Wondering how common (or not) it is on MUDs out there to find group PvE content? It seems pretty well everywhere I go, there's very little groups taking place., pvp and role play aside.
Does your MUD have frequent PvE groups happening? If so, is there anything you're doing to help facilitate? Obviously having a higher playerbase is going to help a lot in that regard. In an era of soloing, even when we see it in almost all MMOs, how do we get groups rolling again on MUDs?
Cheers,
Gicker
d20MUD Star Wars: Role Play, PvE & PvP using d20 and SAGA rules
www.d20mud.com
d20mud.com port 6000
4th Age Dragonlance Role Play & Adventure
ageofdragons.com
port 4444 or port 4500
Whenever we have the numbers, and those numbers are in grouping range, people tend to do that.
Challenging zones/encounters help encourage, along with each class able to perform a very helpful function in combat that no other class can meet as well helps... we have coded systems like combo techniques that can only be done via grouping that encourages it. Also, doing an uneven exp split helps, too... like.. 2 people don't split exp 50/50, its closer to where each player gets maybe 65% of the total exp... this makes it where it is unquestionably a little bit quicker to gain exp over the course of a given amount of time with multiple people... an even split tends to discourage grouping because it isn't always a given that time vs. effort matches up right.
Would you say then that you've set the challenge level of normal game content to be difficult/slow when soloing, so that when a chance to group arrives, it's a no brainer to team up?
I think your points make sense, though I wonder if the average player today prefers to solo much of the time. We've seen even the most successful MMOs rework some of their content to make things easier on soloers, and I think that many MUDders today are of the same mind.
d20MUD Star Wars: Role Play, PvE & PvP using d20 and SAGA rules
www.d20mud.com
d20mud.com port 6000
4th Age Dragonlance Role Play & Adventure
ageofdragons.com
port 4444 or port 4500
In general we have favored a slower pace, anyhow, but I wouldn't say encouraging grouping is a driving factor behind that.
"At some point" we are going to be implementing an NPC follower system that should hopefully, to a degree, emulate what you might expect from grouping with another player, so that players that prefer solo (or when there's no one else around) have that "group" experience.
