will be punished by mass player desertions. Unfortunately there has been an air of this bad attitude in Wildstar, to the game's serious detriment -- both from some of the devs and from certain very small sectors of the player base.  Make dungeons too hard to PuG, believing that this will force people to learn to play more effectively?  Uh, no.  People will just go to games where pugging dungeons is viable.  Refuse to give them an LFD/LFG? Again, they'll just leave.  Try to make them spend months on arbitrary attunements so they can raid? Guess what -- they will go where they can raid without that BS.  
 
 
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I am a firm believer that many MMOs today, including Wildstar, do not do enough to prepare players for the group content that they know is coming at endgame.  
 
[...]
 
Ideally I'd love to see more things that pushed players to go through normal mode group content on the way up.  But I don't think we can blame the game for players that aren't prepared to group at max level - at least not completely.  Part of the fault lies with those players as well.
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We agree, and are working to create both more to do and more incentives for players to dive in to the group content during the leveling process:
We are creating a level 10 'tutorial' dungeon that is aimed at teaching groups of our players the sorts of mechanics that they will see most often within the dungeon content going forward. The instance will be much easier--comparatively--to the other dungeons, but should help teach players stuff like how IA armor works and class roles.
We are (very soon) adding quests for leveling players to complete each dungeon and adventure that have some sweet rewards in order to encourage them to dive in during the leveling process.
The rewards--both items, xp, and gold--are being reviewed for the leveling dungeons and likely boosted up to feel more accurately rewarding for the challenge required to complete them.
While these changes do not require players to be more polite to each other, they should help in encouraging folks to both learn and accept the challenge of our group content during the leveling process.
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OP, the reason people get frustrated at 50 has nothing to do with what they were "taught" at the lower levels.
 
The reason for the struggle with pugging is because the dungeons take most people several wipes to learn. For each boss. And then they are not so difficult.
 
So you have people needing to wipe to learn, and other people who've got it and don't really enjoy wiping.
 
I had a tank/healer/dps group that silvered STL with two other dps. We replaced them with another high dps and someone who'd never done the dungeon before. We wiped for an hour on the final boss because the new guy kept dying and between the two remaining DPS it just wasn't quite good enough (several sub 10% attempts- we were pulling about 5.5K between the two of us).
 
This is a game where each person has to learn the fights and perform in order to beat the bosses. It's not like other games where one or two competent playeres can carry a group. And that makes it a LOT of fun. But it also makes pugging painful when you have people who are used to smashing the content and other players that need time to learn.
 
Really, there's not much Carbine can or should do about this. It isn't about "respecting groups". It's about players having realistic expectations about what happens when you pug (pugging can be fun if you go in expecting to help people learn and are willing to wipe a lot).
 
But I LOVE these dungeons. They are so much fun to work on, and way more interesting than what I've done in other games. It's cool that having one player not up to snuff can doom the group, because it means we all can feel good about our contribution when we get a kill (or silver, or whatever).	
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I think the entire guild concept we have today is garbage.  There are too many guilds, all in their own individual worlds, when many have the exact same goals.  Kill boss X in raid Y.  There should be a server-wide (or game-wide) roster where players are given a composite rating for their gear/performance, similar to arenas, and based on rating they are placed into group A, B, C, etc.  Obviously, there needs to be some metrics in place to measure performance.  You can always play down a level if you want to group with friends that have lower rating.  You can also play as a separate, fixed group if you want to.  In this case, being social/polite is part of the experience; you learn to interact with people of a certain rating as you will see them again in future raids.  Players can be votekicked if they are jerks.  You start from ground zero in raid F (novice) and graduate up to raid E and so on, and the difficulty/rewards of the raid are tuned accordingly.
 
For me personally, I would like to raid, but the entire guild process is so off-putting.  I hate feeling like I'm interviewing for a job, I just want to play.  My ability/skill to play should not require a trial period and judgment from the almighty guild leader, it should be much more impartial than that.  My rating should speak for itself.  Progression should be dependent on my ability to play, not my ability to guild-hop to get in a guild that matches my goals and skill level, which will change over the course of time.	
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Regarding "forcing" players to do stuff, and the silly argument that funnelling players into certain types of content is a bad idea or results in quitters.
 
Last I checked, FF14 required you to do every single dungeon on the way to cap because doing these dungeons was a mandatory step in the main story line.  At last count FF14 has 2 million subs, with no option to play on a CREDD equivalent.
 
It is sometimes necessary, and valuable to have these requirements in order to provide the best experience for everyone when actually doing them instead of showing up at level 50 having never done a dungeon.
 
The MMO genre has indeed lost a lot of the social interplay that made it great.  My biggest concern in WildStar is that there is no manual LFG tool to complement the automated one.  Why can't I pop on a LFG flag with a note saying "I wanna kill world bosses, PST.", or "I need a group for Blighthaven 5's", as tank/dps/healer role.   Then everyone on the server can open the LFG tool to locate people with LFG flags that want to do the same things as them..  There isn't even a LFG channel.	
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It's cool that having one player not up to snuff can doom the group, because it means we all can feel good about our contribution when we get a kill (or silver, or whatever).
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			Timetraveller, This is fine but the OP is stating this should be enforced as gates to contact rather than options to attain better gear, and essentially telling the sizable group of solo grinders to get off the lawn... this is why the post has gone on for 5 pages now..they've stuck their thumb in the crack that divides the playerbase here and in several other games..so if your throwing him a bone, throw us one too..let us know as the game expands solo and small group content will expand with it.	
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Hey all,
 
Just popping in to let everyone know I removed some of the more off topic posts in an effort to guide things back on track.	
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In response to this I want to put up another player experience -- not mine! -- that I believe is more representative of what the "Wildstar Dungeon" experience is like for the average player. (Not the "baddie". The average.)
 
This was posted by user "JustLookingToHelp" on the Wildstar Reddit subforum. I'm reposting because I think he describes the situation with the dungeons perfectly and I couldn't do better if I tried. (No, I'm not him nor do I know him.) Note: the poster's Dad never mentioned this on any game forum; he simply stopped playing, like so many other players who see no reason to waste their time explaining to Carbine why Wildstar isn't for them, which is the majority. 
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Timetraveller, [...] let us know as the game expands solo and small group content will expand with it.
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