Current healing game mechanic is encouraging antisocial behavior

It's frowned upon in a lot of MMOs because kill-stealing used to be a thing. It's not anymore. Kill someone's mob in WoW, for example, and you just accelerated the grinding procress and they'll thank you for it so long as you let them attack their targets first.

Here's the thing, though: I'd rather you kill the monster than heal me. Aside from the fact that it has XP use vs XP pool repercussions, killing the monster means both of us can simply move on with our lives yet healing me instead in this scenario is very arrogant and self-serving.

If I'm going to die, then I already don't have the capabilities to fight my enemies off yet you're just going to stand there and watch me struggle. If I'm going to die, then I should've been running instead of fighting.

No thank you.

If we're in a group, then we're already a team... and I get to decided who I partner with.

If a random stranger ever gets the ability to cast "Light" on me, then I want them to be automatically flagged for PvP so that I may teach them a thing or two about minding their own business.

Last group I was part of couldn't understand that "light" + "stealth" don't mix. I kept dismissing it and the bloke kept refreshing it to the point where he might as well have been griefing me... at which point my solution was to leave the group. Your suggestion would make this scenario all the more troublesome for me.

 

lol can't we all just get along?

 

@Gix Forum told me you qouted me here?

 

@Earl Atogrim von Draken Yeah, there was an mistake. I quoted you from another thread and it ended up in another reply that I was typing here.

 

About the light spell. Given it's a tier 1 spell it really should just be a self cast only... that spell is annoying and easy enough to get on ones own without hurting their build if they desire to have it.

Self serving?
Given the current agroe mechanics it's quite easy to get swarmed now. If you are fighting something that stuns, slows, or roots running is not always an option.
How is this self serving? I get no xp for this. You do not need to heal health to gain xp for the heal spell.

There have been many instances where I have seen people get stunlocked by golems or rootlocked by spiders.

Typically I will ask if the player needs help first if they aren't near death. But I find it annoying to have to party to give then that heal if they have consented. At this point I leech xp and gold. That is not ideal.

 

I mentioned some of those before persistance and I strongly agree with majority of you are saying here.

1) Buffs
a) the biggest issue of buffs is that if someone has big buff and you buff them with lower one it will overwrite the better one (or at least it used to work liek that few releases ago, not sure if that changed).
b) another big issue is that buffs unlike heals are not getting bonus for casting on others so there is little reason to play support role and cast buffs, those who do most damage usually also get the most experience (since they can adventure on their own) and therefore get the buff abbilities to highest level, buffing such players with your inferior buffs is negativ,e notr positive thing.
c) you cannot buff players outsoide of the party (even when they are PvP)

2) Healing outside of the party
a) this is one of my biggest issues with the game. You cannot heal guild members or friends unless you party them. It is super annoying. You cannot rez people who are not in your party. And if they are in someone else's party you caannot invite them to your party to rez them. Or if yo uare in party but yo uare nto party leader you cannot invite them.
b) Especially in PvP I think healing and buffing others should be possible (perhaps at the cost of friendly fire). Anyway I see NO reason why my guildies and friends are defaulted to be my ENEMIES in PvP unless I party them. Also I have kind of issue with friend list, I do not think that most people I friended are my friends, I think acquitances might be better term. I would like friends to be my allies by default and acquitances to be neutral (with my option to change that to allies for those I cooperate that and to enemies for those opponents I enjoy fighting.

3) Rezing outside of party. I covered this under healing, but this is one of the most annoying features. I think playeers should have option to turn down healing or rezzing offers from other players (if they wish to reach ankh insted for example) however there is no reason why it should not be possible to rez others, especially friends.

4) I can see why you should not be able to talk in local chat when dead. I see zone and especially whisper, guild, and party chats as bit out of the game tools so I do not think those should be affected. They seem to be tools for the players rather than avatar's means of interaction in Novia. Natives do not use them.


PS: Also if someone hates beneficial interaction (e.g. healing) there is always friends only (actually should be called party only) and singleplayer modes.

 

You make an interesting point about friends and guildies. Though some guilds fight in tournaments so that may not work too well.

The support roll definitely is hurting though. As a support class I have to gm every single heal spell and then some to effectively heal the damage players take from bosses. From what I've collected you should be able to crit heal for 400 health and that's not something the average mixed heal dps can manage.

 

I see no reason why guildies (or friends) should not be allowed to fight each other. I think rightclicking player in guild list (or friend list) should allow us to treat others as allies/neutral/enemies. However, I think that it would seem reasonable for friends and guildies to be treated as allies. Another option would be to allow for friendly fire in the PvP areas so there would be little issues with not being able to fight whoever you wanted (though healing whoever you wanted should be an option as well).

As for myself I am glad to see 100+ crit heal though I am not GM, yet. And I do not have the best possible gear either. I still think the gap between top player and average player is way too big. That is for another discussion though it plays a role here as well, lower level players contribute very little to tough fights. And since parties are limited to 8 players it is sometimes hard to take someone with lower level for an adventure as it makes things so much harder.

There is bit of player skill needed to be good healer (watch who is low on health in party, stack heals, especially be careful with heal over time and do not cast it while one is still active, use group heal wisely, make sure you do not run out of focus or reagents...) but the character level and especially skill level and attunement play really huge role. Someone healling 200 hp per second instead of 75 is much better healer even if they take time with prioritizing who needs heals most... even if they take time with casting they can heal 100 hp per second on average and use the spare time to get out of combat briefly and regenerate focus quickly...

Anyway I think the game really lacks in more (or any) options for cooperation within scenes (I mean impromptu cooperation without partying). Helping someone kill stuff makes them lose experience, no wonder we are not encouraged to help them that way and healing them is impossible. It frustrates me that most people go out and kill stuff for no reason at all other than to get experience. I mean those skellies should be threat to all Novians and we should all fight them! It should be possible to negotiate with Kobolds or Elves though, why fight is the only option? And why is everyone out hunting down the last remaining wolves and bears in Novia, those animals keep ecosystems in check. The motivation to grind and get more experience makes things look extremly stupid when you actually go out and look what people are doing and try to think about it from within the game perspective. That is probably for another discussion as well.

 

True I like the idea but I know that people would cry hard about that, especially the already restricted pvpers.

Healing isn't really that hard... it's getting your heal to go off before the player runs off out of range of your aoe.

I do like the ideas about cooperation. And the world is so heavily focused on just mass slaughter I agree. The fauns are something I want to be able to heal

 

I tend to agree with the opening post for MMOs in general. The upsides for social positives generally outweigh the fringe griefing cases. But then your post here got me thinking that this game is different. If death mage spells do more damage when the caster is at lower health, a bystander presumably could (even unintentionally) reduce the death mage's DPS output by continually pursuing and healing them. Another example of why a well intended idea may be undesirable in this game.

 

True... but you can ask them to stop. It's as simple as such. I mean I don't want people attacking my enemies, I'd prefer a heal instead.

If the person continues to heal you despite you asking them to stop, it could eventually classify as harassment could it not?
So in the end you're only going to get a heal or two before you ask them to stop and they move on. "Death build don't heal". Simple enough.

 

This topic has been mostly hashed out on this thread, but I have an addition:

Most of this discussion is about "where my rights end and yours begins" and vice-versa (one-to-one) but it also concerns many-to-many relationships (how my party interacts with the entire MMO population). As we all have the same "rights" within the game (or at least we should), if I want to open up others to my influence, then I must also allow others to influence me, and if I want to close down others influence, then I must also accept that I will not be able to interact with others in that way.

So in these cases, just like the real world, I am of the opinion that rules and signposts, along with self-regulation, are preferable to hard-limits. When a group of people walk together in a public space, for example, we don't shove each other, we generally move aside to let others pass, and there is some civility (a set of rules of self-regulation). We could, however, build concrete corridors and automatic gates into our world and force everyone to walk single file through them like cattle (placing a hard limit or regulation into the world itself).

Human beings don't do this for several reasons, one is that it would drastically limit the world around us and restrict our free-will. Freedom is an interesting thing--we need to feel that we have "choice" to do anything, when in practicality (and mathematically) this is often impossible if everyone did that same thing. It is one of the trade-offs that an "individual" has to accept in a world of "groups", which are inside a closed system competing for resources with one another. So if you limit the world to cut off another's perceived freedom, this sends a message to everyone in that world of what they can no longer do, whether or not they will ever choose to do that thing (and many will not, given the choice). And we feel less free.

But if you give that person the choice, and then put consequences in place for those that exercise poor choices, you preserve the perceived freedom of the world. I prefer absolutely free open-worlds (which are in fact programmatically easier to create) and then rely on the civility of the player to prevent most of the problems. For those players that impinge on another player's rights, don't artificiality impose a limit into the world but either allow other world "actors", such as NPCs, players, or pets to counter that individual, or use natural barriers to concentrate or diffuse certain actions, just like the earth does.

This what impressed me with Garriott's first games, he used the guards to enforce rules but a limit wasn't hard-coded in the world. If you attacked someone in town or attacked a guard, you would suffer the consequences, but the game didn't remove the "attack" option from your list of choices. NPCs were mortal and had hit-points--they were not invincible.

In our modern era of personal technology, products and services often give us the feeling of empowerment over other individuals and groups. This is mostly a selfish illusion, as we're all interdependent, inside the same world together. It's easy to create such an illusion if you limit one's context. SoTA, for instance, relies on this to fool us into thinking that the game world is as detailed as our real world. But just like a magician holding an object on stage, we can't investigate or interact with most of the visual objects in the game world to find out how fake they really are. That magician won't let us have it or manipulate it. Our choices are limited.

Our real world has finite resources, in terms of materials, but also in terms of time and space.

Analogy: Go into a shop or store that makes and sells candies or sweets with a small amount of money and look at the variety (sizes, shapes, colors, tastes, textures) from which to choose. Your choices are vast, and you have freedom to choose, but you can't choose ALL of them. And even if you had more money, you still can't consume ALL of them at once, you are human, limited in time and space. You can have ANY, but not ALL.

Now imagine if that store only contained one piece, your favorite candy. You got the same thing in the end, but you lost something more precious, your potential choices, your freewill.

Another analogy: Say you want to play chess with your friend on his wooden chess board and pieces, but your friend refuses to play unless you play in different rooms on a computer system to ensure that you won't cheat, chew his chess pieces, or talk while he is concentrating. You assure him that you won't do that, but he doesn't care and wants to make sure this is impossible. Sure you can still play chess (if you are still friends after that), but he just made your world a lot smaller and less interesting.

Same outcome in the end, but different perceptions of freedom. The hard-limits, the removal of choice, corrupted the journey.

Civility and self-regulation is a wonderful thing and is integral to retaining that freedom. We need to remember how to share. We have to accept some vulnerability in ourselves for the benefit of us all.

 

You can click to cancel all the buffs you don't want in WoW. You also can't stop a heal.

 

So can you in SotA but it doesn't make it less of a pain to do it... nor would it stop someone from casting the buff if he/she insists. Also, good luck dismissing "walker walk" while diving in the water.

In WoW, most of the non-benefits of a buff are based on particular situations and, because of that, most of the annoyances can be avoided. If a Shaman is waiting for you to jump in the water, don't dive. Aggro for tanks is mostly a dungeon-related thing, so kick the Priest off the group or don't PUG. Don't die near a Unholy Death Knight.

In SotA... the only way to avoid it is if you switch to a different game mode (what the OP suggests we do); which prevents you from socializing with others. So you're punishing yourself from trying to avoid jerks.

In the case of "Light" (and I mention Light because it's the one spell that really ticks me off; no idea if the others are like this and I don't want to find out), it severely stunts my character's ability to function. Given that stealth has a cooldown, one person can decide to completely shut me down and all he has to do is follow me around casting buffs over and over again.

aka: it's not the same.

Until there's a refactoring of how buffs are applied and how they affect other characters, I don't want some random dude's buff.

Considering that the game has no instancing for particular groups, limiting buffers/healers to their own specific group increases their participation contribution for their respective groups.

There is a player factor... it REQUIRES a player for it to even function. You are literally taking items from another player.

It requires both you and the victim to be flagged for PvP. It's you against them.

 

This post right here pretty much sums up why this thread exists.
The only thing where restrictions seemed reasonable was PvP, as for the current moment there is nothing protecting those players who are attacked. Not that people don't try other ways to kill people if they aren't flagged.

There is a method of breaking the water with water walk. If I remember right it was to look straight down. Killing the player isn't a guarantee.

But there's this amazing thing about the chat box people seem to forget. Sure some people are pricks by nature, but they will be a prick regardless. Every game I've played no matter what you do that same prick is playing, and he/she/it finds a way. So why penalize everyone else for it?

Switching different game modes is in response to "wanting to play alone" as that is what those game modes were made for. Though it's not what they are used for. But in WoW you can't "switch game modes". If someone corpse camped you, there was little you could do but go make dinner while you waited for them to get bored. In shroud you can switch game modes, move areas, and switch again.

Regarding the buffs, I agree. It's unfortunately that they are now penalizing players for using them, as before the strength/dex/int were beneficial spells. Additionalls the way overwriting buffs works is poorly implimented. But I would eventually like to buff other players, but with the current mechanics there are too many negative effects on them. (And light spell is annoying)

Also lets not forget the most annoying part of the entire part of WoW was some lv 60 camping your lv 15 character for 3 hours (been there done that), NOT someone healing you.

 

How about making the MO mode pvp and the friends only the consent mode. Then you can heal anyone in MO mode!

 

@TheWanderingPoet *thumbs up*

What would be the point of going through the process of consent in "friends" mode? Wouldn't that be redundant?

 

I think you are missing the point

 

If that were implemented they would need a proper crime system, or people would go on unhindered murder sprees.

Currently you are protected by the Oracle. That is part of the world. The Oracle does not protect you from healing however.

Well he does have a point. As there is already a tier above MO called open world pvp. So MO would be consent mode and PvP mode is a tier above that.

The problem here is you are connecting "heal" with "murder". You feel that if someone attempts to be nice to you your genuine reaction is to kill them.

Bear in mind here that the goal is a good game not your game. If you've noticed my replies about PvP I am anti-pvp but I do not want it removed because it is part of the ideal game. It has to be properly done much like the healing mechanic.

However killing another player would be classified as a crime in an open PvP game. Healing another player would not. So you are comparing two things which are vastly different.

 

Well I posted that post with the intent of sarcasm, even though it does have a point. You seem to be willfully ignorant on the concept of consent. This is a consentual game. If i do not consent to you casting a spell, harmful or helpful then you cannot cast on me. This is not debateable. This is why i said make MO pvp then you woyld not need consent. Go to pvp areas and heal and you do not need consent. But if you do not want that then you just cannot heal people that do not want your spell cast on them. This is why i say you should be an advocate of non consentual gaming.